What to Know About Wisconsin’s Voter ID Bill

Summary: Important information for voters and political operatives when Voter ID becomes law.

The Wisconsin State Legislature will soon be passing a Voter ID bill, and it will be quickly signed into law by Governor Walker. Just as the recent move to eliminate collective bargaining was meant to reshape the electoral landscape, so is Voter ID.

The right-wing in Wisconsin says that voter fraud is an ongoing epidemic -- particularly in Milwaukee -- that has allowed Democrats to “steal” elections. The way they see it, there’s no way they could actually lose elections -- people love them! There must be a scam going on.

The truth is that voter fraud is incredibly rare and virtually impossible to get away with. This bill is clearly designed to disenfranchise voters who tend to support Democrats.

But all that aside, here’s what you need to know.

For Voters

For the April 5th election, poll workers will be required to ask for identification. However, you DO NOT need to give it to them if you’re already registered. The bill’s provisions are not enforceable until 2012. Republicans stuck that part in to scare younger and poorer voters (aka, Democrats) from voting this year.

In 2012 you will need one of the following pieces of identification (with up-to-date residency information) to vote:
-- A drivers license
-- A state ID
-- A passport
-- Naturalization papers
-- A military ID
-- A Native American tribal ID

Student IDs will no longer be acceptable. Right now student IDs can be used, with poll workers cross referencing the ID with a list of students living on campus provided by their college. But college students vote more for Democrats than Republicans, so they will now need their driver’s license (or another state-issued ID) to include their campus address to vote there.

Similarly, disabled veteran cards will not be accepted. Disabled veterans tend to vote for candidates who support things like BadgerCare, so they will need another form of identification.

It should be mentioned that if you don’t have your ID the day of the election, you can still cast a provisional ballot, but you must show an election clerk your ID by 4pm on the Friday after the election.

Additional things you must do to vote:
-- Register early (same-day registration is going away, because it helps busy working people and college students vote)

-- Live at your residence 28 days before the election (the current 10-day requirement helps the mobile population cast their ballots, and studies show these voters tend to be younger and more progressive)

-- Sign your name in the voter log when you go to the polls


For Political Operatives

Democratic consultants and campaign staffers will need to start to focus on getting their supporters to climb the new barriers to voting.

Here are three things we will need to start doing:

1) Registering Voters Early. Operatives for our side already do it in most states; we just need to start to do it here too. Hiring organizers, sending voter registration applications in mailers and other efforts will be required. This will be especially important on college campuses and in the inner-city.

2) Better Voter Education. Because Wisconsin has a history of relaxed voting laws, Democrats have never seen a strong need for educating voters on what they need to do to vote. That’s going to have to change. We will need to communicate the law in a clear and effective manner to re-enfranchise our voters.

3) Fight for Repeal. The law is going to pass, and it’s going to pass soon. The Republicans in Madison work in lock-step and can pass anything they want. Looking forward, however, we must support candidates who promise to roll-back this attack on voting rights. Climbing barriers to voting will distract us from focusing on other important campaign operations -- we must break the barriers.

The Healthcare-Deficit Connection

Summary: Explaining the real impact of healthcare reform on our deficits to the American voter.

Hale “Bonddad” Stewart had a good post at FiveThirtyEight.com over the weekend exploring the details of the federal budget. It clearly spelled out one factor of government spending that many of us have known about for a long time: the connection between our country’s rapidly inflating healthcare costs and the growing national debt.

As he maps out, mandatory spending (on programs like Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and Veterans Affairs services) has been steadily increasing over the past forty years while discretionary spending (for things such as national defense, agriculture subsidies, and a wide variety of other government programs) has been steadily decreasing in that time.

I should note that I would generally consider interest on the national debt as mandatory spending, but Stewart does not.


Now, among the mandatory spending programs - which are not covered by PAYGO rules in the House or Senate the same way that discretionary spending is - Social Security expenditures have actually gone down a bit since 1970, while Medicare and Medicaid expenditures are (for the most part) rising fast.


Now Republicans like to trash healthcare reform as something that will increase our debt. In fact, it is quite clear that without healthcare reform, our debt will continue to rise. In fact, it would not be wrong to assume that a balanced budget is impossible without controlling healthcare costs.

Democrats can do themselves a world of good by driving this point home. It needs to be a message that is consistent and constant in order for voters to believe it. If they do, we can kill two birds with one stone: justifying our support for healthcare reform, and letting voters know we are the party of fiscal responsibility.

That’s not to say it will be easy, especially in the age of sound-bite attention spans. The typical voter will struggle to understand the connection between these two issues - after all, there will be new government spending associated with healthcare reform, and the GOP has done a pretty good job characterizing government as incapable of saving money.

Perhaps we can start where Activate left us off last week with the Three Degrees of Separation.

Explaining the connection between healthcare reform and deficit reduction to volunteers shouldn’t be too difficult. Political activists are well engaged and equipped with the ability to see the relationship.

If they explain to fellow voters in their sphere of influence the benefits of healthcare reform on the federal budget, a basic level of understanding will trickle down. From there, they can talk to voters in their spheres of influence about this connection. This second degree of separation probably won’t understand the argument, but at least they’ll know of it.

Assuming your campaign has a volunteer base of at least 1,000 supporters (it will obviously depend on the size of your district) the message could theoretically reach as many as one million voters.

Tell me that wouldn’t help in 2010!

(By the way, the guys at Activate have a great new post up today about healthcare reform on their blog, The New Paradigm in Politics)

How Democrats Can Claim Fiscal Responsibility for Themselves

Summary: Democrats have an opportunity to turn a core Republican message back on them.

Over the past year or so, Republicans in Washington have been quick to criticize the spending coming out of Congress with the blessing of the Obama Administration.

Knowing full well that most Americans are adverse to deficits (which are now higher than ever before) the GOP is calling Democrats “out of touch” with the average American.

It’s had an impact – Republican Scott Brown won his Senate race in the liberal Mecca of Massachusetts in part by criticizing Washington’s spending habits. Defeats like this, in turn, have made Democrats dispirited.

In many places, it’s already primary season for 2010. So if you’re a Democratic candidate, and you need to motivate the base, what do you say?

For starters, the Republican National Committee has demonstrated itself to be anything but fiscally responsible lately.

Last year, the RNC managed to burn through a whopping $95 million despite the fact that they were only supporting about four competitive races. They ended 2009 with just under $9 million cash-on-hand. These spending habits have caused their donors some concern – especially because of how much better the DNC has been doing – and RNC operatives have been frantically trying to reassure their contributers.

Knowing that they were having money troubles, where did the RNC decide to have its Winter strategy meeting? A beachside resort in Hawaii, with the best food, entertainment, and recreation that money can buy. Literally.

From a segment on last night’s episode of the Daily Show:

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
RNC Meeting in Hawaii
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Crisis

With weeks – and in most cases months – before the primaries, it’s not really worth anyone’s time to make this point a panicle one for your campaign message.

