What can Massachusetts Republicans learn from Michael Jordan?
In the early 1990s, Jordan was A1 sauce, a three-time champion and MVP. A ubiquitous Gatorade ad campaign urged his fans to “be like Mike.” But then Jordan stepped way out of his lane, leaving the NBA for a short-lived baseball career that flopped.
At that same time the MassGOP was on a roll too, holding the governor’s and treasurer’s office and, briefly, a veto-sustaining number of state Senate seats, by offering a popular blend of fiscal moderation and social tolerance. But they also abandoned a successful formula to try a new sport — competitive political suicide.
Jordan returned from his baseball misadventure to win three more titles. But Massachusetts Republicans remain a pitiful footnote, with all signs pointing toward another round of humiliation on Tuesday.
What went wrong? How did a brand — still viable as recently as 2018 when Charlie Baker breezed to re-election — become as popular as an algae bloom on the local lake during a heat wave?
The current fiasco offers some answers.
Most obviously, a decade of Agent Orange transfusions into the party’s bloodstream has led to renal failure. After seeing Baker — at times rated the most popular governor in the country — eviscerated and driven out of politics by rabid Trumpers, why would like-minded moderates and pragmatists want any part of the party? Skepticism of the Democratic establishment and its tax-and-spend governance lives on in the form of ballot questions and Proposition 2 1/2 override rejections, but few of these voters seem interested in supporting Trump acolytes.
Voters beg for competence, but despite the earnest efforts of party chair Amy Carnevale, all they get from the GOP is red ink, mismanaged conventions, and “candidates” who can’t even get on the ballot. Organizing the Democratic grassroots is famously like herding cats, but dealing with Republicans activists is like persuading flesh-eating zombies to eat more vegetables. “In the Republican Town Committee bubble they’re very hopped up on fraud, they’re watching Fox every night,” notes a veteran Republican activist. One problem: with Trump and company stealing everything in sight, fraud is not a persuasive GOP talking point.
Poor Carnevale inherited a financial disaster from the preceding party chair, Jim “The Cowardly” Lyons. Without a potent organization and facing hurricane-force national headwinds, the party establishment understandably gravitated to candidates willing to invest personal wealth, clearing the Senate field for John Deaton and trying to force Brian Shortsleeve out of the gubernatorial race. That was a disastrous miscalculation. Deaton, who might have done better running for governor instead of another hopeless Senate bid, struggled to get attention. The free publicity a primary attracts might have helped the gubernatorial nominee nickname himself before Maura Healey and the Democrats did it for him: bald Donald.
Still, there may be value in the GOP cataclysm if some of its lessons are internalized:
Get out of that bubble. Baker reportedly told himself after his failed 2010 run for governor that “you spend too much time with your customers and not enough time with your prospects.” Plying usual-suspect GOP activists with complimentary booze at the convention and open-bar “rallies” staged for TV ad purposes is not a substitute for real campaigning; how do you know all those thumbs-up gestures from red-faced attendees are support for you or an endorsement of free beer?
Don’t shun free media. Debates provide some of the widest coverage a candidate will ever get, and the post-debate scrum is an indispensable opportunity to put your spin on how it went. Running away from the assembled press instead is the dumbest move ever.
Self-marketing geniuses like Trump who can build a personality-based cult following are rare, and efforts to duplicate his scam are usually embarrassments (see: J.D. Vance). Online videos showing the candidate in a hoodie chewing gum or playing hacky sack in yachting attire aboard a fancy boat are not going to create a deep personal bond with working men and women.
If you’re thinking of running for office in a state where the president is by far the most-hated politician, it might not be wise to donate hundreds of thousands of dollars to said president shortly before declaring your candidacy.
Read the room. Understand what has worked before. Know your own strengths and weaknesses. If you’re the world’s best basketball player, don’t ditch basketball for a sport you stink at.
In other words: don’t be like Mike.
