Home Field Advantage

“This is key to me - I refuse to be on the side of the people who never, ever go on offense. I reject that I have to only REACT to GOP politics. I want our own politics, one that doesn't apologize for being liberal and secretly wish that Republicans liked us. I'm not a "pick me". I don't care, at all, what GOP Senators think.”

I’ve come to think of it as my “home field analogy of campaigns.” You see, in my view, one of the foundations for a successful political campaign is to talk about the things you want to talk about and to get your opponent talking about those things as well. Your opponent, on the other hand, if he/she is good, is trying to do just the opposite - talk about what he/she wants to talk about and trying to get you to react. 

Plus, voters want to see a candidate who is willing to strongly standup for what they believe. On balance, fans in all sports like offense more than defense (although good defense does win games). The same holds for campaigns and electoral politics. Playing offense - talking about key issues that matter to you as a candidate or an elected official - is much more effective than defending your positions or reacting to your opponent’s strategy/tactics.

This is much like a football team that wants to play games at home where they have home-field advantage and are much more likely to win the game than if they have to play in a hostile environment in their opponent’s stadium. Of course, the other team also wants to play on their home turf as well. Turns out one of the secrets to running a good campaign, being a good candidate, and good politics in general, is to find ways to play on one’s home field. Responding to scurrilous attacks - and talking about issues raised by your opponent that are not central to your campaign – means you are playing an away game, in your opponent’s stadium, with a hostile crowd screaming in your face. Simply put, it reduces your odds of winning. In many ways, if both candidates and their teams are good, they’ll each be spending most of the campaign playing on their home turf and avoiding “away” games. In essence, they’ll be playing different games on different fields by talking about different things.

I hope this point makes sense, because it is critical to political success. Let’s take a random state, say, Wyoming (I’m a westerner, so I’ll pick a tough place). If a Democratic candidate’s campaign is about gun ownership and second amendment rights, then that person would be playing on their opponent’s field, and the Vegas oddsmakers would not look kindly on the odds of a victory. On the other hand, if that Dem could successfully turn the conversation to, say, healthcare, safety net issues, inequality, personal freedom (choice) and paying a living wage – and make their opponent spend time on those issues – then they would be playing on home turf, and the odds for electoral victory would increase.

Of course, there are times when a candidate or elected official must react to certain issues and opponent’s actions. But the ability to pivot to one’s own issues is critical to success.

Here’s a real-life example. During a press conference I was holding on energy, a caller on the conference line asked how I felt about the supposed transgressions of a Democratic congressman. I replied that I was there to talk about energy issues. The caller pressed again, and I simply told her to provide my team with her number, and I would call her offline to discuss, but I wouldn’t get drawn in because I wanted to talk about developing renewable energy resources to create more jobs and ensure a healthy environment for future generations. And we moved on. It was that easy. By the way, turns out the “reporter” was using a pseudonym and was actually the PR person for my opponent - we made hay out of that as well.