Abercrombie Wins Hawaii Gubernatorial Primary     Permalink

Former representative Neil Abercrombie (D) won the Democratic gubernatorial primary yesterday over former Honolulu mayor Mufi Hannenmann (D) in a hard fought battle although his margin was quite large: 59% to 38% for such a tough fight. Abercrombie will face Lt. Gov. James Aiona (R-HI) in the general election. Given how blue Hawaii is, Abercrombie is expected to win easily and succeed two-term governor Linda Lingle, who as a twice-divorced childless Republican Jewish woman is a bit of an anomaly in Hawaii.

Inouye Renominated and on Track to Becoming Longest-Serving Senator in History     Permalink

Also in Hawaii, Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-HI), now 86, won renomination for his ninth term in the Senate. He is currently the longest serving member of the Senate, and as a member of the majority party, is President Pro Tempore of the Senate and thus third in the line of presidential succession, after the Vice President and Speaker of the House. Inouye has served longer in the Senate than anyone in history except the late Robert Byrd. If Inouye completes this term, he will become the longest-serving senator in history. Of course, he has to get reelected first, but that is pretty much a foregone conclusion given that his Republican opponent, state representative Cam Cavasso is a tea partier and this is Hawaii.

One interesting footnote to yesterday's primary is that the Secretary of State has published detailed statewide results and in the Democratic senatorial primary (Inouye vs. Andrew Woerner) there were 184 overvotes. That means that 184 people voted for both Inouye and Woerner. Given that Inouye has been in Congress since 1959, you'd think people would have made up their minds already whether they like him or not, but apparently not everyone. Or maybe it was due to malfunctioning voting machines again.

Pence Wins the Values Voters Straw Poll     Permalink

In an election that means absolutely nothing, Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN), won the annual straw poll at the Values Voters Summit in D.C. with 24% of the vote. The poll asks who do you want to win the presidency in 2012. Second was former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee (22%). Following them were Mitt Romney (13%), Newt Gingrich (10%) and Sarah Palin (7%). The voters were about a third of the 2000 attendees at the Family Research Council's annual get together, most of whom are conservative political activists. One of the questions asked of the attendees is what their main concern was. The winning topic: stopping abortions. This is really quite a different crowd that the tea partiers, who are primarily concerned with taxes and reducing the federal deficit.

Palin's fifth-place finish means little because she didn't show up. She had bigger fish to fry: she was in Iowa speaking at the Iowa state Republican Party's annual fundraiser and meeting Iowa Republican activists--the people who will play an outsized role in the 2012 Iowa caucuses.

Democrats Confused     Permalink

Democratic leaders around the country understand that many tea party positions (e.g., phasing out social security and abolishing the Dept. of Education) are not popular, but they can't figure out how to package this message to the voters. The NY Times has an interesting piece on how they are struggling with the problem.

Lessons from the Midterms     Permalink

The elections are still 6 weeks away, but already people are drawing conclusions from them. Carl Cannon has drawn these conclusions so far:

• All politics is local.
• All politics is national.
• Money talks.
• Money doesn't mean a thing.
• It's the economy, stupid.
• We're tired of war.
• We're tired of taxes.
• Voting can be cathartic.

In other words, the voters are angry but there is hardly any pattern here and the anger is not focused. Every poll for months shows that the voters prefer Republicans to Democrats while at the same time they say that the Republicans are even worse than the Democrats. The voters are just lashing out and whoever is closest gets hit.

Today's Polls: GA IN KS OH PA WI VT-AL     Permalink

New Senate Polls

New House Polls

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