Posted on 09/08/2007 2:51:30 PM PDT by PJ-Comix
The question: When Fred Thompson opted to announce his presidential candidacy from the comfort of Jay Leno’s arm chair Wednesday night — instead of participating in the Republican debate in New Hampshire that same evening — did that hurt his campaign in New Hampshire?
The answer: What campaign in New Hampshire?
“I think we’ll be getting staff within a week,” Thompson adviser Dan Hughes, a former Republican state representative from New Castle, told me Friday. “I think there’ll be an announcement within the next few days.”
Thompson not only has no paid staff in New Hampshire, he has no organization. He has two advisers, Hughes and former Reagan administration official Gerry Carmen of Manchester. But Carmen is known to spend a lot of his time in Washington, and Hughes has been the one carrying Thompson’s water in New Hampshire this summer.
It was Hughes who organized Thompson’s first visit to the state in June.
“I told everybody he was running and they didn’t believe me,” he said. “But now they do.”
Thompson’s no-show at Wednesday night’s debate unquestionably hurt him with a lot of New Hampshire Republicans. The debate was co-sponsored by FOX News and the state GOP. A lot of Republicans felt that by skipping an official party-sponsored debate Thompson was rudely dismissing the entire state party. So in addition to disappointing Granite Staters in general, he offended Republican insiders in particular.
(Carmen and Hughes got tickets to the debate, but they did not get passes to the spin room afterwards.)
But hurting the pride of top Republicans is the least of Thompson’s worries in New Hampshire. If he commits to campaigning here and impresses Republican and independent voters (New Hampshire’s primaries are open) in the next five months, he certainly could overcome this offense. But to do that he has to have a ground game. New Hampshire is all about the ground game. Thompson has nothing. Nor does he seem too concerned about getting one.
This late in the game, an impressively organized campaign would have had staff in place, or at least announced, the day after the official declaration of candidacy. Thompson’s staff might take a week to get here.
I asked Hughes if he had signs ready to put up and bumper stickers ready to hand out.
“I have some bumper stickers from the committee that was before Friends of Fred, whatever the hell that was,” he said. “We haven’t been actually even trying to get them out. You really can’t be running a campaign if you’re testing the waters, and we haven’t.”
Hughes does have a database of supporters. But it cannot be a big list. At the debate, there were exactly two “Fredheads” holding signs outside the arena. They told me there were a lot of Thompson backers in New Hampshire — “100 of us.”
How is Thompson going to drum up more support in New Hampshire, where he consistently ranks third in the polls, a good 15 to 20 points behind Mitt Romney? Apparently not by campaigning here. Thompson is doing exactly three events in New Hampshire this weekend. When will he return?
“He’ll be back I know in October, but I don’t know the schedule,” Hughes said.
It is an axiom of political campaigning that candidates improve with experience. As Hughes acknowledged, “The more you’re out there, the better you get.” In New Hampshire, Rudy Giuliani has spent the past six months becoming a much better campaigner. John McCain is hitting his stride again and Mitt Romney, Wednesday night’s debate performance aside, is an outstanding campaigner. Thompson, on the other hand, is rusty and almost entirely untested in New Hampshire. Nationally, most of his early performance reviews have been abysmal. So although he enters the race at the traditional starting point — around Labor Day weekend — he is way behind in fundraising, organization and practice.
He also has the distinct disadvantage that most of New Hampshire’s top-flight Republican operatives are committed to other campaigns. Even the big-name endorsements are being snatched up, though there are plenty left to be had.
If Thompson plans to win New Hampshire, he enters the contest at a serious disadvantage. It is not an insurmountable one. He has five months, and Granite Staters are famous for not making up their minds until days before, if not the day of, the primary. But it will take time for him to build an organization here and get to the point where his campaign is really competitive. The other candidates have a big head start, and Thompson does not seem to have a natural base of support in New Hampshire. He polls worse here than he does nationally. Most NH Republicans I’ve talked with say Thompson needs to essentially camp out in New Hampshire for the next five months if he wants to win it.
However, if Thompson does not plan to win New Hampshire, none of this really matters. If he plans, say, to let the eight other candidates duke it out in Iowa and New Hampshire, leaving one winner to take him on in South Carolina and Florida — southern states where he would have a natural advantage over a Northeastern Republican like Giuliani or Romney — then he doesn’t need to pay more than token attention to New Hampshire.
So far, token attention is all New Hampshire has received from Fred Thompson.
I love NRO, check in on their site every day. But Mitt has been an early contributor to their foundation or whatever and has given them plenty of his time. Hate to say it, but it seems that between the Mitt-love and their local Rudy-love—not too many McCain supporters!—they have come off as pettily biased against the Fredster.
Critics may like to target him for supposed laziness and a less-than-bill-crazy senate record, but those are two of the best things they could be picking on: the guys who take too much to the senatorial collegiality or spend a great amount of time focused on details are not chief executive material. And Fred has accomplished too much in his life for such complaints to ring truer than you’d want. Going after the younger wife is another sign that they actually haven’t got anything too potent against him.
How many electoral votes from New HAmpshire have gone to the GOP candidate the past several Presidential elections?
Hmmm?
Thanks Reagan Man.
************
The New Hampshire of today is not the New Hampshire of twenty or thirty years ago. There has been an influx of Massachusetts residents, and it has changed the political climate for the worse.
We are also looking at a changing primary season. New Hampshire no longer will have the clout it has had in the past.
And finally, Fred is not going to run his campaign to suit anyone but himself. It may be one of the reasons his supporters are with him. I know it's one reason I am.
