OH-02: Schmidt Strategy Failing

by Chris Bowers

One month ago today, the Cincinnati Enquirer ran a story on the special election entitled GOP counting on ads, Dems on shoe leather. The article noted that Jean Schmidt was spending a lot of time outside of the district raising huge sums of cash and was relying on television ads for her campaign. By contrast, the story portrayed Hackett as focusing on local events and canvassing. Well, it is indeed true that Hackett is massively out-canvassing Schmidt, but now Schmidt's financial advantage has been entirely wiped out.
Today, Jean Schmidt gave her own campaign $20K. Why? Because, as of last week, her campaign was over $56K in debt. This makes Tim Tagaris's earlier estimation of Hackett's Cash on Hand advantage a severe underestimation. Hackett almost certainly has around $200K more to spend than Schmidt in the final days. Since Schmidt can't go down the PAC well again after blowing their money in less than a month, and since her entire strategy was seemingly based on massively outspending Hackett on TV ads, as we enter the final week of the campaign, the momentum and resource advantage are now decisively in Hackett's favor.

The free media battle is also shifting in Hackett's favor. While over the past month Google News counts ninety-one local stories about Schmidt and only 63 about Hackett, over the past week Hackett has closed that gap to just two: 27 for Hackett, and 29 for Schmidt.

A lot of things are clearly going Hackett's way in this race. If you can't make it into the district to help canvass, his Act Blue page is on the verge of passing 3000 contributers (right now it stands at 2,982) and $150K (right now it stands at 148.3K). The netroots shave done an excellent job helping Paul out in this campaign. Visit his website for info on how you can help.

House 2006 :: Mon Jul 25th, 2005 at 04:19:02 PM EDT

A special election

For more than three decades, Ohio's 2nd Congressional District has been represented by men who may be fairly described as Republican patricians. We don't mean that in a pejorative sense. Rob Portman, like Willis Gradison and William Keating before him, adhered to standards all too rare in Congress. They were policy-oriented pragmatists inclined toward the money issues: tax policy, health care, retirement security, economics.

Next Tuesday voters in the 2nd District will go to the polls in a special election to decide who will fill the unexpired term of Portman, who resigned to become the U.S. trade representative.

The June 14 primary produced two capable, and competitive, candidates: Jean Schmidt, a Republican, and Paul Hackett, a Democrat.

They share certain similarities.

Both are products of financially secure families - Schmidt's father was a builder and entrepreneur in Clermont County; Hackett's father was an engineer and manufacturer's representative who settled in Indian Hill.

Both are athletes - Schmidt is an accomplished marathon runner, Hackett ran track before he became a U.S. Marine.

Both also have long records of public service, albeit in different ways.

Schmidt served as a township trustee for 10 years before winning election in 2000 to the Ohio House of Representatives. There she served for four years before giving up the seat to run for the Ohio Senate - a race she lost, in a recount, by just 22 votes.

Schmidt has also held a variety of civic and political posts, and serves on the governing boards of such entities as the Clermont County Library, Clermont Mercy Hospital Foundation, the Live Oaks/Great Oaks Business Industry Partnership Council and Greater Cincinnati Right to Life.

Hackett's public service revolves around the Marine Corps. In 1982 he enlisted in a reserve officers program while he was a student at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland. He completed law school at Cleveland State before starting full-time active duty in 1989. He continued in the active reserves after returning in 1992 to Cincinnati, where he practiced law in a small firm before launching a solo practice in 1994. Hackett served on Milford City Council from 1995-98; he stepped down after purchasing what he describes as the oldest house in Indian Hill - a recently-renovated, 200-year-old stone structure on the banks of the Little Miami River.

Last year Hackett re-enlisted in the Marine active reserves; he went in with the rank of major and served in Iraq with a governance support team, where part of his job involved organizing convoys to bring money and supplies from Baghdad to Iraqis serving in the regional government.

In terms of their ideology and their approach to issues, Schmidt and Hackett present sharp differences.

