Following the Democratic debate the other night a lot has been made of Sen. Clinton's "Change you can Xerox" retort: It was a lead balloon, it was too rehearsed, is this really the only line of attack she's got? And so on.

It seems perfectly clear to me what the true significance of the statement was though. When you combine marketing folks incessant quest to fill every aspect of a consumer's day with increasing "brand-awareness" with the recent news that Sen. Clinton loaned her campaign $5 million of her own money and it becomes almost self-evident. The Clinton's have never turned down a chance to make a quick buck, and advertising has pretty well invaded just about everything we do in America, you can't even go to a public restroom without seeing some brand-awareness promotion while you do your business. So why not extend brand promotion to the people's business?

You couple increasing participation of the coveted 18-40 demographic with the disproportional participation of upper-income voters that's been noted in most of these contests and what do you get?

Cha-Ching!

A lot of the story out of the SC primary has focused on demographic analysis and whether or not Senator Obama got enough of the "White vote" to stay competitive beyond SC. First of all, as I noted in an earlier post you can't necessarily compare numbers across states, a point that was borne out once again as the demographics of the race changed dramatically from one state to another, and so did the results. Because Obama won women in Iowa didn't mean he went on to win them in NH. Just because his share of the white vote went down in SC doesn't mean white voters from earlier states have changed their mind, it means less whites voted for him in SC.  It's a fallacy to present a change in votes between Iowa to New Hampshire to Nevada to South Carolina to be representative of any national or temporal trend. These aren't shifts in the overall electorate overtime, they are how the electorate in a particular state voted. Despite how media analysts present it, this ain't the same kettle of fish each time.

The other story coming out of South Carolina, along with every other primary, that casts some doubt on the demographic analyses is that turn out on the Democratic side is up remarkably (my entry into the understatement of the year awards)...with every group. A lot of this is thanks to President Bush's incompetence and a lot is due to an exciting race. Either way, my point is that demographic analysis of the party based on past races doesn't really work. Furthermore the demographic breakdowns based on things as broad as race, gender, and education level don't get into nearly enough detail about the micro-targeting that these campaigns are doing (which can get as specific as what church a voter goes to, where they shop, where they get their news, what shows they watch, and more). Part of the reason the polls were so wrong in New Hampshire is that women supporting Senator Clinton turned out in unexpected numbers. What matters in these races is not the demographics of who's registered as a Democrat or even who has voted in these primaries in the past. The only demographics that matter are the demographics of the people that show up on the day. And with turn out up as high as it is across the board, these demographic analyses based on past numbers and broad groups don't have as much validity.

There's another reason we could be seeing these demographic shifts in the vote from state to state, it could be that the race in each state is different (I still believe Tip's adage, crazy right?). Notably the strategy of each campaign in each state is different. In a campaign where you have limited resources, your first goal is to turn out the lowest hanging fruit. For Senator Clinton she saw her support in the African American community, which at the end of last year she competed for fairly evenly with Senator Obama, erode dramatically along with her substantial lead. A combination of his win in Iowa, viability in the other states, and her campaigns tactics. From her campaign's perspective they decided to refocus on capturing other non-black voters where they were still competitive. For Senator Obama, in an electorate where upward of 50% of the vote was expected to be African American and that was breaking for him upwards of 80% (based on polling before the election), it makes sense he would have invested more heavily in turning out and appealing that favorable vote, and that being competitive in other demographics is just a bonus. It's that bonus that made his margin so huge last night, he tied Senator Clinton on white men, won women overall, and appealed to young voters across the board. Rather than it being a dramatic drop in Senator Obama or Senator Clinton's support among this group or that group from one state to the the next I think these changes represent particular strategies in each state contest. On that front I see a lot of reason to be happy about the results out of the early states as an Obama supporter.

Yesterday while at a campaign stop in SC, Governor Mitt Romney had a "heated" exchange with AP reporter Glen Johnson. The video can be found here.

Johnson interrupted Governor Romney's pontification on not having lobbyists "running" his campaign. Johnson observed that Ron Kaufman is a lobbyist and is a Senior Adviser to the Romney Campaign. Romney defended his point, not contesting that Kaufman was a lobbyist (he undeniably is) but saying that if Johnson had listened he said that there were no lobbyists "running" his campaign, citing his campaign manager and deputy campaign managers were not lobbyists. Romney later continued the confrontation and his staffers told Johnson that he should "Be Professional".

