WINNING ELECTIONS 22. If you make a mistake, admit it and try something else. There are few perfect campaigns. Inevitably, mistakes occur. Usually, in a long campaign, a few mistakes won't hurt much - unless you compound them by repeating them. In one campaign 1 was involved in, a television producer made several spots that generated a howl of protest from supporters of the candidate, who claimed they would withdraw their support if the spots continued to run. Faced with this, the producer became stubborn, said it would take awhile for the message of the spots to sink in, and urged they be run for at least two weeks. The campaign manager wisely decided to withdraw them immediately; supporters quieted down, and the candidate eventually won. Earlier I suggested, "If it ain't broke, don't fix it." The opposite is true as well: "If it is broke, fix it." Everybody makes mistakes; the smart ones correct them. 23. The little things often are important. To reach people, you must relate to their level of understanding. For example, there was little complaint on the part of the American public about the country's bloated military budget, because few people understood what the numbers meant. But when it was revealed the Air Force was paying $640 for a toilet seat or $125 for a hammer you could buy in a hardware store for five bucks, then people became aroused, because they could understand and relate to the situation in their own terms. Sherman Adams, President Eisenhower's chief of staff, ran an effective White House and was one of the most powerful men in the government, but he was forced to resign, and the credibility of the presidency was damaged, because he accepted a vicuna coat from a Boston financier, a coat worth maybe .$200 at the time. The lesson here is do not always jump on the big things; the little one could prove to be much more important in turning the campaign. 24. Be leery of primary polls. Great advances have been made in political polling in the past 20 years, but one area that remains difficult to predict is the party primary. This holds true on all levels, from presidential primaries to local elections. One reason for this is the usually low turnout in the primary. Poll respondents may favor one candidate or another, but when only one in three or four turns out to vote, the results can be seriously skewed. Even when several screening questions are asked to eliminate those less likely to vote, the actual voting returns often bear little resemblance to poll results. If your candidate is running ahead in the primary poll, do not assume you necessarily are going to win - and if you are running behind, do not be discouraged, because primaries produce strange results. 25. Recognize your own limitations. We are all better at some things than we are at others. No one I know in this business is equally talented in all phases of politics or campaigning. The best ones know what they do best and are not hesi- POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS tant about bringing in experts in other fields. Sometimes, individuals who are truly talented in one area, such as television production, get themselves and their candidates in big trouble by attempting to expand this expertise into areas in which they are much less effective. Pollsters are another group who fall into this trap: They often believe they are expert in designing campaign strategy just because they have obtained some interesting numbers in their poll. What's worse, campaigns, even on a high level, often make the mistake of confusing producers and pollsters and other specialists with strategists who have the ability to put all component parts of a campaign into place. 26. Don't panic over mistakes. They will happen. I never have been in a perfect campaign, and I doubt anyone else has. Mistakes will happen. Usually they are not serious; occasionally they are. The important thing is not to spend a lot of time crying about the mistake or criticizing the person who made it, but to decide how to handle it. In many cases, the best thing is merely to ignore it and forget about it. Human feelings are important here, too. You do not want to ruin the morale of the campaign staff or unnecessarily embarrass or humiliate one of your good workers because of a mistake. If the same person keeps making the same kinds of mistakes, that's another matter, and you might have to fire him or her. 27. If you do not have to use negative campaigning, don't; if you do, make it sting. Like many consultants, I think there is too much negative campaigning these days, and the reasons are easy to understand: It is easier to move people to vote against someone than for someone. Nevertheless, although it might sound old-fashioned, I think every candidate has an obligation to tell the people what he would do if he were elected and what solutions he has to their problems. When you feel compelled to use negative campaigning, make it sting. If you are going to do it, do it right. Do not just rap someone on the knuckles, give him a good whack alongside the head. I prefer not to use negative campaigning if I do not have to, but I also prefer to win with negative campaigning rather than to lose without. I do not subscribe to the concept of never mentioning your opponent by name. If you are going to call someone a son-of-a-bitch, leave no doubts in voters' minds about whom you mean. I also believe negative attacks should be confined to a person's record and not to his personal habits - and never to his family. A candidate's record should be subjected to careful scrutiny and attack where warranted; the fact that his son has been arrested on drug charges or his wife is an alcoholic are, in my opinion, private family problems and not subjects for discussion in a campaign. 28. Dominate the dominant medium. Not long ago, I wandered into a bookstore, where I saw a book on how to run political campaigns. I looked in the 32 33 WINNING ELECTIONS appendix to see if my name was mentioned. When I checked the references to me, I found one that said, "Many campaign managers follow the advice of veteran political consultant Joe Napoliran to dominate the dominant medium." Now I don't ever remember saying that, and I don't know where the authors of the book dug it up, but I think it's a hell of an idea. If it actually was mine, I'm sorry to have forgotten, and if it were someone else's, I hope he or she gets the credit due. It makes such good sense. The dominant medium varies. In many campaigns, it is television. But in some it might be newspaper advertising or radio. In a contest for a primary nomination in an overwhelmingly Democratic congressional district in New York City, it would be direct mail. Whatever it is, concentrate your resources to make sure you achieve dominance, and chances are you will do well in the campaign. 29. Campaigns should be fun. Campaigning is an intense business, full of pressure and tension. But it also should be fun. If a campaign does not have its moments of joy and laughter or sheer insanity, then it can become boring and depressing. There's nothing more debilitating than a dull campaign or a humorless candidate. I have worked for a few, and I do not want to do so again. 