Where did the Campaign go wrong?

[VoteForRonPaul]

(sigh)

This thread is like watching the Hannity and Colmes version of why Ron Paul failed.

How many of you expert pundits are delegates to your state conventions? How many RP delegates are you sending to the national convention?

We have 365 members in our meetup. 20% aren't registered to vote and another 20% are registered Democrat or Independent. 40 of us showed up at our county convention to become delegates.

This means that our RP delegates will not be going to the national convention having lost the recommendation vote 2 to 1 instead of completely dominating the vote by 4 to 1.

If anyone can tell me what TV ads have to do with this pathetic situation, I'm all ears.

I spoke to some RP supporters in Pennsylvania last night. They have no idea when their county convention is or was, nor have any idea what delegates are. They only knew what day their primary is.

You know, that popular vote means everything. If we run a million ads, we'll get all of the votes in the primary.

This information has been available for the entire campaign. We sent out letters in the mail, followed by e-mails. We discussed this strategy for 1/2 a year at our meetings. We saw 40 RP supporters at our convention.

And I KNOW FOR A FACT that our county is not unique in this failure.

Yeah, but it's Kent Snyder's fault. He should have run national ads. THAT would have done the trick.

You insipids who actually believe there was ever a chance that Ron Paul would win the popular vote if campaign HQ would have done this or that used to only cause a chuckle. At this point it's just pathetic. Please find anything else to carp about. for your own sake.

Grassroots raised money and voted in the primaries. A very small minority canvassed, attended rallies and waved signs and an even smaller minority actually got involved in the party to get RP elected.

All of the YT vids violated copyright laws. YT vids could have been handled entirely by Aravoth. If grassroots was serious about production of a national ad campaign, I saw zero viable examples of it. It would have been extremely costly and would have been like pissing on a bonfire in combatting the media blackout.

Ron Paul IS the campaign. He kept a pace that would have sent most of you to the hospital and he kept up that pace for a year. He won the vast majority of straw polls in this country. He amassed the largest grassroots following in history. He shook the establishment to its foundations. He slew the competition in every debate, despite blatant attempts by the organizers of those debates to smear him, marginalize him and limit his time to next to nothing. He won every debate poll but one, in which he placed a close second. He won the support of the majority of active military personnel. He showed the most consistent growth in 2007, despite his complete lack of media face time. He drew the second largest crowds to his rallies of all candidates. He never held back from telling Americans the truth. Despite the media's refusal to report this record breaking campaign, he still did indeed shatter the political record books.

It is we who failed him. We should be sending a 51% majority of unbound delegates to national with the ability to vote for either candidate in the first round. This was the achievable goal that we failed miserably to accomplish. This is the goal that most RP supporters still don't even understand at all.

HQ set and broke records, against all odds. The tiny, tiny, miniscule, loud-mouthed minority of people who have come to this forum every day for the past 1/4 of a year to piss all over the tireless efforts of people like Kent Snyder are the true losers.

Bosso

Thanks for taking the time to right this!
But just to call people losers because they are doing the things that they are comfortable with is not right! You might have a very good communication skills while others might not. People are different.

You said you had 300 people in your group and only 40 should up. And I am telling you the solution in order to increase the chances of wining more active people is to recruit more supporters and more supporters come from the underestimated popular votes. The Ads can help significantly in doing this job. The more people to support Ron Paul the more people will share your group and instead of 40 people to show up 60 will.

The problem is that this terrible campaign management tried to approach the presidential race from the wrong direction. They insanely concentrated their efforts on only one side and it is to win delegates and they forgot that delegates are real people and the more people you have the more delegates you can recruit.

This situation reminded me exactly of the retarded management of Rudy Giuliani's campaign.

First: Rudy was wining polls nation wide

Second: His campaign decided on waiting for a Florida win.

Third: Look what happened.

All this bring me to the conclusion that RP's campaign was a main factor in the problem you are facing right now and the struggle which the message faces too!

Ads can do many great things.

First: At least at leeeeeeeast it is going to give the impression that Ron Paul is still in the race.

Second: Expose Mccain to the public PERIOD. This should be a huge cause and I cannot believe it is ignooooooooooooooooored!

Third: Recruit more fresh supporters. We keep talking that this revolution will not end and that is true but also time we should get out of this campaign with as many people as possible and this presidential race is the biggest opportunity to do so and delegates cannot do this job.

