Here's the thing: local candidates carry statewide and national candidates, and not the other way around.
I used the Gary Johnson and Scott Gesty vote totals as proxies for statewide. I realize that other candidates got more votes statewide, but I think special circumstances pertained to the Lieutenant Governor and Insurance Commissioner races. In LG, Margie was the recipient of the total third-party anti-Demopublican vote since there was no Green candidate, and in IC there is a strong argument to be made that David picked up a lot of anti-KWS vote from people who would not pull the lever for Mobley.
Anyway, what I was interested in was voting patterns.
Statewide both Johnson and Gesty averaged 9 votes per voting district (of which there were 433).
But in the 170 districts in which we had a local General Assembly candidate running they both average 11 votes per district, as opposed to the other 263 districts in which they only averaged 8 votes per district. Clearly there is a statistically relevant benefit to running candidates in as many districts as possible here. If these stats hold, for example, both Johnson and Gesty would have benefited by an additional 700-800 votes.
Now, here's the thing: our General Assembly candidates racked up 6003 votes in 170 districts for an average of 35 votes per district. [If Johnson or Gesty had managed to hit that average across the state, they'd have totaled over 15,000 votes each.]
It matters significantly whether we run in 2-way or 3-way races. Our 2-way races collected 3913 votes in 65 districts for an average of 60 votes per district, while our 3-way races collected 2090 votes in 105 districts for an average of 20 votes per district.
We should be careful with these figures, however. In the 14th Representative District Margaret Melson averaged 132 votes per district. Margaret's race is clearly an outlier for two reasons: the 14th has fewer voting districts than average (only 7) and there was a lot of anti-Pete Schwarzkopf sentiment in some parts of the district. So if we remove her race from the 2-way tabulations, we have 2,988 votes in 58 districts for a district average of 50 votes.
On the other hand, both Margaret (132 votes/district) and James Christina (63 votes/district) showed that reasonably active campaigning can have a significant influence on our vote totals. Again it is interesting to note that if our statewide candidates had even gotten the lower total of 20 votes per district they'd have doubled their numbers.
But, clearly, it is the local candidates who produce the most votes, because it is in the local races that our disability in terms of money can best be nullified. Think of it this way: if 35 votes per district is the average we can currently expect to receive in a mix of 2-way and 3-way races (even employing primarily paper candidates), then our potential statewide vote totals if we could run candidate in even 2/3s of the 433 districts would be about 10,150. That doesn't mean we would have to run candidates in all races, just in all those districts (remember overlap from Senate and House voting districts).
What stands between us and 10,000 Libertarian votes in Delaware is about ten more candidates.
Moreover, if we are careful to recruit as many candidates as possible for 2-way races even against heavily entrenched incumbents, we could raise that total to 15,000.
15,000 votes in Delaware for Libertarian candidates in 2014? It is possible, but . . . .
There are several caveats here:
1. We still have to field strong statewide candidates if only for ballot access and PR purposes. It is also important to create a Libertarian "ticket." When people go into the voting booth and see eight Dems, five GOPers, and one Libertarian they are far less likely to ticket split. We look like a small-time operation. If, when they go into that booth they see a full LPD slate of state offices, a Clerk of the Peace, State Senate, and State Rep, this says "major party."
2. We have to have volunteers for the candidates we do field. I am convinced that what James Christina accomplished by himself and what I know from school board races about canvasing and lit drops that particularly in 2-way races we could potentially double or triple our results.
3. We need a consistent statewide message to hang our publicity efforts, to include slogans, literature with common motifs, signs with common color schemes, etc. The Democrats do this well, the Republicans do this poorly, and we don't do it at all.
More to come, but I would really like reactions.
I used the Gary Johnson and Scott Gesty vote totals as proxies for statewide. I realize that other candidates got more votes statewide, but I think special circumstances pertained to the Lieutenant Governor and Insurance Commissioner races. In LG, Margie was the recipient of the total third-party anti-Demopublican vote since there was no Green candidate, and in IC there is a strong argument to be made that David picked up a lot of anti-KWS vote from people who would not pull the lever for Mobley.