Schmidt, from what we can discern, would likely be a dependable vote for the Bush administration, particularly its foreign policy and Iraq. In this campaign she has allied herself with the president, as she did earlier to Ohio Gov. Bob Taft and before that to former House Speaker Larry Householder. Her approach to policy issues is incremental, except perhaps concerning taxes. She seems generally to favor supply side economics, and wants to make President Bush's personal income taxes permanent and get rid of the estate, capital gains and alternative minimum taxes entirely. She supports incentives to encourage small businesses to offer health insurance, greater reliance on ethanol as a fuel source and a prohibition against Congress' use of Social Security funds for general government operations.

Hackett, in our view, is a gust of fresh air. If we had to put a label on him, it would be Libertarian Democrat. He says what he thinks and doesn't seem to have much use for the orthodoxy, or the partisanship, of either party. He doesn't want the government telling him what kinds of guns he can own, nor does he want it interfering in family or medical decisions or taking away civil liberties in the name of fighting terror. He regards Social Security more as an insurance program than a retirement savings plan, but wants to put it on a sound footing and would raise the earnings ceiling if necessary to do so.

If elected, he notes, he would be the only member of Congress with direct military experience in Iraq - which, he says, is a fight we should end as soon as possible. He wants to finish the job and get out, and he wants the United States to stop holding hands with Pakistan and to get serious about tracking down those responsible for the 9-11 attacks.

We like Hackett's candor. We're impressed with the freshness of his ideas. We believe his experience shows him to be someone who is action-oriented.

We endorse Hackett for the 2nd District seat.

Veteran of Iraq, Running in Ohio, Is Harsh on Bush
By JAMES DAO
July 27, 2005

CINCINNATI, July 22 - In the Second Congressional District of Ohio, which Republicans have controlled for the last two decades, the quickest route to political oblivion could be the one chosen by Paul L. Hackett: calling President Bush a "chicken hawk" for not serving in Vietnam and harshly criticizing the decision to invade Iraq.

But Mr. Hackett, the Democratic candidate in the Aug. 2 special Congressional election, is not an ordinary politician. Until four months ago, he was serving in the Marines, commanding a civil affairs unit in Iraq.

If Mr. Hackett is elected, he will become the first member of Congress to have served in the Iraq war. That alone has helped Mr. Hackett, a 43-year-old lawyer, unexpectedly turn this potential walkover into a sharply contested race.

"When you tell people he just got back from Iraq, they stop and listen," said Timothy Burke, the chairman of the Democratic Party in Hamilton County, one of seven southern Ohio counties in the district. "He'd not have nearly as many people paying attention to him if it weren't for that initial grabber."

Mr. Hackett's Republican opponent, Jean Schmidt, has poured more than $200,000 of her own money into her campaign and traveled tirelessly across the district. Her campaign has received tens of thousands of dollars from national Republican committees, and Mr. Bush has agreed to record a telephone message that will be delivered the weekend before the special election.

"I'm a runner, and when you are overconfident, that's when you see your competition's shadow," said Ms. Schmidt, 53, who has completed 54 marathons. "And I won't see his."

The candidates are competing to fill the seat held for 12 years by Rob Portman, who resigned to become Mr. Bush's trade representative. Mr. Portman routinely won the district, which stretches from poverty-stricken communities along the Ohio River to affluent Cincinnati suburbs, with more than 70 percent of the vote.

The national Democratic Party initially ignored the race. But Mr. Hackett has changed some minds, and the party has begun dispatching young staff members to the field, hoping to send a message that Mr. Bush is weak in one of his most loyal districts.

In addition, the Democratic strategist James Carville was the headliner of an event in Cincinnati on July 19 that raised nearly $100,000 for Mr. Hackett, who trails Ms. Schmidt in fund-raising three to one. On Thursday, Max Cleland, a former Democratic senator from Georgia and a Vietnam veteran, campaigned with Mr. Hackett, calling his decision to volunteer for Iraq "an act of conscience."

"Someone who has led on the battlefield, that's the kind of person you want to see in the United States Congress," Mr. Cleland said at a rally in Blue Ash.

Mr. Hackett, the son of a traveling salesman, joined the Marine Corps in college and was honorably discharged in 1999. He joined again in 2004, commanding a civil affairs unit in Ramadi and Falluja. A lean 6-foot-4, he is garrulous, profane and quick with a barbed retort or a mischievous joke. He and his wife, Suzi, have three children, ages 8, 4 and 1.