“[B]ehind in fund-raising” is necessarily a baseless assertion. The whole point of the delay was to keep the size of his campaign warchest secret until late January. Because Thompson doesn’t have to report his finance to the FEC until then, neither his opponents nor the pundits know whether he’s ahead or behind in fundraising.
I still think the delay in the formal announcement was a piece of strategy worthy of Sun Tzu himself, however much the supporters of other candidates may try to paint it as a mistake.
Ditto New Hampshire.
Ditto South Carolina, and Florida...
Ditto the NE states, and what might loosely be called 'Dixie'.
Ditto the mid-West, and the mountain states.
I don't think anyone has enough money to campaign in 30 or 35 states right now, but the way all these primaries are compressed this election, that's really what's required right now, or very soon will be.
I think the Republican primaries this year are going to be much more of a marathon than a sprint. Everyone is spending time, money, and associated resources where they feel they have the best leveraged impact.
If any one person had 6 times the money of the second closest competitor, it might be different.
"...disappointing Granite Staters in general..." WTF is this idiot talking about? Who are the "lot of Republicans"? I live in NH. No one but the political junkies give a rat's a** at this stage. This guy is just repeating whatever Carl Cameron @ Fox News spouted.
"...he offended Republican insiders in particular." Yeah, pretty boy Fergus Cullen, NH GOP Chairman. No wonder there was a split in the state party over choosing Fergie for chairman.
LLS
It matters because a large number of its contributors can’t recognize (or, maybe, that’s admit) that whatever he is, Rudy isn’t a conservative.
Another Fred statement out of context. Go find the direct quote, you're spreading misinformation.
How could Fred study their positions? Several of them change positions almost daily. In some cases the other candidates hold multiple positions on the same subject... depending on where they are and who they are talking with. I have heard at least three nuanced immigration answers from rootie... the last being that Illegal Immigration is not illegal.
LLS
According to FOX on debate night, 71% are still undecided !!!
“If your enemy is angry, irritate him”.
LLS
National Review is no longer a conservative magazine. It is becoming in many respects hard to distinguish from the New Republic. It was a movement conservative magazine in the 1960s and even in the 1970s, but it has drifted away from many conservative principles. Some conservatives do write for it, but many are willing to drink the Rudy Kool Aid or trust that Romney is now an authentic conservative, despite the scant evidence. It has become primarily an elitist Northeastern mouthpiece, which looks down its nose at the hinterlands, particularly the south. I canceled my subscription years ago.
I am sure Fred is not sharing his strategy with any folks at NR, especially this fellow(whoever he is). This little preppie thinks it is too late. What a joke. He does not know his history, which most of these pundits do not. There are many examples of candidates hiring staff a lot later and overcoming leads that were more formidable than this. One example is 1996 in Louisiana. Phil Gramm, the Senator from the neighboring state of Texas was far ahead and was the overwhelming favorite. Enter Pat Buchanan, who did not begin assembling a staff until Christmas. He wound up clobbering Gramm in Louisiana on February 6, only 6 weeks later, driving him from the race and propelling himself to strong finishes in Iowa and a win in New Hampshire. And Fred Thompson has a heckuva lot more going for him than Buchanan and a lot more time.
If Fred wins Iowa, which I think is likely, that will probably end it, because the momentum will likely propel him to a win in New Hampshire. Organization is grossly overrated. It does not elect Presidents. It serves as an excuse when someone loses.
Gosh! Fred Thompson is barely in the race officially, and he’s already being attacked just on the conservative side! If Fred does eventually end up as the final GOP Presidential nominee, then he may be so worn out after all of the attacks that he’s continuously getting from all political sides that Hillary Clinton and “socialism” end up as the final victors on November 4, 2008! The entire U.S. could truly be in an even greater “mess” for both the short-term and for the long-term after the ‘08 elections are truly done!
Without a doubt he has "curb appeal." Part of that is he is taller than the other candidates and has a baritone voice. Research has shown taller leaders usually prevail in contests--think George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Deep voices signify strength and, especially, if they have a regional affectation.
Thus far, the Fed Heads seem to be stuck. All they see is he is prolife, claims to want to kick the Mexicans (illegals) back to Mexico. He could be a cyclops as far as they are concerned.
FT's other strength is performance on Paul Harvey radio. His comments and analysis were quite good.
I still see him as seriously flawed--he is a consumate insider's insider in Washington DC and can't raise money. His service in the US Senate was not exceptional and did not validate him as a leader. Finally, although no one is willing to discuss it, this man has an Indolent Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma. He has received chemotherapy and radiation for this and claims (along with his oncologist) no problem in running for President. In actual fact, he has an ongoing cancer even if it is, as described, "indolent." If it is a follicular type that has spread, it is likely he will have an exacerbation within 5-10 years (according to data from a Goggle search) In the meantime, the Fed Heads are quite emotional and prone to ad hominem argumentation. Just proves that Drew Weston's The Political Brain was on target as to the true motivators of the electorate.
Rubbish. Of course he has an organization and that he hasn't stated policies doesn't mean he doesn't have them (hint: he couldn't talk about them before he announced). I don't give a damn if he hasn't studied the other candidates' positions -- I want to hear his.
I apologize for not reading the entire article. Please fill me in:
Is there some kind of “electronic blackout” in place in NH?
No internet, no TV, no phones, etc.?
FRed announced on Leno. I thought Leno was broadcast in ALL 50 States. Fred’s website also had the announcement of his entrance. I thought all 50 states had internet service.
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