I may have a better background in this than I realize. Having been exposed to the ins and outs of city and smaller state campaigns, I’ve seen what it takes to win and been unimpressed with the difficulty of it. Winning even a state office of some significance will require beating opponents who are only sometimes even moderately interesting to speak or listen to (even for their constituents).
While not trivial, the strategy of running for a smaller office and then just knocking on a few thousand (of the right) doors over the months leading up to the election (and being sufficiently versed in social graces and political talk to make that exposure a boon rather than a curse) is sufficient to probably win over half the time.
My general sentiment on winning smaller offices is “It’s just not that hard.” But I may have underestimated how much my experience gives me; perhaps those who haven’t spent their time this way assume that the to-them-black box of political campaigning holds something rather more involved.
I guess my general advice would be to look at some local, or small state offices, and check who your opponents would be in each as the campaign season comes around. You may be surprised at how un-formidable the competition is, and at how often that’s the case, and come to feel, as I do, that it could probably be achieved by any old smart person willing to put in the necessary practice and work, provided they were blessed to start out with (or otherwise develop) a reasonably favorable dispensation of social ability, and can parrot (without feeling too repulsed) the necessary slogans and incoherencies.
I may have a better background in this than I realize. Having been exposed to the ins and outs of city and smaller state campaigns, I’ve seen what it takes to win and been unimpressed with the difficulty of it. Winning even a state office of some significance will require beating opponents who are only sometimes even moderately interesting to speak or listen to (even for their constituents).
While not trivial, the strategy of running for a smaller office and then just knocking on a few thousand (of the right) doors over the months leading up to the election (and being sufficiently versed in social graces and political talk to make that exposure a boon rather than a curse) is sufficient to probably win over half the time.
My general sentiment on winning smaller offices is “It’s just not that hard.” But I may have underestimated how much my experience gives me; perhaps those who haven’t spent their time this way assume that the to-them-black box of political campaigning holds something rather more involved.
I guess my general advice would be to look at some local, or small state offices, and check who your opponents would be in each as the campaign season comes around. You may be surprised at how un-formidable the competition is, and at how often that’s the case, and come to feel, as I do, that it could probably be achieved by any old smart person willing to put in the necessary practice and work, provided they were blessed to start out with (or otherwise develop) a reasonably favorable dispensation of social ability, and can parrot (without feeling too repulsed) the necessary slogans and incoherencies.