30. Establish your candidate's own credibility before you launch a negative campaign. No one has ever done this more effectively than Ronald Reagan in his 1980 campaign against Jimmy Carter. Today, all people remember about that election is that it was a Reagan landslide; but it didn't start out that way. Going into the campaign, voters had serious doubts about Reagan's political philosophy, and his potential to push the U.S. into war. Wisely, Reagan spent the early months of his campaign easing those doubts and establishing his own credibility. Not until his campaign advisers were convinced that his own credibility was established did they launch a devastating negative campaign. There is no doubt in my mind that negative campaign would have been much less effective if they had begun it earlier. There is a tendency today for candidates whose own positions are not known, whose own credibility has not been established, to go on the attack. My strong advice is to concentrate on the positives and establish your candidate's own credibility before making attacks on your opponent. 31. Do not confuse education with intelligence. There is a lot to be said for gut instincts and street smarts in political campaigns; it is not always the best educated people who are the most politically intelligent. Almost everywhere I have worked, I have encountered people with weak education credits and high intelligence. The same is true of voters. Early in my career, I learned never to underestimate the intelligence of the voters nor overestimate the amount of information at their POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGfcMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS disposal. Providing them with the information is the campaign's responsibility; their intelligence will take over from there. 32. An election is like a one-day sale. This is what makes timing so crucial in a political campaign. If you are selling Fords or Toyotas, the customer can buy his car today, tomorrow, next week or next year. But the product (candidate) in a campaign (sale) is available for only a few hours on one day. You must gear your campaign to peak as close to Election Day as possible. Too often we have seen campaigns peak on Labor Day when the election is in November. From then on, it is downhill. It might be better to have a late peak than an early one; at least that way the campaign will be moving in the right direction on Election Day. You have certain controls in the peaking process, such as media time buys and when to make major announcements, and although you might not be able to fine-tune the campaign to peak precisely when you wish, how effectively you manipulate the controls will determine how close you come to your ideal peak. 33. Differentiate between the essential and the nonessential. The wise candidate or leader learns early to distinguish between them, to make the essential decisions and take the essential actions himself and to leave the nonessentials to staff and others in his government. The same guideline applies to consultants: Do not make a big thing of something that is not really important or essential, but if it is essential, utilize all your resources to achieve the objective. 34. They won't let you run in the general election unless you win the primary. It's just like baseball, where they won't let you play in the World Series unless you win the pennant. Yet how many times have we seen campaigns where the candidate thinks and talks of nothing but how he is going to beat his opponent in the general election, paying scant attention to his opponent in the primary? In a classic case in Massachusetts, the incumbent governor, a Democrat, prepared television commercials and a whole panoply of other campaign materials to use against an incumbent Republican senator. Mis primary opponent was a mayor of a medium-sized city, and the decision was made to ignore the mayor in the primary, not to respond to any charge or attack. All the governor's television commercials, signs and bumper stickers went into the trash the morning after the primary, because the unheralded mayor had scored a smashing upset. Advice for Candidates 35. The size of crowds bears little relationship to the vote. Another example from Venezuela: During one campaign, Accion Democratica held a rally in downtown Caracas. It was mobbed; more than 50,000 people turned out. Two 34 35 WINNING ELECTIONS days later, the Socialist Party, which never receives more than S percent of the vote, staged a rally on the same site with the same turnout. In 1968, I was director of media for Vice President Hubert Humphrey in his campaign against Richard Nixon. One day Nixon toured Philadelphia; the crowds were enormous. Humphrey went through a few days later, the crowds were small Humphrey won Philadelphia by 100,000 votes. The Republicans obviously did a better job in turning out the crowd, but at least in this case, not the vote. 36. Do not be hung up on slogans and logos. Too often a candidate or his advertising manager will be so hung up on a slogan or a logo that they will insist it be used in every television spot, every radio spot, every brochure, every print ad, and so forth. Use them where they work, and if they seem out of place, use something else or nothing at all. 37. Start early. You can never start planning your campaign too early. You can begin the campaign too soon; that's something else again. In my own experience, the best example I know of long planning period/short campaign was Mike Gravel's upset victory over Alaska Sen. Ernest Gruening in the 1968 Democratic primary. We planned Gravel's campaign in December 1966; the execution of the campaign, pretty much according to what we had decided to do 18 months later, occurred during two weeks in August 1968. By starting early, you have plenty of time to take and analyze polls, study your opponent and his likely moves in depth, design and discuss various possible strategies, select the best specialists to work on the campaign, and mentally prepare your candidate. When you start late, it does not mean you have fewer things to do, but merely less time to do them. 38. Beware of easy solutions to complex problems. There are none. If the problem is complex, the solution also must be complex. There are ways of providing simple explanations of proposed solutions, but anyone who comes up with a "simple" solution to crime, drugs, unemployment, inflation, housing or a myriad of other complex problems clearly doesn't even understand the problem, never mind the solution. 39. Exude confidence — but never overconfidence. Personally, I prefer a low-key approach in this area: Express confidence that you will win, but say you expect a hard, tough campaign. This is especially true in a campaign where you are expected to win, start out strong in the polls and then are lulled into a sense of false security and fail to do everything needed to ensure victory. If anything, it is better to be less confident than too confident; it also will keep your staff working harder. 