If he loses the race, he says, he will probably return to Iraq next year.

Ms. Schmidt is the daughter of a well-known local banker who owned Indianapolis race car teams on the side. Small, wiry and intense, she exudes seriousness and is given to long pauses before answering questions. She is married to an investment counselor, Peter, and they have a 27-year-old daughter.

Mr. Hackett, who said he had never had political ambitions before, jumped into the race the day he returned from Iraq in March when a friend told him about Mr. Portman's nomination.

Ms. Schmidt, a former state representative, said she formed an exploratory committee, studied a straw poll and contemplated the race for a week before joining the crowded Republican primary.

The candidates are even more different on most issues. Ms. Schmidt supports making Mr. Bush's tax cuts permanent, but offers no plans for closing the federal deficit other than trimming "unnecessary pork" and bureaucratic inefficiency.

Mr. Hackett opposes making those cuts permanent, asserting that troops in Iraq are not receiving adequate supplies or benefits.

Ms. Schmidt, a leader of Right to Life of Greater Cincinnati, wants abortion outlawed. Mr. Hackett says he opposes abortion but believes government should not dictate a woman's health care decisions.

The two, however, support broad gun rights. His opposition to banning assault weapons has gotten Mr. Hackett, who says he owns military-style rifles and has a permit to carry concealed weapons, into arguments with many Democrats.

"The Democratic Party is wrong on this," he said. "We don't want government dictating a woman's right to choose. How do I tell people it's O.K. to dictate their gun ownership?"

Mr. Bush has also emerged as an issue. Ms. Schmidt contends people in the district, which voted 64 percent for Mr. Bush last year, adore the president. Her only difference with the administration, she said, is on Mr. Bush's proposal to create private accounts in Social Security, which she says could be risky.

Mr. Hackett has been bluntly dismissive of Mr. Bush, saying the United States should have focused on capturing Osama bin Laden instead of invading Iraq so quickly. In a public forum, he called Mr. Bush the biggest threat facing the United States, a remark that has infuriated voters, Republicans say.

Yet Mr. Hackett has also tried to exploit Mr. Bush's popularity here, opening his lone television commercial with Mr. Bush saying, "There is no higher calling than service in our armed forces."

Republicans have derided the spot as hypocritical. "I want to win," Mr. Hackett replied.

Democrats are also hoping that disgust with a scandal involving the administration of the Republican governor, Bob Taft, and a Republican coin dealer who is accused of misappropriating $13 million from a state workers compensation fund will hold down Republican turnout.

Mr. Hackett has tried to tarnish Ms. Schmidt's integrity as well, criticizing her for not disclosing free tickets to a Cincinnati Bengals football game she received from a lobbyist last year. Ms. Schmidt blamed the lobbyist for the oversight, and has repaid him $644.

But Ms. Schmidt is a proven battler, having bested several better-known candidates, including Pat DeWine, the son of Senator Mike DeWine, in the primary. She contends that although voters respect Mr. Hackett's military service, it will not be the deciding factor.

At the Warren County fair, where Ms. Schmidt bought a 230-pound pig from a 9-year-old girl and watched a demolition derby, Charles Hartman, a Democrat turned Republican, agreed.

"It's a positive thing for him," Mr. Hartman, a substance-abuse specialist with a nonprofit group, said after meeting Ms. Schmidt. "But we're not at war here."

But Todd Schulte, a Republican, said Mr. Hackett's service had caused him to consider voting Democratic on Aug. 2.

Mr. Schulte, a 40-year-old business owner, happened on Mr. Hackett's event in Blue Ash and was impressed with the candidate's decision to volunteer for Iraq.

"He's got a wife, kids and a good job but he's not sitting in the back row," Mr. Schulte said. "That gives me something to think about."

