CHRIS CRUCIAL: What would worry me if I was running Harris' campaign 😟

PLUS: Trump on Hitler's generals

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1. What if Harris’ ad blitz didn’t work?

This chart, which comes from Ad Impact and was flagged to me by my friend

Bruce Mehlman

, is a) amazing and b) worrisome for Kamala Harris:

What you are seeing — just in case you were wondering — is that between July 21, when Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race, and October 21 (aka yesterday) Kamala Harris and her allies spent more than $1 billion (yes, BILLION) on TV ads.

Which is absolutely mind-boggling. That’s $330+ million a month! (#math). And, while Trump’s TV ad spend was far from small ($640+ million in 3 months), it’s nowhere near what Harris spent.

Which is an astonishing amount of money. By way of context, Joe Biden raised just over $1 billion for his entire campaign. Harris and her allies spent $1 billion in 3 months on TV ads alone! And are set to spend almost another $200 million on TV between now and election day!

Now, why, you ask, is that worrisome for Harris’ campaign? Here’s why: She spent a BILLION dollars on TV and she is in a worst spot — polling wise — than she was a month ago. And she’s in no better political shape than she was when she got into the race at the end of July.

On August 1, according to the 538 national polling average, Harris was ahead of Trump by 1.2 points.

Today, according to the same 538 national polling average, she’s ahead by 1.7 points.

Which, yes, is a .5 point increase. But, like, that’s nothing. Especially when you consider that a) Harris spent $1 billion on ads over the last 3 months and b) she outspent Trump by $400 million on TV over that time.

I would have assumed that with a spending edge like that, Harris would be moving up — slowly but surely — in the national and swing state polling. But what we’ve seen over the past few weeks is that she is losing support (small amounts but still) in national and swing state surveys.

What gives?

The rosiest explanation for Harris is that the ad onslaught hasn’t born fruit yet but that it will. That the whole goal was to convince undecided voters. And that those voters are still making up their minds. And that the ads that Harris ran over the summer and into the fall will, ultimately, sway them to vote for her.

That could totally happen!

The less rosy explanation — and the one that would keep me up at night if I was running the Harris campaign — is that the ads, well, didn’t work. Remember that the goal of a TV ad campaign is to persuade people! To get them off the fence and onto your side! And that has not happened yet for Harris.

Which would make me wonder what could the campaign possibly say — on TV or anywhere else — in the last 2 weeks that would convince voters? Like, what hasn’t she said yet?

I still remember — vividly — something a Democratic ad maker once told me about politics. He said: “Let’s say you want to start a dog food company. You hire the best sales people. The best marketers. All that stuff. Top notch across the board. And then the dog tries the dog food and doesn’t like it. Well, you’re screwed.”

The point is this: No matter how good the packaging or the billboard campaign or whatever, it all comes down to whether the dog likes the dog food. Because if he (or she) doesn’t, then you aren’t going to be selling a whole lot of dog food.

I am not sure if Kamala Harris has a dog-doesn’t-like-the-dog-food problem just yet. Like I said, it could be that we simply haven’t seen the impact of the ad campaign because the targeted swing voters haven’t yet made up their minds!

But, if she loses, I do think we will look back at her huge ad spending edge over Trump in the past three months — and the lack of subsequent positive movement in the polls — as a sign that voters (or at least enough voters) just didn’t want what she was selling.

2. Trump and Hitler

As regular readers know, I have stayed far away from comparisons between Donald Trump and Adolph Hitler — mostly because I simply do not think you compare anything or anyone to a man who sent 6 million Jews to their death.

And, for the record, I still believe that. But, according to The Atlantic, the former president himself invoked Nazi Germany in private conversations when he was in the White House.

Here’s Atlantic editor in chief Jeffrey Goldberg:

Former generals who have worked for Trump say that the sole military virtue he prizes is obedience. As his presidency drew to a close, and in the years since, he has become more and more interested in the advantages of dictatorship, and the absolute control over the military that he believes it would deliver. “I need the kind of generals that Hitler had,” Trump said in a private conversation in the White House, according to two people who heard him say this….

