| What would it have required to get 45,000 Democratic primary voters to change their party affiliation from Democratic to Republican? Aside from getting the legislature to change the election laws, creating open primary elections, in a state where both the Democratic and Republican establishments depend on closed primary elections to ensure the maintenance of their political machines and the power that they produce, it would have required a grassroots effort to obtain lists of people who regularly vote in Democratic primary elections regardless of the fact that there are rarely ever contested statewide elections.
Actually, it would have been even easier than this. Because of the hotly contested Presidential primary election in February 2008 and the not-as-hotly-contested Senatorial primary election in June 2008, anyone who wanted a universe of prospective Democratic voters to contact in the Spring of 2009 would have had far more than they would have needed. In fact, they could have narrowed this universe somewhat by focusing solely on people who voted in both primary elections.
Obviously, none of the Democratic organizations would have been willing to do something like this. It would be bad PR for a party official to encourage prospective voters to switch their party affiliation so that their gubernatorial candidate could face weaker opposition.
However, just because the party establishment cannot and probably should not be involved in such an endeavor doesn't mean that it should not be done. If we believe that elections have consequences and the policymaking that we have seen since Christie was inaugurated in 2010 proves this, then people who care more about policy than politics should be willing to do whatever it takes within the boundaries of the law to achieve the electoral outcomes that will support their policy goals and objectives.
So what does this mean for the future? I would argue that President Barack Obama is as much of a lame duck going into 2012 as Corzine was three years ago. Had someone had the wherewithal at the time, they would have organized an effort to get him to not run for re-election so that someone else like Dick Codey could have run instead. However, this did not happen and I do not believe that anyone is going to have this kind of conversation with Obama even though there are other Democrats who would probably have a better chance to win in 2012 than him.
So in lieu of Obama deciding to not run for re-election or Howard Dean, Russ Feingold, or Al Gore (or even Eliot Spitzer or Anthony Weiner would be better) taking him on, Democrats have no choice but to sit on the sidelines and watch as Republicans choose their nominee. Or do we have a choice? If we cannot have an alternative candidate to Obama and if it is unlikely that the economic environment is going to improve anytime soon, we can at the very least play a role in deciding who will face him in 2012.
Feel free to present an alternative argument if you think that I am wrong about this, but at the moment, it appears as if the most likely Republican opponents for Obama are Michelle Bachmann, Rick Perry, and Mitt Romney. I include Bachmann in the top tier of Republican candidates despite the fact that her poll numbers have declined following Perry's entrance into the race, because she is undoubtably going to be a factor in the Iowa caucuses and if she can win them, it will probably enhance her ability to compete with Perry in the contests that follow for the teabagging wingnut vote.
Obviously, if Perry wins Iowa, her campaign will probably be finished, which will most likely end Romney's sometime thereafter as it is unlikely that he can win a head-to-head with Perry. He needs Bachmann in the race as long as possible to possibly outpace Perry. In my opinion, if either Perry or Romney wins the GOP nomination and unemployment remains above 9.0, Obama will lose. The only candidate in the GOP field who has a chance of winning the nomination and who I believe cannot win in November is Bachmann.
This point is debatable and we all may have varying opinions about these variables, but I think that most of us would agree that a Bachmann nomination gives Obama the best chance at re-election. I think that this is the reason why so much support has flocked to Perry so quickly. In the eyes of the full spectrum of Republican primary voters, he is the one candidate who is conservative enough to win the support of the TPM and electable enough to beat Obama.
Unless Perry completely embarrasses himself in the debates or says or does something completely unimaginable, I think that he will win Iowa narrowly, finish a close second or possibly upset Romney in NH, which would end the race then and there, win South Carolina in a landslide, and lock up the nomination shortly thereafter. The only chance that Bachmann has is to win Iowa, finish 2nd or better in New Hampshire, and win South Carolina. She can win Iowa on her own, but to do well in New Hampshire and South Carolina, she will need some help from someplace unexpected.
That someplace unexpected is the progressive grassroots. Both NH and SC have open primaries, the latter of which saw tea partiers have some fun at the expense of Democrats when they helped Alvin Greene win the Democratic Senatorial primary election in 2010 and completely embarrass himself in the months that followed. It was not as if tea party favorite, Jim DeMint, wasn't going to win re-election in a landslide anyway, but the fact that the Democratic nominee was even more embarrassing and unqualfied than Christine O'Donnell and Sharon Angle put together added insult to injury.
So if self-preservation is not a good enough reason to organize on Bachmann's behalf, revenge should be. Let us work to make Michelle Bachmann the face of the Republican Party and force downticket candidates like Joe Kyrillos, who may abandon efforts to run against Bob Menendez, because he knows that he has no chance in hell if he has to run in NJ on the same line as someone like Bachmann (or even Perry). Nominating Bachmann could also improve the chances of downticket Democratic candidates in swing states.
She is our only hope and we are hers. Politics makes strange bedfellows indeed, but if we truly care about policy more than politics, then we have to get in bed with Bachmann and her TPM allies to give us the best chance at re-electing Obama and giving him the Democratic majorities in the House and Senate that he will need to have any chance to fulfill the promise that his 2008 campaign gave us and make up for the many failures of his first term as President.
Did you vote for Jon Corzine in June and November 2009? If you knew that helping Steve Lonegan win the Republican nomination would have helped Corzine win re-election, would you have done it? It is too late for Corzine, but it is not too late for Obama. All of the time and money thatwe spend on helping him get re-elected over the next year is not going to make a difference unless the economy improves or Bachmann is the GOP nominee. In my opinion, helping her is the only way that the progressive grassroots can actually help Obama win re-election.
45,000 votes would have made the difference in 2009. Who knows how many progressive votes will be needed in 2012? |
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