Posted on 04/12/2010 1:52:19 PM PDT by iowamark
Another campaign manager for Gov. Chet Culver announced Monday she is quitting, leaving the Democrat's re-election effort to a veteran Iowa Democratic activist.
Abby Curran said she would leave at the end of April, only four months after she was hired to manage Culver's campaign for a second term. Her departure continues a tumultuous period for Culver, who has gone through two campaign managers and two interim managers in the past year...
She will be replaced by Donn Stanley, who has long worked for Iowa Attorney General Tom Miller.
The campaign upheaval comes at a time when polls show Culver's popularity has sagged, a trend most believe is due to Iowa's sluggish economy, relatively high unemployment and government cutbacks blamed on plunging tax revenues. Those polls have shown him behind two potential Republican candidates — former Gov. Terry Branstad and businessman Bob Vander Plaats. He leads the third Republican seeking the nomination, state Rep. Rod Roberts...
Drake University political science professor Dennis Goldford said fairly or not, the news out of Culver's campaign has created a "sort of sense of rats deserting the ship" image.
"The question is whether the governor knows something we don't or they don't know something everybody else knows — that he's in big trouble," said Goldford.
Senate Majority Leader Michael Gronstal, D-Council Bluffs, dismissed the worries, saying campaign shake-ups are normal. He noted former Democratic Gov. Tom Vilsack also made repeated changes to his campaign but still was elected to two terms before opting not to seek re-election as governor.
"Tom Vilsack went through three campaign managers in a month," said Gronstal. "It's a matter of finding a person who is the right fit with the campaign."...
(Excerpt) Read more at siouxcityjournal.com ...
Another rotation of the revolving Culver door
As if the latest poll numbers and national pronouncements of doom for Chet Culver’s chances for holding on to the governor’s job weren’t bad enough, there’s another internal shake-up. Culver’s campaign manager, Abby Curran, has just announced she’s leaving. The press release she wrote has her moving to Washington D.C. to “pursue new opportunities and be closer to her family.” Most of us know that old cliche as code for troubles a-brewing.
And there are real troubles for Culver. In six months, he’s lost two campaign managers, a deputy campaign manager and a campaign finance director. Even Bob Vander Plaats is seen as capable of beating him, let along Terry Branstad who, as predictions go, could take him to the cleaners....
What Culver really needs to be doing is getting out there and defining the differences in Republican and Democratic philosophies, why we don’t need more tax cuts for big corporations, why regulation is necessary to protect the environment and the little guy, and why government spending is necessary to protect the vulnerable, safeguard public education, etc. etc.What he doesn’t need to be doing is trying to woo on-the-fencers by being Republican lite.
Bottom line: No campaign manager can replace what the governor needs to do himself. And that’s to stand up for the values he was elected to represent.
Yeah, I'm sure that message will get traction this year. Right. Ugh.
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