GOP Mines Data for Every Tiny Bloc

[Judi Lynn]

GOP Mines Data for Every Tiny Bloc
By Tom Hamburger and Peter Wallsten, Times Staff Writers
September 24, 2006


AMERICA VOTES

The Battle for Control

WASHINGTON — As Democrats drive to extend their power in Congress, holding on to Debbie Stabenow's Senate seat is a must. And the Michigan incumbent is currently ahead in the polls.

But Republican strategists are working hard to upset Stabenow, in part through a low-profile appeal to a group that most politicians rarely think of as a voting bloc — snowmobilers.

And the stealth campaign to woo the thousands of working-class, historically Democratic Michiganders whose cold-weather passion is snowmobiles is just one small example of a technique known as "micro-targeting" that GOP strategists are using across the country as they try to pull off another election day victory against the odds.

By most measures, the November elections offer Democrats their best chance in years. If anti-Republican sentiment turns out to be a tidal wave, strategic and tactical brilliance may not be enough to protect the GOP majorities in Congress.
(snip/...)

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/politics/la-na-dems24sep24,1,6119292.story?coll=la-news-politics-national&track=crosspromo

[fasttense]

1. Will this be the next Ohio or Florida?

Seems the repuke's rovian strategy is to focus most of the election rigging on one pivotal state. Will Michigan be the next Diebold, election theft?

[sweetheart]

2. bog standard marketing

Anyone who's worked in marketing knows that the databases are targeted per-building,
not just per block, and that custom literature can be designed for every demographic
segment to drive sales to saturation levels; to suck up as much wallet share as possible.

.. and here, these same techniques that have been common practice for over a decade, using
targeted databases like claritas, are introduced as something new. Its 1 to 1 marketing
and custom message design, so every mark gets a con from the GOP.

[OKNancy]

3. kick for combine

[Tiggeroshii]

4. LAT: GOP Mines Every Tiny Bloc

WASHINGTON — As Democrats drive to extend their power in Congress, holding on to Debbie Stabenow's Senate seat is a must. And the Michigan incumbent is currently ahead in the polls.

........

The GOP system — built around a database nicknamed Voter Vault — combines huge amounts of demographic, financial and other personal information on individual voters with the data-mining techniques used by direct-mail advertisers to deliver surgically targeted appeals to voters identified as likely to respond, including many who might be considered part of the Democratic base.


http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-dems24sep24,0,580946.story?coll=la-home-nation

[w4rma]

5. In other words, if you support any Repuke in any way you are being used

by the worst of them.

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

6. "Voter Vault"

I'd laugh if I wasn't crying. :cry:

[Mr_Spock]

7. Don't think the Dems don't know how to target voters

This is politics in the electronic age 101 - spend money where it will have the best chance for victory.

[Ravy]

9. The Democratic party is lagging a bit behind in this I think...

... because they have relied on supporters (mostly labor union) get out the vote efforts in addition to their own. I think Dems can get out the vote, but it is not all under the direct auspices of the DNC.

[N90ATC]

11. Today's NY Times...

Their magazine has a profile of Ken Mehlman & in it Harold Ickes admits the Dems are well behind the GOP in this area. My question is, how important is this stuff? How many snowmobilers are actually thinking that way & how many of them will go out to vote? Seems like a lot of money spent on getting a few extra votes. Stabenow should win easily.

[booley]

8. and this is how repubs will keep getting votes

It's classic Rovian. They aren't trying to form coalitions. They are only interested in cutting down the votes for Democrats.

Becuase even if only a minority of blacks or gays or women or the poor vote for Republicans, those are votes that AREN'T going to the Democrats.

Here' a bit more on this. It extends far past just having databases..

AMY GOODMAN: What about the Republican strategy to reach more deeply into the African American, Latino communities, to immigrant communities?

PETER WALLSTEN: It's also a very important tenet of One Party Country, as we lay out in the book, that really under the leadership of the Bush brothers, George W. and Jeb, they tried to redefine the way the Republican Party goes after minority voters. Latinos, George W. Bush won 40% of the Hispanic vote nationally, which is a pretty remarkable number for Republicans. Jeb has won with huge numbers, not just the Cuban Republicans, but non-Cuban Hispanics in Florida who tend to vote Democratic, as well. And they did this with a strategy that some strategists call the “I love you” strategy, where they manage to appeal to a sense of emotion, rather than issues, in the case of Latinos.

In the case of African Americans, we can talk more about programs and issues that they use, but one that we lay out in the book is called the White House faith-based initiative, where the White House actually helped -- created a program to funnel taxpayer dollars to African American churches across the country, kind of bringing influential ministers into the fold, so they would turn around and campaign for Republicans.

You mentioned Hurricane Katrina. There's the immigration debate. There's lots of reasons right now why this outreach to minorities is strained. What we argue, though, is that the point was never to win a majority of these groups. The Karl Rove vision is to peel away slices of the electorate. So, Republicans don't need to win the majority of African Americans to win elections. They don't even need to win 20% of them. They could win 15% of African Americans, and that would give them the chance to really keep Democrats in the minority.
...................

http://www.democracynow.org/article.pl?sid=06/09/13/1331232

I think we need to face facts, the only reason the Repubs are struggeling is that they got everyhting they wanted and those policies blew up in thier faces. They screwed up. They screwed up too much to spin or hide. But the RNC isn't stupid They will learn and figure out how to hide the harm they do better next time. They wil figure out how get thier unpopular and failed policies passed by making them sound like something else.

And if we are depending on the Repubs to screw up just to get them out of office and stop thier policies, we will never win.

So what are we going to do about it?

[tanyev]

10. I love getting Republican junk mail.

I send anti-Bush information back to them in their pre-paid envelopes.

[anotherdrew]

12. script from some republican "private polling" here...

script from some republican "private polling" :

Hello there, I'm calling tonight from your friendly local republican party headquarters... We're asking people about the upcoming elections, you plan to vote for the Republican candidates, right?
Did you know your boss is a republican?
Did you know god is a Republican?
oh and most of the police, yes sir, we're just asking some questions to check public opinion. Just to be clear... your answers will not be associated in any way with your name and phone number Mr. Smith or with your boss Mr. John at Whatever corporation.
So, on a scale of 1 to 5 how likely are you to vote only for republican candidates Mr. Smith? 1 unlikely, or 5 very likely?


Perhaps they're a little more subtle, but I wouldn't be surprised if just that sort of intimidation is going down already.

[sweetheart]

13. I heard that one

Hello, I am with the Republican party, and i wanted to find out if you like to fuck pigs?
Do you like to fuck poor people, and kill people, would you like your neighbor across the
street to die in a war? Well, support the republicans and help us fuck people better, then
when a pig needs fucking nobody will ask which party is best for the job, just call in the fuckers.

And as a member of the fucker party, i'd like to fuck you over, but first could you donate your
soul so we can hock it for some drink with the prostitutes. If you choose to donate at this
time, the republican party will send you a free pig to fuck, specify male or female when you
leave your credit card details. What kind of credit card....