40. You need not oppose every position or statement by your opposition. Even the opposition is right sometimes, just as a stopped clock is right twice a day. POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS By criticizing everything, you dilute the strength of your own criticism. I prefer to reduce the frequency of attacks, or counterattacks, but to make them really sting when you do use them. 41. A power base helps. It might not be absolutely essential to have a power base in a political campaign, but it sure helps. The base can be geographic (the candidate's home state, city or county) or demographic (blacks, Hispanics, elderly, liberals, conservatives, whatever). If you start with a power base, you have something to build on. If you do not, your first step is to create one, and that detracts from other things you can do. Any candidate who starts with a built-in power base has an advantage. 42. You are never going to please everyone. Candidates sometimes try to run campaigns by consensus; they think they can appeal to everyone, please everyone, without getting anyone angry. This just does not happen. Campaigns are a series of decisions, many of them easy, some of them difficult. Every time you make a difficult decision, some group of voters is not going to like it. But if you do not make any decisions, or if you attempt to water down your positions so they become meaningless, no one is going to like it. Advice for Consultants 43. Television spots showing large crowds are of little real value; they just make the candidate feel good. In one Latin American campaign, the advertising agency proudly showed me 22 spots they had produced for their candidate. At least 18 of them showed nothing but cheering crowds; not one of them showed the candidate talking to the people about what he would do for them if he were elected. We made the necessary adjustments in that campaign, but this phenomenon exists, and it sometimes is difficult to persuade inexperienced campaign workers that such spots really do not help very much. 44. Every campaign is different; every campaign is the same. The object of any political campaign is to persuade voters to mark their "X" after one name instead of another. In every campaign, certain basics are similar if not identical. Every campaign contains the same essential ingredients: polls, strategy, message, advertising, organization, fundraising. But each campaign has its points of dissimilarity, and the approach and strategy must be defined and adapted to conform with existing elements. Just as generals often are accused of fighting the last war, we never should allow ourselves to "fight the last campaign." We must adjust our tactics to meet current needs. 45. You might be able to polish a candidate but you cannot really change him. I have seen candidates who have improved (and some who have gotten worse) in the course of campaigning, but I have never been involved with a 36 37 WINNING ELECTIONS % candidate who really changed very much. Sure, you can do some cosmetic things: ,,] Convince him to wear dark suits, cut his hair differently, change the color of his ; socks, buy more attractive eyeglasses, maybe even get him to be more prompt. But almost all the time, you really just work with what you have, so you might ; as well adjust to this at the beginning of the campaign and adapt your campaign •« plan to fit your candidate. "{ 46. Instill some sense of priority in your candidate. Rationally and logi- | cally, every candidate knows that just about every appearance he makes on televi- j sion, especially in paid commercials purchased in prime time, will be seen by more \ voters than will see him in person during the entire course of the campaign. But ~A virtually every candidate resists spending the time necessary to permit the best % possible television production. I This is why it is so important to have the campaign scheduler be someone who | understands the importance of various activities, such as media production, and \ who will cancel a breakfast with 50 supporters so the candidate can have more time \ to prepare for television, or rehearse an important speech, or take a day's rest, or ( discuss critical strategy decisions. \ 47. Proceed cautiously in foreign elections. First, because you are a for- < eigner, there will be natural skepticism about your ability or understanding of the \ problems. If you are an American, these problems usually are compounded. 4 A good friend of mine used to drive me to distraction in early discussions with I presidential candidates in foreign countries. After one two-hour meeting, he was j prepared to design the whole campaign, tell the locals what they were doing wrong • and give some very simple solutions to extremely complicated problems. Some of his analysis was right on the mark, but its effectiveness was dissipated by the speed i with which he made his recommendations. ■} The first objective in dealing with candidates and their staffs in foreign coun- J tries is to win their confidence. Ideas they might reject if offered in the first meet- p ing might well be accepted, or at least seriously considered, after they have devel- ( oped some confidence in you. Proceed slowly and cautiously, even if you know right from the beginning what needs to be done. t 48. Always let the campaign staff know you are not looking for their job. ; In my first meeting with the candidate's staff I give a little speech about my role in the campaign. 1 explain that I have no interest in being the governor's chief of staff or press secretary or head of the state lottery; all I want to do is help win the election and go home. I want them to look on me as a resource, a support system, not a threat. Usually this works, but not always; I know that in some campaigns some staff members, invariably those least secure about their own abilities, try to undercut my recommendations. Not much you can do about this; it's an occupational hazard. POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS But if you make the effort at the beginning to win the cooperation of the candidate's staff, and assure them your role ends on Election Day, then it's usually an easier campaign. 49. If your advice is not being accepted, quit. If your advice constantly is being overruled or ignored, you have two choices: Give in or get out. I always prefer to get out - not that it happens all that often, maybe three or four times in 30 years. Once I was retained as media consultant in a New York gubernatorial primary. One afternoon I had a cup of coffee with the representative of the advertising agency hired by the campaign that turned into a mutual complaint session. By the time we finished our second cup of coffee, we both agreed to quit. In a situation like this, I usually tell the candidate and/or his campaign manager, "Look, you are telling people I am the media director in this campaign, but I really am not, because you are not accepting my recommendations. You are paying me money for advice you are not using, and I am spending my time working in a campaign where my advice obviously is not needed or wanted. Why don't we part company and stay friends?" 