From Miami, FL
Jeb Bush Election Night Headquarters
It always ends with a balloon drop. Win or lose, you have to drop the balloons.
Last month, Democratic National Chairman Terry McAuliffe said, according to Kit Seelye's NY Times piece, that his "Number 1 goal in the Nov. 5 elections was to defeat Gov. Jeb Bush in Florida."
I had decided to come down here about two weeks ago. It looked like a perfect race: Big names, huge stakes, high drama, great stuff.
Bah. Jeb Bush kicked Bill McBride's butt. CNN called it at about 8:20 pm.
According to Florida State GOP chairman, Al Cardenas, the Democrats and their allies tossed about $15 million at this race in the last week, but that was not enough to overcome the $55 million the Florida state party spent on advertising, turnout and organizational efforts and the $35-or-so million the Jeb Bush campaign raised and spent on its own.
As is so often the case in Republican politics, there were two women at the top of the staff pyramids. Karen Unger has been the campaign manager and Ann Herberger led the finance effort.
They ran their respective operations with skill and craft using equal amounts of smiles and glares to stir their mostly-male staffs to high levels of output and low levels of errors.
But, in the end, it comes down to the candidate. Jeb Bush is a decent man. A very decent man. Although the strain of the campaign showed on his face, when he came into the staff office to see what was doing (there is a picture of this on the Secret Decoder Ring Page) he was upbeat and animated.
He asked about the other statewide races. When he heard he was leading them all to victory, he pumped his fist in the air and said, "Sweep, baby!"
As this is being written (shortly before midnight on election day) that could be the description of the entire night, across the entire country for the GOP.
There were technical reasons for the excellent results last night:
The GOP's 72-Hour Task Force (led by yet another woman, Blaise Hazelwood) which was designed to blunt the Democrats' "ground game" appears to have worked nearly to perfection;
The Democrats didn't get the bad economic news they needed last Friday when unemployment ticked up only a tenth of a point and the stock market was up, denying them a last-weekend "the economic sky is falling" ending to their campaign;
The enormous success of the GOP fund raising effort provided the resources necessary to blunt last minute soft money donations to the Democratic party.
The amount of time, effort, and energy President Bush devoted to helping candidates across the country.
When Bill McBride called Jeb Bush to concede at about 10 pm, the program in the ballroom began. Signs were waved, introductions were made. President George H.W. and Barbara Bush were introduced to the crowd. President Bush introduced his son, and the party was on.
In the end, the balloon drop didn't work. The netting didn't open. The balloons came down in one large netted tube.
I turned to Ann Herberger who was directing the show and said, "If the worst thing that happens in a campaign is: The balloons don't drop ... its been a heck of a campaign."
On the Secret Decoder Ring page today: A photo of Governor Bush watching returns come in, a photo of the two women who ran the Bush campaign, the Mullfoto of the day featuring a famous TV reporter, a link to the NY Times piece, and the usual things.
� 
