David Sirota would probably like to think his column, Measuring Electoral Success, adds to our understanding of how to advance the progressive agenda but it seems to serve basically as an apology for outside support of Tom Geoghegan's candidacy in the IL-05 special election.
Sirota writes:
There is a value in backing long shots, even if those long shots lose. In Geoghegan's case, many progressives supported someone who has been an important voice on so many issues, and who has had the courage to fight the good fight.
Dealing with multiple obligations and volunteered tasks, haven't had the time to write here as much as I'd like. I posted my counter-predictions to Russ Stewart on Gapers Block, which Sandra saw. I feel pretty good about that analysis in hindsight, spot-on on winning %, ## the minor candidates would pull, the race being Fritchey v. Quigley, and how Quigley could win. I also believe that my belief about higher turnout than expected was validated; some here predicted low 30s, the Quigley camp's estimate was highest at 35,000-45,000, but in reality Democratic turnout was almost 55,000.
Wanted to share some insights from the Quigley camp (one of the cool things about a 12-person race, the victory parties have high ratio of good conversations).
While Tom Geoghegan held a special place in our hearts, we are pleased and excited by our next most favorite candidate, Mike Quigley's primary and expected general election win. We will be sorry to see Mike leave his yeoman work at the Cook County board, but we look forward to eventually replacing him with a new reformist progressive. Best wishes and good luck, Mike.
I owe Quigley this. I haven't found the time to post here much anymore, or pound the pavement. I like the G-man's positions quite a bit, but Quigley has always been there for us. He has always made the time for our meetings, no matter the size. And he has been fighting the good fight, one of the first ones to do so, in a place that didn't get the press you'd want to prepare a run for higher office back then. Besides, actually serving leaves you with some unpopular votes for your opponents to make an issue of later, as we've seen play out.
As the race comes down to the last weekend, and the candidates are fighting several predictors of a low turn-out, they are doing everything they can to micro-target bases they think will turn out for them.
Abdon Pallasch of the Chicago Sun-Times shows how two candidates might be breaking through:
Feigenholtz turns to her staffers, who are also laughing and one says, "You aren't the name on our list."
The Pallasch household has gotten at least five fliers from Feigenholtz in recent weeks, but all addressed to the woman of the house. Feigenholtz has surgically targetted women voters in her campaign. If she can just get all the women in the district to vote for her in a 12-candidate race with 10 male candidates, that's certain victory.
For most campaigns, today (Friday) marks the end of the persuasion/identification phase of the campaign and begins the mobilization phase. All the indicators available to me suggest that this race ends pretty much where it began. There has been very little movement in the race, in part because no campaign seems to have broken out of the mold, and the short time frame was diminished by the major media's virtual black-out on the race. (The New York Times has given more coverage of the special election in Buffalo than the local papers combined.) So I won't be at all surprised if this race concludes just as it began where the first benchmark polls had it.
But this special election tests some prominent theories about what is effective in campaigns and elections. Each of the major campaigns (and more than one of the second tier campaigns) have pursued a different emphasis among the basket of tactics available to campaigns. The Feigenholtz campaign has gambled on television driving turnout (or lack thereof). The Quigley campaign has put all it's eggs in the direct mail basket. The Fritchey campaign has blanketed the district with signs -- and I've seen more large signs than yard signs on his behalf. The Geoghegan campaign is counting on the netroots. The Forys campaign is betting that microtargeting ethnics will prove decisive. O'Connor seems to be betting that he has tight control over his ward (and a neighboring one), and that his ward organization is sufficient to pull out victory.
Because everyone has been knocking on doors and running their phone banks, these tactics seem to be what separates the campaigns in this special election. One of them will win on Tuesday (although I'm not counting on that fact necessarily being known on Tuesday -- or even Wednesday). What I do think is that we are going to be surprised. I have severe doubts that the most obvious choice will wind up the winner. That may depend on who you think is the obvious choice.
Charlie Wheelan was the last candidate to participate in this series. After a little bit of confusion about schedule, I went into a very wet Chicago to talk to the author of "Naked Economics."
When I walked into their headquarters at noon, they had 15-20 young people -- I'd guess college age -- at their computers entering data into the VAN. Other people were on the phones. An interesting environment, a serious, almost professional. People busy doing their work. Here was a campaign office with volunteers almost entirely in their 20s (perhaps a few teens) and there was none of the chatter, none of the good-natured conversation going on that I could hear. They were serious about why they were there.
Again, I would compliment the candidates I interviewed in this race. Bright, ambitious, serious people who've given a lot of thought about why they were running for Congress and what they wanted to do if they were elected. It's hard for me not to think that those who didn't choose to participate in this series were less so. Everyone had the questions in advance. They weren't difficult questions. But I've seen in the past that there are a lot of candidates running for Congress who can't answer even these basic questions. I look at these interviews as an opportunity for campaigns to get their message out. But they may not all see it that way.
One of the most interesting facets of this particular race is all the talent in the room, so to speak. One of the female candidates, Jan Donatelli, is impressing the people she meets and when you listen to her, you can see why.
I visited campaign offices for all the candidates I've been in contact with this week (except for Paul Bryar), and they all showed signs of increased activity. The Donatelli campaign was no different. In fact, their office was changed around considerably, to allow more volunteers to participate in the campaign. They have added staff, too. What you'd expect for a campaign a week away from election day.
While doing the interview, the thing that stood out was Donatelli's passion for veterans issues. Progressives are veterans, too, Donatelli reminds us. "As an aside, I think veterans in Congress is a positive way to put a new face on progressive politics."