50. Settle your financial arrangements at the beginning. Better not to do a campaign than to do it and not be paid for it. You learn as you grow older. Early in my career, after meeting with the candidate and his team, I often would design what amounted to a whole campaign plan and submit it with my proposal to work for the candidate. Until I became smarter, they often would reject the proposal for whatever reason, and then use the campaign plan pretty much as 1 had written it. Now I will not write a plan until we have agreed on a contract. There are certain expenses built into my fees. For example, first-class air fare. When you make 40 trips out of the country in a single year, as I do, it is not just a question of comfort, it is a question of survival. Unless I know the candidate well or have worked for him before, I now insist on quarterly payments in advance. This is especially important overseas, where you essentially have no recourse if a candidate or party refuses to pay for your services. I am perfectly willing to do campaigns for nothing or for a token fee, if the candidate is a good friend, or if it is a cause or candidate I really believe in and want to work for. But if we are talking about a business arrangement, it should be conducted on a businesslike basis - and that means being paid on schedule. The surest way to avoid problems is to receive a chunk of money up front; at least that way you are not hurt too badly if the second payment never comes. This is even more important for television producers, who need to invest substantial amounts of money in production costs. I must say that more than 90 percent of the political candidates 1 have worked for have paid me in full. A few did not, and their names are etched in my memory. 38 39 WINNING ELECTIONS 51. Research your candidate as thoroughly as you do your opponent. In almost every campaign, an individual or team is assigned to research the opponent's record, in the hope of uncovering things that can be used against him. In my campaigns, I insist we make the same effort researching our own candidate. If there is anything in the candidate's background or record we will need to defend in a campaign, I want to know it, sooner rather than later. Maybe the opponent's researchers never will find out about it; more likely they will. Better to be prepared. I always meet privately with a new candidate to ask him if there is anything in his record that could prove embarrassing later in the campaign. Sometimes candidates tell you the truth; sometimes they do not. My favorite story here concerns a Southern candidate for governor, a freewheeling bachelor. When I asked the question, this conversation ensued: "Joe, do you know what they say about me down here?" "No. What do they say?" "They say I drink whiskey and chase women." "Do you?" "Of course I do." Mow can you hate a guy like that? 52. Marginal improvements are important and often decisive. A fascinating book I strongly recommend is Thinking in Time, by Rich Neustadt and Ernest May. One of the points they make is that "marginal improvements are important." Although the authors are not referring to political campaigns, their advice is on target. When you start a campaign with your candidate 30 or 40 points behind, there is no way you are going to make up this deficit in one gulp. You must chip away, make "marginal improvements," over a period of time. But even more important, most elections are decided by close margins, and if you make small improvements with every group of voters, these will add up. 53. Know when to use bold strokes and when not to. There are times when a bold stroke is necessary to put some zip in your campaign. Usually vou can use a bold stroke tf (1) your campaign is drifting and needs a spark; (2) you are in with the pack in a multicandidate race and need to pull out of the pack; or (3) you are behind and conventional tactics are not moving the campaign. By definition, a bold stroke can be dangerous and has the potential to backfire or be counterproductive. As a general rule, I recommend a bold stroke only when it appears nothing else will pull you out of a rut. Knowing when to use a bold stroke is as important as knowing how to use one. 54. Do not let your candidate think that just because he has said something once everyone has heard it. In the first place, to be a candidate, you must POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS have a sizable ego. Part of that ego is the belief that because you make a statement or a speech, the whole state (county, world, universe) knows what you said and what your position is. I once had the president of a Third World country tell me that his people could recite his speeches by heart, that they all listened to his talks on television and that they all w^ere familiar with his programs. "Fine," I said, "let's take a poll." The poll showed not many people watched the television programs; those who did usually had little idea of what the president was talking about, and they had no idea at all about what he was doing. We made some changes. It is not only in the Third World that candidates or heads of state have these attitudes; they are prevalent wherever I have worked. If your candidate says something good or important, repeat it and repeat it until the message sinks in. Do not depend on a speech or news to carry important campaign messages; reinforce them with paid advertising. 55. Be prepared to produce media right to the end. In years gone by, it was common practice for a campaign to contract with a television producer to make a package of spots or longer programs. Often the finished package was delivered four or five weeks before the election. Not any more. Today, you must be prepared to use television, radio and newspapers right up to election eve. You need the flexibility to capitalize on last-minute events and developments. Arrangements should be made with your TV producer to be available at all times. If this is not possible, then an hour of studio time should be reserved for each day in the final week of the campaign. 56. Establish and maintain an immediate communications system. There are occasions in almost every campaign when you simply must reach the candidate, the campaign manager, the media director, the television producer, or the pollster in the campaign immediately. Unfortunately, these occasions usually occur at night, early Sunday morning or in the middle of a holiday weekend. One of the first projects in any campaign should be to prepare a small directory of all the key people, with telephone numbers where they can be reached after hours, on weekends or other inconvenient times. Naturally, distribution of this directory should be limited to those with a decision-making position in the campaign. During the campaign, someone in the headquarters should know where everyone in the campaign can be reached. If a candidate is traveling, someone in the entourage should call "communications central" several times a day to report what is happening with the candidate and to find out what is going on at headquarters. 57. You do not have to love your candidate, but at least you should respect him or her. I have found it is possible to continue to work for a candidate you do not really like as long as you maintain some respect for him or her. If 40 41 WINNING ELECTIONS you neither like nor respect a candidate, then it is difficult to do your job properly. If you realize this at the beginning, it is not much of a problem: Just don't take the campaign. The difficulty comes when you start out having a decent relationship with the candidate, only to see it deteriorate during the course of the campaign. Then you have a tough decision to make: remain with the campaign and do the best you can, or quit. 58. Make sure your candidate knows why he or she is running and can answer the question: "Why should I vote for you instead of your opponent?" The classic example of this is Sen. Edward M. Kennedy's fumbling the question, "Why do you want to be president?" put to him by Roger Mudd of CBS News in 1980. Kennedy might have lost the election right then and there. Actually, it is astonishing how much difficulty many candidates have with this question. You would think that by the time they have decided to run, they would know the answer. Do not take this for granted. If the candidate does not answer the question to your satisfaction, work with him until he has a crisp, polished, sensible answer. 