Don't Get Cocky

In Body Heat, Teddy the arsonist, sage of murder, explained: "Any time you try a decent crime, you got fifty ways you can fuck up. If you can think of twenty-five of them, you're a genius, and you ain't no genius." (Line at 1:50.)

There are a lot of ways to blow an election and the GOP is pretty good at all of them.

The Other McCain writes:

When you start taking the House races district-by-district, looking at individual candidates, historic voting trends in their districts, their campaign funding, their current level of organization, etc. . . . Honestly, it’s scary out there.

...

Worse than the money situation, perhaps, is the lack of precinct-level organization by Republicans. This was a basic problem in the PA-12 special election. With the help of the NRCC, the Tim Burns campaign was able to roughly match the Democrats in terms of money, but the local GOP didn’t have the kind of organizational infrastructure in terms of county and ward committees necessary to mobilize volunteers for door-to-door canvassing operations.

Phone-banking is important, but even the best phone bank is no substitute for a genuine door-to-door campaign, especially when such canvassing is done by local volunteers contacting their friends and neighbors in their own communities. And, as in PA-12, a basic reason Democrats control these districts is because the local GOP is controlled by weak-minded time-servers who have failed to organize effectively.

There's more at the link, including some races which would be winnable... except the Republican challenger has no money, almost no money at all. Even a rock-star, Allen West, who can tap the national base for funds, still trails his Democratic opponent by almost a half-million dollars.

And Melissa Bean, that arrogant liberal twit (did I misspell that?) who had a goon shut people up at her library "town hall"? She's in a district Bush carried by 55% in 2004 -- thus, a very winnable district -- but simply refuses to debate her opponent Joe Walsh.

Yeah, I wouldn't debate that guy either. His strong-but-warm eyes project laser-beams of integrity and honesty and American grit... right into my pants. Well, into the pants of the general public, I mean. I mean, into people's hearts.

Maybe this metaphor went bad a while ago.

Anyway.

I don't know, exactly, what can be done about this situation. I'd sure like to know.

Money is one thing -- an important thing -- and I'm sure the Online Republican Caucus (ORC) will wind up contributing.

But what about the organizational thing?

In 2008, someone (no, really, "someone") was part of bussed-in operations to key states, so I guess we can do that, but...

I think maybe it's just critical that everyone contact their local Republican offices to find out what can be done about walking the blocks, knocking on doors, and offering rides on election day. Contact them, and contact a bunch of like-minded friends and family members. Because ten weeks is not a lot of time for all the back-and-forth on the phone and meet-and-greets and organization that needs to happen by election day.

Apparently we have a lot of clock-watchers and goldbrickers in these posts. Maybe we need to displace them, or at least surround them with so much drive and competence they can't screw it up for us even if they want to. Surround an incompetent with five competent men and women and the incompetent will fail in his impulse to fail.

It also sounds like some of these candidates are so underfunded and underorganized that you can kind of... like, just walk into their offices and say hi. It doesn't appear that you'll be blocked by a New Praetorian at the door.

And don't give up just because you're in a "safe" Democratic district. There are very few safe Democratic districts this year -- Barney Frank could lose. Scott Brown beat Martha Coakley in his district.

Further, not voting, and not getting out the maximum vote possible among conservatives in such districts, also loses out on all those important state legislature slots, those judgeships, those crucial Board of Elections postings, the AG, the Secretary of State...

We want these positions in friendly hands. We know damn well what Democrats do when they control the machinery of vote tabulation.

By the way, someone and the other morons who bused over to Pennsylvania (I think) to do this reported that it was very satisfying and very fun, meeting like-minded people and working towards one shared goal. So, from their reports, this wasn't exactly hazard duty.

We really need overkill on this. We are way behind. We are in position to score. If we don't score, or if we come away with a field goal, we will have blown the opportunity of a generation. And we'll lose, forever.

On the flip-side: confidence and enthusiasm are good, too.

posted by Ace at 12:20 PM

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