But as Democratic candidates are locating activists and donors, this message is a great way to engage them. An email blast to supporters criticizing the Republicans for trying to make fiscal responsibility their issue – when they’ve proven to be so fiscally irresponsible – is a great way to bring in some small contributions right now.

This is a good message for this part of the campaign because it gives the base a reason to fight.

Why a Strong Volunteer Base is Critical in 2010

Another Democratic consulting firm has started blogging! This time it’s Activate, a direct voter contact firm in Washington, DC.

Recently, Founder and CEO Mark Sump wrote about the importance of volunteer outreach and direct voter contact.

From The New Paradigm in Poltics:

The media is of course singularly focused on recent Democratic Party failures in Virginia, New Jersey and, of course, Massachusetts. They were colossal failures, and each of them was a reflection of the old paradigm in political campaigns. It is no longer true that the successful campaign is the one that has the most and best television advertisements. It is no longer true that campaigns can be won without engaging the public.

Coakley is the definition of this old paradigm. The fact that she was up by 30 points after her primary is not the relevant issue. The fact that she did not see the need to run a campaign after the primary is relevant. The fact that she did not see the need to engage the public and rally her supporters is relevant. Relying on a blitz of paid media at the end of the campaign no longer wins campaigns for Democrats even in the most liberal of states. Coakley is proof of that.

The new paradigm in winning elections is that public opinion is important, but paid media no longer carries the sway to change public opinion it once did. The new paradigm is that you have to earn public opinion through direct interaction with the public.

While the media is focused on in a few high profile campaigns, there is a quiet undercurrent that has so far gone unnoticed. The latest is Oregon, but just last month, the city of Houston…not known for its liberalism…elected Annise Parker the first big city mayor who happens to be a lesbian. A month before that, the state of Washington rejected proposition 71 ensuring the most sweeping gay rights legislation ever up for a public vote in the nation’s history.

Each of these campaigns had two things in common. Each of them embraced this paradigm shift toward engaging an army of volunteers, and each of them won.

We’ve mentioned the importance of volunteers and voter contact many times before, but this should provide more evidence towards their importance in 2010.

What Was Learned in Massachusetts?

Summary: Fellow political consultants provide critical, but reassuring insight following the Senatorial special election in the Bay State.

Recently, our colleagues at Zata3 - a Democratic consulting firm in Washington, DC - sent us an email titled “Sorting Through the Wreckage Massachusetts.”

The email contained some important lessons from last week’s special election that we thought would be good to share with you today.

From the email:

We’ve talked to several of our friends who were involved in the MA Senate race (we did not work there). We’ve read dozens of news articles, blog exchanges and statistical analyses and listened to more than our share of the talking heads from both sides of the aisle. Here’s our one minute summary of the lessons to be learned.

• Don’t let the other side define you. Coakley was not on the airwaves until after the IE’s had defined her as the establishment candidate.

• Take the pulse of voters frequently, especially in these volatile times. GOP polls had Brown within 3 points of definite voters a month out. By January 9, he was ahead and by all accounts, it was too late to reverse the momentum.

• Expect a pragmatic, nimble, aggressive Hard Right. Brown was not the Tea Party’s ideal candidate but when they smelled opportunity, the zealots poured it on.

• Get your field program in order. Accounts vary about the shape of the MA voter file going into the special election, but all agree that Democrat turnout was anemic in key areas.

• In special elections, retail politics matter. The online Far Right was increasingly energized by Brown’s public appearances during the week around Christmas when Coakley made no public appearances.

• Don’t expect help from the White House. The President is personally popular, but the Bush hangover (two wars, Wall Street excesses, deficit, etc.) and Obama’s own ambitious agenda negate any positive coattails.

The good news is, nearly all of these lessons are from the Politics 101 text book. A solid, hardworking candidate and a capable campaign team who execute the fundamentals will win.

Soon we plan to bring you an analysis from a Democrat on the ground during the Massachusetts race, to learn further lessons as we look forward to the November midterms.

Some New Ideas on Social Networking in Politics (Part 2)

Summary: Pondering the implications for campaigns if social networking replaces email.

Vertical Response, a blast-email company used by many political campaigns, sent an email to clients recently about a new debate in the communications world: will social networking replace email altogether?

It all started when Jessica Vascellaro wrote a piece in the Wall Street Journal about why email will soon be a less significant form of communication than Facebook, Twitter, and upcoming Google products.

The argument was simple: social networking services are faster, constantly streaming, and more fun than email.

From the article:

Little wonder that while email continues to grow, other types of communication services are growing far faster. In August 2009, 276.9 million people used email across the U.S., several European countries, Australia and Brazil, according to Nielsen Co., up 21% from 229.2 million in August 2008. But the number of users on social-networking and other community sites jumped 31% to 301.5 million people.

"The whole idea of this email service isn't really quite as significant anymore when you can have many, many different types of messages and files and when you have this all on the same type of networks," says Alex Bochannek, curator at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, Calif.

Nielsen Co., however, took issue with this argument, and put it to the test.

From a post on their company blog:

We decided to churn some quick data to test our hypothesis that “Consumption of social media decreases email use.” First, we broke the online population into four groups. The first three are terciles of social media consumption in minutes. The fourth is a group that doesn’t use social media at all. We then looked at each segment’s time of web based email consumption over the course of a year. Finally, we subtracted the email consumption of those that do not use social media from those that do, basically to show a lift over possible external forces. Clearly, there are more robust approaches that could be taken (controlling for factors other than consumption for example) but for the sake of this simple experiment, we tried to keep it straightforward.

Then they graphed the results:


So if social media is supposed to be replacing email as the dominant form of communication, then why are the individuals who use social networking services the most also increasing their email consumption at a faster rate than non-social networkers?

Then Chris Crum at WebProNews.com gave his Ten Reasons Social Media isn’t Replacing Email. Vertical Response CEO Janine Popick read those arguments and added ten more. Some of the twenty reasons were good, some were not so convincing.

Among the good ones:

2. Nearly all sites on the web that require registration require an email address.

9. More social media use means more email use.

13. You can't easily segment your friends and followers to do targeted marketing in Twitter & Facebook for the optimal response.

19. You are limited to 140 characters in Twitter leaving it impossible to put multiple messages in one Tweet.

20. You almost have to have separate social media accounts for your business and your personal life. Some customers might not care about that vacation you took where you...let's just say what happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.

One problem with several of Popick’s ten reasons was that she was focusing on the company that is trying to send emails to clients or potential clients - not the clients themselves. For example, she notes that with social media the sender cannot track the message as easily, seeing who all clicked on what, etc.

For the sake of argument, let’s say that people actually will gradually move from email to Facebook or Twitter. Will they have second thoughts about doing it because then they won’t be able to help companies sending emails to them as easily anymore? Will they take into account the implications of tracking and response optimization on the part of those sending messages to them?

Of course not, those companies would have to adapt.


The same is true in politics. If social networking does end up replacing email as the primary form of communication, campaigns will simply have to start using these tools more aggressively and innovatively.

