Tue
May 30 2006
11:31 am
Election Watch: Harold Ford
By: Andy Axel

In the article entitled "Can Ford Win," Democratic strategists place key emphasis on the importance of losing East Tennessee by slim margins:

From native Tennessean Al Gore – who lost his last statewide race and therefore the presidency in 2000 – to Tennessee implant Gov. Phil Bredesen – who won his in 2002 – Democrats wooing a statewide vote have had to balance winning by large margins in traditionally liberal urban centers with picking off just enough votes in the more expansive rural regions of the state. Loosely translated, the strategy comes down to don’t lose East Tennessee by too much.

“The conventional wisdom has always been that for Democrats to win statewide, they have to come out of East Tennessee within 50,000 votes,” Tennessee Democratic Party spokesman Mark Brown said.

That's roughly the population of Johnson City (or a little less than half of Neyland Stadium at capacity).

While it sounds like the Ford campaign isn't conceding East Tennessee for the moment, it sure sounds like the operative phrase here is not "win." Without reading between the lines here, you can see that their strategy basically discounts a full 1/3 of the state before the race begins.

I am pleased that Ford feels so confident at this point -- and apparently the talk around the cocktail weenie tables in DC is that Ford is all but a lock -- but I am really not so sure that the picture on the ground is all that sunny in the rest of the state. We'll see how the get-out-the-vote effort winds up in the next few months.

How about, over the next few years, that Ford and his cohorts commit to actually building a functional grassroots organization in East Tennessee which can help deliver some local wins?

This has a few fringe benefits, as I see it... (1) it will help with other Democratic campaigns, (2) it will help build party self-ID, and (3) it'll unstick that charge of "out of touch."

Well, that, and start voting in Congress like you give a crap about everyday needs of everyday people. That's my biggest beef with HFJ. GOP consultants talk about Ford's voting record as it's some sort of liability for him, when in actuality, it's fairly apparent that he's been voting in lockstep with the ever-triangulating Blue Dog coalition. Take his position on the credit card/bankruptcy "reform" bill; even though he claims that he opposed it, he voted in favor of it because there weren't enough votes to stop it. Why? Well, to build his conservative bona fides, of course. At the expense of what? Well, I guess we'll see how much excitement he'll be able to generate with the Democratic base with that record.

Me, I think that the fastest way to turn people off is to treat their support as some sort of ATM which only functions every couple of years. There's an infrastructure that's missing, and perhaps we can start seeing some strategies which address this fundamental issue. It might take a bit of "unconventional wisdom" to get the train back on the tracks here at home.

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Old Hickory's picture

It's Ford's Race to Lose

Submitted by Old Hickory (not verified) on Tue, 2006/05/30 - 5:25pm.

Convention wisdom in Republican Circles assess the race as junior's to lose.

The three things which will cause junior to lose the Senate race:

1.  Too much time raising money in New York and Washington, yes he's got to raise the money but the fundraiser with Hillary Clinton and the associated connotations will motivate bubba in Dyersburg and roy in South Pittsburgh to vote and it won't be for a candidate toting water for Hillary Clinton.

2.  Tension with Bredesen.  There is some degree of political tension between junior and Guv Bred.  They rarely appear on the same speaking program/dinner togather.  Perhaps the Bredesen tension is with the Ford family in general, however, the friction is obvious and to the middle of the road swing vote which pulled the Bredesen lever in '02 and will again in '06, junior needs that vote much more than Bredesen.

3.  Vicious replies from the Fords regarding their own political troubles.  E-Cycle Ford goes on trial in October about the time early voting for the Senate seat begins.  Dead vote Ford has legal proceedings pending and has been tossed by the State Senate but the federal judge has slowed the process down considerably.  The vicious statements made by the Ford's regarding their sitations, particularly with the amount of proof pending regarding cash pay offs, bribes, threats, dead people voting, voter fraud does nothing but cause unease with the middle of the road swing votes that he'll need to win.

Right now junior is more appealing to conservative republicans than to the middle of the road swing voters.  misplaced focus, bad bait, not sure.