…A desire to force U.S. military leaders to be obedient to him and not the Constitution is one of the constant themes of Trump’s military-related discourse. Former officials have also cited other recurring themes: his denigration of military service, his ignorance of the provisions of the Uniform Code of Military Justice, his admiration for brutality and anti-democratic norms of behavior, and his contempt for wounded veterans and for soldiers who fell in battle.

A Trump spokesman issued a blanket denial on the Hitler’s generals comments. “This is absolutely false,” the spokesman wrote in an email. “President Trump never said this.”

Did he? Or not? Honestly, I have no idea. And I am not sure we will ever know for sure.

But here’s what I DO know: Trump has — both in his presidency and after it — made clear that a) he was unhappy with many of his top generals because they wouldn’t do exactly what he told them to do and b) he admired authoritarian rulers and other strongmen because of the almost slavish devotion they engendered in their citizens.

Could I imagine someone who thinks like that — and who has almost zero filter behind closed doors — suggesting that Hitler’s generals were what he wanted because of their unflinching loyalty? Yes, I could.

3. LA Times won’t endorse for president

The Los Angeles Times editorial board will not endorse either Kamala Harris or Donald Trump for president, blocked from doing so by the owner of the publication.

Here’s Semafor, which broke the story:

The paper’s editorial board, which has endorsed Democratic candidates in every presidential race since it first endorsed then-Sen. Barack Obama in 2008, was preparing to do so once again this election.

But according to two people familiar with the situation, executive editor Terry Tang told editorial board staff earlier this month that the paper would not be endorsing a candidate in the presidential election this cycle, a decision that came from the paper’s owner Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, a doctor who made his fortune in the healthcare industry.

The paper did not explain its decision, though it noted at the bottom of its online endorsement page that “the editorial board endorses selectively, choosing the most consequential races in which to make recommendations.

Uh, the presidential race feels pretty consequential!

The reality is that a newspaper endorsement is, um, not terribly meaningful. Especially one based in Los Angeles — given that California is not, um, a swing state.

But, this is interesting to me for two reasons.

First, if Semafor is right that the wealthy owner of the paper is blocking the editorial board from endorsing, that suggests to me that he doesn’t want his paper backing Harris, which they would almost certainly do, for fear that if Trump wins the newly-elected president might be out for vengeance against his “enemies.”

Second, the L.A. Times editorial board actually has a super-interesting history when it comes to endorsing political candidates. While most newspaper editorial boards are pretty liberal, the Times editorial board isn’t — or at least it wasn’t.

As then editorial page editor Sewell Chan explained in 2020:

From 1882 until 2000, The Times was controlled by the Otis-Chandler family: patriarch Harrison Gray Otis, a former Civil War commander; his son-in-law, Harry Chandler; Harry’s son Norman; and Norman’s son Otis.

Past editorials reveal a remarkable thread of continuity — loyalty to the Republican Party — even as that party and America, particularly California, changed.

The L.A. Times endorsed Barry Goldwater in 1964. And Richard Nixon in 1968. It also endorsed Nixon in his loss to JFK in 1960. And in 1972!

The paper’s editorial board then didn’t endorse a candidate for 36 years — as ownership changed to the Tribune Company.

In 2008, the editorial board endorsed Barack Obama. In 2016, they endorsed Hillary Clinton — calling Donald Trump a “catastrophe.” Four years later, the editorial board backed Joe Biden.

Soon-Shiong bought the paper in 2018 for $500 million.

NOTABLE QUOTABLE

“Elon is a powerful symbol of a rich jerk and the epitome of a MAGA-friendly billionaire bad guy. He’s perfect.” — Democratic ad-maker Mark Longabaugh

ONE GOOD CHART

It’s cliche — but true! — to say it all comes down to turnout. In 2020, more than 150 million people voted for president — the most ever. My guess is that 2024 turnout looks a lot more like 2016 turnout than 2020.

SONG OF THE DAY

Do you like Brandi Carlile? I mean, who doesn’t! Did you know her backing band are twins named Phil and Tim Hanseroth? And that the Hanseroth Twins have an album — out this year — called “Vera”? It’s pretty awesome. Here’s the twins playing “Remember Me” with the Colorado Symphony at Red Rocks.

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