Campaign Bickering; Grassroots Organizing

In an Valentine’s Day article in Time Magazine yesterday, Karen Tumulty reported on what appears to be a failing Clinton fund-raising and field team. In a strategy that wasn’t prepared to take Senator Clinton past Super Tuesday, her campaign is now scrambling to fundraise and set up field operations in Texas and Ohio. One striking part of the article read as follows:

“Clinton has shaken up a campaign team whose top rung often seemed to function like the permanent membership of the U.N. Insecurity Council, with each of its often feuding members holding veto power over any move that diverged from his or her plan. Gone is campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle, the former scheduler whose primary qualification seemed to be her long history with the candidate. Some of Clinton’s closest advisers had argued against putting Doyle in such a high-wire role, but it was a characteristic move for a candidate who, like Bush, is known to value personal trust and loyalty above all other virtues.”

I found it striking because of what it means for our grassroots movements. Many of the organizations and movements that I’ve been a part of were (are) completely chaotic. There is infighting. There is bickering. There is a lack of unity on the simplest of issues. Here we had an Establishment campaign that is having minor internal fighting - and its losing. There are certainly other elements of why Clinton is losing, though not having a cohesive campaign team must be one of them. It says wonders about our movements getting their attitudes in better shape and doing what it takes to win.

In article in The Swamp, Mike Dorning outlines what the Obama Campaign has been doing to win - specifically what it took to win in Iowa, but also what it takes to win in other states too (and why he’s ahead of Clinton in many respects):

“It’s an old-fashioned counting system redolent of yesteryear’s precinct walks that rates voters based on personal contact, usually face-to-face meetings or one-on-one conversations over the telephone.

The “ones” are the candidate’s strongest supporters — by Iowa tradition, those who have signed cards pledging to show up on caucus night and back the candidate. The “twos” are supporters who have declared their backing less formally.

Count correctly. Keep adding. If the number rises high enough, the outcome is victory.

That is, if the same army of campaign workers and volunteers that has called, coaxed and cajoled for months also can get those supporters to turn out on a bitter-cold January evening at 1,784 precincts across the state. And if those supporters will stay in place for two hours, standing their ground in front of friends, neighbors and business acquaintances.”

Many people who consider themselves lefitsts don’t do this type of organizing. And to win we’d need to have thousands of communities organized on a longterm basis - not just for a single electoral campaign. They don’t do it for issue-based campaigns, let alone electoral campaigns (even if they aren’t national). We don’t do this in cities and we don’t do it in rural communities. And we wonder why we don’t win? I often am thankful that the Democratic Party didn’t keep a permanent campaign like this going. We’d be in deep shit.