Republicans working behind the election scenes

WASHINGTON - President Bush says he's focused on his job, not his re-election, but that's not the way it looks at his campaign headquarters in the Washington suburbs.

Working from a nondescript office building in Arlington, Va., Bush's political operatives are quietly building what they hope will be the best campaign organization in history. While Democrats focus on the high-profile task of selecting a presidential nominee, Republicans are preparing for the political equivalent of hand-to-hand combat.

Bush may be sagging in the polls, but his national network of supporters, his record-breaking campaign bankroll and his ability to leverage the power of his office for political gain make him a formidable opponent for any Democratic nominee. Nine months before the November election, Bush is well ahead of previous campaigns in money and organization.

The president has raised more than $144 million for his re-election effort, more than four times the total raised by President Clinton for his 1996 re-election and roughly five times the amount raised so far by Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, the front-runner in this year's Democratic nominating contest. And Kerry's spent most of his already.

Bush's campaign organization is equally impressive. More than three dozen paid campaign workers have been dispatched to 13 key battleground states, where they have lined up campaign leaders in every county and in at least 7,000 voting precincts.

The campaign also boasts 163,000 active volunteers and 6 million e-mail correspondents. About 170 full-time Bush campaign aides work at his re-election headquarters, which opened without fanfare nine months ago.

"We never had an organization in place like we have now. It's unbelievable," said Rep. Candice Miller, R-Mich., who has been involved in the state's politics for 24 years. "The Democrats are getting all the attention. But we are getting ready."

The Republican focus on campaign organization reflects concerns in the White House that Bush is headed for another agonizingly close election.

Top Bush campaign advisers believe most Americans have made up their minds about the president, with only about 10 percent of voters considered truly undecided. That means the election is likely to hinge on which candidate does the best job of getting his supporters to the polls.

In the razor-close 2000 election, the outcome in at least six states was decided by fewer than 8,000 votes. Bush won Florida, the deciding state, by 537 votes. He lost New Mexico to Al Gore by 366.

Although Bush came out on top, his advisers came away from the experience determined to improve their get-out-the-vote operation. Karl Rove, Bush's chief political strategist, was particularly chagrined that as many as 4 million evangelical Christians, a key part of the Republican base, sat out the election, according to his estimates.

In Ohio, Bush's 9- to 12-percentage-point lead in pre-election polls shrank to 3.6 percentage points on Election Day 2000, primarily because Democrats and their labor union allies did a better job of turning out their supporters.

"We just got whupped," said Jason Mauk, a spokesman for the Ohio Republican Party organization. "We realized we needed to improve."

Nearly all of the efforts underway now are aimed at influencing events in the final 72 hours before Election Day. The goal is to make sure that the campaign personally contacts as many Bush supporters as possible.

"2000, if nothing else, demonstrated that organization is important. People realize that turning out 10 of their friends can make a difference," said Scott Stanzel, a Bush campaign spokesman. "You're more likely to go to the polls if your neighbor or friend or co-worker asks you to vote for President Bush than if you see a TV advertisement."

Republicans tested their get-out-the-vote techniques in the 2002 election, with notable success.

In Georgia, more than 3,000 volunteers and paid workers knocked on 150,000 doors in carefully targeted areas. After a pre-election rally with Bush, nine busloads of volunteers fanned out in the heavily Republican Atlanta suburbs to prod voters to the polls. More than 2 million GOP households received telephone reminders about the election.

The work paid off when Republican Sonny Perdue was elected governor and Republican Saxby Chambliss defeated Democratic Sen. Max Cleland.

Of course, voters are likely to see plenty of Bush on television, too. The first campaign ads are ready for broadcast next month, as soon as the Democratic race is settled. The ads portray Bush as a principled, steadfast leader, while casting Kerry as a hypocrite. In a direct shot at the Democratic front-runner, an ad titled, "Unprincipled, Chapter 1," ridicules Kerry's claim that he's an opponent of special interests.

Bush will also ramp up his travel schedule, especially to pivotal swing states. Most of his trips will be heavily subsidized by taxpayers. A formula devised in 1982 allocates costs for election-year travel according to how much time a president spends on official "presidential" business, as opposed to partisan politics.

For example, if Bush spends 25 percent of his day at political events, his campaign would pick up roughly 25 percent of the tab. But that doesn't include the cost of security and other expenses that are considered mandatory for a president.

"Just because it's an election year doesn't mean he stops being president," White House spokesman Scott McClellan said.

One of the easiest ways to get involved in grass-roots politics is through campaign Web sites. President Bush's Web address is www.georgewbush.com. John Kerry's is www.johnkerry.com. John Edwards is www.johnedwards.com. You can also volunteer through the state or national political parties.

What the Republicans know is that the real power of the Democrats will not be brought to bear until they have a candidate nailed down.

