I know that you’re probably sick of my complaining about Ed Markey’s fundraising emails. I understand that, even though his is one of the safest Democratic Senate seats in the country, he has to raise some money to keep it safe, blah blah. But really – every day? Look at your inbox and count the number of days over the last several weeks in which you didn’t get a fundraising plea from Markey. If your inbox looks like mine, it’s a pretty small number.
Anyway, I was amused by the irony of the latest plea, which arrived this morning (email, no link):
Nate Silver’s FiveThirtyEight gives Republicans a 54.7% chance of taking the Senate. The Washington Post and the Rothenberg Report are making similar predictions.
The Republicans are pulling out all the stops to take over the Senate this year. We need to build up our grassroots defense to make sure Massachusetts isn’t one of their conquests.
But a little context is useful. First, Silver is indeed now forecasting a 54.7% chance of a GOP Senate takeover. But that is down almost 10 points from a 64% chance just two weeks ago. So things are trending in the right direction.
Second, and more importantly, Silver’s assessment of the probability of Democrats retaining Markey’s seat is … [drum roll] 100%. That’s right, 100%. And that makes perfect sense. What do you think the odds are that more than a handful of GOP activists in Massachusetts can even name the Republican running against Markey? Brian what’s-his-name is not going to be the next US Senator from Massachusetts. He’s just not.
My point is not that Markey shouldn’t be getting in all of our faces regarding the upcoming election. My point is that his is a safe seat, so it seems to me that he could spare a little fundraising muscle for his colleagues who really are in close races. Colorado. North Carolina. Iowa. Minnesota. Even New Hampshire, for heaven’s sake. If Markey’s goal is really to avoid a GOP takeover of the Senate, it seems to me that his fundraising prowess would be better spent on those races, rather than on padding his own already hefty campaign account to blow out a guy who is little more than a token opponent.
On a related note, I got a call from a group fundraising for Al Franken yesterday. To convince me she was legit, she told me what I donated last time ($25). I committed to give a little more, but said I would do it through his website, because I don’t trust telemarketing firms.
She wanted me to donate $100, over the phone. Where is the formula that said a $25 donor should be hit up for four times that amount six months later?
I repeat, Democratic fundraising is the most alienating force out there. DCCC and DSCC send me e-mails showing me how much I’ve given so far ($0 and $0). I believe the Obama campaign pioneered this shaming technique. I’m not shamed (clearly), but I’m a little ashamed for them.
Then of course there are “Issue surveys” with donation links, etc. It almost feels like they’re gauging which issues raise the most money, so they can decide what to work on.
Ugh.
The most annoying approach to fundraising is telemarketing. It’s also the most expensive. Telemarketing firms get about 50% of the amount that is raised.
You did two things wrong that caused you to get this call. First, you gave over the telephone. Second, you told the telemarketing firm that you might give more later.
Here is some advice.
1. Never give money over the phone to a telemarketing company. It is better to donate directly over the internet.
2. When you receive a call, tell them to take your phone number off of their list.
n/t
Your message said that the person knew that you gave $25 and committed to give more. So, wasn’t that original $25 donation over the phone?
Basically, once you give over the phone, you are put into their database for a follow-up phone call.
But my donation was over the website. Which made them telling me about it not a great selling technique.
I tell telemarketers I never donate as a consequence of receiving of a phone call. That includes pledges, and other material mailed in. This has been fairly successful at paring down the number of calls I receive.
What does Ed Markey do with all that money if he’s running in what will no doubt be a lightly contested race in the future? I can’t imagine the weak candidates the republicans scrounge up are going to push him into a corner where he is spending a lot of money.
Who is actively fundraising and stumping for candidates in every swing state across the country and even donating money from her own warchest. For every pundit discussing how much “distance” vulnerable Senate Dems need to have from the “too liberal” Obama I wonder why that downright leftist Warren is stumping in all these red states? Maybe since economic populism actually works to bring cultural conservatives back to their pappy’s party?
And JimC let’s shame Ed-amount of money he’s given to swing state Dems: $0
There are two reasons why Senator Warren is traveling around the country helping others, but Senator Markey isn’t:
1. Ed Markey is up for election in November for his first full term. With his name on the ballot, it would be a major mistake for him to spend time in other states, instead of spending time here.
2. All over the country, people want to hear Senator Warren speak. That’s not the case with Eddie!
Brian Who? Come on bluewatch, as the old Louisiana adage went-he’d have to be caught with a dead girl or a live boy to lose this one. Share the wealth Eddie! Isn’t that what Democrats are supposed to do?
With his name on the ballot, it is totally appropriate for Ed Markey to be spending time in this state meeting voters, instead of traveling around the country. In my opinion, Markey should be doing that even if he were running unopposed. Voters want to think that their elected officials are willing to earn their vote.
And, it’s appropriate that Ed Markey is doing some amount of fundraising, because that’s part of the process of campaigning. Of course, if you disagree with the extent of his fundraising, or the way that he raises funds, you can just decide not to donate. That’s okay too.
As I think about that … do I want my donation to Ed Markey going to Mary Landrieu? (This year I would, but I can imagine years I wouldn’t.) It’s one thing if he does an event for her; it’s another if he collects from us and funnels cash to her.
