Posted on 12/05/2002 12:55:07 PM PST by nypokerface
With polls showing the race tightening, Democrats are growing increasingly nervous about Sen. Mary Landrieu's (D-La.) prospects in her Saturday runoff election with state Elections Commissioner Suzanne Haik Terrell (R).
A lack of enthusiasm for Landrieu among black voters, coupled with a massive fundraising edge amassed by Republicans, form the basis of the Democrats' fears.
Donna Brazile, one of the leading strategists and turnout experts in the Democratic Party, said she was "alarmed that there was a great deal of apathy in the African-American community" despite the fact that "99.5 percent" of black elected officials are behind Landrieu.
"Mary must reach out to [black voters] and talk about her vision and her commitment," Brazile said Wednesday.
With President Bush and other Republican heavyweights flocking to the Pelican State in recent days on Terrell's behalf, Democrats are trying to fight back with a ground game aimed at maximizing black turnout. Brazile, Al Gore's 2000 presidential campaign manager, is an integral part of that effort.
A Louisiana native, Brazile has served as an adviser to the Landrieu campaign throughout the cycle and has traveled to the state frequently since the November primary.
She arrived in Louisiana again Tuesday and will stay through Saturday's runoff to help organize the final days of the turnout operation.
Brazile's task is made more difficult by Landrieu's somewhat spotty relations with elected officials in the black community, most notably Democratic state Sens.CleoFields, Don Cravins and GregTarver. Fields and Landrieu ran against each other in the 1995 gubernatorial primary.
Fields has endorsed Landrieu, however, and has recorded phone calls on her behalf.
"This is really all a locally driven turnout apparatus on the Democratic side," said Brazile. "On the Republican side, they have thrown everything in but the kitchen sink."
Tovah Ravitz-Meehan, a spokeswoman for the Democratic SenatorialCampaign Committee, argued that the national focus on the race will drive black turnout.
"There has been enough attention drawn to the importance of this race that there is a feeling that people will get out and vote," she said.
"I don't think that Suzanne Terrell is offering [blacks] much of anything," she added.
Bush raised roughly $1.2 million for Terrell in a single appearance this week, and Republican Members of Congress and state parties dumped more than$250,000 in hard money into Terrell's coffers in the past month alone.
Landrieu finds herself embroiled in the first December Senate runoff ever because she was unable to crest 50 percent of the vote in the Nov. 5 open primary.
She received 46 percent to Terrell's 27 percent, though the combined Republican vote (split among three candidates) was 51 percent, while the Democratic vote was 48 percent.
In the month since that election, national Republicans have flooded the state with resources and high-profile visits from the president, Vice President Cheney, former President George H.W. Bush and others. The Terrell campaign launched an ad featuring the president Wednesday.
Landrieu, however, has done her part to level the financial playing field, as she has consistently outraised Terrell.
In pre-runoff reports covering contributions and expenditures through Nov. 17, Landrieu showed $961,000 raised in the period to $930,000 for Terrell.
Landrieu had raised nearly $6.5 million for the race to Terrell's $1.5 million.
Landrieu's campaign and the national party are clearly concerned about turning out the black vote, which is considered crucial to her chances of winning a second term.
Polling released in the race bears out the key role blacks will play in deciding Landrieu's future.
A SouthernMedia and OpinionResearch survey that had a sample equally divided between black and white voters showed Landrieu with a comfortable 18-point margin.
Another survey conducted by the GOP firm the AndersonGroup placed Terrell ahead by 4 points, with black voters comprising 25 percent of the sample.
The most recent polling done in the race, by the University of New Orleans, showed Landrieu with a statistically insignificant 1-point lead over Terrell with 29 percent of the sample black.
Blacks make up nearly 33 percent of the state's population, according to the 2000 Census, and Brazile said she is hoping that they will make up one-quarter of the runoff electorate.
While Brazile's task is to boost the energy level among black voters, she emphasizes that Landrieu needs at least one-third of the white vote to win, as well.
"If she remains competitive with the white vote, then black votes can put her over the top," Brazile said.
Considered one of the elite strategists in her party, Brazile served as Gore's campaign manager for most of the 2000 presidential election. Prior to that she served as deputy campaign manager for Rep. Richard Gephardt (D-Mo.) in the 1988 presidential primaries and for Massachusetts Gov. Michael Dukakis' (D) general election race.
Although she is not on Landrieu's payroll or that of the DSCC, Brazile is serving as an adviser to Landrieu, helping to shape the message being sent to the black community.
"I have been advising them to stay focused on jobs and economic development," she said.
She ascribes her interest in the race to her long relationship withLandrieu, which began when she served as an intern inLandrieu's state House office. Brazile later managed Landrieu's first statewide run for treasurer in 1987.
"My political career has been intertwined withSenator Landrieu's," Brazile explained.
She rejected the idea that she was shipped in by national leaders to save Landrieu's hide in the black community.
"Did [Democratic National Committee Chairman] Terry McAuliffe or [Senate Majority Leader] TomDaschle [D-S.D.] ask me to come home? No."
Regardless of her motivations, Brazile will spearhead an advanced turnout operation featuring key state and national black leaders.
"This is a science just like any other science," Brazile said about the mechanics of turning out black voters.
Fields and former New Orleans Mayor Marc Morial have put their organizations to work for Landrieu, as has the CongressionalBlackCaucus led by Reps. WilliamJefferson(D-La.), JamesClyburn (D-S.C.) and Eddie Bernice Johnson (D-Texas), the chairwoman of the CBC.
