Election Night HQ

The Tower has received some intriguing mass e-mails from the official McCain campaign, regarding the stretch run regarding the 2nd quarter FCC campaign-finance deadline of Saturday, June 30.

To start off, here’s the full-text one from McCain e-campaign manager Christian Ferry, on Tuesday, June 12.  The Tower’s news analysis will follow at the end of the text:

“Today, we at the McCain eCampaign invite you to be a part of our new online initiative to help us reach our goal of raising $3 million by June 30th. During his remarkable lifetime of service to our country, John McCain has served in the Navy, U.S House of Representatives, and U.S. Senate. In 1967, he was serving our country as an aviator in the U.S. Navy aboard the USS Forrestal in the Vietnam War. An accident aboard the ship provided him an option to return home, but he did not take it. Instead, he chose to continue his service to his country by volunteering for more combat duty, transferring to the carrier USS Oriskany. T
hree months later, while on his 23rd bombing mission over North Vietnam, he was shot down and spent the next five and half years as a Prisoner of War. The years John McCain spent as a POW only strengthened his love and respect of our country. Today, John McCain continues his lifetime of service to our great country as a U.S Senator and as a candidate for President. John McCain has never been a man to take the easy way out. As he seeks the Presidency, he is ready to tackle the tough challenges facing our nation. This is the essence of what leadership is in our country and we hope that you will join our campaign today to make John McCain our next president. Your immediate contribution will help catapult the aircraft off the carrier toward our goal.We are two and a half weeks away from the end of the second quarter fundraising deadline on June 30th. The McCain eCampaign has pledged to raise a total of $3 million by this date and we need your support today to reach our goal.Will you give $50, $100, $250, $500 or even $1,000 today to help us reach our goal by June 30th?

You have likely heard the Senator refer to this campaign as a marathon, and we are still in the early stages. The steady strategy of this campaign will win in the end and it will be because we have a strong grassroots network of supporters like you.

If you have already given to the campaign, we thank you for your generosity. We ask that you give one more contribution of whatever you can afford - whether it is $50 or $500 - every little bit helps us reach our goal. If you have not made a financial commitment to McCain 2008, please do so today by following this secure link.

You are the backbone of our campaign and we are always thankful for your energy, time and financial commitment. Once again (and we cannot say this enough) thank you.

Sincerely,
Christian Ferry
National eCampaign Director

P.S. We are only two and a half weeks away from our second quarter fundraising deadline on June 30th. We know that John McCain is the right man to lead our country as we face great challenges. Now is the time to show him our full support. Please help the eCampaign reach our fundraising goal of $3 million by June 30th. Thank you!”

The Tower’s analysis of this e-mail:

The Tower noted that Ferry opted to use the naval-aviator metaphor: the letter was titled “Catapult to Victory” - an apt choice for McCain, a naval aviator who took off from many an aircraft carrier during his time in the Navy.

Ferry also subtly addressed the fact that while McCain has been doing respectably well in polling, but he is no longer the front-runner.  Of particular interest is this passage:

 ”You have likely heard the Senator refer to this campaign as a marathon, and we are still in the early stages. The steady strategy of this campaign will win in the end and it will be because we have a strong grassroots network of supporters like you.”  It expresses confidence in ultimate victory, is an honest assessment of the Senator’s current standing in the polls - in summary, it is a very well-crafted way of dealing with the issue.

Although the McCain e-campaign has been very active, The Tower did not recall receiving any previous e-mail from the McCain e-campaign, specifically setting a fundraising goal for the first quarter.  A subsequent search through e-mail received in late March did not uncover anything alone these lines. 

This fact, of course, does not mean that there wasn’t one that had been announced.  Or, perhaps, there was a goal and it just hadn’t been released publicly.  It’s unfortunate, because it would have been interesting to see if the goal had changed from the 1st quarter to the 2nd quarter.

McCain raised about $12.5 million in the first quarter (give or take).  Although top strategist John Weaver has stated publicly that the campaign would top its first quarter take in the second quarter, let’s assume for the purposes of this discussion, that the campaign would raise an identical amount in the second quarter, and the campaign meets the $3 million goal.  That would mean that nearly a quarter of the total take would be captured online.

Online fundraising

This topic is discussed more over on the main site, but here’s a concise summary in terms of how the theory of online fundraising applies to McCain 2008 in particular.

Online fundraising has many advantages over traditional fundraising (the two major forms being in-person events and direct-mail).  Here are some of the key advantages:

1.  Online fundraising has virtually no overhead.  As a result, the gross amount of money raised is virtually entirely net profit for the campaign. 

In contrast, in-person events are expensive to stage.  Halls and hotels must be rented, catering must be arranged, the candidate and staff have to travel to the site, etc.  The same is true of direct mail.   A media consultant must be hired to create the mail, there’s the cost of printing and mailing it, and then the consultant will take a significant chunk of whatever has been raised as a commission.  None of that is a problem with online fundraising.

2.  Online fundraising can yield genuine cash, far more quickly, than traditional fund-raising.

The e-campaign director (Ferry in this case) can send out an e-mail and see money coming in the same day - actual bankable cash via credit card donations.  For traditional in-person fund-raising, the logistics of the event must be arranged and that takes time (and that assumes that everyone who attends the event will sign up by paying online, which obviously isn’t true).  If they pay by check, the check has to reach Arlington, be processed at the bank, and then clear before it winds up in the campaign coffers.

3. Unlike in-person fundraising, online fundraising - like direct-mail - does not consume any of the candidate’s precious time and energy (and to lesser degree, this is also true of the staff).

The candidate’s time and energy are the most important and most jealously guarded of all campaign resources.  He is the best weapon the campaign has.  Also, it is a nonrenewable resource (unlike money, or volunteers, or free-media coverage, which can be augmented).  The candidate only has so many waking hours and days, and there’s no way to increase them.

And this is particularly true of the McCain campaign, where the candidate is very articulate, knowledgable, and charismatic.  McCain does not need to be stage-managed in any way.  Accordingly, the more town meetings he can hold, the better.  (This is in some contrast to other candidates, whose shortcomings in those areas make it desirable to limit public appearances and when they do venture out on stage, to do so in friendly environments where gaffes are less likely.)

Any dollars that can be raised online, are fewer dollars that need to be raised via in-person fundraisers.  That means the candidate is more liberated from raising money - and thus frees up more time to spend out on the campaign trail, hitting media markets, seeing voters, and most importantly, generating more free-media coverage.

It also means an enormous time saved for the staff.  Granted, staff (unlike the candidate) are a renewable resource, since more staff can always be added.  But campaigns are always shorthanded, when it comes to staff, given the enormous demands of a campaign.  (This is also particularly true in McCain’s campaign, where staff was reduced as a result of the - The Tower reiterates, relatively speaking - low fund-raising numbers at the end of March 2007.)

For in-person fundraising, staff must arrange the logistics for the event, attend it in person, and handle the administrative duties of bringing in the checks.  With online fundraising, none of that is necessary; the money just goes right in the bank.  And the time saved can be then plowed into other sectors of the campaign.    

Do you have a question about campaigns, politics, etc.?  Or do you have information to pass along?  Or both? 

The Tower welcomes all replies and/or commentary, positive or otherwise.  You can contact The Tower at tower@campaignia.org.

Come visit the main site  - www.campaignia.org  - for more about Campaign 2008 and campaigns in general.