Maryland: the land that TEA forgot?
I actually sent this in to PJM early this but they decided not to run it for whatever reason. Maybe it’s a little bit off-message, or perhaps we are a true backwater of conservative politics.
Last year in Virginia and New Jersey, the first successes of the TEA Party movement swept unabashed fiscal conservatives Bob McDonnell and Chris Christie into office.
Similarly in Pennsylvania, the latest polls show Republicans with wide leads in statewide races for governor and U.S. Senate. Next door in West Virginia, a Republican has a good chance of taking over the U.S. Senate seat held by Democrat stalwart Robert Byrd.
Even where the polls aren’t as friendly, such as Delaware, they garnered national attention when a TEA Party-backed upstart in Christine O’Donnell upended longtime moderate Republican Congressman Mike Castle in the September 14 primary. O’Donnell made her final push to victory after getting financial backing from the TEA Party Express and the endorsement of Sarah Palin.
Yet as all that political turmoil roils states which border Maryland, TEA Party activists there bemoan the fact that they’ve been bypassed by the excitement.
Sarah Palin’s endorsement of TEA Party favorite Brian Murphy did little to help his campaign for governor as he was spanked by a nearly 50 point margin in the September 14 primary. While Delaware voters turned their political world upside down by going against the state’s establishment Republicans and selecting O’Donnell, Maryland’s state GOP apparatus placed their support behind former governor Bob Ehrlich almost immediately after he formally announced he would seek the office again. The move angered conservative activists but more mainline Republicans bought the argument that only Ehrlich could unseat current Governor Martin O’Malley – who defeated Ehrlich in 2006.
Unfortunately, as of this writing, Ehrlich trails in the latest Rasmussen Poll by 8 points, which is larger than his 2006 margin of defeat. A similar (and more recent) poll by Gonzales Research has Ehrlich down 5.
Of course there are bright spots for conservative activists in some portions of the state. Andy Harris is a TEA Party favorite who is giving freshman Democrat Frank Kratovil all he can handle in a spirited First District race that’s also a rematch, from 2008. Even more popular is the man challenging Steny Hoyer in the Fifth District, Charles Lollar. He’s a dynamic speaker who has excited crowds anywhere from a small campaign event to the 9-12 rally in Washington, D.C.
But for two TEA Party believers I spoke to, the lack of good choices on the Maryland ballot is disheartening.
Chris Lewis helped to organize the first TEA Party in the small Eastern Shore city of Salisbury back in April 2009. This involvement eventually led to an unsuccessful run for a Wicomico County Council seat earlier this year but he still attends a number of TEA Party events and leads the occasional local protest.
While he has no bitterness about losing in his primary – Chris ran as a Republican this time after a bid as an unaffiliated candidate 12 years ago – he’s “not too happy” with the remainder of the choices Republicans selected.
“Voting for the lesser of two evils is becoming very frustrating,” said Chris. “Maryland has always been blue, but the Maryland GOP has done a horrible job of putting up serious and constitutionally conservative candidates against these very weak, liberal, anti-constitutional and anti-business Democrat candidates.”
Fellow conservative activist Julie Brewington agrees. Like Lewis, she was active in the local TEA Party movement practically from its inception and ran for office this year, losing in a GOP primary for a House of Delegates seat.
Julie ran down a list of Republican nominees at the state and local level, describing many as “blah” or milquetoast. “I will reluctantly pull the lever for Ehrlich,” she said, if only for the sake of having a better say in redistricting. “I have finally come around to the fact that if Ehrlich is not voted in we will have no voice at all, as conservatives in this state.”
Still, she’s frustrated at what’s happened to the movement she helped create. “I feel the TEA party here in Maryland has been hijacked to a degree successfully by establishment Republicans,” said Julie. “It’s because of this we have less than exciting candidates to pick from.”
In fact, Julie was most thrilled about crossing over to Delaware to attend a campaign rally for U.S. Senate hopeful Christine O’Donnell. “She’s the closest thing to a true blue TEA Party candidate we have locally (and) I can relate to Christine on many levels. This would include personal attacks I endured during my candidacy for the House of Delegates.”
“She is me, and I am you.”
Lewis and Brewington express a thought that many conservatives trapped in the (not so) Free State have been thinking for years. Emboldened to speak out by other events nationally, they’re afraid that they’re being abandoned by state and national Republicans and don’t have the numbers to make a difference. This is odd because the same Rasmussen Poll that had Ehrlich 8 points down also showed that seventeen percent of Maryland voters consider themselves members of the TEA Party movement, a number slightly higher than the national average.
