Eric Cantor's Hard Lesson
The Hill Reports:
I cannot emphasize how important field operations are to understanding this story. While Cantor probably did Brat a favor by making him a household name with the "liberal professor" ads, someone had to be out there dispelling that rumor.
In Virginia, parties have the option of nominating candidates by primary or convention. As such, Virginia voters may not be fully indoctrinated into a culture of understanding that June is primary season. This means that GOTV efforts become that much more important. Perhaps the pollsters were right, and a majority of the intended primary voters did mean to vote for Eric Cantor (despite all of the grumblings that we now hear about his neglecting the district). These intended Cantor voters may not have known the primary date, though, because the Cantor campaign did not do a good enough job reminding them when to vote.
Sometimes, we get so caught up in the horse race and the glitzy ads that we forget the basics: Campaigns have to get their voters to the polls. At this point, we don't know what Cantor's future political plans are. No doubt, though, that if he plans on running for office again, he'll likely pay more attention to GOTV.
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