Among the annoying contrivances of modern political campaigning are the endless email blasts from candidates begging for expressions of support and monetary donations.
Such as U.S. Sen. Brian Schatz’s recent mass email blasting "Washington Republicans" for a stalemate that resulted in higher interest rates on student loans.
Three times in the 347-word missive there appeared a bright blue clickable link urging, "Take action now. Sign our petition calling on Washington Republicans to stop holding our students hostage."
Two things bothered me about this:
1. It was disingenuous to place all the blame on the GOP. The bill to cut rates died after Democratic leaders refused a vote on a bipartisan compromise, and several Democrats then voted with Republicans to kill the main bill.
2. U.S. senators have some of the most powerful jobs on Earth. The good ones lead. They act. They don’t circulate petitions begging others to act.
If wimpy petitions are all you’ve got, run for the neighborhood board.
I doubt these petitions ever get delivered to anybody; their purpose is to collect names the campaign can use to hector for campaign donations — as in another email blast the Schatz campaign sent outjust before the recent campaign finance reporting deadline pleading poverty because he was running $25,000 below his goal.
The thrice-repeated blue links begged, "Will you give $5, $10 … ?" Willya love me? Willya, willya willya?
This is the political equivalent of panhandling. Some argue it’s better they rely on grass-roots donors than big-money special interests, but they’re mining the special interests even more aggressively.
Schatz ended up raising $911,000 for the quarter, about $400,000 more than his leading opponent, U.S. Rep. Colleen Hanabusa. What a calamity it would have been for his campaign if those nickel-and-dime donors hadn’t come through and he’d taken in only $886,000.
I single out Schatz only because he’s been the most active campaigner so far in the 2014 election cycle.
Hanabusa used similar tactics in her 2112 race against Charles Djou.
I got an email that year from Hanabusa’s dog imploring me "to show her the love she deserves" by sending her a campaign donation for her birthday.
Hanabusa last week started revving it up again with an email blast griping about budget sequestration, pleading in the ubiquitous blue link, "Please sign my petition calling on Congress to repeal the sequester and restore the cuts that hurt our families and degrade military readiness."
Circulating such petitions is all but an admission of a legislator’s impotence at getting things done within the halls of Congress.
And it hardly instills confidence that candidates for such high office are up to the job when they campaign in an undignifiedway that is beneath the position.
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Reach David Shapiro at volcanicash@gmail.com or blog.volcanicash.net.
