Bush adopting Fuller Brush & Avon Calling Tactics

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Jeb Bush abruptly cancels TV time to send staff into the field

Staffers will go door to door in early states

In a move unprecedented in primary history, CNN reported today that the Bush campaign will cancel $3 million in reserved television advertising in Iowa and South Carolina and is preparing to spend its money deploying upwards of 60 campaign staffers from its Miami headquarters to the first four voting states -- Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada. According to CNN, the clearing of Bush's Miami headquarters will send scores of aides to knock on doors in these key states.

The operation, dubbed “Fuller Brush Man” in Iowa and “Ding, Dong Avon Calling” in the other states comes one day after Bush’s Super Pac, Right to Rise, announced that it was sending hand written letters to undecided voters in New Hampshire.

It is unknown at this point whether either the Bush campaign or Right to Rise will ask Amtrak to allow them to use Harry Truman’s famous presidential Pullman car, the Ferdinand Magellan, to mount a “whistle-stop” campaign, thereby completing their retro campaigning triple play.

Given concerns about privacy and security, there is some question among professional political pundits as to whether a door-to-door campaign can be effective in 2016. According to a snap poll taken by Around The Block’s snap pollster, Ajax Snap Polling, 74% of respondents never open their front door to any unsolicited door knocks or bell rings, and among those who do, 62% open the door only for Seventh Day Adventist missionaries while less than 3% open the door to the guy who paints your house number on the curb.

When asked for comments on this new door-door tactic, Bush's father, former president George H.W. Bush said, "it worked for me in 1992", and then left to brush his hair with his circa 1947 Fuller Brush men's hairbrush.

Bush campaign to use hand written letter to convince undecideds

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Jeb Bush Super Pac to Send Hand-Written Letter to Voters

Hail-Mary called desperation move as surveys indicate majority of people don't read letters

In a move some observers believe to be akin to a football "hail-Mary", the New York Times reported today that Jeb Bush's Super Pac, Right to Rise, asked Bush supporters to " to revive the lost art of writing letters" by sending hand-written letters to undecided New Hampshire voters to support Jeb.

According to the Times, in a pre-holiday mailer, the group thanked its donors for their financial support, and asked them to make “a different kind of gift to Jeb by giving a few minutes of your time.” The Times reported, “The mailer included stationery and pre-addressed envelopes for five undecided voters in New Hampshire. It urged donors to dash off a quick missive explaining why Mr. Bush deserved their vote.  The mailer, according to the Times, included a sample message. It is not clear whether the mailer included stamps. When asked about stamps a Right to Rise spokesperson, Delores de la Rosa said, "No, stamps were not included. Look, we're burning through money here. The least these people can do is spend $.15 on a stamp", seemingly unaware that the current first-class postage is now $.49 and hasn't been $.15 since 1980, the year Jeb's father, George H.W. Bush was elected vice-president.

Speaking of whom, in using the technique of hand-written letters, the Bush group is attempting to echo former president George H.W. Bush, who was a voracious letter writer when he was younger. The elder Bush, now 91, said that he thought writing letters by hand for the campaign was a bully good idea, saying, "it worked for me in '92, why wouldn't it work for Jeb now", apparently not remembering that he lost that campaign even though hand-writing letters was arguably more common, but at a time before social media outlets like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram were invented, and even before the wide-spread use of email and the Internet.

When asked to comment, Jeb's older brother, former president George W. Bush was not as sanguine about the idea. While clearly not fully cognizant of the definition of sanguine, Bush went on to say, "I never hand-writed a letter in my life and I have no idea why Jeb's people think this is a good idea. I mean, isn't that what you have secretaries for...to take dictation and then type it out. And hand-writed letters can be so hard to read and all. Bad idea, Jeb, bad idea." W. ended his comments by saying, "What Jeb really needs is someone like Cheney to whip him into shape. I mean, look what he did for me."

Media consultant A.J. Ruckelhaus, in commenting on this tactic by Right to Rise opined “it sounds like a desperation move”. Ruckelhaus went on to say that he’s done research on hand-writing. “In my research less than 12% of the general public hand-writes at all and less than 3% hand-writes and sends letters. His survey further indicated that when looking at the key demographics necessary for a Republican to win the election, adults 18-34,  the numbers drop to less than 4% and less than .5% respectively.

Moving from the writing to the receiving, Around The Block’s  political polling consultant, Acme Polls,  reported that 56% of respondents say they immediately trash anything that comes in the mail. Of the 44% who actually look at their mail 83% say they only read the flyers, brochures and offers from credit card companies offering 0% interest or less, with anything that looks hand written, immediately thrown out.

Undaunted by statistics and polling, Right to Rise believes it's on the right track, saying that after this letter-writing campaign concludes they intend to send Jeb out to all subsequent campaign events in a horse and buggy and have vowed to use no electrically amplified devices at the events, only megaphones.

Free ad-time for Trump dimensionalized -- Competitors cry foul

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Trump Getting $ Millions in Free Airtime

Competition Incredulous!

Just about 10 days ago I posted a comment on my Facebook page and in Around The Block regarding the coverage CNN was giving Donald Trump and his campaign. Here's what I said:

CNN just aired 26 uninterrupted minutes of a Trump campaign rally in AZ. (11:40 am - 12:06 pm PST). Journalism at it's best! They should change their name to CT(rump)N since all they seem to care about is ratings and the Donald obviously brings those. Sad that the one time go-to source for news has degenerated into this!

