Rick Blangiardi is starting his City Hall career with an astounding success: He won with 58% of the vote, with a whopping 224,218 voters saying “yes” to his candidacy.

Not only is it a huge margin of victory, it comes out of a record-setting number of Honolulu votes cast, 384,951.

On a political level, Blangiardi was the perfect candidate for the race.

First, he had never held elected office. In most cases this election year, not being tagged an incumbent was a plus. Already in the mayor’s race, incumbents and experienced politicians were rejected in the primary with the general election race going to Blangiardi and another newcomer, businessman Keith Amemiya.

Amemiya’s campaign turned out to be an often-repeated tale of how you need more than your friends to win campaigns. You must have a consistent theme and message. Amemiya fielded his race with all-star donations and powerful union endorsements, but ended up spending much valuable time complaining about political attacks while his campaign was the first to go negative with attacks on Blangiardi’s voting record as a private citizen.

Former governor and veteran campaigner Neil Abercrombie’s best piece of political advice I ever heard was, “Voters don’t vote because of your reasons, they vote because of their reasons.”

In comparison, Blangiardi’s campaign theme was “It’s about you” and that resonated with 58% of the voters.

The retired broadcast executive also benefited from putting himself on television for several years of nightly commentaries. Much like former Congressman Cec Heftel when he ran KGMB, Blangiardi was able to point out community issues, comment on them and sometimes advise solutions. Of course, this was done before declaring for office, but nightly appearances on television does wonders for your public recognition.

Blangiardi’s third successful strategy was staying with the “I’m an independent, not a Republican, not a Democrat” theme. Amemiya drove straight for the Democratic label, perhaps thinking that making himself partisan in a nonpartisan election was a good idea, or perhaps it just allowed him to harp without proof that Blangiardi was a closet Republican.

When the election was changed from partisan to nonpartisan, much of the argument was that the mayor’s job in Honolulu is that of a manager, not as an R or D.

The debate was that there was no Republican or Democratic way to cut the grass in the parks. That premise still holds and clearly voters bought the reasoning.

Now Blangiardi may wish for a more elaborate set of instructions as he steps into office in January. The city’s finances are precarious and debts are likely to rise. The City Council is coming in with new leadership, and not as Blangiardi supporters. Two major public unions, HGEA and UPW, endorsed Blangiardi’s opponent, although the police union backed the former TV executive.

Blangiardi is likely to find that his overwhelming victory was last week’s TV show, and he’ll need to do much more to keep voters from changing the channel.

Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays. Reach him at 808onpolitics@gmail.com.