Dec 30 2008
The Top Five Jackasses of 2008: #2
Elizabeth Dole
Excuse me if I’m a little reluctant to do this. There’s just something about casting stones at a matronly old lady, deserved or not, that makes me squirm. So I’ll be a little nicer to “Liddy” than I otherwise would.
Soon to be Ex.-Sen. Elizabeth Dole probably isn’t a “jackass” in the truest sense of the word. Especially if we compare her to the previous three entries, and especially to the next one. Here’s what she is: a failed U.S. Senator, a semi-carpetbagger, and the owner of one of the worst re-election campaigns I have ever seen, replete with one of the most shoddy, brain-dead, miscalculated campaign ads in political history.
This campaign was so bad, that what started off as a near certain re-election (so certain to that most big-name Dems passed on challenging her) ended up as a rout, with Dole losing big to woman most North Carolinians hadn’t even heard of 8 months ago. Part of this blame falls at the feet of her campaign team, who should do the decent thing and give her a full refund. Part of the blame also falls on Barack Obama, whose concerted efforts in N.C. certainly helped Hagan win. And still more of the blame falls on George W. Bush and his God-awful Presidency for nearly destroying the Republican brand name.
But most of the blame falls on Dole herself. Despite have universal name recognition across North Carolina, she was never as strong as she presumed herself to be when this campaign started. Most North Carolinians seemed to think of her more as a creature of Washington (with the occasional commute to N.C.), than as a real North Carolinian. If she was surprised by this, she shouldn’t have been. She faced the same criticism in 2002, when she faced a tougher than anticipated challenge from Erskine Bowels and won an uninspiring victory after running a lackadaisical campaign. For a better politician, such a close call would have been a wake-up call to spend as much time as possible in the Tar Heel State. But Dole isn’t a very good politician.
If you need further proof of her poor political skills, I refer you to The Worst Ad of the Decade. An ad that was so bad it may have torpedoed her AND filtered down to hurt Pat McCrory and John McCain. It was so bad, Elizabeth Dole could have put up a 30 second ad showing her horking loogies on the state flag, and it would have done less damage. It was such a miscalculated blunder of epic proportions that everyone who had anything to do with it should be exiled from North Carolina and never be allowed near another campaign again. Ever. EVER.
Let me tell you a true story. It’s not widely known at in addition to The Ad, Dole also made a mailer that hit Hagan on the Godless Americans issue. Well, myself and two Republican mercenary staffers on loan from the RNC were in a certain county’s GOP campaign HQ’s when we saw the mailers. The ad hadn’t come out yet, and we read through the mailers wearing quizzical expressions upon our faces. All three of us, I swear, honestly believed that these mailers were a poorly done 3rd Party hit piece that had been erroneously dropped off at GOP HQ’s. None of us could believe that a professional U.S. Senate campaign had produced something that looked like a bad student government election flyer. And yet… those mailers were better than that TV ad.
And so for being a lousy politician, for not paying more attention to the home front, for running a terrible campaign, and for being responsible for one of the worst ads in political history- all of which helped saddle N.C. with an inexperienced liberal senator who’ll be little more than Harry Reid’s marionette for 6 years, Elizabeth Dole is number two on this list.
Tomorrow- your choice for the BIGGEST Jackass of 2008.
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