Strickman pointed out that several different legislative districts converge in Supervisor District 4, where she was running. A better GOTV campaign combined with the targeting of all Democratic races would have boosted her chances. As it was, Strickman said, there was no one even coordinating the activities of all the different campaigns.
"If we had played like a team, I think we could have had a different result," Strickman said.
Danny Hellman
Who's ya daddy? Watergate "plumber" G. Gordon Liddy.
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State Dem flack DeRose argued that the party did all it could in a red state with a GOP homeboy running for prez and an Obama campaign with only a couple of offices statewide. Then there was the Dems' historic registration disadvantage. She's probably right about John McCain bringing out GOPers to the polls, but what happened to all those new voters the Dems have been boasting about and all that enthusiasm for Obama?
"We'll be doing detailed postmortems in the coming weeks," chirped the effervescent DeRose. Meanwhile, she had no answer for why the Dems' GOTV effort was a bust. She couldn't say what the party had done to help non-targeted races. Nor could she even cough up the names of the people at the state party responsible for strategy.
Landfried, Larson, and many others noted a problem with the Dems' message, or lack thereof. Republicans have a simple answer to the immigration problem: arrest, prosecute, and deport all illegal immigrants. But Dems refused to engage on the issue.
Similarly, the far right had a hunk of red meat in Prop 102, the anti-gay-marriage amendment, and it drew GOP voters to the polls like jackals to a carcass. The state Dems response? Ignore the 800-pound GOP pachyderm in the room.
In The Bird's view, the party's pusillanimity and strategic stupidity drips from the top down. And though Dems will miss her veto power, the likelihood of Janet amscraying to D.C. might be a blessing in disguise. Like with a losing sports franchise, sometimes the best thing is to oust the entire coaching staff. Now if the party could make sure Bivens and Weeg take a powder as well . . .
ARPAIO'S WATERGATE
Maria Weeg's been gloating in recent weeks over the fact that state GOP chairman Randy Pullen's had to give back $105K in donations from the shadowy Sheriff's Command Association, which has a P.O. box in Mesa and MCSO Captain Joel Fox writing checks.
In one recent state Democratic Party statement on the GOP funny money, the press release began with one line: "Republicans have only $73,000 cash on hand."
Of course, the GOP still kicked donkey ass, and that's where the parallels to Watergate begin but don't end, because if you'll recall, President Richard Nixon didn't really need a secret team of "plumbers" to break into the Dems' HQ in the Watergate complex in D.C. back in 1972, or to undermine their Democratic opponents as such GOP dirty tricksters did back then.
As anyone who's seen All the President's Men knows, Nixon was barreling toward a landslide re-election. Nixon's ultimate rival, Democrat George McGovern, would have lost, even without all the political subterfuge on the part of Nixon's CREEP, the Committee to Re-elect the President.
Similarly, Arpaio far out-raised Dan Saban. Until Arpaio ran the scummy anti-Saban TV ads in September, Arpaio and his operatives were successfully ignoring Saban's scramble for votes. And the electorate was generally following their lead. The anti-Saban ads were as unnecessary for Arpaio as Nixon's shenanigans were for him in 1972.
But it's almost as if, like Nixon, Arpaio, et al. couldn't help themselves.
Captain Fox, fronting for the SCA, donated $105K to the state GOP. Chairman Pullen funneled $78K of that into an independent expenditure group called Arizonans for Public Safety, which targeted (in a bad way) the campaigns of Saban and Tim Nelson. Such earmarking of funds is illegal. And groups like the SCA have to disclose the names of donors, so the party in turn can hand over that info to the Arizona Secretary of State.
According to an October 31 letter from Pullen to the Secretary of State's Office in response to the state Dems' complaint that the GOP had violated several state laws, Pullen asserts that he asked "Mr." Joel Fox for the names of those in the SCA, but received no reply. So he finally, grudgingly had to return the dolo. Of course, by then, the nasty anti-Saban ads had already been paid for.
Pullen claims, "No one at the party ever had a direct or indirect conversation with anyone . . . associated with SCA regarding the use of the funds."
The whole affair smells like a loaded diaper, and Joel Fox bears a too-close resemblance to infamous Nixon operative G. Gordon Liddy, mastermind of the Watergate break-in. Attorney General Terry Goddard confirmed that his office received a complaint concerning SCA-gate and that it was looking into the matter. Mysteriously, he said he could say no more.
What Goddard should do is call in Fox for questioning and interrogate Mr. Mustache under a hot light. Who knows? Maybe SCA-gate could do what Saban was unable to: remove Joe from office. But this heron would settle for whatever top member of Joe's command staff pulled the strings.