Yet as Republican U.S. Senate hopeful Eric Wargotz noted when I asked him about the TEA Party, “I absolutely agree with the two main tenets (of fiscal responsibility and limited government)…but Maryland is a Democratic state.” He’s had to walk a bit of a tightrope in his campaign, although it’s clear that Wargotz has embraced the TEA Party more than Bob Ehrlich has in the other major statewide race – Ehrlich completely dismissed the Palin endorsement of his opponent and hasn’t made any attempt to make up with movement conservatives in the state.
Perhaps in a cycle or two Maryland may catch on, but by all indications there’s not going to be a lot of TEA Party victories in the Free State next week. It’s a sad state of affairs, but it’s one the Maryland Republican Party may have brought upon itself due to the conscious decision to not listen to its newly-energized TEA Party base and instead choose the establishment side in the primary.
Friday night videos – episode 49
The last episode before the historic midterm and state elections may be a little on the long side. I have four videos from earlier today to feature first, with Andy Harris, Bob Ehrlich, and two doses of Michael Steele speaking before a crowded Salisbury GOP Victory Center earlier today.
Another short video which is important to our election on a more local scale comes from State’s Attorney hopeful Matt Maciarello.
All in all, Barb Mikulski’s another brick in the wall.
Perhaps a good way to look at the future is remembering the past, like this video from the Republican Study Committee does. This man is a good one to study.
We can roll back the damage done.
I told you I might reuse this one.
That WILL be Tuesday. We can truly drain the swamp of all the scum that’s accumulated over the last couple election cycles.
And when you go to vote, don’t forget what Ava says.
You just HAD to know I would call it a wrap with her – there is no other way but to close a long and bitterly fought election season but with that song.
Fire Pelosi tour comes to Salisbury
This morning there was a big red bus out front of the Salisbury GOP Victory Center.
Eventually we saw there were a number of special guests on the bus, and our small city will get a little love from Fox News as well. Bret Baier sat in our headquarters taping an interview with Michael Steele for later broadcast.
Apparently Bret’s aboard the bus for today. But people were excited even if they’re not on the bus, and passers-by were greeted by about a dozen sign wavers – that’s the first picture below.
Overall well over 100 people crammed into our South Salisbury Boulevard headquarters, including practically every local candidate and state party Chair Audrey Scott. As you’ll see in the second picture below, that guy running for governor is also a popular fella to be pictured with. Bob referred to the group as “the James Gang”, playing off the rock band of yore. Bob made sure to point out that “I don’t support Jim Mathias, despite what he may say.”
It was also an excuse for GOP candidates to see and be seen. Marty Pusey was out making her rounds.
Mike McDermott, her fellow District 38B House candidate, was also there but had this high-visibility item nearby as well.
So after the bus made a show of re-arriving, leading to the quip of the day – Michael Steele joked as he was departing that, “I tell my Democratic friends the bus is a little understated, but it gets the job done” – we all crammed into the headquarters building itself to hear what they had to say. When I say crammed, it was pretty crowded.
State chair Audrey Scott, who you may see in the middle of the above picture, served as the emcee.
As I write this, I’m uploading the videos from today’s remarks for a special edition of FNV. But Michael Steele didn’t get right back on the bus after his remarks were through. He also gave a pep talk to the volunteers who jumped on the phones to make the calls we need for victory.
He also had time to tape a quick interview with local radio host Bill Reddish and talk to other reporters.
Michael noted the 2010 campaign, “is unreal…a tidal wave that’s brewing.”
We will find out on Tuesday, but the group here sounded pretty confident of victory.
Ehrlich: It’s ‘up or out’ for me
On the Washington Post’s ‘Maryland Politics’ blog, Bob Ehrlich told reporters that if he loses Tuesday it will bring an end to his political career. “It would be very difficult to imagine” making another political run, said Bob.
Of course, Ehrlich was already lured out of a comfortable existence once to run this time, so perhaps this statement needs its grain of salt.
But if the polls are correct – even Ehrlich concedes he’s behind, although he claims the deficit is far less than the 14-point margin trumpeted by polls in both the Post and Baltimore Sun – and Ehrlich fails in this comeback bid, it means the Maryland Republican Party will be forced out of the comfort zone it’s enjoyed over much of the last decade by having Bob Ehrlich as a standardbearer.
(continued on my Examiner.com page…)
54-40…so fight!
Yes, I reach back into the realm of long-forgotten campaign slogans (embellishing one used by President James K. Polk in 1844) because it’s the result of a so-called poll out from the Washington Post. According to their poll, Bob Ehrlich trails Martin O’Malley by that very 54-40 margin. It reflects a similarly flawed Baltimore Sun poll which has the former governor down 52-38.
