Hi Frank,
Frank Reichert wrote:
To which, you replied:
Back in the 1970s, all politicians who were pro-choice on abortion felt
obligated to make the statement "I am personally opposed to abortion but
..." That has certainly changed. At this point, no one cares about a
candidate's "personal" views on abortion, but only about the public policy
stance that person takes. Perhaps the same will happen with the drug
issue.
I am not so sure I would rapidly sign on to this assessment. It appears at
least, even casual remarks, or even early briefs written by Supreme Court
nominees are regarded very HEAVILY in terms of how a person might
personally feel about such a hot button issues just to qualify to Senate
approval. We haven't seen the last of this latest one, of course, but the
outcome could very well suggest that what someone's 'personal beliefs might
be' could very well suggest the outcome. Other factors enter into this to
be sure, such as Bush's current approval ratings.
But my point is that the political situation was such in the 1970s that even
rabid pro-choicers had to voice the words, "I'm personally opposed to
abortion." Now, times have changed and such a declaration is not considered
important. It isn't really important in the Alito case either; it will just
be an excuse for people to vote the way they already wanted to.
You continued in response to Robert Goodman...
In the last congressional election, the GOP candidate was Scott Paterno,
son of Penn State coach Joe Paterno, but otherwise with no particular
qualifications, though I met him and he seemed OK. In college (not that
long ago, since he's in his 30s), he had written in support of drug
legalization. He felt obligated to renounce that view and most people
accepted it. When I met him and told him he should have stuck with his
position, I got the sense that he still held his original view. He got
thumped in the election by a 9-or-so term incumbent, though the GOP has a
significant registration edge. It would have been interesting to see what
would have happened had he come out for drug legalization. I can't imagine
he would have done any worse than he did. BTW, he did about as well as the
pre- and post-primary polls said he would.
The situation you just described can be viewed from various standpoints.
In Idaho, as I have observed, local and even State office votes usually are
formed in a vortex surrounding what the 'good 'ol boy' Network seems to
approve of. Let me try and simplify this somewhat.
Idaho is obviously a pro-GOP State. North Idaho, which once used to have a
very strong Democrat presence, now finds a situation that in order to get
elected, even when you are really a Democrat sympathizer, you simply run as
a Republican! It's happened at least twice that I can remember in this
County in the last ten years. One County Commission ran for State Senate
as a Democrat, LOST, and then re-ran for the Country Commission, this time
as a Republican and one. The other instance was the County Sheriff who
originally was placed in office as a Democrat. He lost. He came back
after a tour with the Federal government in Bosnia, and ran as a
Republican, and magically he was overwhelmingly re-elected!
The leaning in Idaho, even north Idaho today, is largely a solid GOP strong
hold, although that might be changing, and it is still too early to tell.
If you compound what I just wrote, throughout an entire block of north
Idaho you come around to what I am suggesting here is that Party labels
themselves can be taken over by the opposite Party, or at least insofar as
Candidates might be concerned. This isn't of course a Democrat plot to
bring Democrats into office, per se. It's simply political expediency, and
in that sense at least it seems to work rather nicely. I would venture to
say that all three of Idaho's Region I legislative candidates are entirely
Democrats wearing a disguise of the GOP, two State Representatives and a
three-term State Senator. It was even rumored that Idaho State Senator
Shawn Keogue was in fact a Democrat activist when she first moved here, but
realized that to get elected she had to find a way to cozy out with the
various local GOP Central Committees at the local level to get elected. I
am not so sure that the rumor is entirely true, but the credibility is
certainty assuring that it most likely and probably is!
In the case I presented though, I do not believe Scott Paterno is a Democrat
running as a Republican. His other positions were standard GOP positions.
And while he didn't have much of a record - part of his credibility problem,
btw, since his only political experience was a 5-month stint in a state
senator's office that his father arranged for him - what little evidence
there was suggested that except on the issue of drug legalization he was a
standard-order conservative Republican. (His father appeared at some GOP
fundraisers.)
Here's my main source for this information, although I have heard the same
story from other sources:
My Democrat opponent in 2004 when I was running for State Representative
(under the Libertarian Party banner), confided in me, being himself a
Democrat activist at the time, that Shawn Keogue showed up at all of the
meetings, but decided for expediency's sake to bolt to the GOP. That's the
story. You wonder just how widespread this may be in terms of Idaho
politics these days, don't you?
Think about it. We are talking about just one small Region in north Idaho.
When you examine the legislative track record of our State Legislature
these days, it could have obviously been entirely written by liberal
Democrats!
Is there any wonder why there is such divisiveness and division within the
GOP in Idaho these day? At least half of the GOP in Idaho is made up of
expedient Democrats!
That's one reason that in many cases the party primary decides everything.
One reason I've been a registered Republican for a long time, even back in
the days when I was active in the LP.
Regards,
Doug
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