John Fritchey is one of us. He's been blogging for at least four years now, and has been at the forefront of ethics reform in Springfield for as long as I've been in the state. Smart, determined, he's figured out how to get things done -- without having to succumb to the seductions of the Daley political machine. While Mayor Daley may not be endorsing anyone in the race, I am told by friends in City Hall that there is one person he doesn't want to see win. That is John Fritchey.
I can't tell you what that means in this race -- the mayor has ample support on the northside of Chicago -- but I do know what it means to me. Anyone the machine wants to defeat is okay in my book. Anyone who can divide machine pols (or what we call "Regular Dems" in this part of the planet) from Mayor Daley is even better. In the post-Harold Washington world, where the machine has learned to consolidate support among blacks and whites, reformers have to learn how to take voters from the machine in order to be successful. Fritchey is one of the few reformers in Chicago who have been successful at doing that.
One would think that given recent events in illinois politics voters would be more engaged than ever not less engaged; more aware of the need to be vigilant and educated in the voting booth. And this is a particularly high profile seat. It was recently vacated by Rahm Emanuel who left to become President Obama's chief of staff.
What if they gave an election and no one cared? (The answer: they hold it anyway.)
The Forys campaign was my last stop on Tuesday. Driving in from downtown Chicago (via Belmont), I could see evidence that Forys was making inroads with the local population. His red and white signs popped up with regularity.
The headquarters was buzzing. Perhaps a dozen volunteers on the phones and a few doing some administrative functions. I walked in with their new intern. Forys and his campaign manager arrived shortly afterward. We found a good spot to set up the camera, and when Forys arrived, we started talking. I asked about all the boxes in the space, which I didn't realize was filled with medical supplies. The community was involved in shipping meds and supplies to Poland, to my slight surprise. Forys seemed really tied to his local community.
As the interview ended, I asked about his experience with the Solidarity strikes. I couldn't really help myself, as I was fascinated by the fact that Forys was visiting Poland at the time. I included it at the end of the interview seen here.
IL-05 voters will have to pick only one candidate. There are other forms of voting that have the voters rank candidates, like Instant Runoff Voting or Condorcet voting, or approval voting allows one to vote for all acceptable options.
In multi-candidate races voters are often faced with a choice of a candidate that they like the most and the candidate who has the best chance of beating a completely unacceptable candidate. For example, you might really like Candidate E who has no chance of winning and vote for Candidate A over Candidate B, because you are deeply opposed to B and figure A is acceptable.
Below is a poll (you can vote for multiple options) of which candidates have a realistic, if only slight chance of winning.
Sara Feigenholtz is the right candidate at the right time to work with President Obama in Washington. She is a time tested Progressive with a 14 year history of getting things done for her constituents. Sara is ready to fight for each and every one of us, to ensure that health care is a basic right, not simply a privilege. In this time of economic crisis it is important that we have people in Government who can look at the bigger picture and understand that the stimulus is only the beginning and that fixing our health care problem will go a long way in helping each and every one of us and our nation as a whole.
Sara understands this, because she has seen firsthand what it is like for families who need medical treatment and have nowhere to turn.
UPDATE: Commenter Kathy G. notes that Geoghegan proposes an eventual raise to 65% of past income from the current level of 38% to 39% of past income. This is only a 70% increase, not actually doubling it which would mean a 100% increase. I apologize for the error. - Sandra
Earlier Jeff Wegerson did a nice summary of the yes/no questions on the IVI-IPO questionnaire, but there are also several essay questions. One of these is:
What changes, if any, do you support regarding Social Security?
The boldest answer to that question is given by Tom Geoghegan, and in fact it is one of the signature issues of his campaign:
I want to expand Social Security, our public pension system, to replace, not overnight but in stages, the private pension system which has collapsed. Social Security now pays about 38 to 39 percent of your working income. In other developed countries, it averages 65 percent. That's where our fiscal stimulus should be: a commitment to reach this goal, a public pension that ordinary working people can live on.
A preposterous idea?
I decided to take a look at my own W-2 form to see how much I currently put into Social Security versus how much I am spending on private retirement funds. What I found out is that last year I (and my employer) put an almost equal amount into my various pension plans as we did into my Social Security taxes. And those private pension plans are not looking so good right now. The reality is that a big chunk of my life savings is now gone. Ironically, if all that money had been in Social Security it would be still be there. So, just looking at my personal situation, the idea of doubling my Social Security in exchange for getting rid of my private retirement accounts seems like a pretty good deal.
Gheoghegan also has the experience of his lifetime of legal battles against companies trying to deny workers the pensions that they have earned. How many times do we hear news stories about pension funds being looted or underfunded or bankrupt? I am sure he has seen every trick in the book for denying people's pensions; it is no wonder he is advocating for a different system.
Below are the other candidates responses to this question.
I drove out to the 5th last Tuesday in the rain. I called the Bryar campaign to let them know that I was running a few minutes late -- which mattered, because it was the day that the candidates were being interviewed by the Chicago Tribune's endorsement board. So we couldn't really put it off. Surprisingly, I was only a few minutes late.
The Bryar campaign office was humming. Actually, it was quite crowded, with both volunteers and staff. As I set up the camera and lights, I got a reminder that this was Chicago. The El tracks were fairly close, and you could hear them inside the building. About halfway through the interview, the candidate got caught up in a tonque-twister. Can we do that over?, he'd ask. I ended up leaving it in because it provides Bryar's complete answer. Even polished candidates get caught by tongue-twisters. Bryar wanted it to be perfect -- but it wasn't a perfect day, outside or time-wise.
