A Win for Campaign Reform (washingtonpost.com)

David Brodedr's column today hightlights some important changes as a result of the change in campaign finance law. Speaking of what the national party organizations did in the 2004 elections with their expanded small donor bases, it appears as though, once again, the GOP is on the cutting edge of political developments, if not driving them. Where's the proof?

Prior to the 2000 elections, the GOP had been diligently working on expanding a base of small donors--those people who give less than $500 per election. Most political commentators, particularly those on the left, failed to realize the most import concept of a small donor. Someone who gives $75 when they make $30,000 a year is now much more personally invested in the outcome of the election since his/her contribution represents a much more significant percentage of their disposable income. Thus small donors will do two things--they will be sure they go vote and they are more likely to talk to their friends about politics.

So with a growing base of small donors to mobilize, what did the GOP do next, they starting investing that money--not in big TV ad campaigns that do little these days to move voters. Rather the GOP began building a highly effective grassroots organization. The GOP realized and learned a lesson from past elections--campaigns, like war, is not won in the air. Certainly air power helps, but it is the ground-pounders, the foot-soldiers who win wars and win campaigns. Broder points out that the investment in grassroots organizing has paid off.

Here's the beauty of the matter and the pay-off for Republicans. The GOP has built a strong grassroots organization, an organization that can be tapped by other candidates, for governor, for Congress, for the state legislature.

The Democrats are about 3 elections behind in their strategy. To be sure, they have embraced the small donor, but they still rely on two methods of campaigning that are no longer successfull--television and hte unions. More and more people get their news information from sources other than TV--and certainly not network TV, but that is where the Democrats spent money in 2004. Likewise, Democrats still rely on the unions to mobilize voters. But with fewer union households-this is a recipe for disaster.

One bit of irony. Democrats have been blasting President Bush for his policies that, they say, encourage corporations to outsource work to overseas operations. Democrats, Broder implies, need to learn the lesson that "local volunteers recruited by the Bush campaign proved more adept at turning out voters than the out-of-state workers hired by independent groups to whom the Democrats "outsourced" much of their precinct work. " That seems obvious to me. People will trust their neighbor more than some hired gun--it is just human nature.

A Win for Campaign Reform (washingtonpost.com)