Thom Tillis has a new ad up. And he’s still talking about education. As long he’s running ads about public schools, Kay Hagan’s campaign is controlling the message.
Tillis needs to get off of education all together. Not many people believe Republicans spent more on public schools and most know that they stiffed teachers out of a pay raise in 2013. Anybody with kids or grandkids in public schools knows that classrooms have fewer resources.
The Republicans, though, want to keep arguing the point. Watch twitter. In the #NCPOL and #NCGA feeds, every third tweet is some Republican spouting talking points about spending more on schools or not having cut education. The Locke Foundation has its staff writing articles refuting the cuts. That’s a lot of wasted time and energy.
The longer they talk about education, the longer they are playing on Hagan’s turf. Per pupil spending dropped from 44th in the nation to 48th in the nation. Teacher pay fell so much that school districts from other states came recruiting our teachers. If Tillis keeps saying he put more money into public schools, he’s going to kill his own credibility, not change any minds.
And in the credibility department, his line about working across party lines rings hollow. We had the most divisive session of the legislature in recent history last year. Most people get that Moral Monday protests were about being left out of the process. And we haven’t even seen the “divide and conquer” ad yet. In contrast, Hagan really was named most moderate senator.
The Tillis campaign is still fighting on enemy turf. They’re saying how much they spent but not what they’ve done. In essence, they are arguing semantics instead of substance. That’s the sign of a campaign in deep trouble.
Thomas Mills is the founder and publisher of PoliticsNC.com. Before beginning PoliticsNC, Thomas spent twenty years as a political and public affairs consultant. Learn more >
Let him talk. Let him continue to spend money and plow the same ground, over and over again. People will get sick of his mouth eventually.
I agree with Tim. The neo-cons all subscribe to the theory that a lie told 3 times becomes the truth. It’s worked for them many times.
Um, Thomas, it’s the only thing he CAN talk about. He knows that if enough people repeat the lie, enough moderate ignorant moderates may vote for him. The best thing Senator Hagan can do is call him out for the liar he is because he has nothing else to appeal to moderate, right of center voters with.
I just do not understand how Tillis’ ads –new and old– just continue to try to foist his “I Helped Education in a Huge Way!” inanity on voters.
Look, fading teacher salaries has been a issue since at least the 2009-10 budget. He and his party did nothing about it for 4 years until it became such a huge public issue (with good teachers leaving and out-of-state recruiters arriving) that they had to. And their pay-raise “fix” did nothing for our most veteran teachers, while the state’s per-student support fell, text book funding didn’t increase significantly, and millions of dollars went to new charter schools and public school vouchers. The Locke Foundation can spew its drivel all it wants, but teachers, students, their parents, and most thinking voters (those paying attention, at least) know better.
He hasn’t laid out any bold, positive or thoughtful notions on how to better NC. Like his education ads, he is still inexplicably choosing to play defense on most issues.
Of course, he’s been forced to do that by his own actions. To wit, all his and his party’s actions and positions since 2010 have been “no” and “less” messages—LESS in new state investments, NO to tenure, NO to Medicaid expansion, LESS to the UNC system, LESS environmental protection/stewardship, NO to agreeing with the SCOTUS (and a growing number of states) on gay marriage, NO to supporting the minimum wage, NO to increasing voter turn-out (especially among the young), NO to allowing the public’s voice at the LOB, and LESS in unemployment benefits.
His poll numbers are slipping, yet he and his handlers still are playing defense on Hagan’s field. Perhaps they see it as what they must do, given that he is not charismatic or energizing, nor does it appear that he has any innovative ideas between his ears.
I am still waiting for the final weeks leading up to election day, when, if he is trailing in most polls by more than their margins of error, I suspect his ads will likely turn truly negative and ugly, if not unethical.