A new job for Jim Messina

[solarstorm]

The SPD wants to engage Obama's chief campaigner: Jim Messina helped provide Obama with a surprising re-election victory. Now he is going to support the Social Democrats in the upcoming federal election campaign.

The Willy Brandt House is carrying negotiations with the 45-year-old campaign expert. Party leader Sigmar Gabriel is very interested in signing. Parliamentary leader Thomas Oppermann was already in talks with Messina in Washington last October.

The SPD headquarters confirmed the negotiations with the Obama aid to the news magazine Der Spiegel. The Willy Brandt House said that they fondly hope to gain knowledge acquisition from the campaigns of the Democratic Party in the United States.

Messina relies on the use of social networks in election campaigns. The Obama victory of 2012 was, if nothing else, the result of an innovative campaign strategy in the social web.

Jim Messina was/is also an adviser to Max Baucus, Jon Tester and the UK Conservative Party.

[ingemann]

"Surprising"?

[Lief 🗽]

Working for the Tories = HP.

[solarstorm]

"Surprising"?

That's what the original article wrote.
One mustn't forget that Romney was temporarily leading in the polls.

[solarstorm]

Working for the Tories = HP.

That's what I thought. His political views seem to be pretty flexible...

[Middle-aged Europe]

Working for the Tories = HP.

That's what I thought. His political views seem to be pretty flexible...

To be fair, both the British Tories and the German SPD probably exist within the ideological spectrum represented by U.S. Democratic Party.

[Beezer]

Both countries (US/Ger) have vastly different electorates and electoral systems. What plays well in the US may bomb in Germany. So unless Messina becomes an expert on German politics over the next couple of years I really do wonder what exactly he can bring to the table.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Both countries (US/Ger) have vastly different electorates and electoral systems. What plays well in the US may bomb in Germany. So unless Messina becomes an expert on German politics over the next couple of years I really do wonder what exactly he can bring to the table.

Well, there have been previous examples for an "Americanization" of German election campaigns.

Willy Brandt had already modeled his 1961 campaign after JFK's. The Schröder campaigns also tried to get inspiration from U.S. presidential elections and it certainly had a long-lasting impact through the introduction of TV debates held between the two major Chancellor-candidates in 2002. The SPD also conducted their first national canvassing experiments in 2013, and the hiring of Messina possibly means that they'll intend to continue with it in 2017.

[Citizen Hats]

Both countries (US/Ger) have vastly different electorates and electoral systems. What plays well in the US may bomb in Germany. So unless Messina becomes an expert on German politics over the next couple of years I really do wonder what exactly he can bring to the table.

You comment implies that the entire SPD campaign would be directed solely from the desk of Jim Messina.  Jim Messina's skills are in organization and tactics. These can be fitted quite well

[You kip if you want to...]

Working for the Tories = HP.

That's what I thought. His political views seem to be pretty flexible...

To be fair, both the British Tories and the German SPD probably exist within the ideological spectrum represented by U.S. Democratic Party.

Ed Miliband and Peer Steinbruck would beg to differ.

[Famous Mortimer]

Hire expensive corporate whore, who probably knows nothing about Germany, to teach you how to spam people's e-mail.

SPD sucks.

[Beezer]

Both countries (US/Ger) have vastly different electorates and electoral systems. What plays well in the US may bomb in Germany. So unless Messina becomes an expert on German politics over the next couple of years I really do wonder what exactly he can bring to the table.

You comment implies that the entire SPD campaign would be directed solely from the desk of Jim Messina.  Jim Messina's skills are in organization and tactics. These can be fitted quite well

Of course there'll be local input but just take your example of tactics for example. I just fail to see what kind of valuable input Messina can really give them on this matter with his background and (presumably) total lack of knowledge of Germany. But oh well, at least it got the SPD some headlines.

[Middle-aged Europe]

Both countries (US/Ger) have vastly different electorates and electoral systems. What plays well in the US may bomb in Germany. So unless Messina becomes an expert on German politics over the next couple of years I really do wonder what exactly he can bring to the table.

