Yesterday brought with it more than a few whispers of intrigue and disaster. As usual with such things, though, there was no fire, and I'm having a hard time even locating the smoke.
Take our good Senator Evan Bayh, and the word that he will be speaking on the third day of the Democratic National Convention. Panic! Alarm! What does it all mean!?
The answer, in short, is that it doesn't mean a damn thing. The assumed lockstep coordination between the DNCC and the Obama campaign is probably a big leap of faith, nevermind the simple fact that these schedules are being written in pencil, not in stone.
The other drama du jour was the realization that private companies do, on occasion, support various political figures. The target of all this speculation is CSO Architects, whose small shindig for Mitch Daniels is raising eyebrows because of CEO Jim Schellinger's prior gubernatorial ambitions.
So here's how it goes: Schellinger's two partners, both Republicans, will throw their weight behind Daniels, hence the party. Incidentally, they did back Schellinger in the primary.
As for Schellinger, he sent a letter to Thompson this week with a financial contribution -- the remainder of his campaign funds, plus some contributors' checks. A copy of that letter also went to all the county party chairs and to top Schellinger donors.
No fire, no smoke. In fact, the bigger story is probably the fact that all of the post-primary "will he or won't he" nonsense has silently fallen by the wayside.
It's also important to realize that the political world of absolutes doesn't really translate well into the realm of business. To take the actions of a private sector company and extrapolate it out to some mixed-up message about personal political affiliations moves beyond ignorant and into the area of sheer absurdity.
And so goes another day of flare-ups and let-downs.
For those of you who like to keep tabs on movers and shakers in the state, word comes this afternoon on the latest moves and shakes of two familiar faces of the Democratic Party.
CSO Architects, Inc. today announced the election of James A. Schellinger, AIA, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer by its shareholders. Schellinger recently returned to CSO after spending 15 months as a candidate for Governor of Indiana.
"I am extremely proud to be entrusted by my colleagues with this important leadership role," Schellinger said. "As a firm, we are poised to grow and continue offering world class quality and service for our clients."
[...]
CSO also welcomes a new employee, Tim Jeffers of Indianapolis, who has joined the CSO Team as Director of Business Development and Community Affairs. Jeffers will work with Schellinger on business development, strategic planning and community affairs.
"I am very excited about the future of CSO and Tim's potential to help us grow and identify new challenges and opportunities," Schellinger said.
For those who have forgotten, Jeffers joined Schellinger's gubernatorial campaign relatively late in the game, but his leadership and hiring of key staffers (such as friend-of-the-site Jennifer Wagner) generated a lot of credit for the Army veteran in the postmortem reports.
The Star gives a full rundown, for those who might be interested.
Matt Tully's latest column in the Star that looks at the missteps made by Jim Schellinger's campaign:
The Indianapolis architect ran one of the most disappointing, bland and dysfunctional campaigns Indiana has seen in years; a top Democrat called it one of the worst statewide efforts since Republican Linley Pearson's 1992 bid for governor.
For Schellinger, a primary blowout was averted only by the late hires of campaign manager Tim Jeffers and communications director Jennifer Wagner. The sharp duo stabilized the campaign this spring. By then, however, it was too late, and on Tuesday, underfunded rival Jill Long Thompson won by four-tenths of a percentage point. The margin was so narrow that it suggests Schellinger would have won if he had run even a mildly competent campaign.
Tully's analysis hinges on a few main points:
Wasted 2007
No clear vision
Boring ads
Lake County
He mentions several other problems, but his main points seem to oversimplify things. Most importantly, he never explicitly names the on-the-ground organizing that made the difference in this race.
Yesterday afternoon brought a concession, and with it the official beginning of the Jill vs. Mitch match-up. Long Thompson was in Indianapolis yesterday to kick off her general election campaign, and Bill Ruthhart of the Stardiscusses the challenges awaiting the Democratic nominee as she launches her bid.
It took close to 24 hours after Indiana's polls closed for Jill Long Thompson to sew up her win as the Democratic nominee for governor, but she wasted no time Wednesday homing in on her next target: Mitch Daniels.
Driving south after a campaign rally in Fort Wayne, the former congresswoman made about 50 phone calls, including a number in which she sought campaign contributions.
She's going to need the help.
Daniels has raised more than $8.8 million, according to current finance reports. He's run 11 different television ads in the past two months, during which he was uncontested in the primary.
In the same period, Long Thompson ran four TV ads. She raised $1.4 million and spent most of it in her narrow win over Indianapolis architect Jim Schellinger.