Color me … ambivalent. Party building and all that, but someone so committed to Markey to give to him when he’s almost certain to win probably has reasons for not giving directly to the party.
By the way, I know most people know, but not everyone does: DSCC and DCCC are NOT the party. I was shocked when I found out.
Being able to run up the score in terms of warchest is part of what keeps them safe.
Pull a Bill Proxmire. He ran on his record against no name opponents and usually spent a few thousand dollars, most of which was spent on postage to send handwritten notes to long time supporters. No need for Eddie to have a warchest this large, a lot of it still held over from that time he thought he was going to run for Senate in 1984, 2004, and 2010 and that time he did run in 2012. Brian who?, is not going to be much of a threat.
Are you arguing the warchest scared away another GOP contender? I doubt Gomez would’ve been renominated, Brown is taking on Shaheen who has pockets as deep as Ed, Baker and Tisei would’ve run for their contests regardless-not sure who he was scaring away to be honest.
Even now you don’t want to run the risk of looking like you’re taking your race for granted lest the NRSC decide that MA may be a good investment after all. I do think he can at least allow others to use his list though.
Who? Seriously, who could the Mass. GOP plausibly have run for that seat? Furthermore, it doesn’t make any sense that the GOP wouldn’t run this hypothetical strong candidate just because Markey has a few bucks in his account. As a partial-term incumbent up for a full term for the first time, he’ll never be more vulnerable than he is right now. And Elizabeth Warren obviously isn’t going anywhere until she wants to.
There’s a difference between “taking your race for granted” and “not annoying your most reliable supporters by filling their inboxes daily with scary tales of Republican takeovers in Massachusetts that in reality are not going to happen.”
…but it’s Campaigning 101 to raise money as if you are running scared. There may not have been a huge likelihood this time, but it’s not something you neglect and you never know when someone might have seized an opportunity.
Weren’t we all laughing about Scott Brown a few years ago? I don’t think Robert Hedlund (to grab a name) would beat the world, but you never know when something is going to catch fire.
He’s planning to run for president. Okay, no he’s not. I don’t know what his problem is.
the Markey has a huge Napoleon complex when it comes to Warren. After all, he has been in officer for forty years with his largest accomplishment being nearly twenty years ago and despite being up for reelection himself, Warren has still managed to out raise him more than 2 to 1. Oh and he is the junior Senator. My guess is that he is trying to fundraise to raise his own profile within the Senate and make people take him more seriously.
On another note, I completely agree with jimc. The DCCC in particular but also the DNC more broadly has lost a lot of respect over their emails. (there is an entire Tumblr dedicated to making fun of them for it – http://emailsfromthedccc.tumblr.com/) End the Insanity.
Or they would not send them out. I think the same thing when I indulge in my guilty pleasure and watch the shopping channels for laughs until I realize that these programs are promoting this stuff on TV because people are actually buying it. Who and where and why is something I really do not want to know!
I suspect they “work” because they go to committed people. But are they adding to the numbers of committed people? Or just beating us over the head and ultimately demotivating us?
I stopped contributing to DCCC and the DSCC (or whatever the acronyms are for the house and senate) way back during the ACA battles (maybe even before) when alleged “Democrats”, elected using MY contributions to the national party, were endangering the entire agenda of my party. My contributions went to “Democratic” candidates who, after election, aggressively worked to restrict a woman’s right to choose.
I have been VERY clear with every caller from the national committees that I now give directly to candidates I choose, I explain why, and I ask them to please call me ONLY when they seek my opinion on a matter of policy or platform.
Interestingly, I get essentially NO calls. It seems the national committees are far more interested in my money than my opinion.
If you don’t like Ed Markey’s email messages, there is a very simple solution: You can easily stop these messages. Just UNSUBSCRIBE! That’s what I do, and it works great.
If you don’t UNSUBSCRIBE, you should know that the frequency of the emails will increase as we get closer to the end of this month. It will be even more frequent as we get closer to the election.
Also, please unsubscribe rather than mark them as spam. Political emails wind up in my spam folder on my gmail account with the reason, “Others have marked messages from this sender as spam.”
There is enough money in politics, even without yours. If you want to donate something, donate your time to the candidate or the cause of your choice.
Why not both?
Candidates do need money for their message to get out, and if they know a big chunk is coming from small donors, they might be more careful to not upset the applecart of the masses.
Some people have more money than time. Some people are introverts. Some people support candidates that are farther away. I just sent $50 to Staci Appel of Iowa because she’s in a competitive House race where there’s also a competitive Senate seat in a relatively small state, and Appel’s stances, while not as liberal as I’d like, are liberal enough for me to give money (in contrast to, say, the incumbent senators from AR and LA). I’m not going to travel to Iowa to donate my time to Ms. Appel’s campaign, but I sure hope she (and Mr. Braley) win, and am willing to try and help.
They seem to ask for more far more often than they ask for help.
But I would say, do what you can do. Or what you want to do.
n/t
Campaigns are funded by the wealthiest 0.01%. These e-mails are ineffective, but talking and listening to rich people is. Average people donating $20-50 here and there raises the chances of the politicians listening to us ever so slightly.