Buried by ads

"Less is more."
Architect Ludwig Meis van der Rohe

"More is more."
Behavior of campaign consultants in Oregon's Senate district three

Money keeps pouring into Republican Brad Hicks' campaign: $330,000 more in the past seven days. Denise Krause is getting money and in-kind help from union groups: $145,000 in the same period.  

Hicks started out with almost a million-dollar head start as of Labor Day, so he is way ahead in the ad war. My estimate of TV ads is that there are three, possibly four, Hicks' ads for every one of Krause's, at least in the news-oriented TV that I watch. 

Hicks has already done door-to-door canvassing with teams of paid canvassers:

Oregon Capital Chronicle

An Ashland family provided me with some insight into who gets which mail advertising, consisting mostly of 6-by-11-inch stiff full-color postcards. The wife of the family is a registered Democrat. The husband is a non-affiliated voter. 

One can infer the strategy: Krause is trying to energize and secure Democrats to turn out in this Democratic-leaning district in a year when Republicans are burdened by Trump's divisiveness and policies identified as hurting Oregon. Trump has prospered politically by zero-sum politics: Show contempt for Democrats and urge Republicans to relish liberal tears. That has consequences; it makes it hard to get Democrats to support Republicans. Hicks has a dual message: Krause is terrible, so don't vote for her, and Hicks isn't a Republican, not really.

The wife has received five postcards so far from Denise Krause's campaign. Here are the front and back of each of them. Four of the five flesh out her brand as a strong advocate who has overcome problems. One of the six postcards references Hicks' opposition to the Cascade-Siskiyou National Monument designation, saying that if he had his way it would be sold to mining and timber companies.

The husband has received 10 separate mailings, all from Hicks.

These postcards accuse Krause of becoming part of a too-powerful Democratic majority and a prospective rubber stamp for Governor Tina Kotek. He does not articulate any policies of his own, not a new tax policy, not a different policy for the Oregon Health Plan and our stressed hospitals, nothing about why he would ban abortion, nothing about agreeing or disagreeing with Trump's effort to end Oregon's vote-by-mail system, nothing about what he would do to address homelessness, nothing about data centers, nothing about how to finance education, and nothing about what he would do to support regional colleges like Southern Oregon University . It is astonishing to me: Over a million dollars in ads in this tiny media market and yet I know nothing about Hicks' position on anything. 

I have written that his well-documented record as the CEO of the local Chamber of Commerce was one of relentless and consistent Republican partisanship. It is an observation voiced by others on social media. He does not deny it. Instead, he ignores me and that criticism, sticking to his position that he would be bipartisan, really he would. He has good, smart, cynical message discipline; when your claim is indefensible, don't defend it. Instead, ignore critics and hope they fade away.

The husband said the wife will vote for Krause. The husband also said that he would not vote for Hicks because it would validate Trump, but that he didn't think Democrats in the legislature needed Krause's vote. He told me that incumbent Senator Jeff Golden's on-again-off-again indecision about whether to run for re-election created irritation with both Golden and Krause among some Democrats. He had heard about that. Krause filed for the Democratic nomination during a period that overlapped a period when Golden had said he was indeed running. The husband seemed equally miffed at Golden and Krause for the messy primary. He is relatively new to the area and knew Golden only as a talk show host on the local public radio station, and said he did not realize that a young Jeff Golden in 1986 himself won a Democratic primary nomination by filing against an incumbent Democratic county commissioner, a contest Golden won. The husband said he would consider Krause after all, but was still undecided. The bombardment of negative ads about Krause and Democratic majorities appears to be leaving an impression. 

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