The Associated Press story from a few hours ago quoted the Jim Schellinger camp on where they stand in the ongoing vote count process for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination. While the Long Thompson campaign has declared victory, they assert there are still quite a few votes to tally.
Schellinger spokeswoman Jennifer Wagner said early Wednesday morning that the campaign was not conceding the race, and would evaluate matters later Wednesday.
"As far as we're concerned it's still a neck-and-neck race," she said.
Word on the street says there are still a good many provisional ballots hanging out there, and that the vote differential is down to just 3000 votes. As the process continues this morning, I will try and get some updated statewide numbers.
"We're in the process of figuring that (who won) out right now. It's too close to call," communications director Jennifer Wagner said.
Wagner said Schellinger's campaign staff is checking with each county to get updated vote totals in the race against Jill Long Thompson.
"I know everybody wants to call it ... especially Jill Long Thompson," Wagner said. "But it's far from over. ... Elections are a process that don't end when the polls close."
Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton squeaked out a critical razor-thin victory in Indiana's presidential primary Tuesday but lost North Carolina's primary, a split decision that left her no closer to overcoming Sen. Barack Obama in the race for the Democratic nomination.
With 99 percent of the votes counted, Clinton was clinging to a narrow 51 percent to 49.percent lead. Only about 22,000 votes out of about 1.2.million cast separated her and Obama.
U.S. Rep. Andre Carson said it's time to reunite the party after winning a hard-fought Democratic nomination in the 7th Congressional District, where the race featured record spending and multiple candidates who split the majority of the votes.
With most of the precincts reporting, Carson led with 41 percent of the vote, according to unofficial tallies. The three top voter getters who trailed Carson together had 52 percent of the vote.
Carson said it won't be difficult to unite the party for the general election in November, when he will have a rematch with Jon Elrod, who easily won the Republican nomination. Carson beat Elrod by 9,000 votes in a March special election to complete the term of his grandmother, Julia Carson, who died while in office.
Jill Long Thompson captured a slim victory early today in a fierce battle for the Democratic nomination for governor.
With just 26 of the state's 5,230 precincts left to report at 1:30 a.m., Long Thompson led Schellinger by just 5,400 votes.
She had won 50.25 percent of the vote statewide compared to his 49.75, largely thanks to winning 54 percent of the Lake County vote, which did not release most of its results until early this morning.
Of course, the Long Thompson victory is still subject to scrutiny and recounts, and there are some still making noise about the race still having a little life left in it. More on that later after I have a few hundred cups of coffee.
If you haven't already made your prediction, now is the time. We're an hour out from the first results starting to trickle in, and two hours from the first races being called.
In terms of turnout, I'm hearing that counties across the state are running out of Democratic ballots. Tippecanoe County has surpassed 35,000 total votes for the day, Vigo is reporting a shortage of ballots, and Lake County has turned out in full force. Others mentioned in the rumor mill are Porter, Howard and even Hamilton.
The question remains, of course, as to who will benefit the most from these historic numbers.
The first exit polls will be hitting the streets shortly, and I'll bring you information as I receive it.
Update: I'm hearing that Lake, Marion, and Monroe Counties have experienced huge turnout today -- a definite plus for Obama. In the 7th, evidence seems to be pointing to big cross-over voting from Republicans -- a big plus for Dr. Woody Myers, if conventional wisdom is to be believed.
41% Jim Schellinger 43% Jill Long Thompson 16% Undecided
Schellinger, an Indianapolis architect, is up 5 points. In the final weekend, there is movement among women to the man. Long Thompson had led by 23 among female voters, now by 5. Among men, the two remain effectively tied. Among voters age 18 to 49, Long Thompson last week led by 10; today, Schellinger leads by 3, a 13-point swing. There is similar volatility in Southern Indiana and in Greater Indianapolis, where Schellinger finishes strong. Given that 16% of likely voters remain undecided on Primary Eve -- unchanged over the past three weeks -- any Primary outcome is possible.
As we've discussed before, gubernatorial nominee Jill Long Thompson has been pushing her plan to suspend the sales tax on gasoline, something her opponent Jim Schellinger has often portrayed as a election-year pandering. Yesterday saw Schellinger push his own plan to deal with the skyrocketing gas prices in the state, and Niki Kelly picks up on where the debate is at the moment.
"We have to make responsible decisions and not knee-jerk decisions in an election year to try to win voters over," Schellinger said of the proposal during the only debate between the candidates.
