And the Huntsville Times endorses…
That’s right, they refused to endorse either Wayne Parker or Parker Griffith in the AL-05 race.
They say that documents alleging Griffith gave sub par treatment of cancer patients make it “difficult to imagine him serving his constituency effectively.” They also said he was too old.
As for Wayne Parker they said that he basically ran an ultra negative campaign with no message.
Personally, I don’t blame the Times for the non-endorsement. Griffith is an arrogant, bullying individual who accomplished squat during his two years in the Alabama Senate other than voting with his party over 99% of the time. The two biggest – and virtually only – issues Wayne Parker associated with himself are being pro-life and against gay marriage – one of which is low on my voting priority list and the other I don’t necessarily agreee with. His campaign was predicated on attacking Griffith.
I’m going to vote for Wayne Parker. I think he is the more philosophically agreeable individual and, unlike Dr. Griffith, I have confidence that Wayne is a thoroughly good and decent person. However his campaign hasn’t given me justification for a full throated, hearty endorsement.
Brian one of the first things the NRCC people need to do one week from now is launch a better candidate recruitment effort for 2010. You have republicans like Greg Davis next door in north Mississippi who are just horrible on the campaign trail. Theres also Jay Love down south and Mr Goddard over in Georgia who should be way ahead. Their just killing themselves with these candidates. Theres also three congressional seats in Tennessee and one in south Mississippi held by democrats that could easily be won by top tier GOP candidates. When you mix a very unpopular President in with bad candidate recruitment. No one should be shocked that the GOP is facing another loss of 20 plus seats in the House.
dan t, I think that’s a chicken/egg kind of situation. I personally think that a lot of good candidates didn’t want to run this time because they face such a huge up-hill climb. Why run now when you can run in 2 years after a) the country is sick of Obama or b) you at least have a fresh face to the Republican party in McCain?
Having said all that, I think y’all are being hard on Wayne. How could he sit on those documents in good conscious? I know I couldn’t do it.
I think many folks misunderstand the candidate recruitment process. While political parties certainly have a role to play, good candidates are those who already have “fire in their belly” for public service as well as personal skills to be a good candidate. The best candidates don’t have to be recruited to run, they identify themselves.
One huge advantage Dems have in candidate recruitment is the notion that “you’ve got to run as a Dem to win the local race”, regardless of the actual leanings of the district or county. So often good folks who want to serve in public office, but are not particularly partisian chose to run as a Dem, even if the county or district actually leans Republican.
Of course, in local races of the state the better-known, better-liked candidate will win the local race in either party unless it’s in an area that’s strongly partisian, one way or the other.
Although Alabama is a solidly red state, the local courthouses are still solidly dominated by Democrats and have been for many years. While municipal elections are non-partisian, I would say that a disproportionate number of Mayors & Council Members lean more Democrat. These local offices and the campaigns serve as incubators for the Dems to develop their candidates and gain campaign experience.
I believe we Republicans have a great team, but we need more depth, a larger pool of local officals and political activists to draw from. Of course, Republican presence in the courthouses & city halls have been steadily increasing since 1986, but our growth has been more top down.
Which gets me to this point: The Alabama Republican Party was largely irrelevant until 1986. We may be out of our infancy, but we still in an early growth stage. Having failed at infantide, the Dems have will continue to do can to stop the growth or at least slow it down.
I don’t think the Dems have been as effective in slowing down the growth of the Republican Party in Alabama as much as some Republicans who are quicker to criticize other Republicans than Democrats, often scaring away good candidates otherwise to the Democrats.
The Republican tide has risen steadily (there have been a few blips) since ‘86. Ultimately, either the Dems will be able to stop the rise or we’ll reach a tipping point where the legislature and many courthouses will be Republican. I hope it’s the latter option.
Mike, you somewhat echo my thoughts. I’ve all but given up on the national Republican party. It’s a matter of broken trust. However, I think there is opportunity to grow and provide direction to the party from the bottom up. Get good, honest leaders with conservative principles in local offices and nurture that talent like a pro baseball team uses the lower level “farm clubs.”
The term “farm team” was in mind as I wrote the post.