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January 19, 2003
INSIDE POLITICS:
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Mitzna seen as a lost cause
By Gil Hoffman
Senior analyst: Mitzna was a lost cause
"Not even the best strategist in the world could have won this election for Mitzna," a veteran political strategist, who has run successful campaigns here and worldwide, told Inside Politics on Thursday.
"Labor's expectations were too high. It takes more than a few weeks to build a message and an image for a new candidate. When early elections were announced, Mitzna should have decided not to run." Veteran strategists said the Labor campaign made the following mistakes:
- No target messages to attract votes from Likud, Shinui, Meretz, immigrants, and Arabs. "Labor's slogan, 'We believe in you Mitzna' doesn't mean anything," one strategist said. "Its slogan isn't motherhood and apple pie." It should have said Mitzna will build a fence or Mitzna will leave Gaza.
- The party depended too much on television commercials when ratings are low. It needed maximum field work and minimum TV, but it did the opposite.
- It politicized the Likud corruption scandal instead of acting statesmanlike. It should have said there are more important issues in this election, and that Labor hopes everyone gets cleared of all charges.
Instead, the Likud succeeded in connecting Labor to the charges and reversing their effect.
- Ruling out unity was a big strategic mistake. Ariel Sharon is a respected prime minister, and the public did not understand why he had to be ruled out. Voters don't like being threatened.
Will Norwegian law help Anglos?
When Yisrael B'Aliya leader Natan Sharansky met with Jerusalem Post reporters and editors this week, he was asked whether his party would consider adopting the Norwegian law, whereby ministers resign from the Knesset to make room for the next names on the party list. With polls showing Yisrael B'Aliya receiving no more than four MKs, adopting the law could make the difference for prospective Anglo MK Eli Kazhdan, number five on the list.
Sharansky said he is a strong supporter of the Norwegian law, but warned voters not to trust the polls, which he said have been historically incorrect in predicting the power of immigrant parties.
"We have no doubt that from the Russians alone we will get five seats, and the Anglos can give us another," Sharansky said. "We may end up having to implement the law to help get in Prof. Valentin Feinberg, who is seventh on the list."
Police prevent Tu Bishvat from starting on high The Green Leaf Party had hoped to celebrate Tu Bishvat by sponsoring planting ceremonies in Jerusalem, the North, and at the Ramat Hovav toxic waste dump in the Negev for the party's favorite weed, marijuana. The police turned down the party's request, even though the party was planning on planting industrial hemp, used to make clothes, which has no psychoactive ingredient.
Ramat Hovav was chosen, because cannabis has been found in studies to have the ability to suck up heavy metals and other pollutants from the ground, and is therefore ideal for planting in polluted areas.
"We were saddened by the fact that even though Agriculture Ministry experiments deemed it to have no narcotic value, we could not celebrate on Tu Bishvat the tremendous benefit the cannabis plant can bring to the environment and society," Green Leaf secretary-general Dan Goldenblatt said. "We will try to ensure that next Tu Bishvat, cannabis will be released from years of imprisonment and put to use as an environmental and economic natural resource."
Space, but not cyberspace
It took Israel 55 years to get a man into space before Ilan Ramon accomplished the feat on Thursday. The largest parties seem to be going at a similar pace in entering cyberspace, at least in the native language of the Internet. Neither Likud nor Labor has fulfilled promises to produce an English Web site.
The National Religious Party added an English link to its site, www.mafdal.org.il. Shas introduced a Hebrew site this week and has plans to produce an English site after the election.
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