Search Results for ‘republican challengers’
John Deeth has a rather exhaustive rundown of what candidates have filed for state and federal office this year in Iowa but it’s worth noting two interesting trends that have emerged so far and what ramifications this might have for the 2008 election.
The first is that three Democratic candidates have filed in the primary for House District 13. This is an open seat consisting almost entirely of Mason City and is heavily Democratic leaning, although it is currently held by Republican State Representative Bill Schickel who is not seeking re-election. The prospect of a heated Democratic Primary for this seat should pump up turnout which will have a big effect on the competitive Democratic primary for Iowa’s 4th congressional district. In 2006, where there was a competitive statewide primary but no competitive local primaries, turnout in Cerro Gordo made up about 7.5% of Democratic voters in the 4th district. However, with the competitive State House primary this year as well, it should lead to a disproportionate increase in turnout in Cerro Gordo County. This means that Mason City, which is the second largest municipality that is entirely in the 4th Congressional District, becomes even more important in the primary. This probably benefits the candidacy of Kurt Meyer the most as he comes from neighboring Mitchell County and is already seen as one of the more credible candidates in the race.
The second is that Democratic challengers have already filed in two State House seats that weren’t contested in 2006 or 2004 for that matter. James Van Bruggen has filed in ultra-conservative House District 4 which consists of Lyon County and part of Sioux County. The district is currently represented by incumbent Republican Dwayne Alons. While the district represents what is perhaps one of the most Republican state legislative seats in the country, let alone Iowa, (Chet Culver lost the district by a margin of almost 6 to 1) two slim slivers of hope for Van Bruggen are that Alons may be complacent as he has never faced an opponent in a general election in ten years in the legislature and has made some terribly embarrassing statements in recent years as well. In fact, Iowa Progress has commented numerous times on Alons’s frequent inane statements. These include claiming that the ancient Maya were a race of giants due to warmer temperatures and that the invention of air conditioning means that global warming is not a problem.
The other challenger is Ron Rossman, an organic farmer from outside Harlan, Iowa, who is running against Jack Drake in House District 57 which consists of Shelby County, most of Cass County and a thin slice of Pottawatomie County. It is a much less one-sided district than House District 4, Culver only lost the district by a 60-40 in 2006. However, if the race is solely about local issues, Rossman has a chance. While Drake is from the small sliver of Pottawatomie County that is in the district, Rossman hails from Shelby County which makes up over 40% of the district. If Rossman has a strong local base to build from, he has the capacity to run a competitive race.
Although neither of these seats are likely Democratic gains, it shows that Democrats may have a chance at running a candidate in close to every seat this year. In 2006, 19 House Republicans went unopposed, although few were in competitive districts. One of those House Republicans who went unopposed was Mary Lou Freeman. Freeman was a long time incumbent Republican from a safe district in Northwest Iowa. However, Freeman died two months before Election Day. If there had been a Democrat who had filed, the Democrat would have won automatically. Instead, the seat was declared vacant and in the special election that followed, the Republican candidate won handily, easily defeating his Democratic opponent who was a 21 year old college student.
The other benefit of running candidates in every seat is that it builds up party organization in areas that had previous been ceded to Republicans and helps build a stronger base of Democratic activists and to turn out more Democratic voters. In a year that seems to be trending Democratic so far, this could yield a surprise or two on Election Day.
March 3rd, 2008
While Christopher Rants proclaimed that Iowa House Republicans will regain their majority as the party of health care and education, the two leading staffers at the Republican Party of Iowa were fired by new Chairman Stu Iverson. While Iowa Republicans had a mixed record in 2004 and a colossal collapse in 2006, it doesn’t help to be starting from scratch nine months before the election. Rants can talk about how vulnerable Eric Palmer or Elesha Gayman are until he turns blue in the face but if there is no party infrastructure behind their challengers, he’ll still be talking about how Palmer and Gayman are vulnerable incumbents in 2010. The Republicans do not have the necessary campaign infrastructure and if their message is to run against Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton on health care, they’re not going to have much luck with that either.