Anyway, what I was interested in was voting patterns.
Statewide both Johnson and Gesty averaged 9 votes per voting district (of which there were 433).
But in the 170 districts in which we had a local General Assembly candidate running they both average 11 votes per district, as opposed to the other 263 districts in which they only averaged 8 votes per district. Clearly there is a statistically relevant benefit to running candidates in as many districts as possible here. If these stats hold, for example, both Johnson and Gesty would have benefited by an additional 700-800 votes.
Now, here's the thing: our General Assembly candidates racked up 6003 votes in 170 districts for an average of 35 votes per district. [If Johnson or Gesty had managed to hit that average across the state, they'd have totaled over 15,000 votes each.]
It matters significantly whether we run in 2-way or 3-way races. Our 2-way races collected 3913 votes in 65 districts for an average of 60 votes per district, while our 3-way races collected 2090 votes in 105 districts for an average of 20 votes per district.
We should be careful with these figures, however. In the 14th Representative District Margaret Melson averaged 132 votes per district. Margaret's race is clearly an outlier for two reasons: the 14th has fewer voting districts than average (only 7) and there was a lot of anti-Pete Schwarzkopf sentiment in some parts of the district. So if we remove her race from the 2-way tabulations, we have 2,988 votes in 58 districts for a district average of 50 votes.
On the other hand, both Margaret (132 votes/district) and James Christina (63 votes/district) showed that reasonably active campaigning can have a significant influence on our vote totals. Again it is interesting to note that if our statewide candidates had even gotten the lower total of 20 votes per district they'd have doubled their numbers.
But, clearly, it is the local candidates who produce the most votes, because it is in the local races that our disability in terms of money can best be nullified. Think of it this way: if 35 votes per district is the average we can currently expect to receive in a mix of 2-way and 3-way races (even employing primarily paper candidates), then our potential statewide vote totals if we could run candidate in even 2/3s of the 433 districts would be about 10,150. That doesn't mean we would have to run candidates in all races, just in all those districts (remember overlap from Senate and House voting districts).
What stands between us and 10,000 Libertarian votes in Delaware is about ten more candidates.
Moreover, if we are careful to recruit as many candidates as possible for 2-way races even against heavily entrenched incumbents, we could raise that total to 15,000.
15,000 votes in Delaware for Libertarian candidates in 2014? It is possible, but . . . .
There are several caveats here:
1. We still have to field strong statewide candidates if only for ballot access and PR purposes. It is also important to create a Libertarian "ticket." When people go into the voting booth and see eight Dems, five GOPers, and one Libertarian they are far less likely to ticket split. We look like a small-time operation. If, when they go into that booth they see a full LPD slate of state offices, a Clerk of the Peace, State Senate, and State Rep, this says "major party."
2. We have to have volunteers for the candidates we do field. I am convinced that what James Christina accomplished by himself and what I know from school board races about canvasing and lit drops that particularly in 2-way races we could potentially double or triple our results.
3. We need a consistent statewide message to hang our publicity efforts, to include slogans, literature with common motifs, signs with common color schemes, etc. The Democrats do this well, the Republicans do this poorly, and we don't do it at all.
More to come, but I would really like reactions.
Comments
With our size of active members now, the candidates = the volunteers. This has to change or the plan of increasing balloted candidates will only have marginal effects and won't win us any elections.
It should be easier to get someone to volunteer than to run, right?
That's the challenge.
it includes a demographic breakdown of who voted (by party, age range & sex for each Election District and Office) and thereby eliminates a lot of the guesswork & false conclusions.
for example: could you put a sign in your yard? or, here's a list of houses in your neighborhood, to distribute these door-hangers to.
There is not anything much else to be done with the current stats. But with the LPD Executive Committee preparing to meet soon it is important to get what we can tell from the stats we have on the table.