July 27, 2005

OH-2: Five Points & $285,000

Posted by Tim Tagaris

2004: 72% to 28%
2002: 74% to 26%
2000: 74% to 23%
1998: 76% to 24%

In fact, only one Democrat has received more than 30% of the vote in over 20 years. With less than one week to go, this race is within 5 points. And not only is it within five points, but Jean Schmidt is tanking. And no, I am not sitting in my hotel room with a .pdf file in-front of me. Here is what I am hearing, so take it fwiw...

The NRCC conducted a poll earlier this week (there is another poll in the field, but no idea by who), that showed the poor numbers. The numbers were leaked by a Republican who is part of a group that doesn't see eye to eye with Schmidt on certain issues.

In response, the National Republican Congressional Campaign Committee has just dumped $285,000 into an astounding 1800+ point ad buy that will start running Friday through Tuesday. This is public record.

Now Jean Schmidt is scurrying to round up to volunteers from her primary opposition in a last ditch effort to counter Paul Hackett's overwhelming advantage on-the-ground. To the shock of the GOP, Hackett is also going toe-to-toe on television as well in terms of dollars. The free press because of Paul's service has been huge as well. I overheard the campaign manager (I believe) of Schmidt's campaign say to a Hackett staffer, "I have no idea how the hell you guys are raising this much money." They are worried.

I don't know what to say, other than this is a grassroots takeover. Whatever Paul Hackett accomplishes in this race will be because of us. The work done on the blogs, the volunteer and fundraising support of DFA, and Howard Dean's pledge to fight it out in all 50 states; if MoveOn were to jump in, the future of the Democratic Party will be completely represented in overcoming the most insurmountable of odds. When the ballots were cast on November 2nd, this is the moment we all looked towards. When Howard Dean was elected DNC Chair, this was the moment we all looked towards. In the first federal election since the fiasco in 2004, the grassroots of the party banding together, taking on the most dauting of tasks, and winning. Who would have thought we had such an opportunity, so soon.

While Jean Schmidt and her allies run a slash-and-burn campaign, attempting to "Swift Boat" Paul Hackett, the message is simple, if we can win here, we can win anywhere.

Down the stretch we go.
Paul Hackett's ActBlue Page

Volunteer: volunteer@hackettforcongress.com -- they have housing available

Call Cincinnati Talk Radio All Week
(LINK - Scroll Down)

UPDATE: Some guy has been walking down the street outside Hackett HQ a few hours ago, taking down everyones license plates and making phones calls while walking in and out of Republican HQ across the street.

Posted by Tim Tagaris at July 27, 2005 08:48 PM

Thanks so much KCNY    Great article too!

I'm just back from repairing some large Hackett signs (wind played havoc yesterday) and putting up yard signs.  Our people really do seemed motivated and determined to pull this off.  There is a real sense of excitement in the air!

A short nap and off to the phone banks for five hours.

On to victory!

      Hackett For Congress

Thursday, July 28, 2005

Jean Schmidt and Me

Tuesday I wrote about Paul Hackett, U.S. Marine and Iraq War veteran, who is running for a congressional seat against a right-wing opponent, Jean Schmidt, in Ohio.

What I didn't realize until yesterday is that I used to know Jean Schmidt. This was a long time ago, but I've done some checking and I'm sure this is the same Jean Schmidt.

From about 1978 to 1983 or so I (and my now ex) lived in a suburb of Cincinnati, and the two houses next door were occupied by twin sisters (Jean and Jennifer) and their husbands. The twins' father owned several acres of the neighborhood--former farmland--and had built most of the houses, including the twins', who'd been given the houses as gifts.

I remember the twins as friendly, very pretty, about my age, and pleasant people to live near. We were never chummy, mostly because I found their interests (clothes, money, and the Indianapolis 500) not entirely compatible with mine, plus neither was the sharpest tack in the box. But friendly girls, they were, and I don't recall anything scandalous about them.

I've been wondering whether I should even mention that I once knew the twins, but then I read this at AMERICAblog...



And I'm thinking, who the hell is that spoiled, lamebrained little snot to say that a U.S. Marine isn't qualified to be a congressman?

So now I'm gonna dish.

This article about Schmidt is a crock, for example.