59. If your candidate has a difficult name, try to turn it to your advantage. Sure, it's nice to have candidates with names like Kennedy, Carter, Clinton Reagan or Bush, but how about Ed Mezvinsky, Jim Scheuer and Frank Licht? These were candidates I worked with, and all of them were elected - but not before we made special efforts to make sure voters knew how to pronounce their names. In Mezvinsky's case, Tony Schwartz produced some classic (and frequently copied) television and radio spots poking fun at the name and deliberately mispronouncing it. The point of those ads was that even if people had difficulty with Ed Mezvinsky's name, they knew what he stood for. In the case of Licht and Scheuer, we used rhyming: "Licht. Rhymes with teach." "Scheuer. Rhymes with lawyer." Maybe I'm wrong, but I think people are hesitant to vote for candidates whose names they can't pronounce. How are they going to tell anyone who they voted for? 60. "Instant information creates involvement," - Marshall McLuhan. Politically, what this means is that the quicker you can deliver information about an event to the voters, the more impact it will have. Tony Schwartz is a master at instant production of radio spots to capitalize on fast-breaking news developments and linking his candidate (favorably) or opponent (unfavorably) to the news. In a campaign for an old friend seeking his eighth consecutive four-year term as district attorney, we took advantage of President Reagan's anti-drug campaign. Video Base International of New York, which produced the spots for the campaign, immediately dug out existing footage of my candidate, Matthew Ryan, in 42 POLI; ICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS which he spoke strongly about his own anti-drug campaign. The VBI spot's narration began something like this: "Long before other candidates discovered the dangers of drug use, Matty Ryan had made it his No. 1 priority____" The spot worked and helped Ryan win. The "instant information" formula works just as well, perhaps even better, in free media. We try to generate instant reaction to campaign developments. What is news and usable by the press if issued immediately is old stuff and unusable if you let a day go by. 61. Learn where the real power lies. Sometimes the power positions are laid right out on the table of organization, but as often as not, the real power lies elsewhere. It could rest with the candidate's biggest financial supporters, with his wife or girlfriend, or with a trusted adviser, colleague or associate. This holds true for incumbents as well as for candidates. The intelligent consultant will quietly nose around until he finds out where the real power lies in a campaign or government and then will determine how he can utilize that power in the campaign. This also saves a lot of wasted effort dealing with people who do not really have the authority to make decisions. Not all the wielders of real power are a bad influence; often they exercise their power cautiously, conservatively, and effectively. But it sure helps to knowr who holds it. 62. Analyze your losses. I think you can learn a lot more in a losing campaign than in one you win. For one thing, candidates (and consultants) seldom spend much time analyzing why they have won. They do not bother with postelection surveys and other tools available to them. When you lose, you are much more likely to examine painstakingly all the decisions made in the campaign and the reasons for them, to re-evaluate your strategy and decide where it went wrong, and to poll voters after the elections and see what you can learn about why they behaved as they did. Of course, if you keep losing, all the analysis in the world will not help much; then it is time to start looking for another career. 63. How a person intends to vote is more important than who he thinks is going to win. This is a point I have a great deal of difficulty conveying to candidates and inexperienced campaigners. I don't even know why pollsters ask the question about who the respondent thinks is going to win, because the results can be misleading and give the candidate a false sense of confidence. I would always prefer to have a person say he or she plans to vote for my candidate but believes the opponent will win than have them say they are planning to vote for my opponent but believe my candidate will win. 64. Do not fool yourself or your candidate. It's OK to try to fool the opposition, or even the voters, but don't ever fool yourself or your candidate; this is a 43 WINNING ELECTIONS .■ one-way ticket to disaster. ; Candidates want to wait to take a poli until after some event that will give them j a splash of publicity, so the poll results will be better. I would rather take a survey when the candidate is at the nadir of his popularity, so you get a true reading of | opinion. i Last summer I was approached by representatives of a congressman to take a | survey. The congressman had been in office 32 years and was in his mid-70s. The i only real issue in the campaign was his age. Yet the congressman's people knocked :| out every question in the survey pertaining to his age; they were worried they % would "remind" voters how old the candidate was. This was ridiculous and j demonstrated a lack of understanding of what polling is all about. % Candidates, of course, want to hear the optimistic analysis and prefer to ignore I the pessimistic interpretation. Better the}' should know the truth. 65. Be persistent - but know when to back off. There is a difference J between persistence and pigheadedness. If you feel something is important, do not ** accept a quick brush-off from the candidate, manager or whomever you are work- | ing with. Put it in a different form, amplify it, answer their questions or argu- I ments. \ But if there appears to be no chance they will accept the idea, back off. It is pos- j sible the idea might not really be as good as you thought it was, or the candidate ; might have personal reasons that have nothing to do with its merits - but that he '. does not want to discuss with you or anyone else - for refusing to accept a sugges- v lion. i 66. Live to fight another day. Candidates and the "impassioned amateurs" I % mentioned earlier often are willing to burn their bridges behind them in a cam- i paign and do things that might have some short range benefit but could have fear- \ ful long range consequences. A consultant should be more rational. He lives on his ; reputations and win or lose, he must come out of that campaign with his reputa- \ tion intact. i It also is worth noting that many candidates do not win the first time around, it '•■ often takes two