How Much Money to Win a New Hampshire Senate Seat?

Or rather, How much money to lose? n/t (4.00 / 2)

---

by: elwood @ Sun Jul 05, 2009 at 12:19:59 PM UTC

I Think Carol Shea-Porter Taught Us (4.00 / 1)

I think Carol Shea-Porter taught us that one does not have to spend a vast amount of funds to win an election.  Ideas, credibility, integrity -- those things still mean something, especially in a state the size of New Hampshire where activists in either political party can look you eye-to-eye and ask why.  

I think we might see another example in the upcoming 2010 election cycle.  One does not have to be rich, or well-networked, or say "yes" to every Political Action Committee that breathes, to be elected to office.  

---

by: Rep. Jim Splaine @ Sun Jul 05, 2009 at 13:06:02 PM UTC

Still, I wouldn't mind knowing how much Fred pays out (0.00 / 0)

in taxes each year.

---

by: hannah @ Sun Jul 05, 2009 at 14:45:44 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Fair enough, but.. (4.00 / 1)

..what did Craig Benson  teach us as well?

Anybody have any idea how much money Fred Tausch actually has? If he has Benson-money, that makes him at least a factor to be considered.

---

by: Michael Marsh @ Sun Jul 05, 2009 at 14:51:59 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I thought it was something like $200,000 (4.00 / 2)

To me that's a vast amount of money. Is this a difference between vast and obscene?

---

by: xteeth @ Mon Jul 06, 2009 at 19:34:20 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I'd say that $200K is somewhere between squat... (4.00 / 1)

... and piddling.

Benson spent around $10 million in 2002. I think I recall Jim Colburn spent more than  $1 million of his own loot. And that was for the Governor's office.  

---

by: Michael Marsh @ Mon Jul 06, 2009 at 19:54:23 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Just think of the other things you could do with $200,000 (0.00 / 0)

My comment referred to the title of the lead article in this thread. I think I was told that 200k was about what Carol spent. I still think it is a lot of money. But thinking it over, I think it is a whole pantload of money no matter who spends it. Even local elections (or perhaps certainly local elections) fall subject to the same kind of economics. There isn't even the chance that you can make back the money you invest in your campaign, even with a post office job. $200,000 is four teachers for a year. And just look who ends up with the money afterwards.  

---

by: xteeth @ Mon Jul 06, 2009 at 23:34:42 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

But that's kind of silly. (4.00 / 2)

Think of the other things you could do with $25,000.

Dollars spent per voter, or per contributor, is a worthwhile metric. Absolute dollars is not.

---

by: elwood @ Mon Jul 06, 2009 at 23:52:26 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I'd like to piddle like that. (Not really) (0.00 / 0)

I do think of other things I could do, or more importantly, we could do with $25,000. I know you know this (optimism) but just what do we get from the obscene amounts of money spent on campaigns?

1) We get the overwhelming view of the populace that the system is rigged.

2) We get a rigged system - Abramoff as an example.

3) We get lack of interest of people unable or disinclined to write multiple hundred dollar checks to people they usually don't know and in many cases from whom they get no payback outside of selfactualization.

I can't think of any way not to use money to fund campaigns - even Gravel doesn't go that far. Money is the mechanism we have chosen to allocate resources though it is obviously unfair. A poor person still gets one vote (if they choose to use it) but a rich person also gets to vote with accumulated wealth which seems to be several or more votes. Allowing non-persons to vote in this way seems to me the epitome of disenfranchisement. That a company or corporation that has no corporal existence, doesn't breathe the air, drink the water, expect death as a result of many behaviors is societally suicidal. Remember all the fear about computers taking over like in Terminator. It is far more realistic to see that as corporatism taking over through election corruption.

I thoroughly resent the off hand referral to hundreds of thousands of dollars with which the political system is awash as piddling. That is the very attitude that results from it escalating from thousands to millions to trillions and who cares - it's not real money. Well, it isn't real money to those who aren't real people - corporations. To the rest of us it is. Economists talk about personal wealth of the rich as some sort of collection of talismans they use to keep track of whether Gates or Buffet is currently winning. Stock brokers and bankers want you to think that this kind of accumulation of wealth isn't harmful. Well - they are absolutely, positively wrong. Every single time in history that power and money have gotten into the same hands as they have now, the rest of the folks have gotten screwed and forced to pay in blood for the result. Gates may only buy airplanes and estates but others are buying arms and armies. Halliburton is there to help and point the violence in the direction of their next acquisitions. That is what regarding Carol's $200,000 as piddling gets you and I wish you wouldn't forget it.