For example, let’s say your campaign has added a cool new page to its website and you want to let your supporters know. Additionally, you want to know just how many of them actually go to that page. Traditionally you would send out an email hyping it and including a link. With services from firms like Vertical Response, you can see how many supporters open the email and how many click the link.

You can still see how many hits that page is getting from your message on a social networking site so long as you use bit.ly.

But Popnick’s point about how much you can say when using social media is true - you cannot build the same message. This is troubling for prospects of campaign fundraising: currently Facebook and Twitter are not good tools for fundraising because you cannot explain to supporters just how critical it is that they make a contribution.

Luckily everyone recognizes the relevance of emails to this effect - no matter who you are you will keep an email account because occasionally you have a lot to tell someone.

It seems that - to this extent - social networking is not threatening to email. In fact, the Nielsen Co. study suggests that they are actually complimentary.

Sure, some campaigning and business will start being done more with social networking. At HSG, we typically become Facebook friends and Twitter followers with our clients and business associates. It’s quite possible that in the future we’ll be communicating with them about their races more and more using these services.

Some politicians are already beginning to communicate messages to supporters that would traditionally be done with email via social networking. For example, status updates are a great way to let constituents know what recent action just took place on Capitol Hill. But for more in-depth messages, emails will likely always be king.

It is critical that campaigns, politicians, and businesses utilize all forms of New Media appropriately.

Editorial: Why I’d Put My Money on “TPaw”

Summary: Dave at WAYLA explains why he thinks Governor Tim Pawlenty (R-MN) will be the man to face President Obama in 2012.

If you ask the average American if they think Tim Pawlenty will run for president in 2012, chances are they’ll ask you “who’s Tim Pawlenty?” So my guess is most Americans wouldn’t think he could be the Republican nominee in three years. How’s he going to win if no one’s ever heard of him?

Ask any political junkie or insider, however, if they think Pawlenty plans on running and they’ll probably answer “uh, he already is.”

That’s why I was surprised when only a handful of the people surveyed for our “Who Are You Looking at for 2012” poll - which was composed of mostly political junkies and insiders - said they expect Pawlenty to win the GOP nomination.


So why do I think he’ll pull off the nomination?

Simply put, he’s doing everything right. From his 2010 efforts and the team he’s assembling to the media presence he’s been getting and the speeches he’s been able to deliver, Pawlenty is on-track for the 2012 GOP nomination with a winning strategy.


Focusing on 2010

He recently launched his new political action committee - Freedom First PAC - which will give money to Republican candidates for 2010, and he was all too happy to take up the Vice Chairmanship of the Republican Governors Association when Gov. Haley Barbour (R-MS) moved up to replace Gov. Mark Sanford (R-SC) following the revelations of his extramarital affair.

He says he focused on getting a few wins with those two ventures in 2010 since he’s not running for re-election in the Land of 10,000 Lakes. Is it a selfless act of dedication to his party? Not when you consider the donor lists and activist networks he’s going to get out of it for a 2012 run.


The Team He’s Assembling

Pawlenty is also quietly piecing together a team of strategists that will do wonders for him in the Republican primaries.

From an article in Politico:

[Pawlenty] will announce Thursday the support of a group of high-level political strategists and donors, complemented by a handful of top new media consultants, POLITICO has learned.

Pawlenty, under the radar of D.C.’s political community, has locked up some of the key operatives who engineered then-President George W. Bush reelection campaign — a significant feat for a little-known Midwestern politician.

…Pawlenty, who previously has had little political infrastructure, is now being advised by a trio of GOP consultants with presidential experience: Terry Nelson, Sara Taylor and Phil Musser.

And in formally opening his political action committee, Freedom First, Thursday, Pawlenty will also announce two co-chairmen, William Strong, a Morgan Stanley vice chairman, and former Rep. Vin Weber (R-Minn.), both of whom are heavyweight GOP figures, along with a list of prominent Minnesota donors.

In addition to a high-dollar gala launch for the PAC in Minneapolis in November, Pawlenty is planning a Washington fundraiser for late October designed to acquaint the governor with the Beltway’s most influential Republicans. Helping to coordinate the governor’s GOP outreach in the nation’s capital is Sam Geduldig, a well-connected lobbyist and former senior aide to Reps.

Serving as the PAC’s counsel is Michael Toner, a veteran campaign lawyer in Washington. Alex Conant, a native Minnesotan and former Republican National Committee spokesman, will serve as communications director.

The governor has also inked political technology consultants Patrick Ruffini, Mindy Finn, Patrick Hynes and Liz Mair to develop what Pawlenty advisers hope will be the most sophisticated new-media presence of any Republican in the nation.

Sure, the average American might not know who Tim Pawlenty is yet, but that’s exactly why he’s putting a team like this together to raise money and create a greater national presence. He’s making sure that Republicans all across America know who he is come the Iowa Caucus in 2012.

And they’re not kidding about that New Media presence strategy. Just take a look at the slick new Freedom First PAC’s website (the domain of which is - “coincidently” - TimPawlenty.com) and you’ll see all sorts of New Media tools available for supporters. It even identifies him as “TPaw”, the shorthand name given to him by the blogosphere! They also ask supporters to “RT #tpaw” on Twitter.


But it doesn’t stop there. He’s also - evidently - calling Mitt Romney operatives who are mid-level on the former candidate’s hierarchy, seeing if they’ll come over to his side should the two face up in 2012 (which they probably will) and Romney hangs on to his top-level workers.


Bulking Up the Media Presence

TPaw knows that being well known in the political community is not enough. That’s why he’s getting more stories about him in the blogosphere (and, yes, he’s doing it rather successfully) and appearing more often on cable news.

Just search “Pawlenty” on YouTube and you’ll find a good number of videos of him on cable news - especially Fox News, the network of the conservative base he needs to appeal to - such as this one:




Speaking Across the Country

A well-known tactic for building a national base of support going into an election year is doing the “speaking tour” - speaking at as many conservative or Republican events as possible (if you’re seeking the GOP nomination, of course) to build up a network of smaller donors and volunteers.

Before the recent Family Research Council’s Value Voters Summit, for example, he held a conference call with a team of advisers, including pollster Tony Fabrizio and longtime conservative strategist Greg Mueller, to help shape his speech and general approach at an event where he got rave reviews and finished a surprising third in the straw poll.

So far, Pawlenty appears to be outdoing the other Republicans on the tour, making something along the lines of 50 to 100 speeches throughout the country this year.

Sarah Palin, the darling of the GOP base - conversely - is having trouble getting booked for such speeches according to a recent article in the New York Post. Romney - the other prominent Republican name being thrown out there for 2012 - has actually been a victim of how TPaw “has used public appearances and op-eds to criticize the health care plan Romney put in place in Massachusetts.”


Speaking of his Opponents…

Pawlenty’s primary opponents will have their own difficulties. Romney’s record in Massachusetts will continue to hurt his image with the conservative base - especially on the issue of healthcare. Palin, while still popular among the Republican hard-liners, is nonetheless becoming viewed as “unelectable” within her own party.

