Subject: [big campaign] New Huff Post from Creamer-Lessons from Massachusetts Defeat
From: [email-masked]
To: [email-masked], [email-masked]
Date: Wed, 20 Jan 2010 09:14:37 EST
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Lessons from the Massachusetts  Defeat 

The Massachusetts  Senate race is a watershed event that has enormous 
implications for this  political year.  The media is intent  on making it a 
referendum on President Obama and his health care reform plan. But that 
interpretation of the results is  just flat wrong. 
President Obama  maintains a fairly robust 55% approval rate in 
Massachusetts. And while it is true that the  polling indicates that the “Obama Health 
Reform Plan” as a general concept is  not very popular there, the individual 
 components of reform continue to have substantial levels of public support 
–  both in Massachusetts and around the  country. 
The fact is that if  you see enough TV spots saying that the “Obama health 
care plan” will cost jobs,  take away your freedom, and cut your Medicare 
(all factually wrong) – you start  to believe it.  Because of the  massive 
length of the health care battle, the pro-health care reform forces,  have 
simply been outgunned on TV by the big insurance companies and the Chamber  of 
Commerce (mainly funded by the big insurance companies) that have pockets of  
infinite depth.  
On the other hand, if  you ask people if they want to end the ability of 
insurance companies to use  preexisting conditions to deny care; make health 
insurance available at  affordable prices to everyone; require insurance 
companies to spend the bulk of  their premiums on health care instead of profits 
and CEO salaries; or give  people the alternative of a public option – you 
get very strong  support. 
Add to that the fact  that 98% of people in Massachusetts have health 
insurance because of  their own state based health care reform -- and almost 80% 
are happy with their  health insurance -- and it’s clear that the race there 
was not at all a  referendum on health care reform.   
There are however  major critical lessons for Democrats in the 
Massachusetts  defeat: 
Lesson #1.The big take away: don’t run a bad  campaign.  The Coakley  
campaign made four critical errors any one of which, by itself, probably cost  
her the election. 
First, they did not  follow the first law of the Obama campaign to “leave 
no stone unturned”.  Coakley went on vacation in the  Caribbean after her 
primary victory.  She didn’t campaign and she didn’t raise  money.  When the 
campaign’s  pollsters – the respected firm of Lake Research – proposed doing 
a tracking poll  after the primary, they were told there was no money. As a 
result, the campaign  was caught flat footed as Brown began to  surge. 
The reason you leave  no stone unturned in a campaign, it to account for 
the unexpected.   Yes, Coakley was 20 points up on  Brown after the primary, 
but if the campaign was not asleep at the switch it  would have discovered 
the Brown surge while it could still be  stopped. 
Second, the campaign  allowed Brown to define himself – and Coakley -- for 
swing voters.  When Brown began a wave of advertising  between Christmas and 
New Years, it went unanswered.  The moment Brown began to surge, the  
campaign should have hit back and defined him as a shill for the Big Banks and  
insurance companies – not the attractive, charismatic outsider he appeared to 
be  to many voters. 
Third, the campaign  allowed their candidate to be perceived as the elite 
insider – and ceded to  Brown the role of crusading outsider.  Democrats win 
when they appear to be what they ought to be – populist  agents of change – 
not competent insider technocrats. That is particularly true  when people 
are angry at the status quo.  
Forth, unbelievably,  the campaign had no field program.  It was left to 
the heroic efforts of Organize for America (OFA) to try to  save the day by 
improvising a field program in the last week and a half.  More than anything 
else, Coakley lost  because of a wave of Republican turnout. Until OFA 
arrived there was no  apparatus in place to increase Democratic turnout.  That 
borders on political malpractice.  OFA did everything it could. Over the last 
weekend OFA made over 1.2 million  turn out calls to potential Democratic 
voters.  But great field programs – particularly  door to door programs that 
are the most effective means of boosting turnout --  must be organized with 
several  months of lead time – not a week and a half.   
OFA proved once again  how invaluable it is to the Democratic Party.  Were 
it not for their efforts – and the  Obama trip to Massachusetts – Coakley 
could have been routed  in a blowout that would have shaken Democratic 
confidence to its foundation.   
Even with all of these  problems, Coakley might have still pulled it out 
had Brown himself not been an  exciting, engaging, energetic candidate with an 
interesting history who ran a  flawless campaign.  In the end,  elections 
are about the candidate and their campaigns.  People vote for people; and to 
the  voters the quality of their campaigns is a powerful symbol of the 
qualities of  the candidate.   
Lesson #2: There is a great deal of  anger in America that is focused first 
and  foremost on people’s own economic prospects and frustration that 
change appears  so difficult.  Democrats have to do  everything in our power to 
deliver jobs.  And we must focus that anger at the people who caused the  
economic meltdown and are delaying fundamental change: the insurance  
companies, the Big Wall  Street banks, the energy  companies.  