At the time of that post, while I speculated on how much that airtime might have been worth to Trump in commercial terms (i.e., what would it cost Trump to buy 26 minutes of commercial time on CNN), and how Trump’s free airtime compares to the amount of money his opponents are spending on commercials, I never got around to doing the math.

Now I have.

The AP is now reporting, "As other candidates and their affiliated super PACs have spent millions of dollars on expensive television ads, Trump's campaign has reported spending just $300,00 on a sprinkling of radio ads". Instead of spending money on TV ads, reports the AP, Trump has received 22 hours and 46 minutes of free airtime on Fox News alone from May to December 2015, more than twice as much as any other candidate and "more than Ted Cruz, Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio combined."

Now for the math.

Television time is typically sold in :30 units. 22 hours and 46 minutes equates to 1,366 minutes or 2,732 “:30s”. Now, I’ve been out of the media business for a while but I’m going to take a rough guess that the average cost of a :30 spot on Fox News runs about $5,000. That means that the “value” of all this free coverage is worth about $13.6 million to Trump. And that’s on Fox alone. Let’s speculate a second. If CNN gave Trump ½ the coverage Fox did (bet it was more that ½), and charged the same cost/:30 spot, the value of CNN coverage would be about $6.8 million. And let’s say if MSNBC gave the same coverage as CNN, but could only charge ½ the price per :30 because of their smaller audience, that would be an additional $3.8 million. So, it very well may be that Trump, who has reportedly spent only $300,000 in ads on radio, is benefiting from almost $24 million in non-paid airtime.

To put this into perspective, let’s look at what Trump’s opponents are actually SPENDING to purchase TV time. According to NBC News, and including candidate and Super Pac spending combined (which is why it is categorized as “Team XYZ”), here’s what it looks like:

·       Team Jeb Bush: $32.5 million

·       Team Marco Rubio: $13.1 million

·       Team John Kasich: $8.4 million

·       Team Chris Christie: $7.0 million

·       Team Lindsey Graham: $2.7 million

·       Team Ben Carson: $2.4 million

·       Team Carly Fiorina: $1 million

·       Team Rand Paul: $900,000

·       Team Ted Cruz: $850,000

·       Team Donald Trump: $216,000

With the free airtime the cable news networks are giving Trump, his airtime exposure is #2, behind Bush. And he’s getting it without spending a dime! (Well $200,000-$300,000, but who’s counting).

Curious as to how the other candidates are reacting to this un-level playing field, Around The Block contacted several of them

·     Jeb Bush: Jeb’s immediate response was, “Golly, I didn’t know that was happening. I bet my backers on Team Jeb Bush are really annoyed. And, frankly, I would be too, because I always told them I was the smart Bush. I’ve got to rush back to Florida to ask them for more money to fix this”.

·     Marco Rubio: “¡Dios Mio! I’m just the son of poor Cuban immigrants who came to America in 1956 to escape Castro.” (editor’s note: Castro came to power in Cuba on January 1, 1959) “Little did I know that in America, this great land of opportunity, there are so many things that are free. I guess that’s why you Yanquis call it the ‘home of the brave and the land of the free’. While I will ask my staff to look into this free airtime thing, and hope to take advantage of it, I will not change my position on the expansion of Medicaid or the reduction of Social Security and Food Stamp benefits or any other free things given to the infirmed, elderly or poor out there. There's no free lunch in America. These people have to earn it just like my poor Cuban immigrant parents did”.

·    Ben Carson: “It is my opinion that when you get things for free, you get what you pay for. In other words, things that are free are not necessarily the same as things that cost money. And, as I’ve said on many of occasions, when you spend money you end up with less. Having said that, I think Terry Giles, my longtime friend and aide, whispered something to me about this. But as you know, Terry had my bad ear so I didn’t hear it. Because if I heard it, I would have acted on it. After all, this isn’t brain surgery.”

·     Chris Christie: “As a former federal prosecutor, I am appalled at this situation and will use all the powers at my disposal as a former federal prosecutor to bring the perpetrators of this heinous crime, one of the most horrific in the annals of American criminal history, to justice.” When asked if he felt he was grandstanding on this issue, Christie told the questioner to “shut up”, going on to say, “When you’re a former federal prosecutor you need to bring the full powers of your office to every investigation. This case is no exception”. (Editor’s note: Christie ended his tenure as federal prosecutor in 2004. Also, it should be pointed out that in this statement he tied his previous record for the use of the term “former federal prosecutor” in one statement)

·     Ted Cruz: Cruz made his statement at a Butter Carving Contest in Iowa in which all the candidates appeared on stage together. He began his remarks by saying, “I am chagrined and angry at what I’m seeing here. While I won’t blame Donald for what he’s done (Editor’s Note: Cruz never criticizes Trump for anything), I simply won’t stand for this complete disregard of our sacred, Supreme Court blessed, campaign finance laws.” As he then began reading from one of his favorite books, How Obamacare Stole Christmas,  the other candidates on the stage together shouted, “Shut the f**k up!

·     Carly Fiorina: Fiorina pointed out that the $1 million NBC News characterized as TV ad spending, was a “lie, perpetrated by the Main Stream Media". In her vigorous denial she said, “Let me be absolutely clear here, my campaign did not spend $1 million on TV ads. That money was spent on creating blatantly false, deceptively edited hate videos against organizations I disagree with.”

·     Donald Trump: “This issue is gornisht". On a side note, Trump also announced that he is aware that he has become addicted to Yiddish and, over the holiday break in campaigning, will check into a Yiddish-addiction rehab facility to see if he can break the habit.

·    The Rest of the Field: “Shut the f**k up!”