Others are facing their own problems. Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA) for example seems to have lost a bit of popularity at home this year because of his presidential ambitions, something we said was sure to hurt him if he ran nationally. As a relatively moderate politician (and yes, he’s simply playing to the base right now) Pawlenty is still fairly popular in Minnesota (albeit, Minnesotans apparently aren’t crazy about his national ambitions either).

Other possible candidates mentioned in our June survey included former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA), former HHS Sec. Tommy Thompson (R-WI), House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) and even Gen. David Patraeus. But none of these potential candidates have shown much indication that they’re running.

Now, of course, I may be wrong. Politics is a difficult spectator sport because you simply never know what’s coming next. But barring anything unexpected (like Pawlenty having an affair or killing someone) at this point I just can’t imagine anyone else securing that nomination.

Politico reports that there is an emerging belief among many established Republicans that TPaw is becoming the only viable option left for the GOP’s 2012 White House prospects. Not only do I agree with that sentiment (if I take the Republican perspective) but I think he’s becoming the candidate with the best chance of winning the Republican primaries and taking on President Obama in the first place.

What Should Politicians Be Looking At…on TV?

Summary: A new campaign strategy? Using television to connect politicians to their voters.

There’s a fascinating article on Politco’s new page, Click, discussing what television programs members of Congress watch.

For example, members interviewed reported enjoying shows such as USA’s “Monk”, NBC’s “The Office”, and re-runs of “Seinfeld” among others.


But what was more interesting is the idea of what they should be watching. From the article:

"TV and pop culture provide a quick and easy way to stay in touch with what is happening in America and what is being discussed around the coffee maker and the water cooler," says Pete Snyder, president of New Media Strategies. "When your job is decided every two years by the whims of the electorate, you had better damn well know what they’re all about."

In addition, explaining the often-arcane nuances of policy and legislation to constituents is a key part of a Congressman's job description. Using pop culture to do so can not only help a lawmaker communicate more effectively, it can enhance their profile with the media.

How’s that? Synder gives the example of a good line for trying to explain how complex legislation gets through the committee process could: "I don’t know. It’s more of a mystery than the last episode of 'Lost.'"

"Instant quotability," Synder says. "Your media requests will soar."

Democratic strategist Michael Meehan agrees. He says it's imperative that congressmen watch shows that their constituents are watching. "It's vital for long term survival of their congressional careers for members to stay connected with their constituents," he says. "Pop culture is one of those ways."

Like everything else when developing a political message, targeting is a critical aspect of this strategy. That’s why members of Congress - or at least their staff - should check the ratings of television programs in their districts.

"There are regional and local differences in programming and advertising, so it's important to know and keep that local connection back home. That helps with both politics and policy," [former democratic strategist Jeff Eller] says. "Members would be well served to study the local ratings like they study polls."

At the same time, Snyder says all politicians should familiarize themselves with TVs "eight hundred pound gorillas," such as "American Idol" and "Dancing with the Stars."

"Any politician worth their salt should know the two finalists on 'Idol' by name – kind of like a pop culture 'price of milk' question on the campaign trail," Snyder says. "Nail it, and you are someone people can relate to. Blow it, and you’re hopelessly out of touch."

He also recommends a full plate of political and media satire, such as the "Daily Show," "Late Night with Conan O’Brien" and "The Colbert Report."

"You can see how everything you’re working on is playing out there and what potential ambushes to avoid," Snyder says. "If you don’t feel you have the time, make your press secretary show you clips and keep you informed."

Not only is this a great article about message strategies, it also reinforces the idea that in order to represent one’s constituents, a member of Congress (or any politician) really needs to live like their constituents. Television can serve as a great tool for appearing to be outside what some consider the isolated culture of Washington.

Did New Media Make a Difference in the NYC Primary Elections?

Summary: Keeping voters engaged and predicting election outcomes – What we learned from Twitter in the New York City Elections.

Democratic strategist Joe Trippi picked up a surprising piece of news on his blog recently: it seems that the use of Twitter and Facebook by Democratic candidates in New York City could have helped one predict the outcome of Tuesday’s primaries there.


Nancy Scola of TechPresident.com wrote in a blog post yesterday that the winners of the races for Public Advocate, Manhattan District Attorney and City Comptroller might have done as well as they did thanks to the online support they built with social networking websites.

From the post:

In the New York City Public Advocate race, city councilmember Bill DiBlasio scored something of a surprise win, 33% to 31%, over former two-term Public Advocate Mark Green. (It's only a temporary "win." Since neither candidate broke the 40% mark, under city law the race goes into a run off.) While Green's name recognition is strong in the city, given his past service to the city in the same position he was gunning for, this time around his campaign never seemed to build up steam -- which is borne out by the social media numbers at play. DiBlasio collected 3,265 followers, combining his Twitter and Facebook numbers, to Green's far fewer 445…

…The Manhattan District Attorney race had been contentious, dramatic, and up for grabs. It looked for a time like Judge Leslie Crocker Snyder might emerge victorious over Cyrus Vance, despite the fact that Vance was the heir apparent to the influential sitting DA Robert Morgenthau. But Vance fairly trounced Snyder last night, 44% to 30%. A somewhat unforeseen story, but one nonetheless foretold by their respective Facebook and Twitter tallies. Vance had 1,582 admirers and followers to Snyder's 881. Attorney Richard Aborn came in third in both votes and online allies, with 26% of the vote and 720 followers and fans.

And in the Comptroller race, Queens councilmember John Liu pulled out 38% of the vote over Brooklyn councilmember David Yassky's 31%. (A result that, again, calls for a run-off at the to take place at the end of the month.) Surprising? Perhaps. But not if you're keeping tabs on how popular Liu and Yassky were doing online. Liu's Twitter-plus-Facebook tally amounted to 1,159 followers and fans, while Yassky pulled in with somewhat fewer, at 364 admirers and followers.

Of course, Scola was also right to point out that not all of the candidates had a vote total that corresponded with their social networking support.

In the Comptroller's race, David Weprin managed to amass almost as many followers as the top two candidates in the race (1,858 to Liu and Yassky's combined 2,073). But he won a much smaller share of the vote, with just 11%. And in the Public Advocate contest, Queens councilmember Eric Goia racked up more than five times the friends and followers as the second place finisher Green -- but he managed to only place a disappointing far third.

Having a lot of followers on Twitter or supporters on Facebook does not mean your campaign will automatically be successful, and relying on such websites for Election Day is a poor strategy that no well-run campaign would take.

However, utilizing these resources as a tool for fundraising or recruiting volunteers can make a campaign very strong - and it’s very possible that Tuesday’s winners had been doing just that.

As we wrote about New Media in our 21st Century Campaigning series last month:

Keeping supporters engaged is a highly important function of any campaign. Without engaged supporters, a campaign is unable to raise money or find volunteers to knock on doors and make phone calls.

That means campaigns have to keep supporters interested and active in the daily developments of the race.

…the effectiveness of such outreach comes down to what we call the “Twitter talent.” A major part of it is passing the “‘Who Cares?’ Test” - you have to post something relevant that your followers will be interested in.