In spite of their efforts, Brazile said that the negative turn the campaign has taken "is going to suppress turnout across the board."
Brazile further detailed these sentiments in a Nov. 16 memo sent to the DNC analyzing black turnout generally and its implications for the 2004 elections.
"Republicans are well-positioning themselves to suppress the turnout of African-American voters via their specific negative attacks asserting thatAfrican Americans are [taken] for granted and Democrats are out of touch with the values of the community,"Brazile wrote.
"In the face of the Republican suppression strategy, we will be challenged in 2004 to move younger and weaker self-identifying Democratic African-Americans to vote," Brazile concluded.
Regardless of the criticism leveled at their tactics,Republicans believe the time they have devoted to speaking to the black community will pay off on Saturday.
"Our long-term strategy has been to engage on a grassroots level by working with local activists," said Pamela Mantis, deputy chief of staff for the Republican National Committee.
I have been arguing it since at least 1978, that it is almost never necessary to get blacks to vote for Republicans. All that is needed is to get them not to come out to vote for the Democrat.
A famous case was the run for the Governors Race in Ohio in 1972. Jim Rhodes the Republican challenger was running against incumbent John Gilligan. On election night with the race a dead head and mostly inner city black and ethnic precincts still to be counted, Rhodes called Gilligan to congratulate him on his victory.
Three hours latter Al Wallace had to wake Rhodes up to tell him he needed to un congratulate Gilligan.. It seemed that Rhodes had carried the combination of those black and ethnic precincts by several thousand votes.
It seems that both the black and white Democratic leaders in Cleveland did not like Governor Gilligan. They did not get out the ethnic or black votes.
In most states whites vote for republicans by a substantial margin. Blacks vote for Democrats 91 to 9. All it takes for a republican to win is for blacks not to vote.
I think back turn out is going to be low. Terrell's campaign has been running negative adds on Landrieu designed to reduce her white vote. The problem with negative campaigns in Louisiana is they are a double edged sword. An ad that drives Democrat white votes down, will drive Democrat Black votes up.
It looks to me like Landrieu has given up on the white vote and is hoping for a miracle with blacks.
There is a lot of anger in the Black community. I sense it here in Ohio. Blacks feel like they have done a lot for the Democrats, but the Democrats have done little for them in return. The attitude is not to vote for Republicans. The black attitude is to not turn out, so Democrats will have to do things they want. That puts Democrats in a real box. For every black they satisfy, they lose a white.
A recurring sentiment being voiced with more regularity. And it is about time...
She seems to have a talent of working for losers. I hope this trend continues on Saturday.
That's undoubtedly true, but it's always nice to be asked to join something rather than to just have to walk in and be accepted. Explaining to the black community that we share more of their concerns and values than the Democrats do can't hurt anything, and likely will help.
I thought this article was about NASCAR! < /oops! >
There is some possibility for younger blacks becoming Republicans. But they have to be in their 20's or younger. But even that segment is only 20 or 25 percent of young blacks.
90 percent of black voters may be angry at Democrats but they will not vote for Republicans. They believe that government owes them. Listen to what Blacks on the street are saying. We Blacks have supported the Democrats, but the Democrats don't support us back.
Listen to them. They say the DEMOCRATS do not support us. They do NOT SAY My Party Has Failed Me. They don't see themselves as Democrats. The Democratic party is that part of the power structure most likely to give them what they want. They are looking for a way to make the Democrats give it to them. Listen to the retoric. The Democrats are the MAN. Blacks want government handouts and reparations. Ask Al Sharpton how that works. Al got 98% of the black vote in the Democratic primary for Mayor of New York.
Are affirmative action and quotas in education too little to make blacks grateful to Democrats? What have Democrats failed to give black voters that you would give them?
Blacks voters are not looking for freedom from government controls. Black voters are not looking for equal opportunity. The vast majority of blacks voters are looking for a benign government to give them the reparations they feel they deserve.
People try to explain black success in sports as saying black kids have more physical skills. That is just not true. Go watch some black athletes and see all the effort it takes a black kid to make himself into a great one. It is mind boggling.
Can you imagine the results if black kids were as motivtated to learn to do business as they are to do sports? Why don't they? I think they don't ever see role models to make them believe they can do it. If kid knew their chance to earn the good life was a 100 times greater if they hit the books instead of passing the ball, they would be hitting the books. Not only that, their peers have to understand that too.
Today you can see it in sports training camps for kids. White kids get told they are going to have to work as hard as black kids if you want to make it. You can't be watching TV, you have to be out their shooting hoops.
The tide will really have turned when teachers tell white kids they are going to have to study like the black kids do.
That will change the world as we have known it. No one argues for afirmative action in the NFL or NBA. Put equal emphasis in the books and there will be no need for any special breaks for anyone.
I know a younger man who is a descendant of Sally Hemmings and Thomas Jefferson. He is one sharp cookie. Last year he sent me a Christmas card. On the front was a picture of he and his wife with George and Laura Bush in the White House. When his father and I were boys, his father could not drink out of our towns water fountain or swim in the towns swiming pool.
The world has come a long way in the last 60 years. Back then the Man WAS holding them down. But that man has been dead 20 years and good riddance.
When all people can honestly look at life and come to the same conclusion that blacks do in sports... that is look and say to themselves.. I can win this game. They will win this game.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.