North Carolina - Candidate Messaging During an Uphill Climb

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Wednesday November 05, 2014 · 11:40 AM PST

2014/11/05 · 11:40

Jan 27, 2009 - Washington, DC, United States - Sen. KAY R. HAGAN  (Newscom TagID: zumawirewestphotos815374)     [Photo via Newscom]

Oh what a sad day it is today to be in ole NC. The sun is out and its in the 70's here in southern NC, so you can't be to sad. But man what a bloodbath the election night of 2014 was. Could it have been better? I don't know. We all knew that it was going to be an uphill climb from the beginning so I don't know if the outcome was just inevitable. What I do know is that Democrats have terrible messaging and the North Carolina Senate race was no different.

1) The GOTV seemed to be running on all cylinders but in the end I think there was just to much of a hill to climb. In 2010 2.6 million folks voted and it looks like in 2014 2.7 million folks voted. The difference of a 100,000 folks just isn't enough in a State thats Purple with a Red Hue. I also believe the Hagan campaign seemed to only care about trying to run the vote totals up in the urban and suburban areas while hoping that the rural areas wouldn't see an increase in Republican turnout. That seems to have been the fatal flaw. Its nice to garner an extra 2-3% in the cities but if you loose every rural area by 5-6% more than in 2010 then you are looking at a night like last night

follow over the fold

2) Messaging.......What is it with Democratic candidates and terrible messaging. I voted for Hagan, but I can't for the life of me figure out what those reasons were beyond the fact that Thom Tillis is a wacko....You can not win elections by telling folks to vote for you because your not the other guy. You have to give them something to vote for, not against. I realize that you have to try to define your opponent so you run negative adds to define them in the worse way. But where I think the Hagan camp missed was that they didn't try and DEFINE HER. I can't remember one add that told me what her accomplishments were as a sitting Senator. Not one. So basically her adds defined him and his adds defined her, and the voter was left with 2 crappy looking candidates. The problem lies in the fact that what Democrats see as a negative in a Republican candidate is a positive for that said Republican candidate in the eyes of a Republican voter. Which brings me to:

3)Republicans vote for Republican candidates because those candidates say and vote and push through legislation that the Republican voter wants. Thom Tillis was the Speaker of the House when a bunch of archaic voting laws, abortion laws, fracking and tax payer clean up for spills laws were passed. The right eats that shit up. It motivates them to vote. Democrats trying to scare Democrats into voting based on Republicans doing work and passing legislation only fuels the rights fire and has us on the other side wondering why our elected officials can't ever seem to do anything. You want to motivate Democrats.....tell me what you are doing with my vote. I voted for Hagan 6 years ago to go to Washington and work....get some stuff done. Did she get stuff done? I wouldn't have any idea if I listened to her. Now if I look up her record. She voted for the Immigration Reform Bill, she voted for ACA, she Voted for Presidential nominees etc. I can't remember one add where she ran on her record. Not one. So the Hagan camp basically said vote for me ( I can't tell you why) because a vote for the other guy will get you a bunch of bad policies (policies Republicans love)

And we wonder why our side can't seem to win elections in the mid terms. This isn't rocket science, its political science. It ain't that hard. Go to Washington, vote your conscience, come back and relay the great things you are doing for your constituents and stand by your record. If you can't at least do that, then what the hell did I elect you for...........

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