If Schmidt is a farm girl I'm Lance Armstrong. I know exactly where the "farm" is, because my home was on the edge of it, and when I lived there 25 years ago it hadn't been farmed in a great many years. As I remember, Gus never farmed it (somebody should confirm that), but bought the land up cheap and, bit by bit, turned it into a subdivision. And from googling I found that Jean is still living in the same house (on Wards Corner Road, in Loveland), which then was a subdivision, not a farm, and I rather doubt it reverted back to farm status in the years since.

And as far as "the boys being held in higher esteem..." maybe so, as I don't remember ever meeting "the boys." But daddy saw to it the twins weren't hurting for anything (like houses).

Daddy owned Indianapolis 500 race cars, which was a little detail that tipped me off Jean Schmidt was The Same Jean Schmidt.

I remember at one point the other twin, Jennifer, went on a crusade to stop a property tax increase that would have benefited the local public schools. The school buildings were shabby, and news stories claimed the kids were using 20-year-old textbooks. Both twins believed that public schools were inherently bad, and since anybody who was anybody sent their kids to Catholic schools they didn't see any point in funding them. Property taxes were remarkably low, and the increase would have been less than $200 a year average per household, but Jennifer was on a rampage that she would be ruined if she had to pay that tax.

As I recall, the campaign was a success.

That same year, the twins got matching full-length mink coats for Christmas.

Annoying, to say the least.

Schmidt can't recall Ach favor

By Howard Wilkinson
Enquirer staff writer
Saturday, July 30, 2005

Republican congressional candidate Jean Schmidt's media consultant said Friday she had no recollection of lobbying the governor's office on behalf of Cincinnati businessman Roger Ach's Internet lottery business when she was a state representative, as was reported Friday by the Toledo Blade.

But her Democratic opponent, Paul Hackett, jumped on the story, saying Schmidt "should have been lobbying for her constituents."

The Blade on Friday quoted documents released by Gov. Bob Taft's office that included a November 2001 e-mail written by Taft staff member Jon Allison complaining that Schmidt "continues to bug me on the Internet lottery."

Ach wanted to persuade the governor to back his plan to sell lottery tickets through his Internet business.

One year after the e-mail, Schmidt received a $1,000 campaign contribution from Ach.

Schmidt was campaigning in Brown County on Friday and could not be reached for comment, but her media consultant, Fritz Wenzel, said he discussed the Blade story with Schmidt on Friday morning and said she could not recall any conversations with anyone in the governor's office about Ach's business.

"This was one of hundreds of issues she faced as a legislator and it was not the kind of substantive and significant issues that she paid close attention to," Wenzel said.

The Hackett campaign called a press conference at its Batavia office where the Democrat claimed the story was more proof of his contention that Schmidt is entirely too close to the ethical problems swirling around the Taft administration.

"She's a good runner, but she can't run from her record," Hackett said, referring to his opponent's marathon running.

The Schmidt campaign put out a statement Friday afternoon saying Hackett was turning to "baseless attacks" because "his liberal Democratic views do not match up with voters of the 2nd Congressional District."

Facing an opponent in Hackett who volunteered for a seven-month tour of duty in Iraq, Schmidt plans to show her own support for the military with a Sunday rally featuring some Clermont County families who have paid a heavy price for service in Iraq.

At 3 p.m. Sunday in Union Township's Veterans Memorial Park, Schmidt will join the family of Sgt. Chuck Kiser, the Army reservist and Amelia native killed last year in Iraq; Keith Maupin, the father of Sgt. Matt Maupin, who has been listed as missing since his convoy was hit near the Baghdad airport in April 2004; and Sgt. Paul Brondhaver, a member of the Felicity-based 216th Engineer Battalion who was seriously injured while serving in Iraq last year.

Hackett, a Marine, picked up the endorsement of a four-star Army general Friday.

Retired Gen. Wesley Clark, the former NATO commander who ran for the Democratic presidential nomination last year, issued a statement Friday urging 2nd District voters to go to the polls Tuesday and cast a ballot for Hackett. The candidate returned from Iraq in March after a tour of duty with a Marine civil affairs unit.

Clark said Hackett's experience in Iraq "means he understands what it takes to kill our enemies, support our friends and do everything it takes to win the war on terror and keep America safe."