Yesterday, Jim Sills congratulated Tony Krvaric on his election to the Vice Chairmanship of the California Republican party. I do not dispute that San Diego will have more influence in the state party as a result, but I take exception to the self-congratulatory description of the 2010 election results in San Diego. Many of the touted successes were officially non-partisan. More importantly, the GOP made absolutely no progress in taking seats in the State Senate or Assembly, including in San Diego districts. This should be seen as a bitter disappointment when compared to GOP results nationwide. As a Republican, if only for three years, I believe we should set our sights higher, much higher. 2010’s election returns in California should be seen as a abject failure, which should result in soul searching and prompting a sense of crisis for our party. I hope Mr. Krvaric will bring such a sense of urgency to his new office.
Comments 9
In the months since the November 2010 races, I’ve
written extensively here on the huge sums spent by
organized labor trying to defeat Bill Horn, Lorie Zapf,
Ron Roberts, or to pass the Prop. D sales tax hike,
or seeking to stop PLA bans in Chula Vista and SD
County. Don’t tell the SD Labor Council or the UDW
those were non-partisan!
Those races were partisan in everything but name.
The men and women who helped win these races
(as candidates, consultants or volunteers) deserve
our thanks and appreciation.
You did not see, B-Daddy, the procession of local GOP
candidates at the December 2010 meeting of the SD
Republican central committee. Dozens of them thanked
the local Party, and Tony Krvaric by name, for critical mail-
ings, phone banks and volunteer support. Lorie Zapf was
there, Bill Horn, Ernie Dronenburg, Farrah Douglas, our own
Marie Waldron, Gary Felein and on and on. Escondido’s
new Mayor (Sam Abed) emotionally declared the turning
point in his upset victory was the day the giant, over-sized
San Diego Republican postcard hit Escondido mail boxes.
Tony Krvaric and executive director Barrett Tetlow did
yeoman work to help these fine candidates to win. I
am a political professional and saw with my own eyes
the effect they had on several campaigns I assisted.
Please don’t take my word for it…ask Councilwoman
Lorie Zapf, to whom you also rendered valuable aid.
On your other point…
Virtually no state legislative nor congressional seats
changed hands anywhere in California the past decade.
The reason was the 2001 gerrymander of those seats.
San Diego Republicans succeeded in one of those
few statewide “switches” when Shirley Horton won the
formerly Democratic 78th Assembly seat in 2002 and
held it for 6 years. I am proud to have worked on her
behalf, and saw Ron Nehring give her solid support.
With voter passage of Redistricting Reform, the lines
for legislative districts should be much fairer in the
coming decade.
Lets stick to the facts since the substance (or lack thereof) of this post seems to come up every election cycle.
It is the Republican Assembly and Senate Caucus’ chief job to win legislative seats; same for the NRCC and congressional elections.
The local party is the only major Republican organization that plays in municipal elections and it just so happens the SDGOP does it better than any other local Party in the state. As a result, those elections should be its primary focus. Anything done in the legislative races (usually in the form of grassroots) is gravy.
So…when you run for Assembly or Congress in a district that has a +D17 advantage, it is not the job of the SDGOP to finance your campaign after everyone else has passed on you. You were passed up because those other entities only have money for half a dozen races in CA (and they are still outspent by the Dems) and there are about 20 others ahead of you in the line.
The mantra: “budgets are about priorities” applies to elections too.
Between the CRP 2010 Victory Program and the SDGOP there were 23 of 27 municipal races won throughout the county. Directly achieved through GOTV efforts and extensive phone banking throughout the county.
I’d call that a success. Should we always be reaching higher? Yes.
With that said, SD was a shining example of success to be emulated throughout the state.
Works:
1. Making logical well thought out arguments to inspire people to come to your way of thinking.
2. Finding ways to get people you know active in politics.
3. Getting active yourself.
4. Getting involved in non-political groups you are passionate about in order to spread your political message outside of the Republican Party/Tea Party bubble.
5. Volunteering to help get people registered and educated.
6. Raising money.
7. Giving money.
Doesn’t work:
1. Blaming.
2. Nothing.
3. Cursing at Obama while watching Fox News.
The local county party is the lead agency for local elections.
The State Assembly & Senate Republican caucus is the lead agency for state races.
The National Republican Congressional Committee (RNCC) is the lead agency for congressional races.
This is a source of endless confusion for volunteers and rookie candidates.
Blaming the local county party for what “the party” did or didn’t do is like blaming your local Supervisor for what “the government” is doing to Social Security.
The GOP has been extremely wise to concentrate on nonpartisan races. VERY few partisan races are winnable by the minority party. Somebody can do the research on this, but here’s what I recall from memory:
Each two years in CA there are 153 partisan district elections — 80 Assembly, 20 State Senate and 53 congressional districts. In the last three elections prior to 2010, that’s a total of 459 races. I don’t think that a single seat changed from Democrat to Republican, or Republican to Democrat. Someone can update me on the stats, and include the 2010 races (Jim Sills, your job?).
In California, competitive politics is about the props and the local nonpartisan races — with some hope in a few of the statewide partisan races. If I were a financial supporter of either party, I’d want the bulk of my money to be concentrated in winning these winnable local contests — and the props.
Depending on how the partisan districts are redrawn, this area MAY become competitive in 2012. Frankly, I doubt it. Seems to me the Dems still have control of the redistricting process, even after all the “reforms.”
I suspect a few races will be winnable by the minority party, but no more than 10-15%. Hope I’m wrong on this.
Ahhhh, the common misperception of unlimited funding, incorrectly translated into one entity being able to “do it all.” If only the political world were that simple. Not to rehash the prior comments, but…
1) All races are partisan or at least philosophical, especially when largely partisan and philosophical interests have something at stake in the outcome.
2) No amount of money or activism is likely to alter the outcome in a safely gerrymandered district of either major party. The combination of a competitive seat along with funding, mail, a ground campaign and a decent candidate are basics. Without the competitive seat, the rest is mostly irrelevant. The victories across the nation last year ignore the fact that CA leg. seats are drawn to be non-competitive.
Is this to say the GOP couldn’t have done better? No, in fact there are some leg. seats in CA that were winnable. There were none in San Diego, however. Blaming the local GOP for losses in those seats is as much of a non-starter as would be blaming the Tea Party.
A timely article today in the SAC BEE suggests that the state redistricting panel is “tilting left.” Everything I’ve seen on the redistricting process suggests that the commission is being guided by professionals, carefully selected by the progressive honchos overseeing the procedures of the panel.
http://www.sacbee.com/2011/03/28/3507915/california-redistricting-panel.html
Author
I would like to thank all of those who commented. I appreciate your feedback and I learned from you.
I remain frustrated with the following fact. The Republican brand name is toxic in California. Steve Cooley was elected Los Angeles District Attorney three times on a non-partisan ticket, but lost his home county by 53% to 39% in his race for California Attorney General. This can only be explained by the antipathy towards Republicanism held by a large swath of the voting public.
I agree with Michael Schwartz in general; but those efforts will be insufficient to success without a change in emphasis and message for our party in California. I think we have to target winning over the Hispanic community, for example, without betraying core principles with regard to the rule of law. Much else needs to be done to change the perception of the party. I will support the Republican party, but I am asking the leaders of the party who might be reading this blog to take seriously the challenge. We must attack the root causes of our dismal image substantively so that we can bring competition back to California politics. Unfortunately, I cannot prescribe that action today, as I lack the research necessary to understand these root causes. Failure to take the necessary steps to deal with this issue will wreck our state by condemning it to one party rule.