But on an Indianapolis radio show Wednesday morning, he said he is "open" to the idea of at least a suspension of the sales tax on gasoline.
Campaign spokeswoman Jennifer Wagner defended Schellinger's position Wednesday.
"He never ever said he was opposed to the plan," she said. "He said it was a political gimmick and criticized the price tag, but that doesn't mean he wasn't open to the idea."
Also Wednesday. Schellinger released some additional ideas aimed at long-term changes for gas prices, including pressuring federal officials to investigate big oil companies; passing a federal windfall profits tax to prevent big oil companies from making excessive profits; and pushing to receive a greater share of the federal gas taxes Hoosiers already pay.
For their part, the presidential contenders have been dealing with a similar diverging of opinions at the federal level. John McCain and Hillary Clinton have both been pushing a gas tax "holiday," something Obama described at the Bloomington rally last night as a bad idea that would threaten our already-fragile infrastructure. His campaign has responded to criticisms with a new ad, which the campaign was kind enough to forward along to yours truly yesterday. Good, bad, indifferent? Will a relatively nuanced argument resonate when gas is approaching $4 a gallon?
The Evansville Courier & Press gives some ink to Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jim Schellinger's visit yesterday, and once again takes a look at his campaign's response to the accusation that Schellinger was a "lobbyist" for property tax increases.
Schellinger, who spoke at Laborers International 561 in Evansville, brought with him Mindy Lewis, a former school board member with the Bartholomew Consolidated School Corp. in Columbus, Ind.
Schellinger's firm was awarded a contract to build a middle school in Columbus after about six community forums.
The forums were Schellinger's idea, although he and Lewis denied those were tantamount to a "lobbying" effort in Columbus.
They described the forums as an effort to bring community members together behind a solution for the school system.
In addition to this push, it looks like the campaign has recorded an interview with Mindy Lewis that appeared on YouTube a short time ago. You can check it out below:
SurveyUSA has released their latest poll of the Hoosier state, and it finds Hillary Clinton and Jill Long Thompson with leads outside the margin of error.
53% Hillary Clinton 42% Barack Obama 5% Undecided/Other
36% Jim Schellinger 48% Jill Long Thompson 16% Undecided
My thoughts after a week of polling data that has been all over the place? No one has a damn clue where either of these races will end up. We have a huge influx of new voters, the potential for GOP cross-overs, and the inescapable fact that polling is far from an exact science.
This thing will be up for grabs until the polls close next Tuesday. What happens between now and then is anyone's guess.
Is it just me, or did Brian Howey totally steal a TDWism for his latest post?
Regardless, the back-and-forth over the gubernatorial ad wars is still festering out there in the print media, despite the presidential race effectively sucking most of the usable air out of the room. This morning brings us a Niki Kelly piece from the Journal Gazette that looks at yesterday's response ad from the Schellinger camp.
The ad comes after recent attacks by Long Thompson accusing Schellinger - who runs an Indianapolis architectural firm - of lobbying for millions in property tax increases to build expensive new schools.
He previously declined to retaliate against Long Thompson - including in a televised Fort Wayne debate. But he said Wednesday during a campaign stop in Fort Wayne that voters need to understand his opponent's record.
"I don't consider my response negative," Schellinger said. "I think they're huge issues to Hoosiers all across the state."
Jeff Harris, spokesman for the Long Thompson campaign, said the ad mirrors similar criticism offered by Republicans locked in a congressional race with Long Thompson in 2002. He noted that the National Committee to Preserve Social Security and Medicare endorsed her then and that she voted against numerous bad trade agreements.
Well, here's a little twist in the ongoing back-and-forth between gubernatorial candidates Jill Long Thompson and Jim Schellinger over the former's recent attack ad targeting the latter, via friend-of-the-site Abdul:
Schellinger spokeswoman Jen Wagner says the ad is misleading and has no merit. She also says it shows Thompson is willing to go to any lengths to win. Wagner also says the Thompson camp wasn't telling the truth in its ad, because it featured schools that weren't designed by Schellinger's firm.
Jeff Harris, a spokesman for Thompson, admits the photographer they hired for the ad shot the wrong schools, but the right images were put in within 24 hours of its airing. Harris went on to say despite that mix up, the central message of the ad is correct in that it shows Schellinger advocates higher taxes and it shows the differences between the two candidates.
Whoops.
Now let's be serious here: How in the hell does a photographer "shoot the wrong schools" in a case like this? If you're going to take the time to dedicate the last month of your campaign to attacking your opponent's business for building schools, don't you think the first step would be to, well, find a few of those schools?
