Winning is Everything

by Zach Knowling

category: Campaign Jobs

Published October 25, 2009 @ 12:45PM PT

Nothing matters more in campaigning than winning.

I could end this blog post there I guess but I wouldn’t meet my word quota mandated by my blog-slave drivers (I kid, boss. Please don’t hit me- again). So I will elaborate.

A lot of people go into politics because they want to make a difference. That is great. However, the people who succeed in politics are the ones who want to win.

Think about it this way. If you are hiring a person for a campaign do you want to hire the super excited person who gushes with liberal love, guilt and aspires to live in a commune…

OR

…do you want to hire the person who essentially believes in the Democratic Party and doesn’t squabble on the issues but instead wants to get in the trenches and cut down some war-mongering-dinosaur-denying-Earth-created-1,000-years-ago-believing-richie-yuppie-middle-class-hating-white-bread-WASPy-crustless-cucumber-sandwich-eating-chamber-of-commerce-serving-mouth-breathing-Republican?

I would take option number two any day.

You see that both basically believe in the same thing but number two has the type of personality and attitude that channels their beliefs into something useful: an utter disgust for the opponent that leads to their inability to tolerate anything less than victory.

Do not romanticize politics or campaigns. At the end of the day the only thing that anyone cares about is winning.

If that upsets you or you think it is too simplistic then think of it this way: none of the hippie gushy liberal ideals that we all care about will get anywhere unless there are true campaigners – like you are striving to become – that can get out there and get the people elected to make that shit happen.

Anyway, that’s my pep-talk for the day.