I do a lot of referendums. They can't talk back. They don't have wives. They don't have friends who tell you how to run the campaign. They are supported by special interests, so there's a lot of money in them.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
If you want a referendum, vote for the others. Or, in certain cases, you can stay at home, you don't vote and you could find yourself with a referendum by default because you didn't exercise your vote.
I have run campaigns. That doesn't make you the establishment.
My family has been around campaigns for a long time. It's something you really have to be sure that you alone want to do. Because if not, if you don't want to do it, that will just blow through the surface at some point, and people can tell. And when people can tell, it's all over.
A lot of politicians say they want to get people out to vote; sometimes you can't totally believe they really want that.
What business do we have telling people who to vote for? They probably know more about it than we do.
People took part in the referendum because they were tired of the war. They are afraid of talking about it out loud, but they have shown exactly where they stand: Yes, we want peace, and we want to be a part of Russia.
Campaigns fail if they waste resources courting voters who are unpersuadable or already persuaded. Their most urgent task is to find and persuade the few voters who are genuinely undecided and the larger number who are favorably disposed but need a push to actually vote.
I hate to lose the constituency that I've worked with, but I've got 170,000 people to meet in my new district.
There were a number of referendums in '98 that most of the things I voted for passed. That's very satisfying when you feel that most of the country is in step with your views.
I don't often get involved with campaigns at all.