And they're right, Romney was mid-sentence when he was interrupted saying, "I don't have lobbyists tied to my..." and there are any innumerable ways that sentence could end.

We secretly removed who said each of these statements, let's see if you notice:

"They [Islamic Terrorists] watch our elections as closely as we do, maybe more closely than some of our fellows citizens do..."1

"There's certainly a stepped-up level of violence [in Iraq], and we're heading into an election..."2

"When it comes to better securing our homeland and fighting the forces of terror, results matter. And when it comes to choosing a President, results matter."3

"Let's not forget you're hiring a President not just to do what a candidate says during the election, you want a President to be there when the chips are down."4

"So, you know, words are not actions. And as beautifully presented and passionately felt as they are, they are not action."5

"You see, it's not enough to advocate reform. You have to be able to get it done."6

"My opponent has good intentions, but intentions do not always translate to results."7

"You know, what we've got to do is translate talk into action and feeling into reality."8

"The murders in Madrid are a reminder that the civilized world is at war."9

"I don't think it was by accident that Al Qaeda decided to test the new Prime Minister"10

Senator Clinton was out on the campaign trail in NH with this gem:

"I don't think it was by accident that Al Qaeda decided to test the new prime minister," she said. "They watch our elections as closely as we do, maybe more closely than some of our fellows citizens do.... Let's not forget you're hiring a president not just to do what a candidate says during the election, you want a president to be there when the chips are down."

Now the thing that first strikes me about this statement is that it sounds like it was crafted by Karl Rove, perhaps there was more to those reports about Bush advising the Senator than we thought.

The next thing that strikes me is her analogy to the UK transition from Prime Minister Blair to Brown, which coincided with the unraveling of a terrorist attack in London. The attack was discovered and dealt with by the UK security forces with little direction from the Prime Minister. I'm sure he was kept briefed and was ready for any development but there was a contingent of personnel at all levels,  trained and ready for just such an occurence. His most prominent role in the event was in giving his nation's defiant response that they would not be threatened by such acts.

In the US our security apparatus, from the National Security Council and Joint Chiefs, down to the Police Officer out on beat are designed to provide some permanence in our security structure even in times of transition and crisis. I mean, the US security apparatus is designed with nuclear holocaust as it's worst case scenario, I think that we can endure another attack. Saying otherwise is somewhat of a denigration to our security forces at every level.

Having said all that I do agree that who is at the top of that apparatus is very important, and whoever the next President is they will have quite a challenge undoing the damage that the current Administration had done to it. In the end though, the most important role that a President plays as the head of that apparatus, is in being our nation's figurehead and in articulating our response as a nation. So if the worst should happen on January 20th 2009 or any day thereafter, I want the person who is deciding on that response to be someone who when they are put on the defensive will act with courage and wisdom to lift our nation back up and not someone who will react out of hubris and desperation to incite our worst fears. We've had enough of that.

There are a few theories going around this morning as to how all the polling got it SO wrong. Election morning polls showed Obama with anywhere from a 4-12 point lead, the average was around 8. The results came in last night and we see a Clinton squeaker. So how'd she do it?

Over at the Rothenberg Report it's suggested that it may because of John Edwards dip, citing his drop from support in Iowa to New Hampshire he suggests that those that broke from Edwards, who we would think would break to Obama, instead went to Clinton. The problem is this treats the results out of two different states as if they were from the same set of folks. I don't think this explains the Clinton surprise as John Edwards finished at 17% which is consistently where he's been in polls out of New Hampshire since Iowa. In fact John Edwards is the one thing the polls got right, so I don't see how we can say that there was a "collapse" of Edwards explains Clinton's success, in NH there was no break from Edwards he finished right where he always was. I think Edwards may have played a role, but I'll get back to that at the end.

The next explanation I've heard is the contrarian nature of NH, and their desire to stick it to the media. I suppose this could have played a role but don't really know a way to test it other than anecdotally and I've not found anyone doing so. It's an interesting thought and I think it may be part though not all of the answer.