Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Message matters. Mode matters. Everything matters when you’re in a bare-handed fight to the death over a 2-point margin.
We heard a lot of sniggering from Republicans over Obama’s profligate spending on supposedly outmoded, ineffective, and too-expensive field offices.
And we heard a lot from the Republican side about how the GOP was doing things better and more efficiently -- touting how many “touches” they had from knocks, personal calls, robocalls and e-mails.
Well, some of these modes of contact are just plain worthless. And I’m sure a lot of the messages used, even with the effective modes, were subpar or worthless. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and the taste was apparently rancid to a lot of GOTV and persuasion targets.
Time had a fascinating piece on Obama’s tech advantages:
The magic tricks that opened wallets were then repurposed to turn out votes. The analytics team used four streams of polling data to build a detailed picture of voters in key states.
But it’s not just superior technical prowess on the Obama side; their voter psychology smarts are probably even more important. They know much better than us which mode and message works with whom and when and for what. Some messages and modes are generally effective, some aren’t, some work better for fundraising and others for persuasion and still others for GOTV. They can do much, much more with every dollar they raise and every volunteer that signs up.
And today we have a Washington Post piece claiming that Republicans are serious about finding out what went wrong and why this year:
Top Republican officials, stunned by the extent of their election losses Tuesday night, have begun an exhaustive review to figure out what went so wrong and how to fix it. . .
. . . The review began on election night with polls in key states, and next week the party will begin a string of voter focus groups.
Know what I didn’t see mentioned in this article? Anything new or any mention of experiments. I saw a whole lot about focus groups and straight polling, debriefs with volunteers. All fine in moderation, but how do they expect to get the right answers from the old methods that left them flat-footed and “shellshocked” in defeat on election eve?
It’s not magic, and it didn’t happen overnight. They know a whole lot more than we do because they’ve been testing these things seriously for years, with reports of 400-600 experiments under their belt that are proprietary to the progressive movement.
Knowledge is power, and they have the knowledge. We need to learn, and quickly. You don’t do that with outdated textbooks.
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Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Thanks Hang On . . . it seems like the field offices were important, but they are a visible sign of a generally broader and more effective approach, not the whole thing.
I think you're right that candidate-centric capabilities are terrible because they come and go, but it's better with an incumbent, and the Progressive groups, the unions, Emily's List, minority outreach groups, have built institutional capacities and collaborate and share data/information through hubs like Catalyst, the common microtargeting/data house, and the Analyst Institute, the common experimentation/testing house.
I would love to see the development of something like that on the Right, integrating state and local Tea Party groups, national activist and grassroots groups, etc. We're at a disadvantage because the Left has been organizing for a century with unions and big-city machines. They already had an outsized expertise in it, and then super-charged it with better data and experiment-driven advances in message and mode of contact.
It will be more difficult for us, but we can do it. Really, we have to do it. All the hundreds of millions spent this year needs to flow to the right things, though . . .
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Hang On: And another question: If Team Obama was really so good, why was his vote down by the margins that it was? What really mystified me was Romney's vote being down vs. McCain's. · 29 minutes ago
Edited 28 minutes ago
I think Obama would have lost this if there wasn't a campaign. Obama's turnout was down significantly overall, but what makes them so good is that he was only down slightly or even up from '08 where it counted . . .
Jul '11
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
@Adam Schaeffer #9: SCOTUS is gone. The Obamacare decisions pretty much proved that. Obama’s second term will just add nails to the coffin.
Anyway if the GOP is serious about winning again they need to take out the MSM. Not reduce it, not go around it, destroy it. For every message the GOP got to a voter, hundreds if not thousands of contradicting Dem messages got through via the MSM. My mother voted for Obama in 2008, she was very upset that I did not. When I started talking to her about stuff Obama has done and what the GOP message was, about Romney and Ryan, she was astounded. She said she had never heard any of this before. All she knew and heard before was what the MSM had fed her. That the GOP was made up of rich guys that wanted to take away her Social Security. That they believe in war, racism, business and making money above all else. I can’t blame her for voting for Obama in 2008, based on what she had been told by our fair and balanced MSM, I would have voted for him too.
BTW-she went GOP this year.
Sep '10
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Crow's Nest
Pseudodionysius: Vincent: I got an idea what they're looking at.... You know what they're looking at?... I mean — is this guy something, or is he something?... This crew is good!... You wanna know what they're looking at?
Dr. Bob: What?
Vincent: Us.... The L-A-P-D.... Po-lice Department.... We just got made... · 41 minutes ago
Heatis a great film. · 5 minutes ago
And Michael Mann is a very prominent fan of Ferrari sports cars and Move On dot org. Irony piled upon irony.