I don’t believe these polls for a second, and this political observer explains why.
But despite the fact we conservatives have a less than inspiring choice for governor, don’t let these papers fool you into staying home for this election. It’s an age-old attempt to disillusion the conservative voters, and even some so-called conservative pundits like Michael Gerson try to convince us “the wave has crested.” It’s only crested if we believe it is so.
Yet there are signs this frustration has taken hold on a statewide level. Republicans were supposed to be flocking to the polls and couldn’t wait for November 2. But as of this morning 3.09% of Democrats have participated in early voting compared to 2.82% of Republicans and just 1.42% of unaffiliated voters. (On the bright side, the Constitution Party leads with 3.63% participation – too bad they only have 606 voters registered as such statewide.)
But locally the news is better. In seven of the nine Eastern Shore counties the GOP is indeed ahead in early voting, and Queen Anne’s County there’s virtually a tie. (Caroline County is the lone holdout, although the margin in the Democrats’ favor is fairly small.) Maybe it’s because we’re mostly outside the orbit of the Baltimore-Washington media axis, but there seems to be more of that trademark GOP excitement here.
And that’s important because we have local races which need to be won. With strong candidates across the board, we have the opportunity to make the Eastern Shore delegation to the General Assembly entirely Republican – in fact, I recommend it. Why vote for candidates who talk like they’re conservative and pro-business every four years when you can have the 24/7/365 real thing?
If Martin O’Malley wins, we need people in the General Assembly who will tell him to go pound sand with his sure-to-come tax increases, kowtowing to the Obama agenda, and embrace of illegal immigrants as “new Americans.”
Since we’re going to be stuck with Obama for the next two years, we need Congressmen and Senators to place his statist ambitions in check by defunding those things he held dear like Obamacare and the remaining slush fund stimulus while paring away the bureaucratic red tape.
It’s all within reach, and we can make a difference. Let the overconfident I-95 corridor Democrats stay home – we need to fight for what is right in Maryland.
Gonzales Maryland Poll suggests 2006 redux
With time running out before Maryland voters head to the polls, the post-primary momentum which seemed to be on the side of Governor Martin O’Malley is letting up.
But the pace isn’t quick enough for Bob Ehrlich. The Maryland Poll put out today by Gonzales Research shows that Ehrlich continues to lag behind by five points. The key, according to the research, lies in the fact that Democrats are staying in the O’Malley column - they suggest that “17 percent among Democrats for Ehrlich on Election Day won’t do it.”
(continued on my Examiner.com page…)
Will 2011 be another 2007?
With Martin O’Malley as governor, I’m afraid the answer is yes.
Brian Griffiths at Red Maryland questioned why the Maryland Business Tax Reform Commission, which was created as part of the 2007 Special Session, suddenly decided to begin meeting and taking public testimony in the wake of the election – where were they over the last several months, he asks.
In part this is thanks to a bill introduced last year which changed the original law and decreed the MBTRC has to complete its work by the end of this year, so the accelerated pace may be a natural outgrowth of that prospect.
But Griffiths naturally assumes that Martin O’Malley is going to use whatever they say as a pretense to club Maryland businesses with a tax increase. After all, if O’Malley wins he’s a lame duck who’s going to spend the latter half of his second term attempting to position himself as a contender for the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination, whether as successor to Barack Obama or challenger to a Republican president.
Of course, one selling point for him will be the shape Maryland is in when he leaves office and he’s extremely fortunate to have the job creation machine of the seat of federal government right next door. Is is any wonder the battleground of this election is MoCo and PG County? What happens to the the areas of Maryland outside the I-95 corridor will be barely noted and not long remembered by the MOM spin machine. We don’t need those icky chicken farms in our state anyway.
But as long as the federal government is hiring, it places businesses in a position where they have to grin and bear whatever tax increases are created just as long as they can access a relatively affluent market in MoCo and PG. It’s the rest of the state, particularly the areas close by state borders, where employers will be effectively told to pound sand.
Of course, there won’t be a need for a Special Session this time around because O’Malley won’t have the surplus he was handed in 2007 to cushion his first budget. They’ll get right to work in January attempting to chisel more revenue out of the state’s producers and redistribute it to the illegals and so-called working families. (That term only seems to apply if the worker toils in a union shop – all others need not apply.)
I’m not going to say that things will be easy if Bob Ehrlich wins – that is unless we have an unprecendented shift in the General Assembly which would see the GOP gain 34 House seats and 10 Senate seats to place themselves in the majority for the first time in, well, ever. But at least Maryland businesses would have a fighting chance.