The fact of the matter  is that when people are angry, if you don’t focus 
that anger on the people who  really caused their problems – they will focus 
it on the people in charge – in  this case Democrats – even if they were 
not mainly to blame.   
It was the financial  sector – Wall Street speculators, the Big Banks, the 
insurance companies – that  caused the worst economic disaster since the 
Great Depression.  And the Republicans – and their “markets  uber alles” 
philosophy made it all possible.   
Democrats must have a clear, populist frame  to win elections in 2010. In 
Massachusetts the campaign began to talk about  the President’s proposal to 
tax Wall Street in the final hours, but it was too  late. Coakley had allowed 
herself to be framed as an insider, technocrat versus  a crusading populist 
outsider – even though Brown will in fact go to Washington and vote down  
the line for the big insurance companies and Wall Street  Banks. 
To appeal to independent voters we do not  have to be “more moderate” or “
measured” as some have argued.  We must be bolder and more  populist. 
And the problem is not – as one commentator  argued last night – a 
frustration with the “fiscal overreach” of the  Democrats.  The problem is that we 
 have not produced enough jobs. Democrats must pass a large jobs program 
now,  and the deficit can’t stand in the way.  And let’s remember, it was 
George Bush who turned a Clinton surplus into more  debt that all other 
previous President’s  combined. 
Lesson #3: We have to keep our base inspired and  mobilized -- to make 
change and to win elections.  The Massachusetts special election taught the same 
 lesson as the Democrats’ catastrophic loss in 1994 – we have to inspire 
our  voters to go to the polls. Democrats lost control of Congress in 1994 
because  our voters stayed home. 
In Massachusetts the right  wing base was infused with excitement over the 
possibility of taking progressive  icon Ted Kennedy’s Senate seat – and 
hobbling Obama’s agenda in the Senate.  The Democratic base was not inspired by 
 the relatively bland Coakley and has been generally dispirited by the 
difficulty  of passing health care, Lieberman’s sabotage of the public option – 
and the  general recognition that Barack Obama can not simply wave a wand 
and make  change.   
The insurance  companies, Wall Street banks and energy companies haven’t 
just rolled over and  played dead.  They have put up tough  – tooth and nail 
battles – to defend the status quo.   
Though I don’t believe  that the shape of the health care bill would have 
likely been a great deal  different, there is no question that President 
Obama would be in better  political shape with the base of the Democratic Party 
if he had been a more  forceful advocate of the public option – and appeared 
more forceful in taking on  Wall Street.  
On the other hand,  Progressive leaders across America need to direct their 
own  frustration at the forces that are defending the status quo and 
standing in the  way of the Obama agenda.  They need  to take personal 
responsibility for rallying the base against our true enemies –  Wall Street, the 
insurance industry, the energy companies and the Republicans --  not encouraging 
cynicism and disaffection of base voters.  That sense of frustration lead 
directly  to a victory for Brown and now we are stuck with one more huge 
impediment to  change in the U.S. Senate.  
Lesson #4: Democrats must do whatever is necessary to  pass a good health 
care reform now. The President, House Speaker and  Senate Majority Leader 
have all pledged to do just that. The absolute worst  response to the 
Republican victory in Massachusetts would be to cut and run. We have  to muster our 
forces and do whatever is necessary to get it  done. 
Bad enough that the  late Senator Edward Kennedy’s seat is now in the hands 
of a Republican that does  not share his progressive values.  We must do 
whatever is necessary to assure that the fulfillment of his  life long dream 
of health care for all is not thwarted as well.   
That will probably  require that some portion of the bill be passed through 
the budget  reconciliation process that requires only 51 votes, now that 
the Senate no  longer has 60 members who caucus with the Democrats.  If so, so 
be it.   
The idea that a  minority of 41 members of the Senate can thwart the will 
of the majority is  fundamentally undemocratic in the first place.   
In fact, the Senate  needs to change its rules to eliminate the abusive use 
of filibusters that now  effectively require 60 votes to pass any 
significant piece of legislation.   
The Massachusetts loss was a  set back for the Progressive agenda. But it 
is in times of adversity that voters  get to test the mettle of leaders and 
political parties.  Time to square our shoulders, stand up  straight, and 
show America that we can really make  fundamental change. 
Robert Creamer is a long-time political organizer and  strategist, and 
author of the recent book:  “Stand Up Straight: How Progressives Can Win,” 
available on _Amazon.com._ 
(http://www.amazon.com/Listen-Your-Mother-Straight-Progressives/dp/0979585295/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1213241439&sr=8-
1)  
. 

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