Sound Politics: Re: A nationalized election...

January 23, 2007

Re: A nationalized election...

I've read through Brent Boger's analysis provided at Stefan's post below on the State Republican Party. All the statistical evidence Boger presents points to the fact Republican legislators in Washington state fared worse than just about anywhere else around the country. That should be cause for concern.

Meanwhile, Stefan also linked to an Everett Herald column in which Diane Tebelius says, "No one is to blame in our state for a nationalized election." Certainly the national mood wasn't good at all, but if a "nationalized" election is to blame for all woes, how come as Boger points out, as did I in this post, the two Republican Members of Congress in competitive races in this state were re-elected while legislative candidates got crushed?

That seems to speak to some bigger issues for state Republicans that need to be dealt with other than just an unpopular Congress and President. For example, State Party fundraising was really quite bad by just about every reasonable measure last year.

I've given both Luke Esser and Diane Tebelius a chance, prior to my look at State Party fundraising, to respond to a number of questions related to their candidacy for Chair. Luke Esser responded with some pretty good thoughts. Tebelius has not replied to two requests via email and public post, and in response to my post on state party fundraising spoke to David Postman after he covered my post, but pointedly declined to discuss her apparently poor fundraising (my response to that exchange here for those interested).

I would still welcome a response from Tebelius to the questions I've posed, but in the meantime it seems clear one candidate for State Party Chair has an understanding of what happened to the state GOP last year and seems ready to do something about it. The other doesn't seem to acknowledge a problem exists. I'll leave readers to draw their own conclusions from there.

Posted by Eric Earling at January 23, 2007 07:41 AM | Email This

Comments

1. Utterly astonishing. Tebelius claiming the nationalized election is to blame -- when the people who got slaughtered were STATE candidates. The 3 Republican FEDERAL representatives all won -- and handily. Two were targetted by national democrats and the third was Chairman of the Ethics Cmte. How can those three in the national bullseye not just survive, but win going away -- and yet the state candidates were smothered by a national wave?!?!?! Its time for honesty and leadership from Republicans -- starting with the Party Chair -- not someone who says its everyone else's fault and tries to cling on to their position rather than do what's best for the party, which would be for Tebelius to have some guts and honor and step down.

Posted by: Whiskey Dick on January 23, 2007 07:36 AM

2. This is why I don't support the state GOP. I won't give any money to a bunch of people who won't work for it.

Clearly, Tebelius and co. ran a lousy campaign. I can't tell you what any of the Reps. running for state leg stood for, what they planned to do, any of it. They were far too concerned with running away from President Bush than with defining themselves as candidates.

Posted by: Steve (was steve_dog) on January 23, 2007 07:55 AM

3. What? The election challange and being constantly disrespectful of Governor Gregoire weren't a successful campaign strategy? Who would have thought? Next you are going to tell me that ignoring science and lying won't work either. At that point, what will Republican's have to run on?

Posted by: JDB on January 23, 2007 09:32 AM

4.
The simple fact is that the Republicans in this state are now in the same boat as the Republicans in Massachusetts. This is a blue state that is getting bluer by the day. The Republicans will not win back the State House or Senate in decades, most likely. They should concentrate their efforts on finding centrist candidates for Governor... it has been the case that many solidly blue states (MA, NY, etc) will elect moderate Republicans as Governors as an act of rebellion against the Democratic machine running the state if nothing else.

Posted by: Truth_Teller on January 23, 2007 09:59 AM

5. I kind of reject "Truth Tellers" thoughts here, but would like to hear others thoughts.

I've only been in this state for about 13 years now, but I've seen Dino Rossi almost win, saw some fairly close races in election cycles in the 90's where the republicans appeared to be capturing new grounds, and in general saw some real strength in the party until right around the turn of the century.

I don't see the demographic trend that would turn this state "bluer." If anything the number of union members seems to be receding, the average income seems to be going up, and more people are living outside the peoples republic of Seattle.

Am I missing a trendline here?

Posted by: johnny on January 23, 2007 11:08 AM

6. As the author of this report, I do not think Washington is nearly as Democratic as Massachuesetts. Kerry won here by 7% and Mass. by something north of 20% and Kerry's Mass. showing was not just because it was his home state. His margin was actually down from Gore's win in 2000 while Kerry was a bit up here from 2000.

Republicans generally have not done well outside of the South since 1994 and especially in the last two cycles. That is part of the problem in Washington, but I don't think most of it.

The reason why I reached this conclusion is that Kerry won a number of states by margins similar to Washington's where Republicans control at least one house of the legislature: Michigan, Pennsylvania,New York,Wisconsin, and Delaware. And a number of states where Republicans have a much higher percentage of seats than they do here: Oregon, Illinois, Maine, and New Jersey.

Up until this year, Republicans were at least close here as well. We aren't anymore. Something happened here that did not happen in other states where Republican legislative losses were modest. Since Governor Gregoire is not particularly popular nor are the Democrats who controlled the legislature, there was no reason to punish Republicans. Though punished we were.

I agree with Eric Earling that money and lack of support from the WSRP had a lot to do with it.

I will also say after having been involved with the Washington GOP for about 7 years that there are other reasons as well. The Party seems to have tremendous in-fighting and an inability to pull together. It is largely not based on ideology but personalities and personal ambition and self-interest. Some of our leaders I think are pretty selfish and really don't have a stong commitment to principle.

This of course is true everywhere, but it seems to be worse here.

I agree that it will be at least a few cycles before Republicans regain control of the legislature. Though it can happen fast: 27 seat GOP gain in 1994.

But I think the Washington GOP should have a different short-term focus.

I grew up in Washington but first became involved in politics in California and dabbled in it for about 20 years there. For all but the first six years of my involvement (1976-1982), Republicans controlled the Governor's office. That helped the GOP keep a focus and remain relevant.

I think what Washington Republicans need is a governor to provide us a focus. We nearly had one in 2004 and think we will have one in two years.

My vote for State Chairman will be determined by the person who is most likely to get us back in the Governor's Office and able to work with our presumptive nominee, Dino Rossi. I think that person is Luke Esser.

Posted by: Brent Boger on January 23, 2007 12:49 PM