Reader comment: Miller is the guy

Local, National, Politics, Virginia 2 Minutes

From a comment posted elsewhere on this blog:

Sorry for the anonymous post. What I am about to write will make some people upset, and I do not want to have 100 emails in my inbox within the next hour.

I live in Fairfax County, and I will be voting for Harris Miller.I am a Veteran, and I highly respect Jim Webb’s military and civil service. However, how will I know that he will defend our principles in the Democratic Party, how will we trust that he will be there for our delegates and state senators as they push for a majority in 2007 and 2009?

Jim Webb does make an appealing candidate who could do a great job tarnishing George Allen’s reputation in the national media and blogosphere. However, his campaign seems to be a complete wreck, his staff and volunteers have demonstrated a complete lack of temperment, focus, and in some cases maturity. If he were to win on June 13th, how will us rank-and-file Democrats in the DPVA be confident that the Webb campaign will dramatically improve?

Harris Miller, on the other hand, is no perfect candidate. He has flaws. But I see him often and I get to talk with him, and Harris clearly wants the chance to work hard this summer and fall to defeat George Allen. His campaign is this incredibly well-oiled machine, and ready for George Allen’s campaign. At every Webb campaign misstep, the Miller campaign has trounced. Unquestionably, the rumors of wide-spread U.S. Senatorial “endorsements” to Jim Webb should have been a disaster for the Miller campaign. But it was not a disaster because Miller and his staff focused on local and commonwealth support that was clearly dominant, creating the upper hand for themselves because the Webb campaign did not think through the “endorsement” paradigm, thus leaving the local and national media no other choice to coin “National vs. Local” primary race. Brilliant. I have never seen a campaign staff so upset with that perception, and the Webb staff were furious.

Now this, a Washington Post endorsement for a Primary. I had heard through the FCDC grapevine that top Webb staffers and active volunteers have been doing a real good job burning bridges with the media, with a closed-minded storm trooper mentality. Such behavior is dangerous, and makes all of us Virginia Democrats look very bad.

Unfortunately, Jim Webb and his campaign management clearly do not have the political or personal aptitude to be given a special pass on June 13th.

Harris Miller, his campaign manager Andy Resnick, his communications director Taylor West, and the rest of his superb staff do have that aptitude. Even Harris’ wife and daughter, Deborah and Alexis, are outstanding on the campaign trail and have attended events when Harris is at another event. In other words, these people are on top of it! I am continually impressed.

I was going to make phone calls on behalf of Jim Webb, but I will not. Washington Post is right, and there is a clear choice. I suppose I was sucked in by the opportunity for someone famous to lead the charge. But Jim has not really led, he just stood by thinking that the “grassroots” will do the work for him. That was frustrating, and I know I would be very angry by August if I continued to support him.

My vote, my contribution, and my volunteer time will now go to Harris Miller for U.S. Senate. I hope others will do the same. Seeing (up-close and personal) both candidates and staffs working, this has become a very comfortable decision to make

This is pretty heady stuff. Your thoughts?

Published

14 thoughts on “Reader comment: Miller is the guy”

  2. Best summary of the difference I have ever seen.

    Virginia Centrist, if at this late date a campaign needs fixing, that is a sign there is something wrong with the candidate. I have said it before and will say it again, Webb does not know what a campaign looks like and is not interested in learning.

  3. Alice –

    There are presidential campaigns that went through shakeups in September and succeeded…it’s never too late. In politics, a few months is a long time.

    Whatever the Webb campaign’s flaws…they still have a couple thousand rabid supporters who are willing to do work on the ground…

  4. I must chime in.

    POLITICAL APTITUDE is the issue, and anonymous has it right.

    I too was all for Webb, but I have had to rethink things. I’m from Arlington where there seems to be lots of Webb supporters and, naturally, I joined in the fun. But I’ve been involved with congressional and senatorial campaigns in New York and Illinois, and I hate to say this…but we’ve been mislead a little too much with the Webb staffers, and it has become obvious that they lost control of the “national” vs. “local” endorsement issue. I am still puzzled as to why they think that a Kerry endorsement is such a big deal? Kerry lost, right? I respect Kerry, but CLOUT has everything to do with an effective endorsement. I’ll take Wapost’s endorsement over an out-of-state Senator any day. It’s like the campaign just cannot figure out this basic rule in local retail politics.

    I reaaly glad I stopped helping out the Webb campaign in late April, and I regret sending them a donation because it seemed clear that the campaign manager and the senior “advisors” were not handling the punches too well. Seeing that Webb approved cartoon on NLS further confirms that the campaign leadership is not handling their money or resources very well.

    I guess what I’m trying to say is that I keep waiting for the Webb campaign to fall into place. But a friend who volunteers on the campaign has said that they will tie up all the loose ends AFTER the primary! Again, I’ve seen other campaigns over the last 15 years, and the current Webb campaign posture is a first for me.

    I still have some hope that things will fall into place, and I can assure you that no matter who wins, I will support the nominee. The real question for me is whether or not I want to work hard for a campaign that has got their act together (Miller’s) or just watch from the sidelines to avoid being frustrated over a sloppy campaign (Webb).

