"Blowback" from Rand's Time cover....loss of (some) crossover Democrats

jmdrake

jmdrake

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Hi all. As some of you may know last go round I got between 8 and 10 of my family members to promise me they'd vote for Ron in the primary despite the fact that they are Democrats. Well one of them (I won't mention which) asked me if I had read the recent Rand Time article. (Sadly enough I haven't). She said "It seems the Republicans have gotten to him. I figured that had to happen since they are pushing him so much." Well I didn't argue since I hadn't (haven't) read the article. Of course from our perspective it seems Rand's being slammed by the establishment, though not as bad as Ron.

Anyway, I know this doesn't matter in the big picture. We missed an opportunity to get more crossover Democrats to help Ron in 2012. I stand by that as a missed opportunity because Obama was running uncontested. (That was my main pitch.) If everybody had convinced even 2 to 4 of their Democratic friends to crossover Ron might be president today.

2016 will be a contested Democratic primary so the "Why throw away your vote for Obama when he's going to win the primary anyway" pitch will not work. (Note there were some Democrats who wouldn't vote for Ron because they rightly perceived he had the better chance of beating Obama.) And with Rand seeming more appealing to Republicans, he'll be less appealing to crossover Democrats. I don't think that will affect him in the primary, and hopefully in the generally election he can make Hillary look so freakishly hawkish that crossover Democrats that didn't vote for him in the primary will vote for him in the general.
 
I'm pretty sure that a candidate who can actually appeal to Republican voters has a much better chance to win the GOP nomination than a candidate who has to rely on Democrats crossing over to vote for him.
 
Traditional Conservative said:
I'm pretty sure that a candidate who can actually appeal to Republican voters has a much better chance to win the GOP nomination than a candidate who has to rely on Democrats crossing over to vote for him.
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Yeah, that's the reality... one first has to win a Republican nomination :o
 
Why, yes, Ron Paul did do a wonderful job of threatening the 'divide and conquer game' of the powers that be. Hopefully Rand will be able to do a good enough job of that, though I do hope it doesn't happen until after he secures the nomination.
 
Traditional Conservative said:
I'm pretty sure that a candidate who can actually appeal to Republican voters has a much better chance to win the GOP nomination than a candidate who has to rely on Democrats crossing over to vote for him.
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Of course. And like I said, in this race crossover voters are less likely to be a factor. In 2012 they could have been.

Matt Collins said:
Yeah, that's the reality... one first has to win a Republican nomination :o
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True. But a mistake of 2012, that the campaign will never admit, is that the "only concentrate on likely republican voters" didn't play to Ron's strength. Ron's strength was his crossover appeal. I don't know who besides me actually tried to play to it, but I had much more success with that personally than I did following the campaign playbook. But again, 2016 will be different. The democratic primary will be contested. And frankly if my democrat friends just vote against Hillary in the primary they will be doing us all a favor. I think Rand can beat her hands down, but I don't want that evil woman anywhere near the presidency. Her winning might be enough to make me want to take a permanent call as a foreign missionary.
 
jmdrake said:
True. But a mistake of 2012, that the campaign will never admit, is that the "only concentrate on likely republican voters" didn't play to Ron's strength. Ron's strength was his crossover appeal. I don't know who besides me actually tried to play to it, but I had much more success with that personally than I did following the campaign playbook.
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Little known fact that I can now say, but there was actually polling done to see about the viability of crossover voting. Essentially it was discovered that trying to move Democrats to the GOP to vote for Ron in the primary was not possible any more than moving Republicans over to the Democrat Party to vote for Kucinich in the primary would've been.
 
Matt Collins said:
Little known fact that I can now say, but there was actually polling done to see about the viability of crossover voting. Essentially it was discovered that trying to move Democrats to the GOP to vote for Ron in the primary was not possible any more than moving Republicans over to the Democrat Party to vote for Kucinich in the primary would've been.
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Again, I have personal experience that shows otherwise. The ultimate "polling" is that the strategy tried in 2012 didn't work. Also your "Kucinich" examples shows how backwards your thinking is on this. No republican I know likes Dennis Kucinich. I've run into plenty of Democrats who like Ron Paul. Some of them were persuaded to cross over. It's a matter of connecting with people you know and making the pitch. Anyway, like I said, it's not viable in 2016 because the Democratic primary is contested. Oh, and if your polling came from Rassmussen, I don't trust it.
 
John -

Let me also say that I think Rand is making HUGE strides in getting traditional Democrat voters to at least consider voting for him, but not in the primary, in the general. In fact Rand is doing much better at that than Ron did. I mean the NAACP has invited Rand to their events multiple times. Ron never got those invitations AFAIK.
 
Matt Collins said:
Not trying to be an ass, but I believe this explanation fits:
https://yourlogicalfallacyis.com/anecdotal
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Not to be an ass back, but I believe this explanation fits your fallacy.

https://www.google.com/#q=poll+selection+bias

Your "poll", which you haven't linked to and at this point is just "anecdotal", couldn't have taken into account the human factor. Calling up some random democrat and asking "Would you be willing to cross over and vote for Ron Paul" is not the same as personal interaction between people that know each other.

The problem was messaging, not ground game to be honest.
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Ummm...that's what I'm saying. The messaging didn't fit the voters you were trying to reach. "Likely republican voters" in South Carolina booed Ron Paul when he quoted Jesus with regards to foreign policy. The "ground game" was all about trying to win those voters over. It was impossible.

