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What Are the Worst Campaign Mistakes of All Time?
Listen up, politicians of America. I’m about to give you a piece of advice — the kind that would cost you five large from the pros — totally for free. When you are running for office, you are representing a geographical area with set boundaries. It is generally a good idea to live within those boundaries.
I mention this because the latest bit of polling out of Kansas shows veteran Republican U.S. Senator Pat Roberts — who would normally be a shoo-in for reelection — seven points behind independent candidate Greg Orman. The problem, at least in part: Roberts doesn’t seem to have lived in Kansas in any meaningful way for a very long time.
Here’s another complimentary piece of guidance: if you violated that first rule and never bothered going home, do not say — as Roberts did — “Every time I get an opponent … I mean, every time I get a chance, I’m home.” There are Freudian slips and then there are Freudian suicide attempts.
It’s not like Roberts — or, for that matter, Mary Landrieu, who has residency issues of her own — wasn’t warned. Richard Lugar lost his primary in Indiana in 2012 partially because he lived in a hotel when he was in the state (and partially because — and I have this on good medical authority — he was, biologically, a muppet). Elizabeth Dole got sent home in 2006 because she holed up in the Watergate with Bob rather than bothering to visit North Carolina (a state, aides insisted, that she could find on a map if you’d spot her three attempts and identify South Carolina in advance).
This got me to thinking about the worst unforced errors in political campaigns. I’m not talking about scandals or tactical mistakes, just extraordinary acts of avoidable stupidity (I’ve always been partial, for example, to Martha Coakley blowing up an entire campaign in Massachusetts by evincing total ignorance about the Red Sox). What are some of your favorites?
Published in General
Hiring Ed Rollins as your campaign manager.
Listening to Mike Murphy.
Hiring Steve Schmidt or Nicole Wallace.
Yes! I love Mitt Romney, but that was a huge failing on his part. We need a candidate who would have told Crowley, “I don’t care if you want to protect the president by moving on to another subject. You can ask me another question, but I’m going to continue to talk about how the president is lying about Benghazi.” Oh, boy….
Sarah Palin was the best thing in McCain’s campaign. McCain made a big mistake by allowing Nicole Wallace and Steve Schmidt to trash her to the press before the election was over. For all I like Rick Perry, I’m not sure I can support a candidate who hires Steve Schmidt.
Once upon a time there was this guy who thought it was a good idea to distinguish between legitimate and illegitimate rape. He posited that one was more likely to result in pregnancy than the other. ‘Cause science.
Focusing on my home state, there was this ad from Pete Hoekstra in 2012.
Good grief.
I’ll toss in the Al & Tipper weird makeout session just for fun.
Oh, and I may be remembering this wrong (I was a kid at the time) but didn’t Gary Hart dare reporters to catch him stepping out on his wife?
Monkey Business
Here in Texas, in 1982, Reagan Brown, incumbent Texas Agricultural Commissioner, intended to demonstrate the omnipresent danger of fire ants he believed were damaging ranchers around the state. With TV cameras rolling, he brushed his hand over a fire ant mound on the Texas Capitol grounds, and the little critters dashed up his arm and stung him so violently he was taken to the hospital.
Texans like a little eccentricity, but we rarely vote for stupid. Brown lost the election and he and the fire ants gave us Jim Hightower (back when Democrats could win statewide elections), who served two terms before being ousted by Rick Perry in 1990.
Michele “the HPV vaccine causes mental retardation” Bachmann.
I guess it’s not actually a campaign error, but for some reason I’ve always been fond of Jimmy Carter’s killer rabbit.
How about stupid public comments about rape?
Or anything about defining rape.
I think as soon as defining rape enters the political discussion, you’ve lost.
He would have done better to stay home and eat fruit cake. Amirite?! ;-)
Yeah, that was nuts. I like Bachmann, but that was nuts.
I wasn’t a big Bachmann fan, but when I heard that, it completely shut her off for me. Like I don’t care if she reads Hayek on the beach. That shut things off for me completely.
Actually, I thought that was a good idea at the time. He was a senator and this was a major crisis; on that alone he should have suspended the campaign to get busy with his day job. The trouble with it as a campaign tactic was that he didn’t actually come up with any good ideas and he didn’t actually broker anything and he he unsuspended things too quickly and he didn’t even come up with an idea that set him apart from the Washington Combine which was intent on a bailout. It wasn’t the campaign suspension was bad, it’s that McCain was a bad candidate.
And hammering Obama on Obamacare outside of campaign documents and powerpoints.
How about the selection of Thomas Eagleton as a running mate. Nice judgment George
Or anything about defining rape.
I think as soon as defining rape enters the political discussion, you’ve lost.
Well, Republicans and conservatives have lost, Democrats and liberals have won by convincing a pliant media and ignorant public that a few ill-conceived remarks mean that the GOP is the party of rapist apologists and that careful examination of the salary divide between men and women is akin to the threat of the barbarian assault on Rome.
I nominate the biggest flip-flop of all time: when Mr. “How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?” Kerry became Mr. “Reporting for Duty (did I mention that I served on a swiftboat in the ‘Nam)” Kerry.
Oh yes! I’m sure we have a photo somewhere. . .
Well, the whole point is the reason its radioactive politically is that its really easy to demagogue.
Okay — personal story here. Back when I was liberal bliss ninny, I took a flight out of Denver on which I was seated next to a campaign worker for Gary Hart, prior to the Monkey Business. This guy was young — looked like George Stephanopoulos (spell-check brings up Menopausal, btw). We had a nice little chat and I asked him if he’d ever met Reagan.
His reply was something that could have been the genesis of “amiable dunce.” Oh, Reagan’s a very nice man and all, but not too bright. Something along those lines. The arrogance of Democritters. Right there in one picture.
And, as an aside, I’ve always felt horrible for Gary Hart’s wife. That poor woman.
If one party primarily opposes the incumbent for his national health care policy, it should not nominate a former governor who enacted on a state-level the very same health care program it claims to oppose.
How about causing a 5 day traffic jam to punish the mayor of Hoboken?
From 2008 alone: Hillary’s stumble over drivers’ licenses for illegal immigrants; the Howard Dean “scream” (which, to be sure, was overblown by Democrats looking for a chance to Move On to supposedly more electable John Kerry); the Jeremiah Wright explosion.
One of them has to be John Kerry’s lame attempt to throw the first pitch at Fenway Park. The nation got to contrast that with Bush’s forceful strike at Yankee Stadium after 9/11. Trivial, perhaps but we all know the power of optics.
I’m not sure if it was during his reelection campaign, but former S.C. Governor Jim Hodges threatened to lie down in the road to block shipments of plutonium waste from Colorado, destined for the Savannah River Site to be reprocessed. At that point, even supporters began calling him “Governor Speedbump”, knowing that the odds were in favor of the waste hauler running over him instead of stopping.