  5. Being in Hampton Roads, I am far removed from the inner workings of the campaigns. From the outside, it certainly does appear that Miller's campaign is much better organized than Webb's. At the minimum, Miller's campaign communicates far better than Webb's does.

    I go back to a question I asked a long time ago – do endorsements matter? It seems that the Webb campaign is hung up on getting endorsements while the Miller campaign is getting votes. Let's be real – Kerry can't vote on June 13.

    If Webb manages to win the primary, he's got a LOT of work to do for the general election.

  6. The writer is taking aim at the Webb campaign's strengths. The author gets points for style but misses the target. Webb's got a lot of enthusiastic folks. A clever Webb writer would make the same arguments if Miller had the blogoshpere and the activists wrapped up.

    The "bad campaigning"? That's kind of misleading : Jim's won every straw poll and has much better favorability ratings and is doing better at parades and fairs than Harris.

    Miller might seem better focused but his base in Dulles and South East Virginia, Webb is running statewide. The intensity and organizaton might be less visible in some areas but it's a very strong campaign.

    As far as unloading on Jim's supporters … well, I don't know. I think a lot of that of that perception is based on the blogosphere and googling for "Harris Miller H1B Diebold Agriculture". Yes, Harris gets hit pretty hard on the internet. Everybody knows that the web can get a little "over the top" and with lots of people talking you get a high noise ratio. I think people get used to whatever site their visiting and do their own filtering. Yes, even the "offended" members of the press know how read around some the heated rhetoric.

    Playing down the Senate endorsements? It's a testament to Jim's diplomatic skills that he was able to secure the Democratic leaderships support. We want to win back the Senate. They know that Miller's Miller's legislative track record is ballot box bad news. On the other hand, they like Jim's ability to bring the old school Harry Truman Democratic coalition back together: black and white southerners, labor, jews, catholics and egg heads. I know Jim trys to downplay it in SW Virginia but he's best selling author and has an Emmy Award. Jim's a pretty strong product; selling it when the Democratic Party finally comes through the big money support after the primary is going keep the Miller Webb campaign on the national stage.

    If I were a tad more cynical, I'd say it might be a clever "anonymous" meme planted by our friends at the Miller campaign. [ducks] I know , I know : those wacky over the top InterWebb dudes.

  7. “Webb campaign on the national stage”. Sorry, I thought i re-read it right before hitting submit. mea culpa. you need a preview button, vivian.

  11. You know who’s getting visibility with signs where I live- WEBB. Miller will not get my help. I do not like wasting my time on candidates that claim to be something they clearly are not. I don’t like people who lie to cover up their unsavory past. I will spend no time on a candidate I do not agree with on most major issues.
    I will work hard for candidates I believe in, & who I think have any chance of winning. Kerry was that candidate, and Socas, and Kaine, Creigh Deeds, and now Feder & Webb. Miller is not included, not by a long shot, although I hear he is a nice guy (except when he isn’t).

  12. Harris Miller, his campaign manager Andy Resnick, his communications director Taylor West, and the rest of his superb staff do have that aptitude. Even Harris’ wife and daughter, Deborah and Alexis, are outstanding on the campaign trail and have attended events when Harris is at another event. In other words, these people are on top of it! I am continually impressed.

    Good Stuff, Miller astroturfers! You give up the troll in that paragraph, though. You need to take a little sugar out of the recipe.

  13. thegools – I have to tell you: I haven’t seen a single Webb sign down here. Not one. But – signs don’t vote, people do.

  14. Clearly Miller is the slicker and better organized candidate and that counts for something. However, I still think that becoming a lobbyist, and lobbying for outsourcing at that, before running for office is a curious career strategy for one who wants to be a candidate.

    Usually a politically savvy person runs for office, wins, and becomes a lobbyist after a successful career in office. There’s a reason for that.

    Fairly or not, lobbyists are not perceived by the general public as trustworthy, or even as a person who would have the interest of the average voter at heart. Unfortunately, in an age of great cynicism about the government, being considered “a consumate inside” as Miller has been labeled – even by the WaPo, which likes him – is not a campaign positive.

    On the other hand, to knowledgeable readers, the WaPo endorsement will help Miller only among those who support free trade, globalization, guest worker programs, outsourcing, and special interest lobbying for corporations at its best. The Post is militantly anti-union and has never met a free trade deal it didn’t like. The Post collectively scratches its head and doesn’t get it that ordinary people are worried about the economy. All they see is a high GDP, high productivity, and high corporate profits. They keep insisting that wages will eventually catch up. The bounty that corporations are enjoying, they tell us, will eventually trickle down to the worker.

    Trickle down economics didn’t work for Reagan, Bush I and it won’t work now. And the WaPo saying it will won’t alter reality. And so their endorsement of Miller will be effective only among those who share their anti-labor, pro NAFTA, pro outsourcing biases.

    Either candidate will have to work hard to beat Allen. But I think Miller has harder baggage to overcome and a slick campaign alone won’t do it in the general election. It’s hard enough to get voters to trust a politician. But a lobbyist turned politician?

    Like I said, it’s an interesting career path. I don’t think it’s ever worked before. Maybe it shouldn’t be that way. But it hasn’t.

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