Fourth: Energize the people. Alot of the supporters were turned off because of the lack of experience and intelligence of this campaign.

Fifth: Let the supporters feel that their voices are heard and build some bridges with them. When people donate and they want to see RP's Ads then the campaign should respond positively and not just ignore the people and do whatever in their mind. That is totally terrible! I just do not understand the point. What is wrong with Ads? If the people are willing to pay for it. If the campaign does not have enough money, it should make a new money bomb only for Ads. What forbid this retarded campaign from working on all sides at the same time?

 

[kahless]

I would still like to see a simple breakdown where all that money went.

 

[nbhadja]

There is something called Ads and we the supporters can pay for it. I believe you understand the difference between air time and paid Ads.

I do not think there is anybody can deny the conspiracy against RP but at the same time we cannot ignore the failure of the management of this campaign and if there was another experienced management which was able to coordinate efficiently with the grassroots. The campaign would be in a way much better shape and the message would have reached way more people than it did.

Ads won't do anything if he has no airtime. An ad is just 30 seconds long, and most people change the channel during an add. Even if they see it, that is probably the few times they hear of RP since the MSM ignores him. so they most likely dismiss him as a longshot immediately.

 

[JMann]

The campaign was so caught up in the message it forgot that a campaign is about the candidate.
A candidate that never delivered a prepared speech or bought a tailored suit. No one is going to vote for a president that dresses like he shops at a second hand store and can't speak in a way that people understand him.

The support he got was from the people that like his message but he was never able to broaden that support to people that like him as a person.

If you run for office don't ever buy into the fact that people are voting for you because of what you believe. The masses vote for who they like. If you went to an O! rally and asked his supporters if they, like O!, support Marxist teachings and the New Black Panther Party they would probably say no. They don't care what O! thinks they like him because he is clean and articulate, like Sen Biden said a year or so ago.

It became clear to me during the campaign that Paul is a legislator not an administrator and probably wouldn't of been a very good leader. I was breaking my own rule only to vote for a Governor or someone that has held administrative experience in the private sector to vote for Paul. Now I need Jesse Ventura in the race so we don't have to choose between two senators. We haven't had a senator as president since John F'n Kennedy.

 

[WRellim]

I would still like to see a simple breakdown where all that money went.

Then pay attention.

Here for February's spending: http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=129419

And back here for the MAJORITY of the money ($17M) which was spent way back in the 4th Qtr of 2007: http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=108230


Does THAT explain it?

(BTW there is still probably around $5 Million left, apparently that's the "minimum balance" on the checkbook, because they've always had around $5M on hand since the end of 3rd Qtr.)

 

[klamath]

The fact is that you cannot guarantee this situation to happen even if all the supporters realized this problem. Any other campaign can hire trolls everywhere on the internet and outside and they would claim that they are supporters but they are here and there to interrupt the message and hurt our movement.
You cannot avoid this!

No. not entirely but for those that are new to campaigning and thought and were told this is the way to do it, they need to know better. The worst falacy that was put out was "any news coverage even bad coverage is good." Bad coverage will lose you votes period!
Nothing is guaranteed in campaigns.

 

[VoteForRonPaul]

Ads won't do anything if he has no airtime. An ad is just 30 seconds long, and most people change the channel during an add. Even if they see it, that is probably the few times they hear of RP since the MSM ignores him. so they most likely dismiss him as a longshot immediately.

That is so untrue!
For sometime I used to think that Ads are not so efficient but what I later understood is it the inefficient is our campaign and the lack of understanding of the importance of this tool reflects the lack of the experience.
They always waited for the last two days to advertise and even the strategy of what to show on Ads has been a total failure!
And the supporters used every time to complain while the campaign used every time to ignore them.

An ad is just 30 seconds long

30 seconds can be stretched to 1 hour if you keep repeating it. I do not think this needs alot of thinking to figure out. Somebody said in the same thread that CocaCola company does the same thing. So do you think that CocaCola is wasting their money?

And most people change the channel during an add

Are you sure? Do you have a proof of this?

Even if they see it, that is probably the few times they hear of RP ..........

That is alone is a good thing!

If this campaign got the point of coca cola from the beginning, Ron Paul's name should now be very well known not less than any well known brand name. Until this moment I still meet with people who do not know what the heck Ron Paul is.
The idea about Ads is not about how long it is but it is about how repetitive it is. Once you will repeat an Ad 100 times it will catch with people even if it was too silly one.

