Elephant Ears

This blog is dedicated to the political happenings in the Valley and Southwest Virginia. As the the name implies, this blog will have posts based on what is heard by this elephant's (GOPer's) ears. It is also a great treat to get while at the county fair or a carnival.

Wednesday, November 16, 2005

Ken's Blunder

I am sure everyone has seen the infamious letter Ken Hutcheson sent to Phil R of the VCG. Its at about 5 blogs. Anyway, NLS has an analysis of the whole situation. He shows how Kilgore's campaign weakness cost us the 32nd and 68th delegate seats.
He has the numbers to back this up. I think we also lost Craddock and Mason as a result of horrible showing in NOVA even though there are not direct numbers to prove that. I do think some candidates could have helped themselves (Craddock and Marrs by shutting up and Black by not sending out plastic fetuses). Even so, you cannot overcome a top of the ticket beatdown like we saw on election night.
As I have said before, I believe we can regain a few of these seats; namely the 32nd 67th and 68th.

posted by GOPHokie @ 2:54 PM  

5 Comments:

  • At 11/16/2005 11:02 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    I think the Kilgore campaign's problem was that they tried to apply the Bush formula, and so did candidates like Craddock and Black and Golden. The thing is, statewide governor's races have little to do with national trends. Some states are comfortbale voting for the opposing party statewdide, but unwilling to in a national election. Look at states like Montana or Wyoming, SOLID red, but with Dem governors. Kilgore ran his campaign the same way he ran Bush's statewide operation. The problem is that Tim Kaine is not John Kerry. Instead of adjusting, Kilgore tried to turn Kaine into Kerry and it clearly did not work. The Kilgore campaign was counting on EVERY Bush voter to vote Kilgore, but too many people liked the job Gov. Warner has done and were not as put off by Kaine as they were by Kerry. Kilgore spent too much time trying to turn Kaine into something, he forgot to get himself over.

     

  • At 11/16/2005 11:08 PM, Blogger GOPHokie said…

    Your analysis certainly holds water. I am just not sure the Kilgore campaign even had a specific plan other than pray for a win.
    Kilgore did not have one single idea. His entire campaign was "Tim Kaine is just too liberal to be governor".
    Bush said he wanted to reform social security through personal accounts. He wanted to make the tax cuts permanent. And he of course touted his national security strengths.
    Kilgore had no plan for anything; and when you want to defeat a de facto incumbent, you need a plan.
    That is why Jerry Kilgore lost.

     

  • At 11/17/2005 6:46 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    You nailed it. The Kilgore Campaign was Kaine is Kerry, and you voted against Kerry, so vote against Kaine! There was no vision, no nothing. I really liked Kilgore, too, but I just keot BEGGING for something.

     

  • At 11/19/2005 10:41 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    gophokie, the kilgore campaign didn't have one single idea?? Where were you all campaign season? No offense, but remember earlier this summer, 10 weeks of Honest Reform? Sure, it was a bit cheesy, and I'm not saying all the ideas were great, but at least Kilgore was out there running on ideas. I think things started going downhill when they turned away the focus on that and instead ran the campaign against Kaine. But to say they had no ideas is just incorrect. They had the ideas, but in the end they decided to not campaign on them...

     

  • At 11/20/2005 1:15 PM, Blogger GOPHokie said…

    Yes I do remember 10 weeks of honest reform, but I don't really remember the issues that he was using. If I forgot those issues, I am guessing most voters did as well. I think you are exactly right though about the campaign being trun against Kaine closer to the election. Had Kilgore run on issues (any issues I might add), he probably would have done much better than he did.

     

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