And more interesting, of the two original non-CSO schools featured in the spot -- Avon and Plainfield High Schools, from top to bottom -- one of them was actually designed by a Jill Long Thompson supporter. Or, perhaps, a former Jill Long Thompson supporter. According to the most recent fundraising report, Wayne Schmidt of the architectural firm Schmidt Associates donated $1,000 to Long Thompson in February. He also was responsible for building the aforementioned Plainfield High School.
How do you think he felt when he saw his hard-earned cash being spent on a television ad that described his work as nothing more than a bid to raise property taxes?
I finally caught the new Jill Long Thompson ad in its entirety yesterday and uploaded it to YouTube, so here it is.
At the candidate forum I attended in Fort Wayne last week, both Long Thompson and Schellinger were asked about negative campaigning. Long Thompson dodged the question entirely -- for obvious reasons, we know now -- and Schellinger stated that he would not go on the offensive in this race, but would respond to any unwarranted negative attacks.
So where does that leave us? This morning brings us a few stories on the new spot, and Niki Kelly takes a look at one of the main problems that Schellinger and his campaign have with the ad. (And how they are planning to respond.)
Schellinger specifically has a problem with Long Thompson saying he "lobbied" for tax increases. He contends his company - CSO Architects - presents school expansion or construction plans to the community, school board and state tax control board but does not lobby for them.
He also says that he has worked with communities as a consensus builder to bring school costs down.
Jennifer Wagner, spokeswoman for the Schellinger campaign, said he was in the studio Monday recording a variety of possible response ads.
"Her ad is misleading. It's meritless. And we're going to respond to it," she said. "We didn't want to go here, but she's decided to drag this whole race into the mud instead of focusing on what actually matters."
It is my understanding that the Schellinger camp will begin to run some variety of televised response in the next week. The delay is due in part to the fact that they didn't have any "negative" ads cut -- they didn't think they would need them.
What will we see in the Schellinger spots? Who knows, but Long Thompson's spokesperson Jeff Harris seems to have indicated that they don't think anything is out-of-bounds as we head down these last few weeks of the campaign trail.
After last week's debate, Schellinger said he appeared before state and local officials to present information about construction projects but did not "lobby" for higher property taxes.
His campaign spokeswoman, Jennifer Wagner, said Schellinger is not a registered lobbyist and that Thompson was misrepresenting what he and CSO do.
"Architectural firms and architects do not lobby for property tax increases," she said. "Jim designs schools that local communities want, and under state law every community has the option of remonstrating to reject such projects."
But Harris called the ad's property tax statements "fair criticism."
"It's a part of his public record and something all voters need to be aware of," he said. "And it's something Mitch Daniels would bring up if he (Schellinger) were to secure the nomination. It's all fair game."
Whether slash-and-burn campaign rhetoric will work is up for debate, but I think the larger question is where this might leave our eventual nominee on May 7th.
I am still waiting for the new Jill Long Thompson negative attack ad to make its way into my DVR box, but WTHR has a report on the controversial spot, and this morning's joint appearance by the two candidates in which they spar over the issue.
Here's the clip, and a portion of Schellinger's response to supporters sent out via email a short time ago. The blast can be found in its entirety below the fold.
We didn't have much when I was a kid, but my parents made sure their eight children left home with a healthy dose of good Hoosier values -- things like honesty, fairness and respect.
I never forgot those values while I was working my way through school and helping build a successful company. Laura and I share those values, and we've passed them on to our boys.
If you're looking for someone who thinks it's appropriate to advertise false accusations on television just to see what will stick, I'm not your candidate.
If you're looking for someone who's spent a lifetime running negative campaigns mired in Washington-style politics, I'm not your candidate.
But if you're looking for someone who will work tirelessly on behalf of Hoosier working families, someone who will bring our state back together and someone who will focus on the issues that matter to you, I'm your Democrat.
So much for her pledge to run a positive campaign, eh? Jill Long Thompson apparently started running a negative attack ad against her primary opponent this morning, naming Jim Schellinger and peddling the property tax nonsense right out of the GOP playbook. Some will make the argument that we have to "fight this here, so we don't have to fight it over there," but I personally am turned off by it.
That being said, the Schellinger camp made it clear at the Fort Wayne forum that they would respond to any further attacks from the Long Thompson camp. What does that mean? Only time will tell, I suppose, but I'm going to work on getting a copy of the spot for you and uploading it in the next couple of hours.