 

[JMann]

Ads won't do anything if he has no airtime. An ad is just 30 seconds long, and most people change the channel during an add. Even if they see it, that is probably the few times they hear of RP since the MSM ignores him. so they most likely dismiss him as a longshot immediately.

Yes those ad things on TV are useless. I guess that is why companies like McDonalds and Coca Cola throw away hundreds of millions every year on this unproven advertising in the talking box.

If you buy ads you have a better chance of getting more airtime.

 

[Ozwest]

Look, the young vote in New Hampshire didn't turn out.

You may be young, and committed, but your fellow travellers are too involved with whatever.

Piss weak.

 

[JMann]

Look, the young vote in New Hampshire didn't turn out.

You may be young, and committed, but your fellow travellers are too involved with whatever.

Piss weak.

Any candidate or campaign that puts their hopes in young people isn't a very well run campaign. Not to say young people don't serve a useful purpose but I would hardly put my hopes for the presidency in people pulling bong hits drinking keg beer.

 

[Eric21ND]

He had the backing of the media. The same month he joined the CFR and his article was published in their rag, was the same month he started getting free MSM coverage.

He was a firescreen created to prevent RP from gaining a strong base among evangelicals.

gerry just connected on the sweet spot for a homerun here!

 

[Ozwest]

Any candidate or campaign that puts their hopes in young people isn't a very well run campaign. Not to say young people don't serve a useful purpose but I would hardly put my hopes for the presidency in people pulling bong hits drinking keg beer.

HaHa. Need I say more.

 

[Ozwest]

Any candidate or campaign that puts their hopes in young people isn't a very well run campaign. Not to say young people don't serve a useful purpose but I would hardly put my hopes for the presidency in people pulling bong hits drinking keg beer.

You sound like a person who contributed their "hard earned" to the campaign.

 

[wowabunga]

I don't think we get a "half time" where we are aforded the luxury to sit and ponder the past. Each tick of the clock is time wasted... the stakes are very high... nothing will change the past. Time to make something happen.

I see the challenge as very simple... wake up your neighbors, do a convincing job in the presentation, hand them materials that they can easily copy and the revolution gets another member.

As to HQ... I'm not asking for perfection... but I do demand success.

 

[VoteForRonPaul]

As to HQ... I'm not asking for perfection... but I do demand success.

How about demanding a change

 

[nodope0695]

Huckabee did this very thing during the 4th quarter and he raised basically 1/3 less than RP. Notice how in the 4th quarter Huckabee started getting more media attention...he was paying for a chartered bus just so the media could follow him around the campaign trail.

Huckabee also ran a national ad that actually looked professional, and again, he did it with only 1/3 of the money RP's campaign raised.

"Nuff said there. The RP campaign advisors and management FAILED.

 

[H Roark]

I am sure that the campaign has had its share of blunders for attracting new blood, but I'd have to say that Ron Paul himself dropped the ball on the final CNN debate with Anderson Cooper. This was the last chance at making an appeal to a national audience and it seemed as though RP was content with being on the sideline. I can never forget that debate! It still infuriates me. Nothing FOX News had done in the past to Ron Paul could ever amount to what that pencil neck Cooper did.

 

[VoteForRonPaul]

Each tick of the clock is time wasted...

I have to agree here and therefor we need to send our voices to Ron Paul and demand a change in his campaign staff who are sitting over millions of the grassroots money! Click here

 

[JS4Pat]

I am sure that the campaign has had its share of blunders for attracting new blood, but I'd have to say that Ron Paul himself dropped the ball on the final CNN debate with Anderson Cooper. This was the last chance at making an appeal to a national audience and it seemed as though RP was content with being on the sideline. I can never forget that debate! It still infuriates me. Nothing FOX News had done in the past to Ron Paul could ever amount to what that pencil neck Cooper did.

Agreed - HUGE missed opportunity at such a pivotal point.

I guess he just doesn't have it in him. He's a wonderful, principled statesman and I have enormous respect for him - but he either can't or doesn't want to - do what has to be done to WIN politically in 2008.

I'm inspired and will continue the fight and I owe that to Ron Paul and the people he attracted through this movement. But there is also that feeling of great disappointment that the MOST was not made of this opportunity in 2008.

 

[VoteForRonPaul]

Actually because of the failure of the official campaign America does not see except one!