But when you see junior fishing in one of the many beautiful lakes in East Tennessee or perched in a deer stand in rural west tennesse or spitting tobacco at the country store in Lynchburg, you'll know the race is over and the Republicans can retool for 2012.

LeftWingCracker's picture

Tension between Ford & the Guv

Submitted by LeftWingCracker on Tue, 2006/05/30 - 8:39pm.

When Bredesen spoke at Kennedy Day, he gave an impassioned plea (well, as close as he can get) for all of Shelby County to go overtime, if need be, to elect Junior to the Senate.

 What tension there is dates back four years ago when Bredesen, in his victory speech, credited Memphis Mayor Willie Herenton for his Shelby County landslide, when the Mayor's crew did very little compared to the Ford crew, led by Harold SENIOR, who had returned from Florida to run operations in Big Shelby.  The Ford folks were ENRAGED, and that rage was only exacerbated when the Mayor showed up on the stage with Lamar Alexander that same night.

 The Guv later, as I understand it, gave a private, yet PROFUSE apology to both SENIOR and Junior for the gaffe.  Herenton's people, while nice folks, haven't really gotten anybody elected other than the Mayor himself and maybe one or two County Commissioners, but that was this year.

 This is why the Gov is making nice-nice wherever and whenever possible.

Andy Axel's picture

1. Too much time raising

Submitted by Andy Axel on Tue, 2006/05/30 - 11:48pm.

1. Too much time raising money in New York and Washington, yes he's got to raise the money but the fundraiser with Hillary Clinton and the associated connotations will motivate bubba in Dyersburg and roy in South Pittsburgh to vote and it won't be for a candidate toting water for Hillary Clinton.

Oh, B.S. Big money fundraising efforts aren't meant to motivate Bubba and Roy. They're meant to motivate big numbers in big media markets.

2. Tension with Bredesen. There is some degree of political tension between junior and Guv Bred. They rarely appear on the same speaking program/dinner togather. Perhaps the Bredesen tension is with the Ford family in general, however, the friction is obvious and to the middle of the road swing vote which pulled the Bredesen lever in '02 and will again in '06, junior needs that vote much more than Bredesen.

If anything, Ford would need Bredesen more than Bredesen would need Ford, but I think this is essentially a push. Campaigns for national office don't necessarily cross-pollinate with state-wide offices. And while Bredesen has been popular, he's been more popular with Republicans statewide. Ford has never run state-wide.

Put another way: Bredesen runs in Nashville circles. Ford runs in DC circles. Their calendars just don't mesh. Bredesen didn't appear all that much with Clement, either, nor with Jim Cooper or Bart Gordon or Lincoln Davis. I have, however, seen them all on convivial terms together at one time or another. Ford & Bredesen were both delegates to the Democratic National Convention -- Bredesen committed Kerry's slate of electors at the convention and Ford was Kerry's national campaign co-chair.

3. Vicious replies from the Fords regarding their own political troubles. E-Cycle Ford goes on trial in October about the time early voting for the Senate seat begins. Dead vote Ford has legal proceedings pending and has been tossed by the State Senate but the federal judge has slowed the process down considerably. The vicious statements made by the Ford's regarding their sitations, particularly with the amount of proof pending regarding cash pay offs, bribes, threats, dead people voting, voter fraud does nothing but cause unease with the middle of the road swing votes that he'll need to win.

I agree somewhat. HFJ needs a better response. But a lot of people in Tennessee understand the "drunk uncle" situation -- he needs to focus on that angle more. Ford's problem is that his relatives show their ass on a bigger stage than Uncle Jim getting sloppy at the family reunion.

____________________________

Wasabi peas are people! They're people!

Old Hickory's picture

NYTimes Coverage of Ford Campaign

Submitted by Old Hickory (not verified) on Wed, 2006/05/31 - 11:34am.

NYTimes had a nice piece on the junior campaign.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/31/us/31tennessee.html

Big Willie supported Frist in 1994 and again in 2000, nobody from the Republican tree of three has realized the opportunity to cash in on some votes there.  Herenton can't support Ford, there's no future in that relationship. 