Elsewhere, the Indianapolis Business Journal has put online two fairly extensive primary profiles of the aforementioned Long Thompson and Schellinger. Here are a few clips, starting with Jim:
He complains that Gov. Mitch Daniels, a Republican, has forced divisive change on issues like daylight-saving time and the lease of the Indiana Toll Road. He promises to offer the antithesis of Daniels' topdown approach.
"Democrats and independents and Republicans alike agree that we can and should be doing better in Indiana. We deserve better leadership," Schellinger said. "This has been my central message from day one. It's what inspired me to step up out of my comfort zone to do this. Because I believe there's so much potential in Indiana and we have not tapped it."
"I'm a big believer in teamwork. I'm a big believer in bringing people together," he continued. "You cannot accomplish anything with a leadership style that's arrogant and polarizes people."
In 2002, Thompson made a bid at a political comeback, running again for the U.S. House, this time in Indiana's open 2nd District. She managed to defeat Bill Alexa, now a Superior Court judge in Valparaiso, in the primary. But in the general election, she lost to Republican Chris Chocola 50 percent to 46 percent.
Alexa remembers attempting to paint Thompson as an out-of-touch career politician. Rather than respond negatively, Alexa said, Thompson simply called a press conference on her family farm to prove her hometown roots.
"If either one of us had been thinskinned, we could have turned that into a mud race," he said. "And neither one of us would ever want to do that."
Yet another defeat wasn't enough to turn Thompson off to public service. So when Democrats began hunting last year for candidates who might be able to unseat Daniels, she jumped into the fray.
That's the word out of Fort Wayne, where the Mike Downs Center for Indiana Politics has released the results of their recent SurveyUSA poll of the presidential and gubernatorial races. Without further ado, the results:
Good news for everyone, though: Gov. Mitch Daniels enjoyed only a 1% lead on either of the Democratic challengers, and his statewide support looks lackluster at best.
After reading through MfM's rundown on gubernatorial candidate Jim Schellinger's plan for higher education this morning, I started my usual routine of news site rummaging. And what to my wondering eyes should appear, but a miniature Guv and a new set of super-duper talking points!
Gov. Mitch Daniels wants the state to help bankroll the first two years of college for Hoosier families struggling to pay tuition.
The governor doesn't know how the state will pay for the plan, which he said would provide $6,000, the equivalent of two years of tuition at Ivy Tech Community College.
[...]
"The careers of tomorrow will require training beyond that which is available in high schools today," Daniels said, noting college tuition has risen 21/2 times faster than Hoosier incomes.
Hey, not a bad idea. The cost of higher education is skyrocketing for Hoosier families. If only we had known about this problem sooner...
Mitch Daniels on July 13, 2004 -- Railing against Governor Kernan for not doing anything to address college affordabiliy:
Marc Lotter, a spokesman for the Daniels campaign, said Indiana's college affordability problem did not surface overnight, and he contended it has worsened during the past eight years. Kernan was lieutenant governor for seven years before he was sworn into office last September after Gov. Frank O'Bannon's death.
"The answer starts with universities controlling spending, but the real solution is reversing Indiana's economic decline and raising the income levels of everyday Hoosiers," Lotter said.
Mitch Daniels on September 2, 2004 -- In response to the issue of capping tuition increases:
Daniels' deputy campaign manager, Ellen Whitt, said even a limit of 4 percent increases might be too much.
"We need a harder look at the costs and efficiencies of Indiana's universities, which this administration has failed to do," Whitt said.
Mitch Daniels the candidate was a big fan of talking the talk when it came to providing every Indiana student the opportunity to have an affordable post-secondary option, but he hasn't even raised a finger over the last four years to address any of the big issues facing the hardworking families across this state.
Now he wants to throw up a policy band-aid, release a few balloons, and tell us that he's back to the warm, caring guy we saw on the campaign trail four years ago? Handing out some money in an election year won't do anything if tuition rates continue to climb at such ridiculous rates. We need a governor who realizes this.
(Bumped from the user diaries. - promoted by Thomas)
I've been reading Jim Schellinger's education plan. I see a lot I like. He's presented a brief plan of what he wants to do, and he's got a cost estimate that looks a lot like the format you'd see coming out of the LSA. One of the highlights includes:
* Requiring state universities that see more than 10% growth in their endowement to use that money to cut the cost of in-state tuition.
I like this idea a lot. I'd like to look at it a little closer. And finally I'd like to offer some thoughts of my own.
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