It didn't.
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Well I still don't trust your poll.
 
Matt Collins said:
John -

Let me also say that I think Rand is making HUGE strides in getting traditional Democrat voters to at least consider voting for him, but not in the primary, in the general. In fact Rand is doing much better at that than Ron did. I mean the NAACP has invited Rand to their events multiple times. Ron never got those invitations AFAIK.
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Of course. And in 2012 they might have voted for him in the primary. But since 2016 will be contested in both parties, that won't happen. That said, if the democrats run someone that expressed views closer to Ron Paul on foreign policy, like a Dennis Kucinich, then I don't think Rand will pull many of them in the general election. Rand's best hope is that Hillary Clinton wins the democratic nomination, as much as it pains me to think of her that close to the presidency.

People can either listen to what those of us who have democratic friends that either voted for Ron Paul in 2012 or thought about it have to say about how these same people view Rand or we can be ignored. I'm used to being right and being ignored. ;) For the record, Ron got an invitation to the 2007 NAACP convention, along with the other GOP presidential hopefuls, but he did not attend. Only Tom Tancredo attended that. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Republican_Party_presidential_debates,_2008 Ron did participate in Tavis Smileys' presidential debate and that got him a big boost in the black community. I know Rand has to walk a fine line of foreign policy to win the GOP nomination. I'm pointing out the potential fallout over that. Maybe Rand can make up the ground on domestic issues like the REDEEM act. It would be good for him to take that message to Chicago.
 
jmdrake said:
Not to be an ass back, but I believe this explanation fits your fallacy.

https://www.google.com/#q=poll+selection+bias

Your "poll", which you haven't linked to and at this point is just "anecdotal", couldn't have taken into account the human factor.
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I am not privy to the details, but I do know that a poll of this nature was conducted.


jmdrake said:
Calling up some random democrat and asking "Would you be willing to cross over and vote for Ron Paul" is not the same as personal interaction between people that know each other.
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But that's how winning an election happens... mass wholesale politics (except in New Hampshire). It's all about mass direct marketing.



jmdrake said:
Ummm...that's what I'm saying. The messaging didn't fit the voters you were trying to reach. "Likely republican voters" in South Carolina booed Ron Paul when he quoted Jesus with regards to foreign policy. The "ground game" was all about trying to win those voters over. It was impossible.
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SC was not a winnable state with Ron's narrative and message.
 
Matt Collins said:
I am not privy to the details, but I do know that a poll of this nature was conducted.
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And without the details of the poll it's impossible to draw the kind of far reaching conclusions you make.

But that's how winning an election happens... mass wholesale politics (except in New Hampshire). It's all about mass direct marketing.
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Okay. Remind me to ignore the campaign next time when it calls for volunteers to do phone banking and door knocking. After all that's not mass direct marketing.

SC was not a winnable state with Ron's narrative and message.
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South Carolina wasn't the only state where Ron ran into the "narrative message" problem. You can brush this off as "anecdotal" but many Republicans that I talked to in 2008 and 2012 just couldn't get past the idea that maybe Iraq wasn't a good idea after all. Many rank and file Republicans are under the delusion that we didn't have a better result in Iran and Afghanistan because we were just "too soft". For instance a neighbor was telling me about the movie "Sole survivor" which recounts the story of a Navy SEAL unit that got decimated by the Taliban after they (the SEALs) released a goat herder and his son. My neighbors words? "Well of course they had to let the man and his son go because the liberal media would have crucified him." And this neighbor of mine goes to church every Sunday! How do you reason with someone like that?
 
jmdrake said:
And without the details of the poll it's impossible to draw the kind of far reaching conclusions you make.
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The people that ran the poll knew what they are doing.



jmdrake said:
Okay. Remind me to ignore the campaign next time when it calls for volunteers to do phone banking and door knocking. After all that's not mass direct marketing.
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Voters must be indetified, and then they must be segmented and targeted based on geography and issues that matter to them.



jmdrake said:
South Carolina wasn't the only state where Ron ran into the "narrative message" problem. You can brush this off as "anecdotal" but many Republicans that I talked to in 2008 and 2012 just couldn't get past the idea that maybe Iraq wasn't a good idea after all. And this neighbor of mine goes to church every Sunday! How do you reason with someone like that?
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Oh I completely understand and agree. The objective of any campaign isn't to try and change hearts and minds, that's a sure way to not get elected. Candidates have to shape their rhetoric (as Rand does) in order to not offend their audience. So the conclusion? It was impossible for Ron to win with his messaging and platform at that time to that audience.
 
Matt Collins said:
The people that ran the poll knew what they are doing.
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I didn't say they didn't. But without actually knowing the questions posed and how they were written, it's impossible to draw any sweeping conclusions.

Voters must be indetified, and then they must be segmented and targeted based on geography and issues that matter to them.
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Yeah. And I identified segmented targeted voters with issues that mattered to them and had about a 50% conversion rate. That could have been replicated elsewhere.

Oh I completely understand and agree. The objective of any campaign isn't to try and change hearts and minds, that's a sure way to not get elected. Candidates have to shape their rhetoric (as Rand does) in order to not offend their audience. So the conclusion? It was impossible for Ron to win with his messaging and platform at that time to that audience.
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Uh huh. Only two possible options. Expand the audience (my approach as an individual) or keep trying an approach that people had to know wasn't going to work with the target audience (what the campaign did). To top it off the secret weapon was a "delegate strategy" that never really had a prayer. But again, water under the bridge.
 
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