Let's face it: Being a second-tier presidential candidate blows. It's
hard to raise money. You have to travel on the cheap, unlike some of
the other presidential hopefuls who navigate the primary states on
charter planes and luxury buses. It's not even guaranteed that you'll
get much face time during a presidential debate. Some candidates think
the way to momentum is to get the media's attention, but even that's
not easy, in spite of the fact reporters happen to love them a gabby
presidential hopeful.
Case
in point: Former Virginia governor Jim Gilmore, who has tried to rev up
his campaign by offering up tough-talking one-liners about how he's the
only real conservative in the race. The former Republican National
Committee chairman generated a little buzz a few weeks ago by deriding
the top three GOP frontrunners as "Rudy McRomney" because he claims
they don't share the "core conservative principles" of his party.
During the first debate, Gilmore used his brief moment in the
spotlight--he's averaged about five minutes of talking time at the
debates, about half what the frontrunners get--to mention the address
of his campaign Web
site, in hopes of generating some buzz. "Gilmore for President dot
com," the governor said during the South Carolina debate three weeks
ago.
Is it working? Probably not, considering his aides sent out
not one, but two middle of the night e-mails to reporters here in New
Hampshire offering up the former governor for interviews. The first
message, sent through an e-mail CNN set up for the campaigns to send
out debate responses to the credentialed reporters here, hit the
Gaggle's inbox at 12:15 a.m.--three hours after the debate ended. The
e-mail's subject line: "Gilmore interview?" It included contact info
for the former governor's press guy. Clearly that message didn't
generate an electrifying response because the campaign sent out another
message at 5:46 a.m. "Jim Gilmore interview?" the subject line read. It
included two e-mails and a cell phone for Gilmore's main press guy, as
well as a second backup media contact. "Thank you for your
consideration," the aide wrote. At least they were nice about it.
