Democrats learned the lesson about the importance of early money a long time ago, and really proved it with applying the lesson to nominating and electing women candidates.
The term they use for it is EMILY: Early Money Is Like Yeast, and the organization that raises and funnels $$$ to women Dem candidates is called EMILY’s List.
But money wasn’t Bevins’ only problem: he’s stumbled badly in responding to three controversies that hit his campaign: his signature on those bailout documents, the claim on his website that he’d gone to MIT and the cockfighting thing.
The actual issues with those three things were secondary; the big problem was how he and his campaign handled all three in a completely amateurish manner.
He should have been prepped ton respond to the bailout stuff (first rule of running a political campaign is to oppo yourself and prep responses to possible lines of attack) and should never have shot himself in the foot with the other two.
Truth is that Bevins was a lousy candidate, not ready to run for a Senate seat and would have been eaten alive by Grimes and the Dems in the general election. McConnell may still lose, but he’ll at least make Grimes and the Dems work their butts off for the win, sucking a LOT of Dem money out of other races in the process.
Just to put this in perspective, despite his first time campaigning stumbles, Bevin still pulled about 40% of the vote. Even though I’m of the opinion that the early defining of the opposition prize went to McConnell, the bailout attack was the worst. It lingered for months. I don’t think most folks really cared that Bevin gave a speech at a cock fighting rally. I didn’t. To me, it was no different than giving a speech at any gathering. There’s a group...let’s go speak to them. The MIT thing barely surfaced and then there was a response. (Meaning that the Bevin team was learning.)
So, my lessons learned remain the same. Early money, quick response, research on self and opponent.
I still think Bevin has spent a lot of good money and should now run for a congressional democrat seat. All that name recognition should be put to good use, and roughly 40% of the vote isn’t really that bad statewide.