What killed Al Gore in Tennessee was that Al Gore forgot what Tennessee was, is, and should be. Missed the issues completely, couldn't figure out what was important to Tennesseeans until it was too late. Granted junior will have more time and more availability to campaign throughout Tennessee, let's see if he's able to avoid the mistakes Al made every step of the way.

There are a lot of similarities in the backgrounds of Al Gore and Ford junior, let's see if junior can take the track less traveled by West Tennessee democrats.

 

Andy Axel's picture

Al Gore and the Big Lie

Submitted by Andy Axel on Wed, 2006/05/31 - 12:13pm.

What killed Al Gore in Tennessee was that Al Gore forgot what Tennessee was, is, and should be. Missed the issues completely, couldn't figure out what was important to Tennesseeans until it was too late. Granted junior will have more time and more availability to campaign throughout Tennessee, let's see if he's able to avoid the mistakes Al made every step of the way.

Al Gore's "problem" was largely an invention of the media.

"Farmer Al" -- (link...)

"Invented the Internet" -- (link...)

"Love Canal" -- (link...)

"Love Story" -- (link...)

The Dowdification of Gore -- (link...)

"earth tones" -- (link...)

Gore & Bible prophecy -- (link...)

The Buddhist temple in a teapot -- (link...)

Merciless, relentless lies.

____________________________

Wasabi peas are people! They're people!

R. Neal's picture

All true, but he didn't

Submitted by R. Neal on Wed, 2006/05/31 - 12:16pm.

All true, but he didn't campaign much here. Don't know if he wrote us off or took us for granted.

Andy Axel's picture

Yeah, I was here.

Submitted by Andy Axel on Wed, 2006/05/31 - 2:03pm.

Yeah, I was here in 2000. I noticed.

Let's not forget the whole dishonest "Gore-Free Tennessee" campaign, while we're at it. That was a home-grown effort that dovetailed nicely with the Mighty Wurlitzer dedicated to fabricating this image of Gore as an inveterate liar, a smug apple-polishing schoolboy, and a DC elitist. The narrative was Gore as "fake," "phony," "stiff," "humorless," "dishonest," "liar," "pathological," or what have you. And supposedly Bush was "the guy you wanted to go have a beer with."

The relentless hammering on his character and the constant stream of lies out of the national media (not to mention those emanating from Ralph Nader's camp *) didn't help. (I even tried to convince some people in the DC bubble that things weren't as rosy as the internal tracking polls might have indicated. They were predicting an 8 point win for Gore in Oct. 2000.)

Look, I'm not making excuses for the Gore campaign. There were a lot of things that went wrong, and looking for a single theory to explain it all is like picking gnat shit out of pepper. But not all of the blame can be hung on Gore himself. Fact remains, (a) Presidential candidates typically pull their home states (hell, even Mondale and Dukakis both managed that feat), and (b) Gore's history in statewide elections was pretty good, winning by huge spreads.

We can fairly well conclude that Gore's campaign ran into some significant roadblocks (which Kerry solemnly repeated on the "sage advice" of many of the same losing consultants), but ask yourself -- do you think that was out of some sincere belief that Tennessee or that the concerns of Tennesseans no longer mattered?

* I'll admit I was taken in by that. But a lot has happened since 2000, and with the benefit of hindsight, I solidly recant having done so. The first hint was when Nader started popping up in Grover Norquist's circles, to be perfectly frank.

I made a big mistake there, and it's not one that I care to repeat.

It starts, I believe, with an honest re-assessment of what the hell went down in the year 2000.

____________________________

Wasabi peas are people! They're people!

R. Neal's picture

The front page of today's

Submitted by R. Neal on Tue, 2006/05/30 - 7:06pm.

The front page of today's KNS has an article headlined "Ford Too Liberal" according to the three GOP candidates. Man, if Ford is their idea of "liberal" that's a scary thought. In the article Ford explains earlier votes in his career back when he was a Democrat by saying he has grown up since then. He also says he isn't a liberal or a conservative, but instead a "patriot".

(link...)

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