The obstacles are daunting.
Sen. Orrin Hatch has mountains of cash,
almost universal name recognition and the benefit of being a
member of Utah's dominant political party.
What does Democratic challenger Pete
Ashdown have?
His computer and a fast
Internet connection.
Ashdown isn't
ignoring tried-and-true campaign strategies but he is
employing some unheard-of Internet tactics in his underdog bid
to unseat Hatch.
The owner of XMission,
the first Utah-based Internet service provider, is relying on
what he knows best to drum up volunteers, endorsements,
campaign cash and public attention.
"I
realized if I was going to have any chance here, I would have
to get creative," Ashdown said.
Here are
a few of his ideas: Ashdown allows anyone to help draft his
position statements through a collaborative page on his Web
site, http://www.pashdown.org. His calendar listing every
meeting is available for anyone to see. He writes personal
blog items weekly. He interacts on a MySpace.com page. He has
online ads attached to 120 other Web sites.
And
soon, he will add an
interactive map showing his every move as he attempts to visit
each city in Utah.
For his efforts,
Ashdown has received national and even international attention
for some of his online innovations, but a recent poll shows he
is still an incredible long shot.
The
survey, commissioned by The Salt Lake Tribune, found
that 72 percent of respondents didn't recognize Ashdown's
name, compared to just 1 percent who had not heard of Hatch.
Mason-Dixon Polling of Washington, D.C.,
conducted the statewide survey over two days starting June 19,
talking to 625 registered voters. The poll had a margin of
error of 4 percentage points.
The poll
indicates that 60 percent of respondents viewed Hatch
favorably, compared to only 9 percent for Ashdown. If the
election were held now, Hatch would receive 67 percent of the
vote to Ashdown's 23 percent, with one in 10 voters saying
they were undecided.
Ashdown said the
numbers are frustrating.
"I feel like we
are making progress and then we get polls back and it shows
that
our progress has been
minimal," he said. "But the most important thing in any race
is persistence."
Hatch also has a
campaign Web site, http://www.orrin2006.com, but it is much
more traditional, operating more like a campaign brochure than
an interactive hub. And the senator has kept an eye on his
opponent's site.
"I think he is
innovative," Hatch said.
But Hatch says
winning campaigns still come down to a few basics.
"One, of course, is getting out the
vote, two is personal campaigning and contact and three is
raising money," he said. "Raising money may be the most
important thing and that is how you judge campaigns to a
certain degree."
Hatch says money not
only gives a campaign the resources necessary to attract
votes, but also indicates the support a candidate has.
The most recent campaign records on file
show Hatch has more than $2 million in his account after
spending $1.3 million. Ashdown, according to Federal Election
Commission filings, had a little more than $11,000 on hand
after spending nearly $46,000.
Ashdown
believes a "top down"
campaign like Hatch's works when "you have a ton of money and
a flatter structure works if you are trying to do things more
effectively."
Online campaigning allows
the candidate to engage supporters quickly and cheaply, while
also empowering volunteers to make some pretty significant
contributions. In Ashdown's case, online volunteers help draft
his position statements and research his opponent.
Ashdown believes the Internet will
reduce the built-in advantages that incumbents like Hatch now
enjoy.
"What I hope is the Internet will
negate the need for the amount of money that is spent
marketing a candidate - that this campaign will demonstrate a
way that other people can run for these kind of offices
without having to start at the mark of $1 million," he said.
His strategy is to find enough Americans
upset with Hatch, primarily on technology issues, to funnel
small donations to his campaign. So far money has come in a
trickle, not a flood like he expected.
But he has received positive attention
from England's BBC, PBS, Wired News and dozens of blogs.
Phil Noble, founder of PoliticsOnline, a
consulting firm focusing on online possibilities, said Ashdown
should "get a gold medal for being a political pioneer."
"He will go down as someone who helped
reinvent the political process in the Digital Age," Noble
said. "But technology itself is not going to elect anyone to
the United States Senate."
Noble said
too many candidates either ignore the Internet or get enamored
by the technology and forget that they must present an
attractive message to voters.
"Technology doesn't make a bad campaign
great and on the same token, a great campaign that doesn't use
technology very well is still a great campaign," he said.
Ashdown is not just an Internet
candidate. He has driven around the state in his father's old
motor home talking to Rotary Clubs and senior citizen centers.
He participates in the parades and political conventions. He
bought an advertisement in the major newspapers and started to
plaster signs on just about anything anyone would let him. He
has volunteer coordinators, fundraisers and event planners on
staff.
But in the mold of former
Democratic presidential candidate Howard Dean, Ashdown's true
community is a digital one.
Misty
Fowler, a software engineer, has never been active in
politics, until she read a story about Ashdown on Wired News.
She then communicated with the candidate
on his MySpace page. Since then, she has walked in parades
with her children and staffed his table at the state
Democratic Convention.
mcanham@sltrib.com
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