or even three tries to be elected. I am as competitive or aggressive as anyone in the business, but there are lines I will not cross, because I know there i is another day, another year, another campaign. ] 67. When you think you know it all, you don't. When I started out as a » political consultant, I think I won my first 13 elections. Then I lost a gubernatorial primary, so I figured, "Well, I might lose to another Democrat, but I've never i lost to a Republican." Then I lost to a Republican, and that theory was shot to hell. When I was 35, I thought I knew all there was to know about campaigning and j making people vote for your candidate. Now, more than 20 years later, I'm begin- ' ning to realize how little anybody really knows about what motivates voters to j POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS mark their "X" for one candidate or another. Matt Reese and I were talking one day about a young consultant who had acquired a good reputation on the basis of winning several campaigns. I did not know the man, and I asked Matt, who did, how good he really was. "He's pretty good," said Matt, "but he'll be a lot better after he loses a couple of elections." 68. If you hear someone has said something nasty about you, do not overreact. It's inevitable, in this or any other business, that at some time someone is going to tell you one of your colleagues or competitors has said something nasty about you. Don't overreact. The person might not have made the statement, or the version you heard was taken out of context or unknowingly twisted. It might have been made in the heat of a campaign, in anger, in jest or the person might have regretted it the moment he said it. You can't have a thin skin and survive long in this business. Now, on the other hand, if you really believe the statement was made, that it was made in malice and you are hurt by it, then you can always observe the old political adage: Don't get mad get even. 69. Learn patience. This is especially true if you are working overseas, especially in places like Latin America or Africa. Sometimes it is difficult for American consultants, who have become accustomed to thinking that today's 4 o'clock meeting is going to take place at 4 o'clock today, to adjust. I cannot count how manv hours or days I have sat in hotel rooms or by hotel pools, waiting for a call from presidential palace. Now I come forearmed, with a stack of books, a box of cigars and mentally prepared to wait. 70. Do not assume you have the contract until you have the check. Again, this probably is more pertinent to political consultants who work for foreign candidates, parties or governments. And, of course, in other countries, if your contract or agreement is not honored, there is little you can do about it. I now require payment in advance, but still am stiffed now and then. For those new to the business of overseas consulting, I strongly advise against any significant expenditure prior to receiving the initial payment. This includes exploratory trips to discuss a contract with a prospective client; always ask for travel expenses to be paid up front. It is bad enough to have someone default on a fee, which represents time; it is much worse to have them renege on payments that also cover your own out-of-pocket expenses. 71. If your candidate wins, it's because of his charm, appeal and powers of persuasion; if he loses, it's your fault. After managing a campaign that most political observers hailed as a sensational upset - and putting everything I had into it - I overheard the candidate tell a reporter that he really did not have a campaign manager, that he pretty much handled that himself. I did not say anything then, but later I remembered the old rule about not getting mad but getting 44 i 45 WINNING ELECTIONS POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & IACTICS even. I doubled the fee I had intended to charge him for the general election. || Few candidates will admit they lost because the voters did not care about them J or their programs, or maybe they liked them well enough but just liked another ,t candidate better. ;| 72. Be tolerant. I already have said not to panic when a mistake occurs, but I there are other times a consultant must learn to be tolerant - with the candidate, j with the people in the campaign organization, with those with whom he has to | work. a Those of us who have been in the business for a long time know that when we | become involved with a new campaign, especially overseas, it sometimes feels as | though we are reinventing the wheel each day. When you work in a different cul- { ture, a different environment, with less experienced people, it is easy to become f exasperated. This does not do you or the campaign any good. | 73. Maturity comes with age. In many ways, I think I might have been a bet- 3 ter consultant 15 or 20 years ago than I am today. In those days, I would argue and | fight with my candidates and their staffs, pounding the desk, screaming and sulk- :f ing. Now, I am more relaxed, more patient, more tolerant and, I hope, more | mature. | I also have come to realize that my function is to advise a candidate, not to pum- I mel him into accepting my ideas. What I might have lost in pugnacity, I think I § have gained in maturity, and I do not know any way to speed up this gestation peri j od. ! 74. Do not take unnecessary risks. Again, this applies more to working over- | seas than it does in the United States, and maybe it is another function of age. But f there are countries 1 will not work in, nor send anyone on my staff to work in. If | you have any doubts, don't go. Campaigns are important but not that important. f 75. Do not have too much sympathy for a candidate. Not many candidates s are drafted. Most of them are candidates because they want to be, because they f want the glory and power that the position they seek will give them. They are there j of their own volition. As consultants, we have responsibilities to our candidates f and to our campaigns. But the candidate also has certain responsibilities, and it is » as important for him to fulfill his commitments to the campaign as it is for me to fulfill mine. So do not waste time commiserating with candidates. If they were not willing * to make the many sacrifices that being a candidate entails, they did not have to run. Advice for Campaign Managers < 76. Do not be afraid to bring in the real experts. The sense of insecurity that exists among campaign managers and advisers never should be under- : estimated. ■} 46 In several recent presidential elections, the advisers and workers who helped obtain the nomination for a particular candidate blocked out talented specialists from working in the general election, some of whom had worked for other candidates in the primary, some of whom had not worked for any primary candidates. It broke my heart in the 1984 presidential election to see all the talent on the sidelines not being used by the Democratic candidate - when he clearly needed all the help he could get. If you have access to the skills of a Tony Schwartz, or a Bob Squier or a David Garth and you don't use them, you are making a mistake. Hire the best people you can find, and don't worry about whose feelings might be hurt. 77. Most campaigns do not know how to use consultants properly. This seems absurd, but it is true, and it is more true in foreign elections than it is in the U.S. Most candidates and their managers really have little idea about what a consultant does or should do. You must make this clear to them at the beginning, so their expectations are neither exaggerated nor unrealistic. 