I Don’t Hate America!

It seems that Brian Davis, candidate for Congress in Minnesota’s First District, has shown his hand when it comes to campaign strategy early on.

Apparently absent from that strategy is tact. Check out Jason’s earlier post highlighting Davis’s decision to campaign while trick-or-treating with his kids last week on Halloween.

Showing your family on a piece of literature or on a campaign website? That can give voters an opportunity to see the personal, as opposed to the political, side of the candidate.

Campaigning for office while your kids trick-or-treat? While not scandalous or even unethical, it’s the opinion of this blogger that trick-or-treating on Halloween is a very sacred annual event in a child’s life; one which should provide memories for a family based on the costumes, candy and carving of pumpkins. What Davis did crosses a delicate line and violates that sacredness. Those memories should not have to take a backseat to politics.

By showcasing such activity on his blog, Davis obviously feels this is “creative campaigning.” I find it to be simply “tacky.”

In the same post, Davis takes issue with our previous assertion that due to lackluster fundraising within the district, he may not have the support of those necessary to gain the GOP nomination. He didn’t have any real in-depth rebuttal, but had three comments about what we said. In the third comment, Davis becomes the second GOP contender for the First District nomination to show struggles with mathematics, but let’s start from the beginning:

1) It’s good to have friends and colleagues who are willing to provide support.

Sure. Al Franken has given similar justification for his outsta…er…out-of-state fundraising, but Kevin Kline, Lucy Lawless or Paul Newman will not be able to cast a vote for Franken at the State DFL Convention. Likewise, Davis’s nationwide network of physician friends who gave money will not be able to cast a vote for him at the district GOP convention.

The difference comes here: Al Franken has demonstrated that he has already built a grassroots network of supporters here in Minnesota who are working the phones and will doorknock with him. Has Davis? I mean, other than his children, of course. (Only kidding!)

2) Having receipts greater than expenses is a good way to run a business or a campaign.

Being stuck with campaign debt, which is a possibility for Randy “the Whammy” Demmer, would suck, so Davis is correct here. Of course, his personal contribution went a long way towards that accomplishment for the campaign.

Well, over one-third of the way toward that end anyway. Davis’s campaign kitty had $74,104.85 in it at the end of October; Davis donated $26,193.25.

3) The FEC reports don’t tell the whole story, particularly as it concerns donations at $200 and below.

I’m quite curious: what part of the story do they not tell, Dr. Davis? Of $55,035 of individual contributions in the third quarter, just $3,132 of that was from contributions less than $200, which aren’t listed on the FEC report. Even if all of that came from within the First District, at just 5.7 percent of individual contributions that’s hardly anything to brag about, or even “add to the story.” Compared to the percentages of his “Team 3-D” comrades, it’s even less impressive (Day had 20 percent and Demmer had 31.8 percent).

The percentage of the incumbent, Tim Walz, was 28.1.

Randy Demmer, who has proven he can’t count, isn’t a doctor, so I suppose I can see him having some issues with mathematics. For someone with a Ph.D., however, Brian Davis should be able to not only count, but do a better job of interpreting equations and figures.

This entry was posted on Monday, November 5th, 2007 at 5:41 pm and is filed under Dick Day, Randy Demmer, FEC, Brian Davis, Congress, 2008, Tim Walz, DJ D.. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.