---

by: xteeth @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 12:21:19 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

I guess you misposted. (0.00 / 0)

Somebody must have said something about piddling. Not me.

---

by: elwood @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 19:58:40 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Guess what you want. (0.00 / 0)

Michael referred to 200 grand as piddling and you denigrated 25 grand. It's all the same to me. Piddling is after all, piddling.

---

by: xteeth @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 20:50:54 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

You seem to be incapable of reading. Goodbye n/t (0.00 / 0)

---

by: elwood @ Wed Jul 08, 2009 at 22:04:23 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Dean screwed up. (4.00 / 2)

He doesn't mean a (New Hampshire Senate) seat. He means a seat in the US Senate from New Hampshire. (That's what Tausch is chasing.)

And yes, I've heard the campaign for state Senate is in the 150K-200K ballpark.

---

by: elwood @ Mon Jul 06, 2009 at 22:47:30 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Yes - thanks for clarifying. (4.00 / 1)

And now I understand xteeth's question, which I didn't understand before.

birch paper; on Twitter @deanbarker

---

by: Dean Barker @ Mon Jul 06, 2009 at 23:29:20 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

$150-200K would probably guarantee you a NH Senate seat (0.00 / 0)

the actual amount spent by candidates is a lot less than that.

In 2008, Molly Kelley spent $72K. Bob Odell spent around $54K. Jack Barnes dropped $19K.  Peter Bragdon spent about $25K. Lou D'Allasandro spent $77K (altho he raised $212K, bless him). Jeb Bradly spent $50K in his special electiopn but he raised $100K, including $5000 from one Mr. Fred Tausch, who may possibly be related to the subject of this blog.

If you have a problem sleeping some evening, and want to go sleuthing, check this web site

---

by: Michael Marsh @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 00:14:08 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Not the whole picture (4.00 / 1)

You are leaving out all the third party money. Mitt Romney's PAC spent over $40,000 on Jeb Bradley's race. The caucus committees spent significant sums in targeted state senate races.    



"When you get to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on."  Franklin D. Roosevelt    

---

by: Kathy Sullivan 2 @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 13:17:27 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Not the whole picture, Part 2 (4.00 / 1)

You are forgetting the primary spending. Lack of a primary doesn't mean they don't make expenditures. For example, Molly Kelly - $30K in primary expenditures for a total of $102K, Bob Odell - $19.5K for a total of $73.5K.  

All this money to win a $100.00 a year job?

Can someone explain to me why, if they love the Constitution so much, the right-wingers keep introducing amendments to change it?

---

by: NHFlatlander @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 14:21:31 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

Vast and obscene (0.00 / 0)

Yes, there is a difference. I can't define it, but I know it when I see it.

---

by: JimC @ Tue Jul 07, 2009 at 01:44:28 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Haven't been watching much TV (4.00 / 1)

What are Tausch's ads about? Attacks on Paul Hodes, on Kelly Ayotte, or just "Hi, I'm Fred Tausch and I like to spend money on vanity campaigns?"

Only the left protects anyone's rights.

---

by: RealNRH @ Sun Jul 05, 2009 at 13:22:53 PM UTC

If you go to his website S.T.E.W.A.R.D. for Prosperity, you can learn.. (0.00 / 0)

... all you ever wanted to know to know about Mr. Tausch. And more. The TV ad is there of course, as well as pretty much everything else Fred-related.

He is "tired of the politicians wasting the taxpayer's money." Imagine that! Fred says "thousands of residents have already joined him." What I want to know is what the heck are the people who have not joined his finen organization thinking? Are they pro-waste?

In the Press Room section of the website, he lists every news article that has ever printed his name or radio talk show he has ever called into. My guess is if you look hard enough, you will find a clipping dated 1966 from his local newspaper with his name on a list of fifth grade honor roll students. A voice inside Fred's head ought to be saying to him, "Fred, don't you think you come across as a little vain?"

According to Fred, S.T.E.W.A.R.D. stands for Save The Economy Without Accumulating Record Debt. I think somebody is pulling a fast one on poor Fred. It is actually a secret message from GOP leaders to fellow Republicans, which you need the special wingnut decoder ring to understand. S.T.E.W.A.R.D. really stands for Support Tausch Every Which-Way And Risk Disaster.

---

by: Michael Marsh @ Mon Jul 06, 2009 at 19:43:50 PM UTC

[ Parent ]

"but it's no more "politics as usual". " (4.00 / 1)

Also.

"Ill writers are usually the sharpest censors." - John Dryden

---

by: Jack Mitchell @ Mon Jul 06, 2009 at 20:19:55 PM UTC

[ Parent ]