Once that's taken care of, America will see one of the most, if not THE most, aggressive and well-funded Democratic campaigns in history.

Already, operating behind the scenes under cover of so-called "campaign finance reform", they have amassed staggering financial resources, and their goal is crystal clear: Get George W. Bush out of the White House, no matter what it takes.

Their hatred of President Bush is visceral and unites them in a way I have never seen, even during the Clinton years. There is also a strong foreign interest in removing Bush, with uncountable millions of dollars in dirty money pouring into Democratic coffers from around the world.

The sheer scale of money and power being aligned against Bush even consigns the contributions of big-money players like George Soros to the realm of rounding error for the "Defeat Bush" budget. There is no doubt about it, this is going to be huge.

The 2004 presidential election will be a battle royale, and probably a more costly and vicious campaign than anything America has ever witnessed.

In spite a non stop attack on our President since this past summer, the latest Rasmussen Poll shows that GW is ahead.

We can't relax, but lets give up this negative bs of when are we going to do something. Good things are being done each day that never get on tv or in the left wing mediot print media.

Re: Bush vs. Kerry: Second Look
To Grampa Dave | 02/23/2004 8:21:23 AM PST sent

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/1083724/posts

Bush vs. Kerry: Second Look
Rasmussen Web Site ^ | 2/23/04 | Rasmussen

Posted on 02/23/2004 8:03:51 AM PST by The_Victor

Survey of 1,000 Likely Voters Feb. 19-20, 2004 Bush vs. Kerry: Second Look

George W. Bush

Conservative 50%
Moderate 34%
Liberal 8%
Not Sure 7%
RasmussenReports.com

John F. Kerry

Conservative 8%
Moderate 39%
Liberal 41%
Not Sure 12%
RasmussenReports.com

Your Taxes if Bush Wins

Go Up 32%
Go Down 16%
Stay the Same 45%
Not Sure 7%
RasmussenReports.com

Your Taxes if Kerry Wins

Go Up 51%
Go Down 10%
Stay the Same 27%
Not Sure 12%
RasmussenReports.com

Who do you THINK will Win?

Bush 51%
Kerry 35%
Not Sure 14%
RasmussenReports.com
February 22, 2004--It's been a month since Massachusetts Senator John Kerry emerged as the Democrats' front-runner.
His string of Primary and Caucus victories have driven all serious challengers but John Edwards from the race... and the Edwards campaign is in the Hail Mary phase. Still, in many ways, voters across the nation know more about who Kerry is not, rather than who he is.

Because he defeated Howard Dean, Kerry was seen as the more moderate Democrat (and the more electable Democrat). Because he is not George W. Bush, he is good enough for most Democrats.

Now, as Kerry seeks to be the man who also vanquished John Edwards, he faces another image make-over. Will Kerry suddenly seem more liberal while defeating his more moderate Southern colleague?

Ultimately, though, John Kerry will be defined for who he is, not who he has defeated to win the nomination. That will happen over the next 60 or 90 days. By Memorial Day, voters will finally have an impression of who John Kerry is is... and that impression will go a long way towards determining how close the election will be in November.

A month ago, we provided a look at voter first impressions of a Bush-Kerry match. Now, a month later, it's interesting to note how public perceptions of John Kerry are already beginning to shift.

* Forty-one percent (41%) of all voters now see John Kerry as politically liberal. That's up from 37% a month ago. Thirty-nine percent (39%) see Kerry as a moderate, unchanged from a month ago.

* Liberal voters continue to see Kerry as a moderate (59% of self-identified liberals have this view). Only 23% of liberal voters see Kerry as politically liberal. That has not changed in a month.

* Fifty-one percent (51%) of American voters now believe their own taxes will go up if John Kerry is elected President. That's an increase of six percentage points from a month ago.

* A month ago, just 37% of political moderates believed that John Kerry's election would increase their taxes. That figure has jumped to 55% today.

* Among those who identify themselves as somewhat conservative, 63% now believe a Kerry win would lead to a tax increase. That's up from 57% a month ago.

* By comparison, 50% of voters see the President as politically conservative. Thirty-four percent (34%) see Bush as a moderate.

* While two-thirds of liberal voters see Bush as conservative, conservative voters remain divided. Just 49% of all conservatives see the President as one of them. The good news for the President is that figure is up from 46% a month ago.

* If George W. Bush is elected, 32% of all voters expect their taxes to go up while only 16% expect their taxes to decline. A month ago, those figures were 34% and 15% respectively.

* Regardless of who they want to win, 51% of all voters believe George W. Bush will be re-elected. That's down from 55% a month ago. Thirty-five percent (35%) now believe Kerry will win, up from 30% a month ago.

The national telephone survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted by Rasmussen Reports February 19-20, 2004. The margin of sampling error for the survey is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. (see Methodology)

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