In fact, some of the NYC candidates were doing just that with their Twitter and Facebook outreach. Scola mentions how Mark Green used his Twitter feed creatively, tweeting 100 “New Ideas for a Better City” to his followers.

Unfortunately for Green, creative tweeting is just one of the necessary parts of an effective New Media strategy. A campaign also needs to continually grow their list of supporters and followers in order to raise more money and get more volunteers. To that effect, it is very beneficial for a campaign to hire a New Media Coordinator who can devote their time to building a social networking base, among other things.

Luckily for candidates like Green, they have time to do these things before the run-off election.

GOP Twitter Paranoia and its Implications

Summary: Today, WAYLA focuses on picking and choosing followers on Twitter, stemming from Colorado Republicans "scrubbing" their liberal followers - what it means for each party, for future campaigns, and what they're missing.

On Monday, ColoradoPols.com - a Democratic-leaning political blog in Colorado - reported that Republicans on Twitter began purging liberals from their list of followers over the weekend.

From the post:

Apparently the word went out over the weekend that "liberals" are attempting to "follow" Republicans on Twitter. This is being interpreted as a bad, nefarious thing, needing to be stopped, although "following" on Twitter is in most other circles considered desirable. In fact we're not certain under what circumstances attracting Twitter followers is undesirable, but then again we've been following Republican “tweets” ourselves. We understand why some of them would prefer to not have just anybody seeing this stuff.

We're told that the advice to begin 'purging' liberals from high-profile conservative Twitter accounts was supposed to have gone out quietly, with the goal being an under-the-radar purge.

Colorado State Senator Dave Schultheis (R-09) didn’t do it very quietly, however, tweeting “Important! Many libs and progressives attempting 2 Follow conservatives. Scrub your "followers" I blocked three more today. #tcot #redco”

This development is interesting for two reasons.

The first is how the GOP is using Twitter. They want to be able to rally supporters without the other side getting word of the language or tactics they’re using.

Unfortunately for them - as they should know - anything done or said in the political realm in this day and age can be leaked faster than water in a sieve. Just take President Obama’s comments about Kanye West the other day, or many of the embarrassing tweets Republicans have made that we have relayed here on WAYLA.

As we said in a post about new media last month:

"The point is that politicians wouldn’t (in most cases) say those sorts of things to rally supporters in a speech - because that too would be picked up by the mainstream media - so they shouldn’t try to engage supporters with such rhetoric in the social networking realm either."

It seems that Colorado Republicans don’t read this blog.

The second reason it’s interesting is how liberals are acting in terms of new media - or rather, political people in general.

The simple psychology of it is that it is alright to follow the opposition on Twitter - it doesn’t compromise your own ideological principles. Similarly, many smart campaign workers will sign up for the email lists of their competition.

[In fact, there are occasionally email wars between liberal groups (like, say, MoveOn.org) and conservative groups (like, say, FreedomWorks). In these wars, one group will email its supporters saying something somewhat confrontational in order to drive support (typically in money or online petition signatures) and someone from another group will receive the email too. Then they’ll use it to send out their own email, blasting the original, and driving their own support (in money or e-petitions). Sometimes it can go back and forth for a while.]

Contrast that sneaky way of watching the competition with another new media tool - Facebook. On Facebook, in order to keep track of an opposing politician or ideological group automatically, one needs to become a supporter. A follower is one thing, but identifying yourself as a supporter is too much too handle!

Nonetheless, the media follows - and “supports” - everyone in order to keep tabs on their campaign activities. That’s how we get word when somebody like Sarah Palin coins a phrase like “death panels” with a status update.

Colorado Republicans have hardly anything to fear in liberal followers on Twitter - it’s the press that they should look out for.

A Preview of Tomorrow’s Election in Afghanistan

It seems like only yesterday we were previewing the heated elections in Iran that soon turned into chaos as demonstrators took to the streets in protest. In the end, incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad controversially won.

While the results were disappointing to most in the world, it was interesting to see how the democratic system played out in the Islamic Republic.

Tomorrow there will be another closely watched election in Iran’s neighbor to the east, Afghanistan, where NATO forces have been fighting since 2001 and democracy is still in a very infant stage.

So we thought we would answer what could be some Frequently Asked Questions about the campaign in this distant land.


What Similarities Are There Between Elections in Afghanistan and America?

While this is only Afghanistan’s second presidential election - and the first ever truly contested presidential race - the top campaigns are using some tactics that Americans are very familiar with. They’ve had presidential debates, campaign ads on television and radio, and even campaign memorabilia.


While the top candidates - incumbent President Hamid Karzai, former Foreign Minister Dr. Abdullah Abdullah, former Planning Minister Dr. Ramazan Bashardost, and former Finance Minister Ashraf Ghani - have not been able to travel to many parts of the country for security reasons, they have been able to connect with voters through other forms of communication.

Television and radio are widespread, and many Afghans are paying close attention to the race with these media. Just take a look at this TV ad for the Abdullah campaign:



There has been some attempt to contact voters via telephone, but only about 5.5 million citizens have cell phones or land lines. That’s not very helpful considering over 15 million citizens are registered to vote this year.

And although internet is not widespread - less than a million Afghans have access to such technology - all three of the top campaigns have reasonably flashy websites that resemble those of our own politicians, complete with biography, issues, and - most importantly - contribution pages.




And some campaigns have taken the cue for “professionalization” of their campaigns by hiring political consultants. Ghani, for example, hired former Bill Clinton campaign manager, James Carville. The cajun consultant talked to Stephen Colbert about it recently.

The Colbert Report	Mon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
Yes We Afghan - James Carville
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes Political Humor Health Care Protests

Finally, Afghan voters have one extraordinary characteristic in common with their American counterparts - they identify more with their country than their ethnicity, something not as common in other Islamic countries. Richard Sexton of FiveThirtyEight.com relayed this poll in a post last week.


How Are Elections in Afghanistan Different?

There are a great number of differences between the U.S. system and the Afghan system. One of the more noticed peculiarities of the Afghan elections so far is how they’ve been moving ballots across the country. A few days ago it was reported that donkeys had become a significant source of transporting ballots to polling stations.


Meanwhile, one U.S. soldier writes a fascinating blog post about his time helping Afghan troops assisting the movement of ballots in the volatile northeastern region.

“…on our way to pick up the ballots yesterday, we got in a nice little enemy engagement, which resulted in one of our trucks getting a tire shot out, two antennas blasted off and a round of indeterminate caliber (we’re still debating what size it had to have been) cracking up our windshield. Armor is a good thing to have when the element of surprise is not on your side. The firefight was a nice way to welcome our recently-arrived replacements to the joys and adventures of life in Afghanistan.

We should have good security for most of the ballots and polling sites, but a few of those ballots are going to be headed a little further up the road into country we don’t venture…and are not going to venture for this election. The Afghan National Police (ANP) refuses to escort the ballots around here without our help, and in this case we’re not helping.”

In the end of the post, he writes “I’m just thankful I get to be here to see how this thing turns out.”

