McAuliffe's Earned Media, Support

I came across this very cute blog post by a mother who got some pictures taken of her son with Terry McAuliffe and will.i.am.

It got me thinking.

McAuliffe has run the best campaign in recent Virginia history. Beyond the fact that he's outraised his opponents in-state and out. This campaign has more field offices, more staff, better messaging, and much better events than the opposition of either party.

Moreover, Terry has both mastered the nuance of Virginia politics like the pro that he is, and has managed to master not only the media coverage, but the deep messaging as well. Every campaign has adopted Terry's "Jobs, jobs, jobs" theme, and suddenly the new guy on the block looks like he was the first one to arrive at the party.

One could argue that the sum total of all of this outstanding success can be seen in the polls, which at worst have him ahead and at best have him breaking away by double digits, but that's not all.

The total of the McAuliffe campaign's success can be seen in a mother writing a blog post about her son meeting a candidate and his famous protege. The total of the McAuliffe campaign's success can be seen in the growing consensus. It ranges from national and local media down to just plain regular folks.

It's the consensus that the Virginia Democratic primary has a leader named Terry McAuliffe, and chances are, he'll be Virginia's next Governor.

You can buy staff. You can buy great communications. But an emerging sense of leadership excellence can't be bought, that's something you have to earn.