Three campaign operatives voice insights on the Granite State’s special role

By Scott Brooks
The New Hampshire Union Leader
Tuesday, March 31, 2009

MANCHESTER -- There isn’t much a presidential candidate wouldn’t do for a shot at winning the New Hampshire Primary. 

In 1996, Sen. Bob Dole practically risked his life for it.  The Kansas Republican refused to let a major storm stop him from flying into the Granite State for a big rally, and according to NBC reporter Kelly O’Donnell, then a member of Dole’s press corps, the plane ran into turbulence.  Everyone aboard, she said, was terrified.

“One of the cameramen behind me said, “We’re all going to die for four electoral votes!” O’Donnell recalled. 

O’Donnell, of course, lived to tell the tale, one of many stories she and two other famous survivors of New Hampshire Primary campaigns shared last night with an audience of 400 at the Radisson Hotel.  Joining her were two political operatives with records of success in New Hampshire: Mike Murphy, who was a top aide for Sen. John McCain during his winning campaign here in 2000; and Paul Begala, whose candidate in 1992, Bill Clinton, came in second but famously dubbed himself the “Comeback Kid.”  The line was Begala’s.  It was spin, but perfectly executed: The candidate “loses, but he pretends he wins, and everybody buys it,” Begala said. 

The New Hampshire Political Library brought O’Donnell, Begala and Murphy to town to honor them with its annual New Hampshire Primary awards, given to people who, according to the library’s Web site, “have demonstrated strong support for the first-in-the-nation New Hampshire Presidential Primary.”  Past recipients include former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, former Sen. Gary Hart, ABC news anchor George Stephanopoulos and Hearst reporter Helen Thomas. 

The dinner was a fundraiser for the library, a non-profit, non-partisan organization that promotes the primary.  The New Hampshire Union Leader was among the event’s many sponsors. 

Throughout the night, speakers repeatedly expressed their affection for New Hampshire-style grassroots politics and their appreciation for the state’s prominent role in the nominating process.  Murphy said the state is a “special place,” one of few where a large campaign chest may not guarantee a victory.  O’Donnell said it’s a place where reporters sit “elbow to elbow, knee to knee” with a candidate on a bus. 

Even 17 years later, Begala could still rattle off the name of a construction worker and young father, Ron Machos Jr., whose story of losing his job made an impression on the Clinton campaign.

“That guy and his story was the same story as (in) Akron and Bakersville,” Begala said.  But there, he said, “You don’t get a chance to hear it.”

Ambitious politicians know they’ll have to go through New Hampshire to get to the White house, Murphy said.  “I work in Hollywood,” he said, “where every celebrity has a secret room with porn or drugs in it.”  Similarly, he said, “Every politician has a secret room with a precinct map of New Hampshire.”

Begala said Clinton, a political natural, “had that secret room in preschool.”

“I think he had both rooms, actually,” Murphy said, to one of the night’s biggest laughs. 

Both strategists acknowledged the rigors of the campaign, which can be wearing for a candidate and everyone around him or her.  By the end of the primary, Murphy said, “I don’t know whether they want to marry the state or sell it to Canada.”

But if they win, he said, “they love it forever.”