Blue America Contest Update
by digby
Getting back to progressive work for a minute (I know — dull, dull, dull) here’s an update on the contest we’ve been running all week, from Down With Tyranny:
Last Saturday, we introduced a week-long Blue America contest, “to spotlight nine of our House endorsees this week who may eventually wind up in the program but who need campaign cash to compete effectively now.”
That “now” is the critical word. Ads must be produced now, though they may not appear until later. Time slots and ad spaces must be purchased now, though the ads may not be slated to run until sometime several weeks down the line. Strategies for October and November must be planned now, to get enthusiasm and energy and turnout all revved up for election day. A sudden flood of cash the day before the election is nice, but by then it just goes to pay down the campaign debt. These campaigns need cash, and they need it now.
The contest works like this: Blue America has a special contest contribution website, where every donor who makes a contribution (of any size) will be able to “vote” to see who should receive an extra $5000 contribution from Blue America. This would be in addition to whatever money each candidate receives in direct donations, of course. Russ Warner’s supporters, for example, have already donated over $4,200 to his campaign since Saturday, much of it in $1, $5 and $20 increments! In terms of “votes,” though, Annette Taddeo has taken a slight lead over Russ and Debbie Cook, although both Dennis Shulman and Sam Bennett are starting to move up. All five candidates already have over a $1,000 in contributions on our special contest page, which, as you can see, now has grown to over $15,000 since Saturday.
$5000 may not seem like a lot, when we hear stories about the millions being spent on the presidential races, governor’s contests, and various Senate battles. But for a House race, especially in areas away from major media markets, $5000 can go a long way.
For instance…
A full page newspaper ad in a small district can cost as little as $1000. An extra $5000 means five full page ads. Five ads in one paper, or one ad in five different papers. Either way, that’s some nice publicity.
In a major metropolitan paper, a full page ad in the main news section might run $40,000, but a full page in the local section might run just $6000. A full page ad in a regional network of small papers could run for around $11,000. When the $5000 prize is combined with whatever donations come in to win the contest, that puts that full page ad in the local section within reach, and would be a big step toward what is needed for that regional network ad buy.
Then there’s radio and cable television. According to one person familiar with campaign media advertising rates that I contacted, $5000 paid for a solid, heavy-rotation radio advertising blitz in a medium sized market, and $6000 paid for a week’s worth of cable ads in heavy rotation– some 800+ spots! Remember this effective TV spot Alan Grayson used to beat the heavily favored hack establishment candidate in the Orlando primary last week? You might want to see him running that in honor of Bush rubber stamp Ric Keller from now ’til November. Each of our 9 candidates would like to run spots like that. You can rest assured their Republican opponents will fill the airwaves will deceptive ads blaming them for high gas prices, corruption, gays, abortions… whatever Karl Rove tells them is getting traction.
What else? $5000 would buy a candidate a billboard ad along a major highway in district filled with suburban commuters. That’s lots of eyeballs, every day from now to the election.
Your vote– and your contributions– can make that happen for the candidate that gets you the most excited.
The nine candidates in this Blue America contest are already excited about the possibility, and some have been putting the word out to their supporters about what we’re doing. On their campaign websites you can see more about them, and in some cases, you can see the ads they’d like to give much more distribution, with some financial help from people like you.
Here are the nine Blue America candidates (with links to their sites) that are part of this contest:
Sam Bennett (PA-15) – Lehigh Valley
Debbie Cook (CA-46) – Orange County
Larry Joe Doherty (TX-10) – northern Austin to Brenham and Katy
Alan Grayson (FL-08) – Orlando
Jared Polis (CO-02) – Boulder and Westminster out to Eagle County
Dennis Shulman (NJ-05) – northern New Jersey from Bergen and Passaic around to Warren County
Annette Taddeo (FL-18) – Miami-Dade from Miami Beach and Coral Gables down to Key West
Russ Warner (CA-26) – northeast L.A. suburbans from Rancho Cucamonga to Arcadia
Barry Welsh (IN-06) – east central Indiana centered on Muncie
They need your help, and they need it now. Tell ’em Blue America sent you. One more thing, you can vote as many times as you like but we only count each screen name ONCE for each candidate. If you give Russ Warner $5 and Sam Bennett $500, you just registered one vote for Russ and one vote for Sam. If you give Dennis Shulman $50 in fifty one dollar increments, you just gave Dennis one vote (plus 50 much needed dollars, so… awesome, but save yourself the trouble and donate as one lump sum)
There are 600 donors so far as we publish this– and $15,370 donated. Let’s see if we can bring that up a bit. We’ve invited Rahm Emanuel, Steny Hoyer, Debbie Wasserman Schultz and Chris Van Hollen, all of whom are charged with electing more Democrats (and all of whom we’ve given tons of press)– to each match the $5,000 check Blue America is donating. We’ll let you know if they decide to.
They should. It’s a slap in the face to progressives everywhere that they can’t find it in themselves to pony up this money.
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