I attended a wake tonight. Ok, it wasn’t QUITE that bad, but there was a little bit of discontent at our meeting. Obviously, our side didn’t win as much as we’d hoped starting from the top down and a good deal of the time was spent in analysis why we thought this happened. But, as it turns out, in the words of one commenter, “we got butt whipped.”
Discussion touched on a number of topics, including a lack of enthusiasm by Republicans as a whole, how the primary losers didn’t get behind the primary winners, and a need for better organization and more targeted advertising.
There’s one topic that I got raw numbers for (thanks to Woody Willing at the Board of Elections.) The Republican turnout was 57%, while the Democrats managed 51% and independents were 2,800 strong (that’s roughly 40%.) It works out to about 10,830 Republicans, 11,730 Democrats, and the 2,800 independents. So the independents were enough to tip the scales.
What was noted at the meeting is that the 62% Ehrlich vote didn’t translate all the way down the line – aside from Mike Lewis and Gail Bartkovich, no other contested Republican came close to those numbers. The GOP could not even hold its base in a lot of races as some votes leaked away for Norm Conway, Mark Bowen, et. al.
So that turned out to be the bulk of our meeting, and I even chimed in with my thoughts, which I’ll elaborate on at the end of the post.
We did do some business items. Our treasury is still pretty healthy and ready for the next election cycle. The club also got nice thank-you notes from State Senator Lowell Stoltzfus, Bonnie Luna, Bryan Brushmiller, M.J. Caldwell, and District 3 Councilwoman Gail Bartkovich. And come January, the club will begin the process of nominating and selecting its officers for 2007. It was also revealed that the next event for the club will be our Christmas Party, which will be Sunday, December 10th from 5-7 p.m. at the Elks Club on Churchill Drive. Admission is $5.
Fellow incoming Central Committeeman Dave Parker told us about the state Executive Committee meeting (he attended in place of our chair, Dr. John Bartkovich), particularly about the remarks that Michael Steele made to the attendees. Steele stated that basically the Maryland GOP was back in the same position that they were in after the 1998 elections – beaten down and battered because of poor election results. At the time their goal was to eventually elect a GOP governor…by 2006. Obviously Bob Ehrlich beat that timetable.
According to Parker, Steele had two points that he stressed to those in attendance. One is work on getting candidates early, particularly younger candidates (which our local party did pretty well this cycle.) The other is place more emphasis on the annual Lincoln Day dinner, as that draws attention to the party even in off years. Dave noted that Michael Steele was quite upbeat and positive at the gathering, despite being handed a convincing defeat at the polls and despite having the better position on issues facing Maryland. (Ok, the last is my editorial comment.)
We also heard briefly from two electoral winners. Joe Holloway, newly elected in County Council District 5, joked about the tone of the meeting, quipping “(I guess) I’m the bright spot. Sorry about your luck.” He admitted that he’s still getting up to speed on some of the issues but looked forward to tackling them. (Note to Joe: read the blogs more often.) But he thanked all of us for our help, and complemented opponent Ed Werkheiser on running a gentlemanly campaign.
Delegate Page Elmore also spoke a few words, saying that we all needed to move forward and most likely the first big issue out of the chute when the General Assembly kicks off will be the slots debate, as Maryland is facing a financial crunch and Page didn’t see Governor-elect O’Malley raising taxes right away. In Elmore’s view, if slots are going to be placed it should be where gambling already occurs; in other words, at the racetracks.
There was also a quick question regarding revamping the club’s website, and it was reiterated that the issue had been left up to the officers and they were awaiting a proposal from a prospective operator (it’s not me!)
Which leads me to my comments. During the whole discussion about what happened in 2006, I had to place my two cents in. In so many words, I just had to say that 2006 is history now, let’s learn from our mistakes and move forward.
We have two years now before the next major election. What I thought should happen among the people in the room is not necessarily to spend that whole time being political with people, but rather to lead by the example of doing things in the community and get out among other people. Sooner or later they get to know you and it’s at that point that, if politics becomes a topic of conversation, they’re more amenable to listening to the Republican message. You have a much better chance for success with stating a case for a candidate by talking to a friend about him/her than any 30 second commercial or mail piece ever does.
I was also the subject of an interesting comment put to me because I’m a blogger. Since I have a record of my blog posts it gives me an institutional memory that can be used for or against a candidate or a point of view. Obviously I spent a LOT of time attending forums and the like and compiling my notes on what was said…so someone could go back and say (for example) Rick Pollitt, you said you “want no more government than is necessary” but here you are asking for funding on (fill in the blank) and that’s more intrusive government. It’s sort of like opposition research on the cheap, and as the blogosphere expands and becomes more of a “legit” media source, many more voices can and will be heard. (Finally, someone who MIGHT understand this blog thing and how it can work for the GOP.)
All in all, it was a long meeting that was basically an exercise in getting out the frustrations we have over the election results of three weeks ago in a civil manner. Maybe we didn’t work quite hard enough, and maybe our side was hurt by national events, but now that’s all water under the bridge and we must move on. I’m not going to be like those on the other side who were STILL whining about Bush stealing elections years after the fact. We have a county, state, and nation to help govern even if we are in the (temporary) minority in most cases.
Michael, that wouldn’t be Dave Parker, formerly of Salisbury University’s Math and Computer Science Department, would it?