Oct '10
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
I've said it before and I'll say it until I'm blue in the face (or until someone tells me to stfu), but we need to change the communication paradigm: http://bit.ly/SIfxyT
All other efforts are futile, utterly futile, unless we change the communication paradigm. Ronald Reagan was The Great Communicator, but he wouldn't stand a chance today with those who voted Left. Because the current communication paradigm is our Achilles Heel.
Oct '10
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Fake John Galt at #23 is exactly right. My experience with dozens of Libs is exactly the same as he described. They get their news, and they form their opinions, from the MSM. When I challenge their facts, or question them on their assertions, they lash out with invective and refuse to engage in a discussion. They are poisoned by the MSM and will be so forevermore, unless we speak directly to them without the MSM filter caricaturing what we believe and how conservatism is better for them than Liberalism.
Mind you, this MSM poison even exists in my Hispanic in-laws, the vast majority of whom are Republicans here in PR, and other Republican friends here. I tell them things - factual things - that blow their minds, because they only get what the MSM feed them. They're Republicans because they think their way to their opinions. But even they are woefully misinformed and uninformed about what's really happening out there. If our Republican friends who only have access to the MSM don't know truth from fiction, the rest of the nation won't, either, and we'll never reach them unless we change the communication paradigm.
Jun '12
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Not a particularly big or strategic point, but as a Buckeye who was pounded with this, I say KILL the robocall machines. I regard them as roughly equivalent to telemarketing calls and treat them accordingly (even if the caller speaks my language). Complete waste of money, in my experience.
Sep '12
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
I'm with Fake John Galt - there needs to be a day of reckoning for the MSM. Folks in their armchairs did not hear that the administration lied about Benghazi, that Biden lied about the HHS mandate, and the BLS lied about the Sept. unemployment number. Fox's audience is growing, but only among those who can afford cable. There must be a right-leaning free television network while tvs are still viable.
Also, I just heard a suggestion on the talk radio station from a caller whose African-American friend said: all the GOP offices should invite the local leaders of African-American churches, Latino & Jewish organizations to their annual holiday party. No campaigning, but goodwill and a further invitation to meet and talk and listen right after the holidays. Would be a good start.
Aaaand Rubiophones in Ohio. (see my Member Feed post on the Obamaphone Effect)
Aug '10
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
The only use I see for robocalls is for inviting those who are already identified as strong supporters to campaign events.
That's the only thing I've ever used robocalls for - to notify Conservatives of a meeting, or a rally, or a BBQ, etc.
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Misthiocracy
The only use I see for robocalls is for inviting those who arealreadyidentified as strong supporters to campaign events.
That's the only thing I've ever used robocalls for - to notify Conservatives of a meeting, or a rally, or a BBQ, etc. · 29 minutes ago
Agreed . . . robocalls seem useful possibly for notifications, but all the persuasion and turnout experiments suggest they are an utter waste of time and money.
Mar '11
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Amen. As a Wisconsinite, we got bombarded with these things. Come home from work and find 5-10PER DAY on the answering machine. They are just noise, with no effect.
Maybe if we got three over the course of the last month of the campaign, they might be effective. As it is, they're about as useful as an ad in the Yellow Pages.
Jun '11
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Robocalls are the epitome of favoring activity over effectiveness.
Aug '10
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
There are some circumstances where that's a feature, not a bug.
Example: The bylaws of your organization say you have to give official notice to all your members for an annual general meeting, but you don't actually want all the members of your organization to show up at this meeting, because you're trying to rig a vote, or something.
So, you send a poorly-recorded robocall to all your members, knowing that most people hang up on those calls anyway, and then you send a well-worded letter to the members you WANT to show up.
Of course, I would never dream of doing something so unethical...
Dec '10
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
Misth, we just don't do things that way. Ours is not a top-down parlimentary system. Only our top-leadership is driven by the folks we can't reach. Akin's loss was his own, but that was Missouri's problem.
Our national problem was that 5,000 GOP votes that showed up for McCain in my rural, solidly GOP county, didn't show up for Romney. Those are registered, non-dead Republicans in a county long-since finished counting.
And Casey, maybe you have something there, though leave it to a cat to reference Deacon Jones, which I assume refers to the Head Slap. Before it was outlawed, it did let you gain a step on the competition.
May '10
Re: Does the Republican Party Really Intend to Learn Anything?
The titular question is not only foolish, it is an incredible triumph of hope over experience. Why start now?