Why the Republicans keep coming up short for governor
The state GOP legitimately has the governor blues, but there's no reason to despair about ever winning a chance to lead the state again.
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2004: Dino Rossi vs. Chris Gregoire. At a time of hyper partisanship nationally, state Sen. Dino Rossi became a political star in Olympia for reaching across the aisle to produce a no-new taxes budget with key Democrats. Together with an inspiring life story — the son of a school teacher who worked his way through college sweeping the floors at the Space Needle — he was the face of the New Republican party. It resulted in the closest race for governor in American history, which Gregoire was awarded on a third count, after losing the initial count, and a recount, to Rossi.
One interesting side note: The 2004 campaign was twice as expensive as any previous run for governor, and the trend has accelerated. In 2000, about $6.5 million was spent on the governor’s race by the candidates, political parties and third parties. In 2004 it passed $15 million. In 2012, more than $45 million.
2008: A rematch. Gregoire’s 133 vote victory was pricey: She spiked state spending by a third in just four years. Rossi argued that her spending spree had put us on an unsustainable path, making a balanced budget impossible regardless of what happened to the economy. Gregoire shot back that Rossi’s claims of a $2.5 billion shortfall were gross exaggerations.
Not exactly. Five months after the election the shortfall was closer to $5 billion. But timing was once again on Gregoire's side: The Obama campaign generated huge crowds and enthusiasm, as he swept to a 16 point victory here over John McCain. Rossi ran 10 points ahead of his party’s presidential candidate, but still fell six points short of taking out the incumbent governor.
2012: Republican Heartbreak. Attorney General Rob McKenna, the best prepared, best organized, best funded Republican in a generation, runs against the guy who ran a distant third for governor 16 years before. Six months before the election, well-placed Democrats were quietly predicting a McKenna victory. Ninety days before the end, some of these same Democrats started hedging. Thirty days out, they started predicting a Jay Inslee victory.
It wasn't because McKenna was running a bad campaign. To the contrary, it was remarkably efficient and disciplined, with the party's top political mind, Randy Pepple, at the helm. But Inslee's early ads were better, particularly the “Bulldozer” biography spot, and the national party's ads for McKenna were head scratchers. I'm still trying to figure out who they were targeting with the five old men kvetching about Inslee at the diner. Was the old codger vote not already in the Republican column?
On Election Day, McKenna's internal polls showed him up, as they had for the previous week and a half. But instead he comes up 3 percentage points short. What happened?
Simply this: More Democrats were excited about voting for Obama than Republicans were about voting for Romney — and it hurt every other Republican down the ballot. A superb Crosscut piece by Chris Vance spelled it out, county by county. A slight voter drop-off in Democrat-heavy Seattle vs. a 5 to 9 point drop-off in Republican leaning counties in central, eastern and western Washington. That's pretty much the way it played out in Ohio and all the other swing states. McKenna’s polls were probably accurate. But if your people don't turn out, it doesn't matter. Jay Inslee told me he didn’t know whether he would win or not on Election Day, though Democratic State Chairman Dwight Pelz believed, based on sophisticated modeling, that Inslee was going to take it.
The outlook for many Republicans is bleak but not dire (they actually gained seats in the state Legislature) and nowhere near as depressing as 1992, the year the Clinton-Lowry-Murray landslide delivered eight of nine congressional seats to Democrats, along with a handsome legislative majority in both state Houses. Just one year later, liberal overreach provoked voters to put a brake on state spending (I-601) and pass America's first "Three Strikes, You're Out" law. A year after that a Republican tidal wave washed away the Democratic majorities in Olympia and reversed the 8-1 Demo majority in Congress to 7-2 Republican (the current configuration is 6-4 Democrat).
So yes, even as Washington’s hue remains blue, Republicans can regroup and regain lost ground. But it sure would help if Jim McDermott wanted to be Governor again…..
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Comments:
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 7:28 a.m. Inappropriate
To this conservative Demo. the reason is simply the distaste that people feel for Republican values. People want to have the right to choose,the right to come before corporate America, the right to control what is in their food, the right not to have a Palin, or Ryan close to power. Mitt Rmoney seems like a monster with a smile. People see that. Divorce yourselves from the Religious Right get over abortion restrictions(if you don't like them than don't get one) acknowledge and lead on climate change, have the guts to tell the irrational and uneducated extremists to take a walk. Than maybe you can find someone who might win. Otherwise you are what represents the mistaken past and what is and has been wrong with this country. It is that simple. I don't love Obama but he seems smart and rational. He does not ever scare me. Your guys look and act like land sharks. Obama will not ruin this country but your leaders Boener,McConnell and Cantor will try to so they can have a shot in four years. That is disgraceful,and it is why you will lose again. People see it and don't like it.
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 8:14 a.m. Inappropriate
Which Fred MacMurray was Ken Eikenberry like? The "Double Indemnity" Fred MacMurray or the "My Three Sons" Fred MacMurray?
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 9:22 a.m. Inappropriate
John, I believe the "attractive, smart and popular KING-5 reporter Mona Lee Locke" was a KOMO-4 reporter.
