Advice to '08ers: Know Thyself

MANCHESTER, N.H. - If you are a candidate for president or thinking about being a candidate for president let me give you a little advice: Don't set foot in early primary voting states like Iowa, New Hampshire or South Carolina unless you know who you are and what you are about.

With two years before anyone votes in a primary, this is the period when biography and personal connections matter most.

Talk with activists as I do at the grocery store or a county party meeting, and you'll hear the same thing from Republicans and Democrats alike: with the nomination wide open, they want to be inspired.

You won't find a base of support just because you are a moderate or a progressive or a conservative. These activist bases have their choice among moderates, among progressives, among conservatives. And why exactly should they invest in you?

It is all too well known in these parts that for the first time since 1952 there is no president or vice president seeking their party's nomination. It is the first time in our current Iowa-New Hampshire structure that this has been the case.

This being the case, endorsements for you will likely come later, not sooner, and will be based on some sort of personal connection, not just an ideological one.

One of the most important New Hampshire endorsements in 2004 came because of the personal connection with a member of the candidate's family, not the candidate.

Your problem as a candidate is an understandable one. You are likely to be one of the most successful politicians in the country. Your approval ratings in your home state show you are not only known there, but loved. And now you are one of those names mentioned as presidential material. That can be a good ego trip. But you forget that to those eating their breakfast at Mary Ann's Diner in Derry, N.H., or those at the Marshalltown, Iowa, Rotary Club, you are just another politician and they aren't sure what to make of you.

These classic images of presidential primary lore will surely have you running for McGinniss's "The Selling of the President." But remember, before you can consider running you have to sell yourself to activists, fund-raisers and potential employees.

So many of you will have to think about your first political race. Back then, you likely had fewer consultants making up your image machine. You were defined by who you were and where you stood. (Or in Sen. Evan Bayh's case, who never faced a competitive primary, maybe you have more thinking to do.) In the living rooms and town halls of the early states, it is back to this most basic level.

And this is the beauty of our current presidential primary system. Voters in the early states have grown the most affectionate of the candidates who are the most genuine and disdain any fancy branding. If you want proof of this, look at Jimmy Carter or Bill Clinton or the "compassionate conservative" who got beat by 19 points in the 2000 New Hampshire Primary.

So far 18 candidates - nine from each party - have visited Iowa or New Hampshire since the 2004 election. In the next year the candidates who emerge are the candidates who understand how biography matters. Biography doesn't mean winning the title of the anti-Hillary (Bayh, former Virginia Gov. Mark Warner, U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold, former Vice President Al Gore) or a Republican Maverick (U.S. Sen. John McCain, U.S. Sen. Chuck Hagel). Nor does it mean repeating that you are from one party yet got elected in a state dominated by the opposing party (Bayh, Warner, Gov. George Pataki, Gov. Mitt Romney). These media driven labels come with time.

This is not about the manufactured biography present in all modern presidential campaign. Those "I am a son of a mill worker" labels are also for later. Keep in mind that these lines are only effective if they are true.

Right now the focus should be on the bigger narratives of what motivates you, what you find interesting, what is it that you want to learn more about. After about 40 events in the past year, I can count on one hand the amount of times someone in an interview afterward said they had a sense of where the candidate was from and headed. And every time that happened, they were invited back to the state.

So go stare in a mirror and ponder your childhood. Go see a psychologist. Try yoga. Whatever works for you, do it.

Just remember there are 17 other people wooing for the same attention, commitment and news coverage. And that doesn't even include Hillary, yet.

[Author Affiliation]

James Pindcll is the editor of PoliticsNH.com since Aug. 2002. In 2000, he covered Iowa Caucuses for the Des Moines Register and has been the statehouse bureau chief of the Morgantown (W.Va.) Dominion Post. He has also written for the Boston Globe and Indianapolis Star. He provides political analysis weekly for New Hampshire and Boston television stations. In addition, he is quoted widely throughout the country in newspapers and has appeared on the nightly news for all three national broadcast networks and more regularly on all three national cable networks.