A Tale of Two Primaries
Primary elections can be messy affairs, leading to all manner of hurt feelings, strange bedfellows, depleted campaign coffers, and crushed, broken dreams. Party officials tend to hate them, preferring to follow Ronald Reagan’s eleventh commandment.
For them, it’s not just a matter of money being spent on internecine warfare, but fears of skeletons popping out of closets which inevitably haunt the eventual winner in the general election. But for all the complaints, this is one area where what’s bad for the party is good for the voters. In the end, it is the individual members of the party around the state or district who should choose the nominee, not the entrenched leadership.
The Republicans have a couple of these family affairs in full swing right now, complete with all of the angst and confusion you might expect. Perhaps the most high profile race is playing out in Florida between Marco Rubio and Charlie Crist. Rubio’s campaign looked to be a rather quixotic one in the beginning. He started out with zero name recognition and a financial profile better suited to setting up a lemonade stand than launching a statewide Senate race. By contrast, regardless of some national conservative opposition, Crist was widely regarded as a popular figure around the state with impressive resources and the rapid, if ill considered backing of the national party.
The primary process led to that situation changing drastically over the winter, though. Rubio attracted millions of dollars from online activists who found his conservative bona fides to be far more solid than the Obama-hugging, stimulus-supporting Crist, and Florida voters seem to be listening to that message. A recent poll found Marco leaping out to an 18-point lead, forcing the formerly presumed nominee into some desperate measures. Someone inside the party began telling tales out of school and the local papers jumped on a story which involved Rubio making personal purchases on his GOP credit card. The story doesn’t look like it will gain a lot of traction, but it’s still a painful reminder that politicians today have to exercise extreme caution in every facet of their lives. If you find yourself at the local wine shop with a party credit card in your hand, it may be time to ask one of your staffers for a few bucks.
Thus far, John McCain’s race is shaping up somewhat differently. He’s being challenged by talk radio host J.D. Hayworth, who features similar conservative credentials to Rubio and has a fair-sized platform from which to shout. But the 2008 Republican presidential candidate still seems to hold significant appeal for voters in his home state, and his campaign has been quick to dog the challenger about various things he’s said on the radio. Most prominent among these are what Ed Morrissey recently referred to as his “birther flirtations.”
Another brilliant observation by Mr. Shaw(yawn). The sun will rise in the east tomorrow!
This is a contest between two losers. The choice is do I vote for the RINO (Republican In Name Only) progressive, or do I vote for the guy who could not win reelection in a solid Republican district, and engaged in questionable payments to his family. Neither one is a real fiscal conservative and believes in limited government. Where I do find that square on the ballot that says, NONE OF THE ABOVE !!!!!
Even the best tools wear out. I hope the ‘Zonies move beyond McCain.
Rubio has more serious ethical challenges, and he is refusing to address them. His chosen budget chief, Ray Sansom, has been forced to resign office and is being prosecuted for an action that is not only truly sleazy but calls into question the fiscal practices of the state legislature Republican leadership that includes Rubio.
The scandal involves precisely the type of behavior that Rubio is claiming to oppose: using government office to gain insider, set-aside privilege on the taxpayer’s dime. Sansom delivered taxpayer funds to a pal at a community college to build an airplane hangar that a private third party wanted to use. There is a paper trail: there is also evidence of subverting the public process. In return, Sansom got a six-figure no-show job at the taxpayer-supported school. Does that sound like responsible, small government to you? I am no fan of Crist, except that he passed very successful legislation requiring violent offenders to serve their time. However, it must be noted that Rubio’s challenge is forcing Crist to recommit to certain conservative principles that he seemed willing to abandon. Activists might find this to be the silver lining if Rubio falls to the Sansom scandal.
Notice how McCain is Mr. Conservative now that his job for life is on the line. If he is re-elected, expect him to revert to form.
Sansom was the successor to Rubio, not his budget chief, Crist put in Greer
who spent hundreds of thousands of dollars of party funds, along with his
aide Delmar Johnson. Crist has shredded every conservative principle, in part made it possible for Obama to win Florida, RINO is too nice a descriptive
Hey there, anonymous AZ Resident,
Nice smear, “questionable payments to his family”, referring to Hayworth. Odd how you fail to mention McCain’s millions from convicted felons like Symington and Keating, from a suspected murderer who dodged a grand jury through political pull (Kemper Marley) and from disgraced Arizona Majority Leader, Burton Barr, not to mention more recent corporate contributions from his father-in law, Jim Henseley’s company.
Anybody interested? Look these names up with McCain’s name added.
The only reason these names seem new to most people is that the news media have always covered for their boy, McCain. But you are certainly typical. Stab the Conservative, but avoid real issues. McCain has operated like this for decades, but this is his first real primary and his time in politics has finally ended.
(BTW, look up my name. I stand behind everything I’ve written)
Bill Heuisler
Crist and McCain can be made to say they’ll “recommit to certain conservative principles” that doesn’t mean they will. The problem with trying to rededicate the senate to conservative policy. Six years is too long and cattle prods too short to make squishes toe the line.