1. Deb Goldberg: well, we actually do not know exactly how much she plans to spend on TV advertising, because I believe her campaign has not said so. However, given that at the end of July she had 1.9+ million on hand, we can guess that she will spend approximately $2 million on ads, give or take a couple of hundred thousand.
2. Andrea Silbert: $530,000. According to a press release received today from the Silbert campaign, they
will air two new television ads today. The ads, which are Silbert’s first of the campaign and were created by noted media specialist Tad Devine, are entitled “Andrea Silbert: The Jobs Candidate,” and “14,000 Jobs.” They will air today and take a hiatus for the Labor Day holiday. They will return to the airwaves on Tuesday, September 5th through the September 19th primary. The ads are part of an approximately $530,000 media buy designed to ensure that Silbert’s message reaches Democratic and unenrolled primary voters.
According to an article in today’s T&G,
So the mayors campaign, which had $391,234 in the bank at the end of the most recent reporting period, Aug. 16, was able to plunk down about $400,000 for media for a longer run than the mayors advisers had anticipated. Besides the network booking fees, the campaign paid Mr. Patton-Spruill, the director, about $20,000.
After incurring those costs plus other fees for the services of media buyer Tobe Berkovitz, a Boston University professor, the campaign has only about $80,000 left, Mr. Ferson said.
Another interesting piece from the article:
In one of the two versions of the ad, a group of elementary school pupils behind a beaming Mr. Murray chant: Hurry, hurry, vote for Murray.
In the other version, the candidate declares: Im in a hurry to get Massachusetts working again. I hope youll give me the chance.
Hoss Analysis: remember that with all of these amounts, a portion goes to the consultants, so each of their amounts that is actually spent on tv ads is less than the total amount put out there.
That said, this is overall an impressive bunch of media buys for a downballot race, particularly Silbert’s buy and, to a lesser extent, Murray’s.
Regarding Silbert, the following are especially impressive:
A) Her ability to spend more money on TV than either 2002 LG candidates Pines or Slattery, even though they were both much more established politicians at the time. She’s also buying more time than any of the Treasurer candidates did in 2002. Again, impressive, given that that group had both established politicians (Cahill, Cahill and Murphy) and a guy that was an ultimate insider and kicked in 100K+ of his own dough (Segel).
B) Her ability to have conserved enough resources to be able to spend this much.
Regarding Murray, it’s impressive that he’s been able to pull together a larger media buy than Pines or Slattery, but it’s surprising overall that he didn’t raise more given his position as an elected official. I know he’s allegedly putting together a field operation, but as I’ve said constantly, I’ll believe it when I see it. I also know that some say “he got into the race late.” Baloney. He’s known he was running for years, and for him not to have stocked up more funds prior to getting in the race was foolish. Or, if it was not foolish, then his failure to raise more since he did get in isn’t impressive – and yes, I know he’s “raised more since he got in than anyone else.”
Also, it appears that Murray’s people have bought into the “remember a rhyme” school of political ads a la Tim Cahill. But “Hurry Hurry Vote for Murray”? Uhhh…
Lastly, I’ll say this: usually the candidate that accumulates and spends the most wins. In this race, Deb Goldberg’s inherited wealth positions her as the leading candidate to do that now. However, given that she has not gotten a ton of attention, and given that her ads are not particularly memorable, she is less of a favorite than she could have been. Silbert and Murray are still in this thing, and as we all know in politics, anything can happen.
I didn’t know that even as we get closer to the end of this campaign that you would continue to take cheap shots at Murray and his campaign. Rarely have any of your comments come onto this blog without a bias in them. September 19th and one of these great people get to represent the democratic party. So in these coming weeks Highlight Andrea Silbert, and her accomplishements and achievemants. Your negativity is just a little much for me any way and I’am sure others agree. Instead of spinning every little thing that goes on in this race look at it openly fairly and have the willingness to change your mind sometimes. As far as the ads go don’t get to caught up in the numbers but rather focus on the substance. If the voters elect a Lieutenant Governor who buys the most ads the winner will be Deb Goldberg. The ads that Murray and Silbert are running will help keep them in this race and possibly give them a slight edge. But as a Democrat who believes in grass roots campaigns who speak the will of the voters I hope in my gut the voters will look at more than just TV ads this time around. Though the probability of this is not on my side I still believe this comes down to who has the best organization and the greatest message for the voters. When I first looked into this campaign it was murray and to this day it is still murray. Murray/Gabrieli
…that I am too negative for you. I’m sure you know that winning is my ultimate goal, so doing what I can (within the rules our fearless editors have set out) to help a candidate that I’ve chosen by commenting on her positively, as well as commenting on why the others are not as good a choice, seems to me to be a fair thing to do. And I did compliment Murray on his performance, I just don’t think it’s been good enough to win, and I pointed out why I thought that. If I’m wrong on why, so be it, I’ll happily amend my perception of things. But in my opinion, Murray has conducted his campaign in a way that did not take advantage of the natural advantages someone in his position had. I also don’t think that a ground game will work. Hence my thoughts above.
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As for the substance issue: I wish you were correct, but I think (but don’t know) that voters won’t process too much substance at the LG level, they’ll only procees memory. “Jobs” & “Mayor” – two things that I think will likley stand out. Goldberg’s memory hook? Probably just her name and endless saturation, not anything else. If history holds, her strategy has a better chance of winning, as you note too.
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Interesting that you want Murray Gabrieli – for whatever reason, that hasn’t been a combo too many have talked about here, and honestly I hadn’t thought about it much either. I’ve mostly thought about variations on the Deval ticket, and note how each would complement him. We probably agree that generally any of the 3 LGs would generally complement Deval and Chris, but that they’d have a harder time complementing Tom.
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While this is all fun, I can’t wait for it to be over…
If anyone had told you in advance that “Tim for Treasurer” would have won the race for an obscure county official, you’d have laughed him out of the room. Don’t count your chickens…
I think that helped a lot, just as Murray being a Mayor may help. It was pretty much John Kerry’s quip at the 02 unity breakfast about a 9 year old girl coming up with a better slogan than all the consultants in the world that propelled the “Tim for Treasurer” story into the mainstream. Not that it didn’t work, it just wasn’t what was underlying people’s votes, I don’t think. Perhaps the rhyme combined with the executive position will propel Murray.
As Norfolk County Treasure (which is what it said on the ballot) had to have help, against a state rep, city councilor and Jim Segal, who will probably more qualified than all of them, had no title next to his name.
could hurt Silbert this time around too.
The Murray initial media buy is 400,000 starting Tuesday, with radio and the buy from now until then added, with an additional buy coming. I know it’s important that our number look the lowest, and I haven’t posted on this before because the three campaign’s will have adequate impact, in my opinion, but I don’t want to let this mis-impression of our buy stand.
Thanks for clarifying, Scott. I was only relaying what the T&G reported that you told them. I am not surprised that they either mischaracterized or under-reported the information provided…
It reads correctly, though some might read more into it. We “plunked down 400”. Glad we’re on the same page, though
too bad she isn’t running in north ethiopia. then she could be “andrea for eritrea.”
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also too bad LG won’t win on merits. the other two aren’t even close. she’s a star.
If you think she should win, you should be urging people to vote for her. I surprised myself the other day when I voted for her on my absentee ballot.
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I certainly think she has a very good shot at winning – she has enough cash to get her message out and I think she’s going to be riding Deval Patrick’s coattails.
lowballing her chances is my super-secret way of getting more people to support her.
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but now you ruined everything.
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DP has coattails? who knew?