Questions I’d love to ask
Tonight Wor-Wic Community College played host to a District 37 and District 38 Candidate Forum sponsored by the Coastal Association of Realtors and Salisbury Chamber of Commerce. Tomorrow I’ll have more on what the participants said, but a major weakness in the format was soliciting audience questions but only using one (that I was aware of.) It’s too bad, because I had two I thought were good (although one was to be asked of a specific candidate.)
The first question I had was for Jim Mathias and relates to the post I did yesterday. Once again I’ll restate the quote he made in a full-color campaign mailing that arrived at my house:
In the State Senate, (Jim will) push to cut wasteful government spending and reinvest the proceeds in small business jobs and the Eastern Shore.
What I wanted to know from Jim (and certainly other candidates could have added their two cents as well) was what specific programs he considers to be “wasteful spending.” See, it’s one thing to talk in generalities but certainly another to actually propose things to be cut. For all the talk about how communities around the area have to live with less, we haven’t seen all that much effort to do so at the state level.
(Yes, I know some will beg to differ and claim state spending has gone down – but in real terms the budget’s gone up over the last four years, with the federal share increasing.)
The other question I wanted to ask came about as part of the discussion about lowering the state sales tax by a penny on each dollar. I took the figures from memory, but as a ballpark it should be close. Besides, the actual figures matter less than the principle.
The total annual revenue from our state’s sales tax runs about $3.7 billion, and the Eastern Shore is roughly 1/10 of the state’s population, so it stands to reason that 1/10 of the sales tax revenue comes out of here.
Let’s say we could finally place our Eastern Shore merchants on par with Delaware and eliminate the sales tax entirely in the nine counties of the Eastern Shore. I’m curious to see if these candidates would support that, based on the dynamic economic analysis that suggests the additional economic oportunities and jobs created by such a move would end up filling state coffers by more than the $370 million “lost.” Remember, Bob Ehrlich said that increased economic activity and slot revenues would make up the difference from rescinding the penny per dollar sales tax increase, so why not use the same theory here?
So for all of you would-be interviewers and forum hosts, here’s a couple of questions you can ask of the candidates. Tomorrow I’ll discuss this forum, which was way longer than promised but rather interesting.
Polling stories: O’Malley plus 8, Harris plus 3
Maybe the Washington Post poll dismissed by Bob Ehrlich as “out of whack” wasn’t so far off after all.
Yesterday Rasmussen came out with its latest poll on the governor’s race; a survey which gave Martin O’Malley a lead he hasn’t enjoyed in quite awhile. The 49%-41% margin can’t be good news for the Republican standardbearer who seems to be a victim of a backlash against the TEA Party by entrenched Democrats in one of the few places they still have political muscle.
(continued on my Examiner.com page…)
Comment on another’s post
Subtitled, why bury good writing and research in a comment?
First, let me set this up: Julie Brewington pondered on her site, Right Coast, why Martin O’Malley was leading Bob Ehrlich so widely (11 points) in a recent Washington Post poll. I weighed in with some statistics found on the Maryland Board of Elections website which may point out the poll was an outlier. This is my comment.
A couple points not necessarily considered:
In 2006 the primary voter split between Republicans and Democrats was 29-71 – over 70 percent of voters were Democrats.
In 2010 it was 37-63 R to D, in a state where the actual voter proportion as of the last report was 32-68. Bear in mind that in August 2006 the split was 35-65. (We’ve lost ground over the last four years for a variety of reasons.)
So in 2006 (a year that was terrible for Republicans) they underperformed at the primary ballot by 6 points, leading one to believe that R’s were less than enthused and D’s were excited.
This time we outperformed by 5 points, suggesting the tide has turned. The fact Garrett County, which is the most solidly Republican in the state, led the pack in turnout speaks volumes about the enthusiasm gap.
I think you’re citing a poll that will turn out to be an outlier because there’s not a good geographic breakdown and it depends a lot on people who may not show up at the polls anyway.
However, having said that, there was a trend (shown by Rasmussen) of Ehrlich pulling even to barely ahead all spring and into the summer, but the last two polls have placed MOM back in the lead.
**********
Julie does bring up a valid point regarding the Brian Murphy campaign. I have a number of thoughts on that 25% of the GOP vote and what will happen to it.
First of all, I sincerely doubt that many of those voters will vote for Martin O’Malley out of spite. While many were dismayed by the actions of the Maryland GOP in that race, I think that most realize the stakes are great in this election. The fraction of Republicans who vote for O’Malley out of spite probably will be fewer that the votes the Democrats found in Baltimore back in 1994 to push Parris Glendening over Ellen Sauerbrey.