You comment implies that the entire SPD campaign would be directed solely from the desk of Jim Messina.  Jim Messina's skills are in organization and tactics. These can be fitted quite well

Of course there'll be local input but just take your example of tactics for example. I just fail to see what kind of valuable input Messina can really give them on this matter with his background and (presumably) total lack of knowledge of Germany. But oh well, at least it got the SPD some headlines.

Depends. From my experience, things like "framing" as a technique in political communication as well as canvassing are both treated almost as a science by political parties. And most of the knowledge used for strategy development and analysis in those areas comes from the United States (the Democratic Party to be precise) anyway. At least that has been the case with the Greens. I assume that the SPD handles it similarly. And hiring Messina is an attempt to directly tap the source, so to speak.

[Famous Mortimer]

Messina, and the Obama camp in general, made no innovations in "framing" or indeed innovations in any field. Democratic campaign tactics have remained largely the same since Clinton. Obama's team won because they were running against crappy candidates, not because of any innovation on their part. The only thing they did differently was deliver an even higher volume of spam e-mail to unemployed students, which is obviously highly overrated.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

How do you get to be one of these globetrotting shakedown artists? It sounds like a lot of money for no real work and thus I am (like all sane people) interested.

[Citizen Hats]

Messina, and the Obama camp in general, made no innovations in "framing" or indeed innovations in any field. Democratic campaign tactics have remained largely the same since Clinton. Obama's team won because they were running against crappy candidates, not because of any innovation on their part. The only thing they did differently was deliver an even higher volume of spam e-mail to unemployed students, which is obviously highly overrated.

And this is why Mortimer will never win an election.  

[Famous Mortimer]

Alright, what exactly do you guys think Obama did that was so revolutionary?

[Lief 🗽]

How do you get to be one of these globetrotting shakedown artists?

Win two U.S. presidential elections...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

You mean be attached to the staff of someone who won multiple US Presidential elections. Hmm.

[Citizen Hats]

Alright, what exactly do you guys think Obama did that was so revolutionary?

They did a number of things, arguably more evolutionary than revolutionary, but nonetheless - they greatly refined the process and technique of microtargeting - developing scores based on enormous amounts of data to come up with very refined individual estimates about voter behavior. This enabled them to direct their resources where they were most effective.  They put a real emphasis on on-the-ground communications, staffing, and volunteering, placing comparatively less emphasis on the air war that had come to dominate the thinking of American political campaigns in previous decades.  They made real efforts to bring empiricism into the political process, working with actual researchers in the process of waging campaigns, and a rigorous system of testing.  

Politics: harder than you think

[Citizen Hats]

In my experience, the shakedown artists are the Republican consultants

[Famous Mortimer]

Alright, what exactly do you guys think Obama did that was so revolutionary?

They did a number of things, arguably more evolutionary than revolutionary, but nonetheless - they greatly refined the process and technique of microtargeting - developing scores based on enormous amounts of data to come up with very refined individual estimates about voter behavior. This enabled them to direct their resources where they were most effective.  They put a real emphasis on on-the-ground communications, staffing, and volunteering, placing comparatively less emphasis on the air war that had come to dominate the thinking of American political campaigns in previous decades.  They made real efforts to bring empiricism into the political process, working with actual researchers in the process of waging campaigns, and a rigorous system of testing.  

Politics: harder than you think

Wow. You could be one of these consultants yourself. That's a big ass paragraph and it basically says nothing.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

'Scientific' canvassing is hardly revolutionary. Ian Mikardo was at it in the 1940s.

[Citizen Hats]

'Scientific' canvassing is hardly revolutionary. Ian Mikardo was at it in the 1940s.

you might note that I said evolutionary.  They put together a lot of new and some comparatively disused techniques to produce a more effective system of campaigning. 

You mention Mikardo. Yes, politicians have been doing these sorts of things since forever, but, there are 150 million voters and civic participation has been declining for years. How do you take your limited resources for contacting and identifying who they are and use them to the best effect?  You target, and the refined targeting allows you to target all the better and focus those resources on having a better idea of who to talk to to find IDs and then on election day a better idea of who needs an extra push to the polls. 

Again nothing revolutionary, but evolutionary. It's using superior research and organization to inform the use of timeless campaign methods. 

Wow. You could be one of these consultants yourself. That's a big ass paragraph and it basically says nothing.

You might be on to something...