Congressional Straw Poll Results

Forum attendees picked Jamie McLeod-Skinner

It is a validation of her campaign.  It is a wake-up call for her rivals.  It is an opportunity for one or more of them to re-think the race and their messages.

Six Candidates

Jackson County Democrats hosted two forums. The audiences watched and listened for nearly two hours.  They all had equal time.  They answered the same questions.  The each had their shot to stand out.

Some 450 people attended. Some 325 people filled out ballots.   There was a clear leader in the preferences among the attendees who cast votes. The balloting took place at the end of each forum.  People picked their first, second, and third choices.

First Place Votes:

Jamie McLeod-Skinner---  54% 

Jim Crary --------------------   16%. 

Tim White  -------------------- 12%.

Jennifer Neahring  --------  10.5%.

Eric Burnette  ---------------  5%

Michael Byrne  -------------- 3%

Second Preference.  The preference straw poll showed Jim Crary and Jennifer Neahring approximately tied as the number two choice after the person chose someone else for first place, with some 23% of the votes cast.  Jamie McLeod-Skinner got 21% of those 2nd place votes, cast by people who had picked someone else first.

Jamie McLeod-Skinner

These results are not a random sample of District voters.  These were preferences cast by a generally older audience of activist Democrats, i.e. people interested enough in this election to sit through a two hour event, and cast a vote.  Many people went to the event as a partisan for one of the candidates, wearing campaign buttons, which is why the second place votes are suggestive, because it shows who those attendees likely found attractive or acceptable, after their own favored candidate.

Jamie McLeod-Skinner got 75% of combined first and second place votes.  Of combined first and second place votes Jim Crary got 39%, Jennifer Neahring got 33%, and Tim White got 28%.

Third Preference.   All of the candidates who failed to be first or second choices gained substantially as a third choice, except Michael Byrne.  Crary, White, Neahring, and Burnette got substantial votes.

Observations:  

1.  Jamie McLeod-Skinner has Jackson County activist support.  Either people showed up liking her, or they saw her performance then liked her well enough to give her far more support than anyone else.  Either her campaign is further along--with more supporters in the room--or she performed better.

2.  Michael Byrne did not persuade this audience.  Few people voted for him for an preference.  Eric Burnette did a little better, but when people had a chance to vote for their first and second choices, then looked at Burnette for third, they chose Crary, Neahring, and White instead.  Each of them need to decide why they did not "click" with this audience.

Click here to see his campaign website

3. What might Jim Crary conclude?  He has positions on the full suite of Democratic issues, but he has a signature issue on on which he has spoken repeatedly: campaign finance reform.  His website says 97% of the problems with our politics stem from the dangerous influence of money in our political system. He presented that position to this audience and they found it acceptable.  He got first, second, and third place votes. But the audience heard it and didn't find it dispositive. Apparently a great many of the 325 voters do not consider it a knockout, centerpiece issue.  

On January 30, Crary wrote on his campaign website  "My signature issue is campaign finance reform, which is admittedly about as unsexy an issue as I could dredge up."  He went on to quote the Einstein saying that insanity is doing more of the same thing and expecting a different result.  Crary has been talking about campaign finance for 3 years.  What is Einstein telling Crary?  Crary needs to decide if this message is simply the one he wants to share, or if this message is the one he expects to use to win.

4. Jennifer Neahring can conclude she was credible.  She might conclude that a Medford and Ashland audience, filled with friends and supporters of local candidates McLeod-Skinner and Crary, were a place for her to expose herself, but that she was going never likely to win a straw poll so early in her campaign.

But there is a warning for her: she did not outshine Tim White, who is also a newcomer candidate from out of town. She did not startle people with her expertise in health care and change their minds.  Like Crary, she did not deliver a knockout punch.  She was in the pack but not at the front of the pack.   She has expertise, but her message did not stand out, at least not as she framed it at those forums, apparently.

5.  Tim White, too, was credible.  He impressed some people, getting a few more first place votes that Neahring, but was in the pack. Like Neahring, he has had a career marked by achievement and excellence.  Neither of them succeeded by being "pretty good." They are accustomed to being distinguished, outstanding.  This is an opportunity for Tim White to decide to push reset--or not.  However he may have perceived the audience body language and applause, the straw poll results are numbers to consider. People saw and heard him--and saw and heard McLeod-Skinner and Crary, and chose them, and, worse, picked Crary and Neahring ahead of him for second place. 

Tim White appears to me to be the candidate most open to reacting to market signals and audience response. The retired Chrysler executive knows full well it is easier to sell cars people actually want. (Crary makes a sincere virtue of the opposite, telling people what he thinks they need to hear about campaign finance, even though he considers the message "unsexy.")  White's campaign focuses on economic issues,not identity or grievance: "Employment, Economic Opportunity, Inequality of Wealth and Income."  Tim White has credibility to talk about those from the point of view of a winner and informed observer, not a victim. There is a market within Democrats for a critic of corporate power and inequality.  White needs to figure out how to look like a truth teller and good guy, not part of the malefactor group he criticizes..

5.  Jamie McLeod-Skinner got affirmation that an activist Democratic audience finds her personally appealing.  This is probably a primary election strength.  Since all the candidates express essentially the same general political positions on the various issues, the forums were an affirmation that a lot of people generally liked how she presented herself, her biography, her personality, her identity.  (I referred to her as a "cowgirl" in earlier blog and got objection by readers who apparently consider this an insult.  It is a compliment.)

McLeod-Skinner needs to consider what was it that caused the win?  Had she pre-won the straw poll with a room full of supporters?  Did the audience like her story of courage coming out as homosexual?  Did she frame the issues differently than did the others, and did that help? Or hurt?  

Conclusion.  My own sense is that none of the candidates showed any meaningful difference among them, either in policies or in the clarity of their criticism against Walden.  (I know that this must seem foolish and uninformed to them.  Perhaps they wonder, "Cannot Sage see how different and unique and special I was?"  I didn't particularly see it, no.  Different biographies but the same politics.  Same tone. )

There is an opportunity here for one or more of the candidates:  distinguish yourself from one another on policy, if you choose to.  Democrats are picking which of you will go up against Walden.  If, by election day candidates all seem very alike on policies, then voters will pick the female doctor, or the retired Chrysler guy, or the tough cowgirl, or the retired marine regulator guy, or the former lawyer guy who ran last time, or the stone mason guy.

There is an opportunity to stake out bold policy positions.

There is mental shelf space for people to know about two or three more things about each candidate beyond biography by the time they vote.  The candidates can fill in those blanks by what they choose to do now.


Tabulated Results, Ashland:



Tabulated Results, Medford: