A Winning Campaign

1. Aspects of a campaign.

Running a campaign has been considered by many as a nightmare because of the logistics involved in making it successful. It is a challenging task since other competitors’ endeavours are usually meant to counter every effort achieved. Another dreading element is the fact that the voting deadline can never be extended. For this reason therefore, some key aspects of a campaign need to be carefully considered. For this reason a candidate needs a treasurer, a fundraiser and a campaign manager.

The most important component of a modern political campaign is target. Through targeting the right supporters, the candidate is able to focus on eligible voters required to achieve a threshold. This is commonly done by securing a list of registered voters provided by the state office and other state parties. Besides information registration, the list will include addresses, phone numbers, voting history, ethnicity and census data. This enables reduction of residents to the more meaningful and financially manageable numbers. Targeting identified supporters and prior financial sponsors ensure success in fundraising efforts.

A thorough research on issues affecting the electorate needs to be carried out in order to use its outcomes in the process of candidate’s campaign. According to results white papers and press releases should be produced.

It is a key aspect which helps to determine strength and weaknesses of the messages and position from the voters’ perspective. Both qualitative and quantitative research taking into consideration both geographical and demographic factors of voters would be important in domination over other opponents.

Fundraising is crucial for raising enough funds and is mostly done by the candidate’s spouse or a fundraiser; however most of the fundraising job is done by his sponsors.

2. Political party of affiliation.

All the tension and pressure resulting from campaigning is meant to secure a win since there is nothing more important. Two consecutive wins in the general election by the Democratic Party makes them admirable. Not only did they employ the use of modern technology as a backbone to their success but they were also very critical in their research and analysis of what the electorate needed to be addressed. Major issues affecting our citizens are stagnant national economy, discontent over health care, security, transparency and accountability in governance.

Democratic Party addressed the stagnant national economy by assuring that hard work in America should be paid and responsibility needs to be rewarded within the middle class. They promise an economy that converts ideas into profitable businesses, affordable housing, health care and decent retirement benefits to those citizens who work hard and play by the rules.

They promised to enact the health care system by providing economic security for families. Through financial reform legislation they protected Americans from carelessness that cost so many their jobs, homes, and savings. Through tax cuts, low cost of health care and affordable student loans they projected decent living to all citizens.

Security at the focal point of it development was a major issue that the Democratic Party addressed. They stressed on new funding to keep and support police officers, emergency medical personnel, and fire fighters on the streets. Security was curbed through investment in confirmed community-based law enforcement.

3. Manipulation and perception of an event by public opinion.

The media have always played a big role in political influence. Exploiting fully their media freedom, they sometimes go to extreme extends of criticism. This negative publicity frequently spreads pessimism among citizens. Existing technology of social sites, on the other hand, can either make or break a politician. Gay marriage for example is a human right factor which fetches varying public opinion. From the Democratic Party’s 2012 platform, “The US government supports marriage equality and support the movement to secure equal treatment under law for same-sex couples. We also support the freedom of churches and religious entities to decide how to administer marriage as a religious sacrament without government interference.” The news reporters fulfil their duty of broadcasting news even if it means being radical as a scheme to earn their viewers’ or readers’ attention. The news outlets need to make news and those ones with political controversy are sold the most. The average American watcher/reader plainly consumes what media offers but has the role of generating public opinion which in most cases is very personal.

4. Handling issue of illegal immigration at federal and not state level.

Foreigners residing in different states of United States face numerous treatment from different state policies governing illegal immigration. Since the attack of September eleventh, popularly known as 9/11, debate over illegal immigration has been built up. According to a Reuters report, the United States has over eleven million illegal immigrants. This has been attributed to the fact that American policy on foreign residency is not revised. Several states have, therefore, passes stringent laws regarding illegal immigrants.

In June, the state of Texas passed one of the toughest laws in the country. It compelled the state’s public schools to determine the legal residency of its students, deterred illegal immigrants from acquiring a driver’s licence of business permit and gave police authority to detain any person alleged to be in the country illegally, if they are not in a position to produce the documentation.

Texas law has faced challenges from federal courts since its passage. However it was upheld, citing that its implementation did not harm the public interest. Obama’s administration has intervened by asking the eleventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals with prerogative over Texas, to take actions, arguing that Texas had interfered in the government’s authority decision over immigration through formulating of a state law that outdid their companion laws at the federal level. The trend was continued with other states like Arizona, Georgia, Indiana and Utah having various portions of their state immigration laws struck down. The ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that Arizona’s law, which exposed suspected illegal immigrants to be detained by law enforcers for lacking documentation, violated the Fourth Amendment’s defence from unreasonable search and arrest.

These disparities between states strengthen the need for establishment of a new national policy to address the fate of illegal immigrants. Illegal immigration is therefore a federal case and should be removed from state to federal level. Federalism in the U.S. has provided all her citizens with receiving an equal and fair treatment regardless of the state of residence.

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