Another obvious difference is that it’s - for all intensive purposes - a four-way race. The winner tomorrow will have to secure a majority to avoid a run-off - something that doesn’t appear entirely likely based on the polls so far.


Even more significant, many voters don’t seem to want to change their support when a run-off comes.


Of course, depending on the events of the election, some voters may still change their minds.

What Threats Are There to the Election?

The most obvious threat is the possibility of violence. The Taliban has not only boycotted the elections, but they’ve been increasing their terrorist efforts to disrupt the democratic process. In fact, six poll workers have died since yesterday alone.

The other threat is corruption. Karzai supporters - including his half brother, Wali Karzai (head of the Kandahar province provincial council) and Sher Mohammad Akhundzada (a member of Afghanistan’s upper house) have not only been accused of involvement in the opium trade, but also of buying votes for the incumbent President.


While election observers will be on hand throughout much of the country, about 30% of the nation will not have observers because of security threats. Some say that after the results are tallied the situation could be similar to the aftermath of elections in Iran earlier this summer.

Who is Most Likely to Win?

The polls taken so far, and the media reports of corruption, seem to point to a Karzai victory - if not tomorrow then at least after a run-off. Sexton says that the polls might “better approximate the Afghan public sentiment than the results will” because of the corruption issue, but either way, it would appear Karzai will likely be the winner.

Of course, the polls might not be entirely accurate. After all, there will be over 15 million votes cast tomorrow, and only 5.5 million Afghans have telephones. So if other candidates stand to benefit from a higher proportion of voters without phone access, we could see a different outcome. We’ll really just have to wait and see.


Do you have any other questions about the election tomorrow? Leave a response with your question and we’ll try to answer it!

How is New Media Changing Politics?

Part 10 of our 10-part series: “21st Century Campaigning”

Those who are highly engaged in the political realm hear a lot about the prospects of “New Media” everyday. But what role does New Media really have in politics? More importantly, how can New Media be used effectively by campaigns and politicians?


When people think of New Media, they often associate it with social networking - Facebook, Twitter, etc. - but in fact it encompasses much more than that. Resources such as YouTube, social bookmarking sites (Digg, Reddit, etc.) and the blogosphere are some of the other important tools in the New Media hype. And all of these tools are becoming more and more important in politics.

For example, as newspapers fall by the wayside, campaigns are increasing their outreach to bloggers. As we noted in Part 6 of this series, campaigns can engage these citizen journalists by sending them interesting YouTube videos, news clips, and other online materials regarding the race. It helps build a relationship with friendly bloggers and that can help get your name and message out there the way you want it to.

Yet, much of the New Media world requires navigation on the part of the user. In other words, if a voter is not interested in the campaign, they’re not going to subscribe to an email list, become a fan on Facebook, or a follower on Twitter.

So why are these tools still important?

There is one important group of voters that are still going to follow the campaign with these tools - supporters. Keeping supporters engaged is a highly important function of any campaign. Without engaged supporters, a campaign is unable to raise money or find volunteers to knock on doors and make phone calls.

That means campaigns have to keep supporters interested and active in the daily developments of the race.

Let’s use Twitter as an example. As we mentioned in our own Twitter study last month, the effectiveness of such outreach comes down to what we call the “Twitter talent.” A major part of it is passing the “‘Who Cares?’ Test” - you have to post something relevant that your followers will be interested in.

So we decided to do an analysis of the New Media strategies of the two main campaigns of the Virginia Gubernatorial race going on right now between Democrat Criegh Deeds and Republican Bob McDonnell.

Deeds has some Tweets and Facebook updates that supporters can use. He mostly uses the social networking tools to update supporters on where he’ll be speaking each day. Occasionally, he also throws in less useful updates.

Take these three Tweets (in chronological order) on August 1st:

“Today is Jerry Garcia's birthday. We turn to Workingman's Dead”

“At FedEx in hot anticipation of Sir Paul. Surrounded by good friends”

“Still waiting. @jbtaylor I like it all but I'm partial to the Revolver-Rubber Soul period for the Fab Four”

And in the past two weeks, he has only posted one link outside of Twitter. On Facebook, his posts have been more relevant - he regularly posts videos, events, and news bits that will encourage supporters. Yet his outreach to them on Facebook is still a little weak - he has less than 10,000 supporters while McDonnell has over 16,000. He also has just more than half as many followers on Twitter as McDonnell.

In fact, McDonnell uses Facebook just as well - constantly linking to his website on updates, informing supporters about upcoming events, and posting even more videos and positive news stories as Deeds. On Twitter, McDonnell constantly links to videos, pictures, news stories, and other websites that will be of use to supporters - engaging them so they will be encouraged to help his campaign.

Obviously, it would be irresponsible to credit McDonnell’s lead on Deeds solely with his dominant social networking strategy, but it certainly helps.

Another favorite New Media tool has been YouTube. Although we were quick to criticize this video for its inaccuracies, it certainly served its purpose well - it engaged and encouraged like-minded Recovery Act opponents.



Of course, using New Media as effectively as it can be used takes a lot of work. Campaigns that actually have a New Media coordinator - whose sole responsibility is social networking, engaging bloggers, posting on sites such as YouTube and Flickr, social bookmarking, etc. - can have a tremendous advantage in fundraising, volunteer support, and even message delivery.

Yet there is still a danger to such a strategy.

Back in June we mentioned how a few GOP operatives and activists were stepping over the line with some of their Tweets. For example, Mike Green of the GOP firm Starboard Communications tweeted “JUST HEARD THAT OBAMA IS GOING TO IMPOSE A 40% TAX ON ASPIRIN BECAUSE IT’S WHITE AND IT WORKS.”

He later apologized - using two tweets to do so.

And nobody has been scrutinized for their use of New Media by the traditional media sources than Sarah Palin. Just last week she talked about an Obama “death panel” euthanizing her baby with Down Syndrome on a Facebook status update.

The point is that politicians wouldn’t (in most cases) say those sorts of things to rally supporters in a speech - because that too would be picked up by the mainstream media - so they shouldn’t try to engage supporters with such rhetoric in the social networking realm either.

And that’s another reason to have a special New Media coordinator rather than a candidate updating their New Media tools themselves - message discipline.

Like so many other advancements in campaign politics, just because the technology is changing doesn’t mean the basic principles are.

Well, we hope you’ve enjoyed “21st Century Campaigning” - it was certainly a pleasure to give our predictions and analysis of the changes happening in the political campaign world. Soon we’ll be starting a new series that should be fun: “Politics in the Movies”

What Will GOTV Look Like Ten Years From Now?

Part 9 of our 10-part series: 21st "Century Campaigning"

Get-Out-the-Vote (or GOTV) operations have changed dramatically in the last ten years, and – chances are – they’ll change even more in the next ten.

GOTV has always existed in some form or another throughout American electoral history. But modern GOTV methods really began to take shape across the pond. In the United Kingdom’s 1945 general election, Labour Party MP Ian Mikardo and his campaign developed a system in which the Reading constituency he represented was canvassed for Voter ID. The campaign then generated lists of supporters called “Reading sheets” for volunteers to remind to vote on Election Day.