78. How much money you have to spend is not as important as how you spend it. Although no one will deny it is comforting to have all the money you need to conduct your campaign, it is not always the candidate with access to the largest amount of money who wins. There are many factors involved, of course, but certainly one of these is how effectively you spend the funds you have available. It is easy to squander money in a political campaign — and many candidates do so. Occasionally, it is possible to drown an opponent in a sea of cash. But in most cam paigns, assuming that each candidate has at least the minimum amount of money to mount a decent campaign, the likely winner is the one who spends his money best -or, put another way, succeeds in getting the biggest bang for his bucks. 79. Running a campaign is not a democratic process. It is more like a military operation - at least if it is run right. All voices should not be equal in campaign discussions and decisions. A campaign should have experts and specialists in various areas. Their opinions should earn' weight. If you need an operation, you should pay more attention to the surgeon's opinion than to that of the ambulance driver; if you need to get to the hospital in a hurry, then take the ambulance driver's advice. The ultimate responsibility for making campaign decisions should rest with the campaign manager. If he wants to talk to the candidate about these decisions, fine. If he wants to accept a consensus from his staff, fine. But he certainly should not make his decisions on the basis of one-person, one-vote. 80. Make sure your candidate understands the issues. Those outside our business would consider this a simplistic statement; those in it know what I am talking about. Never mind the extreme cases, like the candidate for the U.S. Senate who once asked me, "What is this detente business, anyway?" Just consider the run-of-the-mill candidate who does not do his homework. 47 WINNING ELECTIONS POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS Last year, a Maryland television station embarrassed some senatorial candidates by asking them some simple questions on foreign and domestic policy. If it had been an examination in high school civics class, they all would have failed. It is bad enough when the candidate is not informed about the other guy's issues; what is really bad is when he is not informed about his own issues. It happens. 81. Let your candidate talk to the people. In this era of "creative" television commercials, there is a tendency to make a whole package of spots in which the candidate never once talks directly to the people. This is a mistake. The people want to see and hear the candidate. Maybe he does not look like Robert Red ford or speak like Ronald Reagan; they still want to see him, hear him, get a feel for him. Those of us in the consulting business sometimes make the mistake of assuming we know more than the candidate. The longer I stay in the business, the more convinced I am that the eyeball-to-eyeball spot can be one of the most effective weapons in our arsenal. 82. Latch on to existing organizations. Creating an organization not only can be a formidable task, it can be expensive and difficult as well. Whenever possible, latch on to an existing organization, whether it happens to be a political party or special interest support group. Organizations that share the candidate's views on highly emotional subjects, such as abortion, gun control, tort reform or school vouchers, can be of great organizational assistance to a campaign. At the very least, they can provide useful mailing lists; at best, they can provide bodies, experience and money. 83. When you use new technologies, make sure you bring in specialists. It is not enough to buy or rent a couple of computers and hire a kid who has taken a course in computer programming and then believe you have "computerized" your campaign. If your campaign calls for any sort of sophisticated equipment or procedures, make certain you hire specialists who know how to operate that equipment or execute those procedures. I have a degree of familiarity with how computers can be used effectively in political campaigns; it would never occur to me to try to run a computer operation, because I do not possess the required technical skills. 84. If your media materials do not work, throw them away no matter how much they cost. There is a tendency to think that if you have paid a lot of money for a television spot or a brochure, then it must be good. Often it is; sometimes it is not. And if you ever discover that a television or radio spot or print piece is not working, or, even worse, is counterproductive, then dump it immediately. At least you will save the cost of putting it on the air. If it really is bad, continuing to show it could damage your chances of winning the election. 48 Do not let the producer make this decision. A few producers are willing to admit that some of their materials might not be working very well; few will ever say, "This has turned out to be a bad spot; let's kill it." Incidentally, I am not talking here about spots that have "burned out" because they have been shown a lot; this can happen to perfectly good materials that need to be replaced with new material. I am talking about material that is bad from the start and should never be run, or material which, after being shown a few times, clearly is not working. 85. Restrain impassioned amateurs. A persistent problem for political professionals is the impassioned amateur - the person with enthusiasm but little experience - who does not have the knowledge to put the campaign in perspective. These people remind me of football fans who always want the coach to go for the first down when it is fourth down and a yard to go and cannot understand why the coach sends in the punting team. On a volunteer level, these people usually are not much of a threat to the campaign, because they are not in decision-making capacities. When they become dangerous is if they hold important positions in the campaign, are large contributors who link their support to acceptance of their suggestions and, perhaps worst of all, when they are related to the candidate and in a position to influence his thinking. 86. Have a reason for what you do. Ask some tough questions of yourself about every step taken in a campaign: • Why are we doing this? • What will we get from it? • What will happen if we don't do it? • Is this the most effective way to use our money? If you are working to a strategy, there should be a good reason - and if you are not working to a strategy, you are in trouble anyway. 