Wednesday, November 15, 2006

A brief election review

As I mentioned in the previous post, it saddens me greatly that the Darcy Burner button won’t remain on the newly-renamed 2006 Endorsed Winners section of this blog’s sidebar. 

In the company of fellow Western Washington bloggers Lynn Allen (Evergreen Politics) and Daniel Kirkdorffer (On The Road To 2008), I made one last trip across Lake Washington to attend Darcy’s farewell statement yesterday morning.  Standing alone at a podium, in a small room filled with friends and supporters (as well as a whole lot of reporters and TV cameras) she was, as always, quietly eloquent and unfailingly gracious.  I hope this bright and committed young woman will continue to do what needs to be done for our region and our country.  After Darcy left the room, there was general milling-about in the small courtyard near the Burner offices.  Within a few minutes, though, Darcy returned from wherever she’d gone, on her way back for a press conference.  She made a point of detouring from her route, though, to offer (and accept) hugs from us bloggers.  Her net-savvy, her commitment to the value of blogs to the democratic process, and her spot-on knowledge of vital issues like Net Neutrality will be missed.

I’m also sad to see Peter Goldmark’s name disappear from the list.  Though he started late, suffered from very low name-recognition, and didn’t garner a large campaign war chest, Peter won about 4-5% more of the vote in WA-05 than Don Barbieri got two years ago.  Considering that Cathy McMorris had the tremendous advantage of incumbency this time, Goldmark’s results might be considered to be very good.  But I’m disappointed that Peter didn’t even win the majority of votes in Okanogan County, where he’s known best.  I’d love to see him remain active in politics, perhaps at the state legislative level (he lives in either the 7th or 12th Legislative District) if he doesn’t want to try again for Congress.

Those two were the only losing races on my Endorsements sidebar.  The good people of the Evergreen State saw through the big-money campaign by the BIAW to buy themselves another seat on the bench, and returned Justice Owens to the Supreme Court by a landslide margin.  Equally impressive and sensible were the overwhelming defeats of Initiatives 920 and 933.  Take that, Frank Blethen!  Drag your sorry ass back into your cave, Howie Rich! The citizens of Seattle handily affirmed City Council’s selection of Sally Clark to join their membership, though she’ll have to face the electorate again in 2007 ... this time for a full four-year term.  And my good friend Derek Kilmer moved up to the State Senate from his previously-won House seat in the 26th LD; Larry Seaquist won Derek’s former seat, completing the district’s move from 2 R/1 D to all-Democratic in just two election cycles.

Of all the campaigns I endorsed, though, perhaps the most gratifying win came in a race that took place almost 3000 miles from here.  My Dartmouth classmate Paul Hodes will soon be Congressman Hodes (D-NH), representing that small town where we went to school over three decades ago.  In recognition of Paul’s achievement in my old stomping grounds, I moved his endorsement button to the top of the heap.

By the end of the campaign, it was almost anticlimactic that Paul walloped six-term incumbent (and scion of a famed Granite State political family) Charlie Bass in NH-02.  Paul’s resounding win was all but lost in the astonishing sweep by New Hampshire’s Democrats.  Carol Shea-Porter’s improbable grassroots victory in NH-01—she eased past a two-term incumbent after defeating a well-known DCCC-backed competitor in the primary, despite getting vastly outspent both times—may have been the biggest surprise in the country last Tuesday, but even that pales next to the Democratic takeover of the state’s Executive Council, the State Senate, and the General Court (house of representatives).  The last time there was a Democratic majority in the General Court was in 1911, and the last time Democrats controlled all of those legislative bodies simultaneously was during the Civil War! 

Somehow or another, New Hampshire is now just about the bluest state in the land.  Quite a change from the way it seemed during the years I lived there, 1996-2001.  I, of course, lived through the deep dark days of 2000, when New Hampshire was the only state in the union where that goddamn Ralph Nader deluded enough people to vote for him that Dubya edged Al Gore in the popular vote (in Florida, Al received more votes than Bush in spite of Ralph, but SCOTUS didn’t let them all be counted).

All in all, my endorsed campaigns achieved a lot.  Even if Darcy and Peter couldn’t help me pitch a shutout against the bad guys.