“Nothing to Do With Presidential Politics”??
John Kerry just told Wolf Blitzer that in addition to heading up to New Hampshire this weekend to campaign for candidates there, he is also going to many states that, “have nothing to do with presidential politics.”
I thought every state had something to do with presidential politics.
It is this attitude that lost Kerry the election in 2004. He ran a 17 state strategy, not a 50 state strategy. In my own state, Virginia, he wrote it off as a “red state” even though he and Bush were 4 points apart two weeks out. 4 points and they hardly tried here at all. With a Democrat in the governor’s office during the 2004 race and another Democrat elected in 2005, to write off Virginia, as with any of the other 33 states left out of his strategy, was a foolish mistake.
The internet and mobile networks connect people across state lines, indeed across the nation. This means creating a buzz about a presidential candidate in any state adds to the excitement of voters in every state.
Elisabeth Noelle-Neumann wrote in the Sprial of Silence that the people can accurately predict who will win the presidential election based on a sense of the buzz of the nation. As the buzz for a conadidate increases, more people jump on the bandwagon, while supporters of the expected loser tend to get quiet.
The internet can help amplify the buzz for a candidate. But to maximize the amplification, a campaign must create a buzz everywhere in the country.
To continue a fixation on a limited number of states in presidential electoral strategy is very “second wave thinking.” Before the internet and free mobile long-distance broke down geographical barriers, a 17 state strategy may have made sense. Today, it makes none.