The Reading System also began a GOTV tactic known in the U.S. as “poll watching” – in which campaign workers watch to make sure that voters identified as supporters have made it to the polls already and can be crossed off the list. If not, they get reminded to vote again.

In the United States, national GOTV operations really started to be noticed by the media following the 2000 general election. It was a year where the vote between Al Gore and George W. Bush was so close that getting supporters to the polls could make all the difference in many states.

That fact prompted the GOP to make important strides in the way GOTV was to be done in the future. They developed a new system they labeled “the 72-Hour Program” for the 2002 midterm elections.

From a 2003 Washington Post article on the new program’s implementation:

The 72-Hour Project was born of necessity after the 2000 election, when Republicans discovered that Democrats had done a better job of getting their voters to the polls in one of the tightest presidential races in history.

With prodding from White House senior adviser Karl C. Rove, White House political director Ken Mehlman and RNC Deputy Chairman Jack Oliver, the party undertook a top-to-bottom review of its get-out-the-vote operation, poured more than $1 million into more than 50 experiments to test how best to reach out to voters and then methodically set about implementing their findings in the midterm campaigns.

It paid off. In the subsequent 2002 and 2004 elections the GOP significantly drove up turnout among the Republican-friendly Evangelical community and scored some important victories for their party.

Still, the efficacy of such extensive GOTV programs is of considerable debate. Yale University has devoted an entire website to research done on the effectiveness of GOTV operations.

And Democratic strategist Mark Mellman argues that putting such weight on GOTV really only makes a difference when a race comes down to a couple thousand votes or so.

From a 2006 piece he wrote for The Hill:

“Experiments on turnout by [famed political scientists] Alan Gerber and Donald Green suggest that the most effective means of increasing turnout raise it by less than 10 percent — and that’s for people who get canvassed in person. None of this is to suggest that GOTV efforts are not valuable. When 2000 or 200 votes decide an election there is no question that GOTV efforts can make all the difference in the world. But again, that is simply not the case that is being argued by GOP operatives.

Can’t micro-targeting help them achieve spectacular successes? Anyone who has ever modeled data knows there is much more salesmanship than science in Republican claims about these efforts. Our firm and others on the Democratic side have been using these models for half a dozen years or more and we know they can make our efforts much more efficient; expand our GOTV and persuasion universes; and provide message guidance. So when races are otherwise marginal, the lift models provide can make all the difference between winning and losing. But no model is going to turn what would otherwise be a 5-point loss into a victory.”

With this idea in mind, how will campaigns adjust their GOTV strategy so it only counts if a race is going to be close? How will they plan such an important operation ahead of time if they don’t even know if it will be worth it?

And if these questions don’t make campaigns rethink how they do GOTV, maybe some recent trends will.

As we mentioned in our post on Monday, early voting might change a lot of campaign strategy in the next few elections. In fact, when polls showed then-Senator Barack Obama with a substantial edge among early voters, we commented on the importance behind the Obama campaign’s efforts.

“The real advantage of having supporters vote early is that the campaign can focus more time and energy on supporters that vote less frequently (because they are less politically engaged) in the final 72 hours.

So have early voting laws made October a month long GOTV period? It would certainly appear so, as this tactic is sure to be used in presidential campaigns to come.”

But if campaigns are going to devote time and energy to such a “Get-Out-the-Early-Vote” operation, what will that look like? Will they rely on more time-effective methods to convince folks who were already going to vote for them to do it early – methods such as email, robo-calls, text-messages, and direct mail? Or will they actually redirect volunteers from important Voter ID operations to make calls and canvass these supporters?

Ultimately, these aren’t questions that can be answered yet with any certainty – but they are questions that campaigns will have to answer for themselves in the next ten years.

The only thing that is certain is that GOTV will continue to evolve and is likely to look much different in 2020 from what it looked like in 2008.

Why Campaigns Ask You Who You’re Voting For

Part 8 of our 10-part series: “21st Century Campaigning”

Have you ever received a phone call from a political campaign asking you to name the man or woman you’re supporting in an upcoming election? Have you ever worked on or volunteered for a campaign and had to make such a call?

If the answer is “yes” you’ve no doubt wondered why. After all, one’s vote is traditionally thought of as a private decision - a guarantee of the blind ballot. Yet campaigns have a very good reason to ID voters. In fact, they have three very good reasons for doing so.


1) Knowing Where You Are

Ideally, a campaign will identify over half of the electorate (in a two-way race) as strongly supporting their candidate. If this can be achieved, you know you’re going to win even before Election Day. If you have no idea how many voters are supporting you, chances are that means you’re going to lose.

Watching the polls is helpful to get a rough idea of your support - but it is not 100% accurate. Additionally, you cannot track each individual voter. That means that come time for the Get-Out-the-Vote operation (or GOTV) you won’t know exactly who to remind to vote.


2) Laying a Foundation for Your Party

Politics doesn’t stop after one election - it doesn’t stop at all. When you can identify which politicians a particular voter is supporting you can get a good idea of how they will vote in the future. Only a small fraction of the electorate are truly “swing” voters - most will vote for candidates in one particular party the great majority of the time.

By identifying these voters the party can determine how likely they are to support future candidates. This helps these future campaigns plan how they allocate their resources. If a particular voter is identified as a strong Democrat or Republican there is no point in sending them a piece of mail, giving them a phone call, or sending volunteers to their house to try to persuade them. If they’re identified as a swing voter, they are certain to get more contact with the campaign.

Additionally, precincts that have over 65% of the electorate identified as strongly Democratic (in the case of Democratic campaigns) will be covered tooth-and-nail come GOTV time. Every house in such precincts will be hit before the polls close on Election Day. This tactic is designed to drive as much support to the polls as humanly possible for the party.


3) Solidifying Their Support

One of the most significant phenomena in politics is how voters will commit to supporting a particular candidate once they’ve said they support him or her. By neglecting a Voter ID program, a campaign risks losing voters that lean toward its candidate before Election Day. By calling or canvassing these voters and getting them to say out-loud that they support your candidate, they become much more likely to follow through when they head to the polls.

Where’s the evidence?

In 2008, President Obama won his bid for the White House because his campaign rigorously tracked where they were in swing states, used the Democratic Party’s existing infrastructure and information to plan the optimal use of resources, and convinced voters that leaned towards his candidacy to follow through by voting for him. In the end, the Obama campaign had contacted about 37% more voters than the McCain campaign, and Voter ID is by far the most important tactic in voter contact

But 2008 was important for another reason - namely the use of Voter ID in early voting trends. Early voting increased significantly last year, and it had a major impact on how the rest of the campaign was run. By identifying which voters had already submitted a ballot, campaigns were able to devote more time and energy to those who were waiting until the end.

That means saving time by not trying to persuade early voters to support your candidates or reminding them to head to the polls on Election Day. With the saved time, the campaigns were able to focus on voters known to be undecided going into the last few days of the race.

