December 25, 2003
The Politics Of Campaigns, And Of Newspapers
Brief post for some political items. Turning to yesterday's edition of "City Matters" there are a couple of things from the Mayoral campaign:
Tom Potter, running to replace Katz after she retires at the end of 2004, is telling audiences to reject conventional political wisdom faulting his decision to limit donations to $25 a person. Here's his winning math formula: Potter aims to collect from 8,000 donors. Multiply that number by $25, and Potter says the $200,000 will be enough to win the May 18 election. Potter stresses those self-imposed money limits as a key distinction between him and Francesconi, who has been raising nearly $1,000 a day for his mayoral campaign.
Henry Stern points out, "Since 1972, there have been 11 city elections in which the candidate with the most money didn't win."
As someone who would tend to lean far more towards Tom Potter than towards Jim Francesconi, I suppose I'm counting on the sheer energy of Potter's small army of supporters to make it a decently competitive race.
Stern also mentions the Phil Busse campaign kickoff event at Holocene on January 9, and indicates that Busse's campaign platform, which I previously reported will be opened to community reivew, is up to around 80 pages.
Meanwhile, switching gears to the politics of the local media game, this week's edition of "Murmurs" in Willamette Week has this:
What started as serious but fixable caffeine shortage-- the closing of the Tully's coffeeshop in the basement of City Hall in November--has led to what could be a major turf battle between The Oregonian and the Portland Tribune. The Trib asked for office space in the building a couple of months ago. The O already has such space but, upon finding out that the upstart publication might have its eye on the former coffee shop, expressed interest in upgrading from its cubicle-sized quarters.
Hey, as long as we're positioning ourselves, I can be had cheap: Just give me an old ratty desk in the corner and access to someone's WiFi network.