In what will be a temporarily reoccurring feature (from now until Election Day), here are the best and worst political stunts of the 2022 election cycle.
If you are like me, you’re starting to feel extreme hostility towards the human who decided that Election Day shall be “the first Tuesday AFTER the first Monday of November.” Thus giving campaigns an entire extra week to fill our mailboxes, bombard us with YouTube pre-roll, interrupt our evenings with bizarre TV ads, and incessantly text us.
So what better way to use this extra time than a look back at some of the best political moments of 2022. Let’s start at the top of the ballot (the lowest-hanging fruit) and dig into the battle of the US Senate PACs: The Patriot Freedom PAC vs. Alaskans for Lisa.
It is now well reported that the Kelly Tshibaka-supporting Patriot Freedom PAC decided to hand out lightsabers as a publicity stunt. But if you haven’t heard about it, let’s just break down this video.
Our Patriot Freedom PAC hero starts out by explaining, “All we have to do is inspire 3,000 people to change their mind to vote for Kelly Tshibaka.”
This man has done his election math and has a concrete, data-driven, organizing goal. But somewhere in the strategic planning process things took a real turn when the Patriot Freedom PAC got to the tactics brainstorm.
Clearly someone suggested branded lightsabers because of Kelly Tshibaka’s last name that sounds like a popular Star Wars character. But instead of just 3,000 lightsabers, one for every voter they needed to convince, they ordered 20,000. So they are estimating a 6.66 lightsaber to vote conversion rate. Not bad, Patriot Freedom PAC.
(Sidenote: While the prop is maybe the most iconic of the Star Wars series, it is not one that Chewbacca actually uses. It’s also humorous to note that the the actual lightsaber-wielding Luke Skywalker is sending fundraising texts and emails for Mary Peltola.)
Note how he says “Our lightsaber swords are finally here and arrived.” That is because they got stuck in customs on their long journey from Thailand. And as the Anchorage Daily News reported, it costs them $95,000 for these lightsabers once they were shipped to AK. That’s $4.75 a lightsaber or $31.65 per vote shift if they actually achieve their goal.
Luckily, Alaskans from all over have driven to Anchorage to pick up lightsabers to distribute, seemingly mostly to children, who can’t vote. But I canNOT wait for the report on this tactic to see how many undecided or Murkowski voters changed their minds after receiving a lightsaber.
Now, let’s contrast that with the Alaskans for Lisa PAC ad of what I *think* is Mount Redoubt. It claims to be a “Moment of Zen” and just reminds Alaskans to vote on or before November 8th.
This is basically the opposite of giving away lightsabers. Here’s my analogy: 20,000 lightsabers is to the moment of zen as Stassi is to Lisa Vanderpump in Season 4 the Bravo reality TV program “Vanderpump Rules”.
Stassi (Patriot Freedom PAC) is trying so hard to be a reality TV star and get as much screen time as possible. So she throws a fit at her former boss, an actual reality TV star, Lisa Vanderpump (Alaskans for Lisa). Stassi performatively storms off from a table and says “You hate me Lisa!” And Lisa Vanderpump very calmly says “You’re not important enough to hate. Sit down.”
And this is how I will remember the United State Senate Race of 2022 thanks to these two Political Action Committees. “You’re not important enough to hate. Sit down.”
