One of the most important factors that dictates the outcome of any political race is the incumbency factor. According to Herrnson, most of these incumbents "begin the general election campaign organization with higher name recognition and voter approval levels, greater political experience, more money and a baetter campaign organization than thier opponent". (246) Strictly going by this, I would predict Ciro to beat his opponent Canseco, however due to unpopularity with Democrats overall in the nation as well as a very agressive campaign by Canseco, this is a race that could easily go either way.
In the past Ciro has proven that he is a strong contender and has many years of previous political experience. This would ensure that he has high name recognition not only among the people in his district but also among the "political elites" in Washington who willlook at him and assume he'll win. In terms of money, Rodriquez seems to be running a fairly modest amount of funds of 702,422 dollars. The only criteria that I could say Rodriquez doesn't follow from Hernson's theory would be "better campaign organization." This is based solely off th fact that Canseeco just seems to be making himself more heard and more visible than Rodriquez at the moment.
No in regards to Canseco he is currently slightly leading in th polls, however this lead is not a great one and could change at any moment. As stated in the previous paragraph Rodriquez has several advantages over Canseco that he'll need to overcome in order to win. Such as the fact that Canseco only has 453,370 in remaining funds as of early October. However Canseco seems to be putting in all his efforts in trying to not only get higher name recognition among voters through door to door campaigning but also to slander Rodriquez's name with television ads in which he makes false claims of Rodriquez voting for the bank bailouts in 2008.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CkIMd_UuSUk
Overall this is on the of th tightest races in not only Texas but in the entire nation. I personally feel that it coul really swing in either direction, however if i had to pick someone to win it, it would be Canseco simply because he's already leading in the polls against all odds. Which tells me that an aggressive campaign may just win over the incumbency factor in this hot race.
Monday, October 18, 2010
Saturday, October 2, 2010
Campaign Funds
FundraThis week we learned a little about Interest Groups and the effect that they have on political parties. Interest groups are important to campaigning and political parties because they raise a lot of awareness and fundraising for the candidate they feel will help their cause. The level of fundraising for Canseco and Rodriquez seem to be on two completely different levels, with Canseco easily leading.
When you visit Canseco's facebook, he has lots of posts updating people on various fundraising goals and how much he has raised. He also has people actually asking him where they can go to donate money in order for him to have more money for his campaign. Although whether or not these individuals are part of interest groups, they do comment on certain topics such as "border control" and claim they will fund raise because they believe Canseco can help the issue. Another interesting aspect of Canseco's fundraising is that not only does he ask for money for his own campaign, but he also asks for money to be able to bring more awareness to Ciro's faults by exposing his temper tantrums through the media.
Ciro's fundraising on the other hand seems to be quite lackluster. Based off on the little information I can find about him on the internet, it seems like his fundraising or campaigning is virtually non-existent. I would love to get in contact with him, and ask him about how he feels about this. I wonder if because of his general unpopularity and losing in the polls to Canseco, maybe he's finding that it's difficult to garner any support for him. The one thing that Ciro seems to be consistent with is, updating his website as to what he has voted on in Washington.
So, it will be very interesting to see if this like many other campaigns will be heavily impacted by the amount of funds raised by each candidate. According to the Huntington Post Canseco has raised about 50,000$ whilst Rodriquez's fundraising is so insignificant it doesn't even come up on the website. Fundraising Funds
I wonder if theres a correlation between this and the fact that Canseco's leading in the polls.
When you visit Canseco's facebook, he has lots of posts updating people on various fundraising goals and how much he has raised. He also has people actually asking him where they can go to donate money in order for him to have more money for his campaign. Although whether or not these individuals are part of interest groups, they do comment on certain topics such as "border control" and claim they will fund raise because they believe Canseco can help the issue. Another interesting aspect of Canseco's fundraising is that not only does he ask for money for his own campaign, but he also asks for money to be able to bring more awareness to Ciro's faults by exposing his temper tantrums through the media.
Ciro's fundraising on the other hand seems to be quite lackluster. Based off on the little information I can find about him on the internet, it seems like his fundraising or campaigning is virtually non-existent. I would love to get in contact with him, and ask him about how he feels about this. I wonder if because of his general unpopularity and losing in the polls to Canseco, maybe he's finding that it's difficult to garner any support for him. The one thing that Ciro seems to be consistent with is, updating his website as to what he has voted on in Washington.
So, it will be very interesting to see if this like many other campaigns will be heavily impacted by the amount of funds raised by each candidate. According to the Huntington Post Canseco has raised about 50,000$ whilst Rodriquez's fundraising is so insignificant it doesn't even come up on the website. Fundraising Funds
I wonder if theres a correlation between this and the fact that Canseco's leading in the polls.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)