February 16th, 2008
I know David Yepsen gets dragged through the mud an awful lot in these parts, so I figured it was only fair to give credit where credit is due. In his column today, he provides a fairly accurate analysis of Iowa’s 2008 Senate race–or lackthereof.
Yepsen notes that “No big-name Republican challengers have emerged, just some unknowns” and that even Republican Senator Charles Grassley was unable to name any potential challengers. Yepsen then recounts the standard lore of how Harkin has defeated more sitting Republican Congressmen than any Democrat in the history of the Senate (has anyone ever been to a Harkin Steak Fry and not heard Democrats crow about that?).
I had written previously about Harkin’s potential retirement, though as I made clear in that post, there was really no need to worry. With 2008 shaping up to be a Democratic year, at least in the Senate, it now seems that his race will be easier than ever.
Alas, I couldn’t sign off without one dig at Yepsen. He writes almost-correctly that “Democrats quit being serious about trying to knock off Grassley years ago” (Sorry Art Small). I say “almost” because I’ve been hearing the rumblings of a Vilsack-Grassley match up. Let’s keep our fingers crossed. It would be the best chance we’ve had in a while to take Grassley out and it would be a monster of a Senate race, something the Hawkeye State hasn’t seen in years.
April 9th, 2007
The Washington Post reports that the National Republican Congressional Committee is planning to spend 90% of its advertising budget on “what officials describe as negative ads.” The article explains that Republicans’ only hope of shifting attention away from pesky little issues like Iraq is to wage personal attacks on Democrats. Or as Representative Tom Cole, Grinnell class of ‘71, puts it, “When you run in an adverse political environment, you try to localize and personalize the race as much as you can.” Actually, Cole doesn’t even try to spin the Republicans’ nasty program:
In a memo released last week, Cole, who is running to succeed Reynolds at the NRCC, expanded on that strategy. The memo recommended that vulnerable incumbents spend $20,000 on a research “package” to find damaging material about challengers and urged that they “define your opponent immediately and unrelentingly.”
You might also remember Cole from 2004, when he gave a speech including the gem: “I promise you this. If George Bush loses the election, Osama bin Laden wins the election. It’s that simple. It will be interpreted that way by enemies of the United States around the world.” He went on to add, “What do you think Hitler would have thought if Roosevelt would’ve lost the election in 1944? He would not have thought American resolve was strengthening. What would the confederacy have thought if Lincoln would have lost the election of 1860?”
No one’s going to fall for that kind of mumbo jumbo this year, Tom. In the words of an alum I much prefer to you, “Have you no sense of decency, sir?”
September 11th, 2006
The Register editorializes today on the apparent tension between traditional Republican talking points and actual Republican performance:
This was a bizarre week in federal budget politics, as usual. Everything about the federal budget is bizarre. To wit:
President Bush bragged about “reducing” the red ink this year to “only” $296 billion. That will be the fourth largest deficit in history and only a modest improvement from last year’s $318 billion deficit. That’s hardly cause for celebration.
Locally, Republican congressional candidate Jeff Lamberti said pork-barrel spending is out of control and the federal budget process is broken.
He got that right, but it takes a large dose of chutzpah for Lamberti to cite it as a reason for people to elect him instead of Democratic incumbent Leonard Boswell.
Recall that the last time the Democrats controlled Congress, they produced healthy budget surpluses that put the country on a path toward paying down the national debt.
When Republicans took control of Congress and the White House, they promptly boosted spending while cutting taxes, producing the worst fiscal mess of modern times.
When Republican challengers in Congressional races run their “we need a change” campaigns (which every challenger’s campaign will at some point say), whom do they think they’re railing against? Maybe someone needs to ask Jeff Lamberti exactly which parts of the Bush (and Nussle) budgets he’s against in specific enough terms that he actually has to answer the question. Odds are he couldn’t think of anything he’d want to mention by name.
July 13th, 2006
