With Tea Parties and Town Hall activism, the summer of conservative ferment hit a road bump with the coming of fall weather and the latest field poll.
Republicans Meg Whitman, Tom Campbell, and Steve Poizner are all losing to Democrats Jerry Brown and Gavin Newsom for California Governor.
Republican Senate hopefuls Carly Fiorina and Chuck DeVore are trailing Democrat lightning rod Barbara Boxer. While Republican areas across the country may be poised for a comeback in 2010, my gut feeling is California is as Democratic a state as ever. While the Cal state GOP chair Ron Neiring is spinning Field Poll results as no big deal, there is no way to escape their face value—Democrats have California under control.
Not quite dead in the water, the California GOP hangs on, barely.
So what does this mean locally going forward? CD-11 and AD-15 are high on the GOP target list. While they are still sorting out candidates for CD-11 vs Jerry McNerney, local Republicans have cleared the field for a repeat run for San Ramon Mayor Abram Wilson against Joan Buchanan in AD-15. The central organizing principal of the Wilson Campaign is the hope of local revulsion with Joan Buchanan as too liberal; betraying voters, especially Democrats when she ran in the CD-10 primary, not to mention the fiscal crisis in Sacramento.
The best hope for Republicans is if the young voters who tend to vote for Democrats stay home and Republicans can carry the day with angry old folks.
Republicans say they will be lifted by public unease over what some seems as an expansionist Democratic takeover coupled with tough House votes on issues like healthcare,
climate change and— just days ago—expanding the definition of hate crimes to cover sexual orientation.
“The political environment has shifted due largely to Democratic overreach, particularly on key economic issues and the ever-expanding role of the federal government,” said Ken Spain, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.
Without a doubt, the two parties are settling in for an intense year long battle. So do not expect the partisan talk and tension that has defined Capitol Hill in recent weeks to dissipate. With a struggle for supremacy under way, neither side will easily surrender much political or policy ground.