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 10:38 a.m. Inappropriate
No Bob, John is right. Mona was at KING.
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 10:44 a.m. Inappropriate
An overarching reason McKenna was not elected: He offered no real difference to Inslee. McKenna's main stake in the ground, and which his TV ads (and last-minute direct mail) pounded in clearly, he's a PRO-ABORT, which the group "Mainstream Republicans" heralded as the only way to get elected. McKenna was a dismal failure in the race. Rossi, an ardent pro-lifer, had far better results. Beyond babies, McKenna was simply another politician -- voters of the state could get all that and more with Inslee who had no need to persuade us about who he REALLY is.
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 11:19 a.m. Inappropriate
There's your problem in a nutshell, Carlson. You can't win with fetus fascists like JohnUSA, and you can't win without them.
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 11:05 a.m. Inappropriate
McKenna stands against Obamacare, legalizing pot, and gay marriage made him a non-starter with many young, fiscally conservative people. Kids today, by which I mean pretty much anyone under 30, just dont agree with 1950's republicans on these issues, and young people continue to be a bigger and bigger voting bloc, and, as they age, they are still pro-choice, socially liberal, even if they are fiscally conservative.
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 12:04 p.m. Inappropriate
The Washington Republicans need to be the party of personal freedom and personal responsibility. You can't be that when your candidates scold the voters that God doesn't like the voters' politics. Even a candidate like McKenna, who was not a moral warrior, can be easily cast in that light because of his party affiliation. Washington will never be a bible-thumper's paradise. To the extent that it is anti-liberal, it is libertarian. The results of the initiatives and referendums in November prove that. Leave the moralizing in the pulpit. Get to work defending people's rights, not curtailing them. That would set a reformed Republican party apart from both the current one, and the Democrats.
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 3:55 p.m. Inappropriate
neither party can see the forest through the trees, we pick the lessor of two evils and hope for common sense.
then add bleeding hearts, political correctness and backdoor deals and we get higher taxes, less jobs and a polluted environment.
millions of dollars were spent on the campaigns to convince us they are the one to lead our state to prosperity. don't hold your breath.
Posted Tue, Dec 4, 11:19 p.m. Inappropriate
At least all the millions/billions of dollars spent for all the various national political campaigns employed a great number of actual American people. I doubt many of those jobs were outsourceable, so in many ways, the mighty political campaign dollars are a huge, huge part of the GDP.
Hopefully the layoffs won't be too massive.
Posted Wed, Dec 5, 6:44 a.m. Inappropriate
Democrats have finally elected a Peter Priniciple Governor, we have a real opportunity to watch a totally unqualified Governor address the pressing issues of State via "Staff". Will the media insist on performance from this Governor? What will press conferences sound like? Soft ball questions and "Secret Sauce" based answers? You had better hope as a State that there is a cadre of handlers that actually know what they are doing, because the "lead dog" doesn't know where he is going.
Posted Sun, Dec 9, 11:03 p.m. Inappropriate
Since when it is media's responsibility to "insist on performance"?
Posted Wed, Dec 5, 5:46 p.m. Inappropriate
I blame those trendy and "cool" glasses McKenna started wearing.
Posted Fri, Dec 7, 3:55 p.m. Inappropriate
While John is obvious just a tinge biased, my theory on why AG McKenna lost, while John makes a good point about the old guys at the diner being in McKenna's column already, though that's one of the McKenna ads I can remember - is the effectiveness of the Inslee ad that had McKenna pandering to the "Tea Party" folks. The second-most effective ads were the ones related to taking women's rights away and, to a lesser extent, suing about Obamacare. The old guys ad seemed a bit far-fetched, disingenuous, like how much were they paid to say that, as did, to a lesser extent, the one with McKenna and his family where he agreed with them, it sounded quite staged to me...as he's outvoted for anything in the family as it is! As for historical, Governor Spellman was a bland candidate who won in 1980 due to the national events (hostage crisis, 20% interest rates). In the later 80s and beyond, the Rs ran a series of far-right candidates, including Bob Williams (then a bland Eikenberry in-between), Craswell and Carlson himself. Senator Rossi gave the look of a slick used-car salesman, not too unlike Governor Romney, and wisely kept away from the social issues, which is why he almost made it. AG McKenna almost did so as well, except for the "Tea Party" and other ads I mentioned, which suggested he was further to the right than he led on. The majority of folks apparently didn't want to take the chance. I was surprised at how big the margin was, and I am doubtful that, in the short term, the Rs can win the Governor's office as well as many other state-wide offices.
Posted Sun, Dec 9, 11:07 p.m. Inappropriate
Did you really think those ads were not staged? The old guys were actors. McKenna's family was acting also.
Rossi was actually a slick real estate salesman.
Posted Tue, Dec 11, 10:25 p.m. Inappropriate
Rossi may have been a real estate salesman, but he wasn't any good, slick or not.
Posted Mon, Dec 10, 1:46 a.m. Inappropriate
I loved the "old guys" ad. Kept wondering what on earth they could possibly know about small business in the 21st century, but loved the ad. Gave me one more reason not to vote for McKenna.
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