Early voting is becoming more and more popular, and it will be interesting to watch as it continues in the future. Needless to say, campaigns prefer early voting because early voters probably weren’t persuadable to begin with, and it allows the campaign to be more efficient in its outreach activities.

This trend certainly appears to be the most important aspect of future Voter ID operations.

How Does Polling Affect Political Campaigns?

Part 7 of our 10-part series: “21st Century Campaigning”

You’ll often hear politicians claim that they don’t pay attention to the polls - especially politicians who are behind in them. But that notion is typically just political rhetoric. Even if the candidate is ignoring the polls, his or her campaign staff and consultants do not.

Campaigning is both an art and a science: there are aspects that require inherent political savvy, talent, and creativity, and then there are aspects that need to be measured empirically - a necessity for winning a race. Polling is in the latter category. Watching and even taking polls helps a campaign track where they are and where they need to go.

But aren’t polls often inaccurate?

No poll is perfect, but political scientists and junkies as well as campaigners do a lot to figure out which polls are best to look at.

Nate Silver - the author of the popular blog FiveThirtyEight.com - is one such political junkie. During the 2008 presidential campaign he was able to determine Barack Obama’s and John McCain’s chances of winning by using a very in-depth system of poll analysis.

As he found in April last year, not only do all polls suffer the normal sampling error (usually below 4%) but also from what he calls a “Pollster-Introduced Error” (or “PIE”) - an error of poor methodology. For example, how a question is asked can lead a respondent to say something different than they would if the question was put to them another way. In fact, there is an entire science behind that concept.


Another problem that arises is who is asking the question. For example, a poll by Fox News is likely to demonstrate a conservative politician or stance being more popular than, say, a New York Times survey would. This is because a pollster that identifies himself as being with Fox News is more likely to have a liberal voter hang-up on him, whereas a New York Times pollster would be more likely to have a conservative voter hang-up on him.

Similarly, a campaign’s internal surveys are likely to be more skewed towards their particular candidate than an independent poll would. Even when the campaign outsources the job to a polling firm - which they almost always do - the poll is likely to suffer from a larger PIE than an external survey.

Still, internal polls are important because they can be used to gather data that an independent survey might not. Smaller races (in fact, most anything smaller than a targeted Senate race) are particularly dependent on these additional data because independent pollsters do not pay as much attention to their races.

Aren’t those internal surveys just “push-polls” though?

A campaign will track polls carefully to see how they’re doing - an important way to empirically determine whether their strategy is working or not. But in order to figure out what strategy needs to be employed in the first place - specifically the candidate’s message - a survey will be taken early-on in the campaign to test the waters of the electorate.

These “message-testing” surveys are very different from “push-polls” because they are meant to legitimately plan a campaign message, platform, and image of the candidate. Push-polls are intended to directly influence the opinion of the respondent under the disguise as a message-testing survey.

The American Association for Public Opinion Research explains how a respondent can tell the difference:

Identifying Advocacy Calls Made Under the Guise of Research

Political telemarketing calls, when disguised as research, may sometimes be difficult to differentiate from a legitimate survey. Here are characteristics that will usually indicate to a respondent that the call is not a legitimate survey.

-One or only a few questions are asked, all about a single candidate or a single issue.

-The questions are uniformly strongly negative (or sometimes uniformly positive) descriptions of the candidate or issue.

-The organization conducting the calls is not named, or a phony name is used.

-Evasive answers are given in response to requests for more information about the survey.

In addition, the following characteristics will indicate to journalists, reporters, and survey professionals that a telephone call is not a legitimate survey.

-The number of people called is very large, sometimes many thousands.

-The calls are not based on a random sample.

-It is difficult to find out which organization conducted the interviews.


[Identifying]…Message Testing

… One way to tell is that message-testing surveys exhibit the characteristics of a legitimate survey, such as:

-At the beginning of the call, the interviewer clearly identifies the call center actually making the calls. (However, legitimate political polling firms will often choose not to identify the client who is sponsoring the research, be it a candidate or a political party, since that could bias the survey results.)

-The interview contains more than a few questions.

-The questions usually ask about more than one candidate or mention both sides of an issue.

-Questions, usually near the end of the interview, ask respondents to report demographic characteristics such as age, education level, and party identification.

-The survey is based on a random sample of voters.

-The number of respondents falls within the range of legitimate surveys, typically between 400 and 1500 interviews.

In 1996, citing the increasing practice of push-polling, the American Association of Political Consultants publicly condemned the tactic and required its members to abstain from it under the AAPC’s Code of Ethics.

But the concept of push-polling really became famous in 2000 during the GOP presidential primaries. Karl Rove encouraged the Bush campaign to wage a push-poll against Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) in South Carolina. The pollsters asked respondents if they were aware that - among other negative and untrue things - McCain was the father of an illegitimate black child. The incident was so appalling and became so famous that little of the practice has been seen since.

So how is the 21st Century changing the effect of polling on campaigns?

While modern opinion polls have been around since George Gallup tracked the 1936 re-election of FDR, in the last few years they have become increasingly significant with the rise of bloggers.

One such blog is RealClearPolitics.com, which in 2000 began compiling polls of the close presidential contest between Gov. George W. Bush (R-TX) and Vice President Al Gore (D-TN). As time passed they would update the outlook of the election with the RCP Poll Average. It was a helpful way for the average political junkie to look at where the candidates were at without worrying too much about the number differences between multiple surveys.


Next in that tradition was FiveThirtyEight.com. Founded in 2008 by Silver - a former baseball statistician - it was able to track where the candidates were at even better. 538 was able to analyze the polls by weighing them, tracking them by state, and using complicated math that the typical American (and even most folks in campaign politics) wouldn’t understand. With the internet providing the opportunity for this blog, millions of Americans were able to see Silver’s rolling predictions.


So on Election Day, when - according to Silver - McCain had roughly a 1% chance of winning, it was really no surprise that Obama could declare victory that night. In fact, it was such a long-shot for McCain to win that the 538-reading Obama supporter had nothing to worry about.

And that’s exactly the point.

Campaigns have had to tell their supporters for years not to pay attention to the polls. If their supporters are taking polls seriously, it means that they’ll either figure their candidate has it in the bag (if he/she is ahead) or that their candidate doesn’t have a chance.

Similarly, in 2004, many criticized the national news media for releasing exit polls mid-way through Election Day. Sen. John Kerry was ahead in the presidential election according to the exit polls, and that may have encouraged Bush supporters to get to their polling-places before they closed and for Kerry supporters to not bother.

Luckily for Obama in 2008, most of his supporters were pretty skeptical of the polls as well as 538’s findings. Not only did they make sure to vote, but they continued the campaign’s GOTV activities like the election could come down to one vote.

But with 538’s analysis being so sophisticated and so incredibly accurate, such blogs pose a real problem for campaign workers. With the information so readily accessible in the internet age, it can go a long way towards influencing supporters. If your candidate’s scientifically-measured chances of winning are so high (or conversely, so low) then why bother volunteering or giving money?

That will be the challenge for campaigns in the future.


“21st Century Campaigning” returns Friday with Voter ID!