I’ve got to admit that I’m constantly bemused by the California Republican Party. We’re a crazy Democratic state (instead of a sane Democratic state) because the GOP is so insular and Judean People’s Front-like.
For the latest blast from the ‘splitters,’ let me offer the The California Majority Report, the Democratic equivalent). Here’s Fleishman:
Well, the progressive liberals that dominate main stream media newspaper editorial boards are at it again. This time we see it is the sage and wise lefties on the Sacramento Bee Editorial Board who are telling us that Tom Campbell is the best GOP pick for the U.S. Senate. You know what I say to these fine folks on the SacBee Ed Board who in 2008 levied their endorsement of Barack Obama for President of the United States? Butt out!
Yeah those outsiders – you know, people like me, who don’t like Barbara Boxer very much and actually might vote for Campbell in spite of his flaky Middle East views (but wouldn’t in a million years vote for Devore) – ought to butt out and let the GOP pick a pure, truly Republican candidate who can lose by 20 points to Boxer in November.
Splitters.
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Chicken or the egg. Are the Republicans crazy because the Democrats are crazy? Or vice versa?
Or is politics in California as P. G. Wodehouse might have put it far from hinged?
This isn’t surprising at all if you accept the idea that the Republicans that control their levers aren’t interested in rolling back the power of the ruling political class, but in scheming to regain it for themselves.
It’s one thing to say that you should be open to the views of people who are persuadable to your cause or who might support your candidate but it’s another to say that you should be open to the views of those who are diametrically opposed to you.
If Jon Fleischman’s description of the political ideology of the Sacramento Bee editorial board isn’t accurate (I don’t know, I don’t read their paper), that’s one thing. But if it’s true that they generally lean pretty far to the Left and will more likely than not throw their support behind the Democrat anyway (like the Strib in my state), then I don’t think his statement is unreasonable.
What specifically have you got against Devore? I’m asking as a (persuadable) voter in the Republican primary who hasn’t made up his mind yet.
Frankly, I used to like Tom Campbell, until he reached that sublime point where he was on record for and against any major policy position possible at some point in his career. I really don’t see what he stands for anymore, other than “trust me.” And “trust me” worked out so well for that Austrian actor that I really don’t plan on doing *that* again…
Cheers
— perry
Well, I could never quite suss out what was going on in California Politics, but I got a major insight in to it when a friend showed me those Carly Infomercials (I don’t know what else to call them) then saw Alice in Wonderland.
What that insight was, I really can’t say, but is was ABSOLUTELY COSMIC!!!!!!
Not sure how the “Judean People’s Front” reference works here: the Dems certainly don’t resemble the builders of the Roman Empire.
Maybe the Vandals or the Goths, but it’s been a long time since they did anything in this state but loot & pillage.
I’m thinking of crossing over and voting for Mickey Kaus against Babs.
As for Tom Campbell, it’s hard to see how he goes to war with the bureaucrat unions, so it’s good he isn’t running for governor. Also, I’m not sure that Meg Whitman is willing to be hated enough to fight the ugly fights she has to fight.
The wild card is Jerry Brown. He’s flakey enough – and old enough – that he may well go to war with the unions and not mind them hating his guts, but his Acorn suck-up in his current job didn’t look so wonderful.
I’m not sure such a person exists. I’m sure there are people Barbara Boxer can beat (count on the CA GOP to find one) but not by 20 points. I’m not sure she could get 20 points over a dead musk ox in a general election.
The weird thing is that Campbell, Fiorina, and DeVore have virtually identical poll performance in a match-up with Boxer, and have for the entire campaign so far. Against any of them, Boxer averages about 45%. To be precise, her RCP averages are 44% vs. Campbell, 45% vs. Fiorina, and 45.5% vs. DeVore.
I suspect that you could recruit 20 more Republican candidates at random and get 20 more polls that look just like this. This is unusual, because in a three-way primary there is almost always one insanely unelectable person that even a despised incumbent can clobber in a poll.
The common theme is lack of enthusiasm for Boxer. By no means do I think the GOP has the race in the bag, but a good candidate will probably beat her.
The Massachusetts Senate race was over the moment that Brown established himself as a normal human being that people could vote for without being embarrassed, and this looks like the same scenario.
BTW, in the first poll taken at the beginning of the Massachusetts Senate race, Martha Coakley got 54%, versus Brown with 24%. A 30 point spread.
Boxer has never gotten above 50% vs. anybody, except in the Daily Kos/R2000/Bullshit poll. And even the last three Daily Kos/R2000/Bullshit polls (which always manage to find an extra 5% for Democrats that nobody else can find) can’t do better than 49% vs. Devore, with a 10 point spread.
The day has come where Jerry Brown is the only last ditch hope to stand up to the exploding leviathan of government in the form of pubic service unions.
I brought my ice skates.