A larger number will choose to leave the Governor’s race blank or vote for either Susan Gaztanaga, the Libertarian in the race, or Eric Knowles, who represents the Constitution Party. Ironically, this could help one or both secure ballot status for the next four years since they need 1 percent of the vote to qualify as a minor party. But in all likelihood those numbers will subtract out from the Ehrlich column.
Having said that, though, Murphy’s campaign may have served to expand the Republican universe enough that, even if a decent number of Murphy supporters go third party or skip, it will end up being a wash as compared to a scenario where Murphy withdrew and left the field to Ehrlich. Some proof of this lies in how the GOP did 11 points better compared to the expected average because we had a contested primary for Governor – in 2006 we did not.
Yet the vast majority of Murphy supporters accepted the primary results, and will move into the Ehrlich column next month. The $64,000 question is whether they’ll be advocates for Bob or just show up on Election Day, hold their noses, and touch the screen next to the Ehrlich name.
But that difference could also affect races down the ticket, particularly in areas (like the Shore) where the GOP has a shot of picking off some Democratic General Assembly seats. While they can’t expect the same sort of rout we may see on a national scale, there is a threshold of 10 House seats and five Senate seats that could turn the GOP from a cipher to a truly functioning minority party in the Maryland General Assembly.
A note to former Murphy supporters
We can watch the train go over the cliff with us still on it, or we can fight to control the locomotive. That’s the difference between Martin O’Malley and Bob Ehrlich.
Voters’ memories are notoriously short and if you asked them right now whether the name Brian Murphy rings a bell, 95% of them will say no.
I’ll certainly grant Bob Ehrlich isn’t my preferred candidate but I’d rather have someone who at least would have conservatives at the table than one who would shut them out. We need to send the message that our continued support is contingent on following through on issues near and dear to us.
In the meantime, we also have work to do reforming the MDGOP. Taking our ball and going home simply means they can continue business as usual. The more talk about going third party or skipping the election, the more ability the establishment has to marginalize those of us who choose to fight from within.
I left that comment at Ann Corcoran’s Potomac Tea Party Report. Obviously there’s a subset of people who believe that all is lost after Murphy’s defeat (as well as that of Jim Rutledge) and are willing to toss their votes out the window to support a third-party candidate. Once upon a time millions of Americans (including me) did that for Ross Perot and we got Bill Clinton.
There’s no doubt that Brian Murphy was a more conservative candidate, nor do I dispute the claim that the Maryland GOP put its finger on the scale big-time when they waived Rule 11 to back Bob Ehrlich.
But all of these people need to understand that we only lost one battle in a war that’s going to be fought long-term. If we fade back into the woodwork nothing will change. Those of us who are fighting the battle from within would be the ones left high and dry, smacked back into oblivion by the machine that we’re trying to fight this guerrilla struggle against.
If we stay at the table and Ehrlich wins, he’s going to owe us bigtime. I don’t know if Bob can run again if he wins, but conservatives would be in the far better position with a Republican in the governor’s chair and enhanced numbers in the General Assembly than we would with Martin O’Malley back in charge. Remember, Martin O’Malley represents a party whose Senate leadership vowed:
(GOP leaders are) “going to be flying high, but we’re going to get together and we’re going to shoot them down. We’re going to bury them face down in the ground, and it’ll be 10 years before they crawl out again.”
That’s how they operate in this state, my friends. Martin O’Malley would sooner give up his guitar than do something for conservatives. I’ve known this for awhile.
If diehard Murphy supporters leave or vote third party, we are ceding the hard-fought gains we’ve won in this battle and it’s going to be twice as hard to get it back in a war where the enemy holds all of the high ground. I don’t care for compromise, and certainly it would have been great to see success like conservatives saw in Delaware. But we still have a lot worth fighting for, and staving off extinction through redistricting is a serious prize to me. Democrats have plenty of plans to carve Republicans right off the electoral map.
Sure, it would be nice to get the Libertarians and Constitution Party their 1% to stay viable for another term. But let it come out of the other guy’s total.
New Rasmussen Poll has O’Malley up 3
Just released this afternoon, the newest (and first post-primary) Rasmussen Poll has Martin O’Malley eclipsing the 50 percent mark for the first time in his rematch with former governor Bob Ehrlich. The numbers have it at 50-47 O’Malley.
It continues a trend that’s seen O’Malley regain momentum after a spring and summer which saw Ehrlich catch up to O’Malley after being down by 9 points in Rasmussen’s initial sampling back in February.
(continued on my Examiner.com page…)
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