Wise Up Kerry, You Lost Them Awhile Ago!
I really enjoyed (and just happen to agree 100% with) the article by James Verini titled, “It's the Incompetence, Stupid” for Salon.com on December 16th, 2004. Besides MoveOn.org earning the “Most Likely to Piss Off a Supporter Award” because of their poor response time, untrained coordinators and notorious reputation for doing absolutely no prior research on the communities they were working in, the Kerry Campaign had it’s own troubles from the start.
As Verini suggested, too many people were voting against Bush and not specifically for Kerry. It was their hatred for Bush that got them to, or drove them away, from the polls on Election Day. On the other hand, it seemed Republicans really believed in Bush and his entourage which motivated them to vote and to turn out in droves to volunteer and mobilize other voters.
Keeping with our technological focus, what could Kerry have done? Democrats didn’t identify with the man running for President of the United States on their behalf! It’s kind of sad… What about more emails? How about a weekly test message “from” Kerry thanking supporters for all their hard work? Or just wishing everyone a great day?
2 Comments:
What really got me is that Kerry at one point began to run as the "not Bush" candidate. When I started to see this I knew his campaign was doomed.
He rebounded, realizing the majority of America wanted to vote for someone, not against someone but it was too late to save him!
I was one of those anti-Bush but not pro-Kerry Dems who voted for Kerry out of loyalty to the Democratic Party and his stance on issues I cared about. And I am someone who closely follows politics. MoveOn and other 527s ended up doing an unorganized Kerry campaign more harm than good.
I personally delete MoveOn emails when I receive them now. I don't think they are any longer a very effective resource for the Democratic party. However, if the Kerry campaign had as good of a strategy and message as Bush, then the 527s could have registered voters and put on concerts, etc and the campaign would have gotten out the vote.
Then the results could have been different. But hindsight is 20/20.
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