I’ve liked Kendrick Meek and his campaign ever since I met him in January. Super GF Lisa was a big fan and tried to get us jobs on the campaign. We failed at this, but remain committed supporters of the Congressman, securing hundreds of petition signatures in Volusia County. A gregarious but serious man with witty but bearable children and an impossibly attractive and sharp wife, not liking Kendrick Meek is a symptom of some personality disorder. While he is undeniably the Kendrick Meek of the manicured life and the high-flying friends, he’s also surprisingly Progressive and committed to the plight of Americans on the edge. And yet, even though he is running a well-organized, well-funded, and well-connected campaign, the Party seems to find ways of marginalizing the man, like giving him the tail-end time slot after the one-sentence speeches by the House candidates, while the delegates were eating lunch. He faced a half-empty room and gave a rousing speech to people who were already backing him, while freshmen like Alan Grayson got choice slots to fuel his re-election campaign to the US House.

On Sunday Morning at the State Conference, after the AG’s debate, The Kendrick Meek campaign held a combined press/new media event with three professional reporters and a handful of bloggers. The campaign’s new chair and the newish new media director were present and began the briefing before the arrival of the candidate. They were delighted about a poll that showed the Crist-Meek gap to be not 18 points, as last month’s poll showed, but a mere 14. Hey, advocacy is their job. They had it partially broken down and showed where Crist’s numbers were soft, which we knew. A great deal of emphasis was placed on an 800 LV phone poll with an MoE of 4.

But it’s hard to imagine a poll can be meaningful 13 months out when one’s opponent is the sitting governor of a state with huge budget liabilities and angry citizens. Crist’s decision to leave the Governor’s mansion and run for the seat mid-term in the middle of a budget crisis has always seemed callous to me. When some of my more Republican-friendly acquaintances told me he was going to do it, I suggested that there were cheaper methods of political suicide. Chalk another one up for the genius.

The real reporters questioned the validity of the poll, and I had technical questions. The real reporters asked inside baseball questions about the emergence of yet more penniless candidates in a crowded field that includes safe-seat fixture Corrine Brown from bizarrely gerrymandered District 3 . By this time, Kendrick had come in and addressed the reporter’s questions in a even, focused tone I found effective. He then went on to criticize a St. Pete Times reporter for a story that reported the empty room the day before without explaining why the room was empty. The effect was deceptive, but Meek was not making his case. There’s no way to complain about coverage and sound above the fray. Reporters go for the superficial. It’s their way of being “fair.” Analysis is spin. Besides, they might all be replaced with fashion reporters next Tuesday, so who the hell cares?

I saw near-universal Meek support among the delegates. Meek stickers were at least as omnipresent as Obama stickers in the parking lot. There is no doubt he will win the nomination, and in that sense the St. Pete piece was deceptive, because it strongly implied the nomination was up for grabs.

Reporters asked repeatedly about third-quarter fundraising numbers, which were still not public. The Chair delayed releasing the numbers until they finished spinning the poll. Then he announced that the campaign raised just under $800,000 in the first quarter, not enough to catch up with Crist. He promised three major fundraisers in the fourth quarter, two with former President Bill Clinton. If he can’t crack a million and a half then, something will be wrong.

One of the odd moments was when a reporter seemed on the verge of asking whether a black man could be elected Senator in Florida. He didn’t want to ask that question and it sort of visibly morphed into whether a man from Miami was electable statewide.

This was my first media event, so I’ll suspend judgement. The overwhelming impressions were the dearth of political savvy among the bloggers, the cynicism of the press, the tightly controlled candidate, and the transparent spin of the campaign staff. Other than two numbers and two scheduled events, I was no more enlightened than when I got there. Since everyone in the room had a Blackberry, it might have been avoided altogether.

Honestly, I’m worried Crist might knock Kendrick off, just by name-recognition alone. But it’s a hell of a long time between here and there. By choosing to get on the ballot by petition, he’s putting his money into voter contact where the response rates are higher. Crist will thus be able to out-TV him in the General. Countering that in the field will take the kind of specialized social-media tools we saw in the Obama campaign and that are as yet unseen in Meek’s campaign. The whole strategy is a risky bet. Large states are always won on television. Clinton won most large states in the primaries. The trend is aggravated by the likely low turnout in a mid-term race. If the petition strategy has a hidden advantage, this is it. Turnout operations are easier when you have all those voter contacts.

Anyway, good luck to Kendrick and his team. Hint: always feed the reporters. Worked for George W.

Tags: charlie crist, Florida, kendrick meek, marco rubio, senate