87. Make sure you have good photographs of your candidate. This should be one of the simplest steps in a political campaign. In actuality, it always proves to be one of the most difficult. One of my first recommendations at the beginning of a campaign is to take good new photographs of the candidate in various situations, even if some good pictures already are available. I have found that you never have enough good photographs. What often happens is the candidate will resist taking the time early in the campaign to have a good photographer spend sufficient hours with him to produce a good photo file, and then, in the crush of the campaign, when pictures arc needed for brochures, signs, print ads and a dozen other things, you are forced to use inferior photographs or grab some on the fly at the last minute. Hire a top-flight still photographer. It is worth the cost. More people will see your candidate's picture than will ever see him in person. 49 WINNING ELECTIONS POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS 88. Make sure your candidate gets some rest. It takes a big ego and a certain machismo for someone to be a candidate, and candidates often feel they must maintain their Superman image by forgoing rest and vacations. They act as though it is inhuman to admit they become tired and need rest. This is a mistake. A tired candidate is an unreliable candidate, prone to error inclined to talk without thinking of the impact of his or her words and certainly not looking his or her best. It is especially important for a candidate to take two or three days off going into the final month of a tough campaign. Even if he or she resists, insist upon a rest. A candidate not at his or her best is a threat to the campaign. 89. Be careful in the selection of technicians. The campaign service industry is booming. Individuals and companies are available to sell you almost any kind of service you can conceive. But they are not all equally good; some, in fact, are so bad they can be counterproductive to your campaign. One of the qualities an experienced consultant or manager brings to a campaign is the knowledge of who are the competent people in the technical area: computers, direct mail, production, telephone campaigns and so forth. Obviously, in making their pitch, these technicians will emphasize their successes and play down or ignore their failures. Check them out with other consultants, managers, or candidates. Know what questions to ask; take the time to call their references. 90. Pre-empt negatives. If there is something in your candidate's background that is certain to come out in the campaign, sometimes it is better to bring it up early and get it out of the way. I recommend this strategy only if you are virtually certain the opposition is aware of the fault and will likely use it. And, of course, much depends on what it is. I have found that voters will accept a candidate who drinks whiskey, has a physical handicap, or chases women, but except in rare instances, they reject candidates who use drugs, have been treated for mental disorders, or are homosexual. If your candidate had problems with the law as a young man, then you should try to use this in a positive way ("I know; I've been there") before your opponent slugs you late in the campaign by making the record public. If there is something on his record that sounds worse than it really is, then it should be explained before you are forced to go on the defensive. 91. Do not unilaterally talk about your negatives if you do not have to. No candidate is perfect; every one has done or said things he wished he had not. Most of these are fairly harmless, and I don't think it's my responsibility as a consultant to show the candidate's warts: This is the responsibility of the press and his opponent. I realize this point seems to contradict the previous one about pre-empting negatives, but it really does not. For example, if your candidate struggled through 50 high school and barely managed to graduate from college, I do not think it is the campaign's responsibility to tell people that he might be a nice guy, but he's just not too smart. This is not the kind of issue the opposition can do much with, and there is no need for you to talk about it. 92. Do not distort your candidate's record; you're almost sure to be caught. In most cases, it is not the consultant who distorts a candidate's record, because most consultants are smarter than that. It is the candidate himself, and most of the time it is hard to figure out why. Candidates are constantly claiming they were graduated from Harvard University, when it turns out all they did was attend an occasional football game there, or saw combat in Vietnam, when what they really did was type reports on a supply ship 50 miles off the coast. Why candidates persist in doing this is beyond me. I do not think the average voter much cares if the candidate went to Harvard or Appalachian State. Most of them didn't go to Harvard either. And, to me, "served in the Armed Forces during the Vietnam War" is sufficient, as well as accurate. 93. In a major campaign, always create a reaction unit. These go by various names. What they consist of is a small group of knowledgeable people in the campaign, with political sensitivity and experience, who meet regularly in the closing days or weeks of a major campaign. As a matter of personal preference, I like to have these meetings early in the morning and to limit the group to four or five members. The purpose is to analyze developments of the preceding day, to determine if any responses or other actions are needed and to decide who should make the response. Some of the time, perhaps most of the time, the best response is no response. But when a reaction is called for, it is important to have key people with decisionmaking responsibilities available. 94. Know what your opponent is up to. You do not have to be a political genius to realize the importance of monitoring your opponent's activities, but it always is surprising to learn how few campaigns do this on a systematic basis. You start with the record, if the opponent has held or run for office before, and try to find out who his advisers are and anything you can about their style. All public statements must be recorded and filed; all pieces of literature collected and reviewed. If possible, have someone attend his speeches and other public meetings. The better informed you are about your opposition, the easier it will be to win. 95. Your enemy's enemy is not necessarily your friend. It might be true in war, love or high society, but it certainly is not true in politics. It could be true but, just as often as not, you might want to keep a fair distance from your enemy's enemy Often, these "enemies" are disenchanted or disgruntled former friends or supporters of your opponent. They might even have a legitimate complaint. But most 51 WINNING ELECTIONS POLITICAL CAMPAIGN MANAGEMENT, STRATEGY & TACTICS of the time their hatred is passionate, clouds their thinking and encourages them j to provide you with a lot of "facts" that might be far from the truth. I advise j extreme caution in dealing with your opponent's enemies, especially if they are "I people who once were close to him. j These observations hold primarily for individuals. There certainly are situa- f tions when a group, association or even a whole social class is upset at an incum- j bent or frightened of a challenger and is willing to work hard for his defeat. This I is a different situation, and usually these groups can be turned into assets. f 96. Information is power, use it wisely. Intelligence is critical, especially if