Sifting Through the Electoral Rubble
Posted November 4th, 2009 at 10:33 AM by Jeff A. TaylorJohn Lassiter pauses Election Day campaigning to grip-and-grin at the unveiling of Uptown’s new Disco Chicken. Pat McCrory is off shilling for trains in Tampa but hurries back in time to give Lassiter a consolation hug.
Local Republicans need to think long and hard about what comes next.
The turnout map for 2009 is eerily similar to that of 2007. The further you get from GOP ground zero at roughly Providence and Sharon Amity, the lower the turnout. Lassiter ran as a McCrory Republican. I don’t think you can discount the connection.
Lassiter needed more of the large suburban precincts to turn out above 30 percent, like Olde Providence did for him, giving him over 900 votes, 700 more than Anthony Foxx received. Instead he got GOP precincts along Rea Road and into Ballantyne turning out at 24 percent (Pct. 232), 27 percent (Pct. 112), 29 percent (Pct. 90), 20 percent (Pct. 226), 26 percent (Pct. 144), and 24 percent (Pct. 137). That last one — Providence Country Club — has over 5100 upper middle-class voters who went 80-20 for Lassiter, yet the local GOP could not even get one quarter of them to the polls.
Last year the Official Excuse for this dismal performance was the Obamawave coupled with biased reporting discouraging people from coming out to vote for GOP candidates. Maybe it was the weather this year: It was too nice out so all Repubs went golfing instead of to the polls.
Meanwhile, Greensboro just booted out its first incumbent mayor ever in favor of a first-time candidate running on a platform of fiscal conservatism. No one expected Bill Knight to top Yvonne Johnson, but he did:
Knight, a retired certified public accountant, has promised to cut tens of millions of dollars from the city budget — an appealing prospect for voters who are disappointed that Greensboro has the highest tax rate among large North Carolina cities.
“I want an efficient city government. Let’s remake what a municipal government is all about,” Knight said.
Huh. And Knight will have a city council committed to the same thing. Double huh.
Special bonus incompetency to the Uptown paper of record, which omitted Libertarian Party at-large candidate Travis Wheat from its Election Day candidate rundown and today does not even bother to run a correction.
Oh, and look, today’s edit on the new city council continues to make the mistake of identifying Tariq Bokhari’s candidacy with the Tea Party movement. The Dilworth libs want to do this so they can claim that voters “rejected” the “extremism” of Tea Party issues. Check out this fairy tale:
With voters choosing a Democrat for mayor, adding a Democrat to the at-large lineup and giving a thumbs down to three conservative Republicans running at-large, it’s tempting to conclude that Tuesday’s election was a rejection of the more extreme wing of the Republican Party. Candidates Bokhari and Ridenhour were organizers of the anti-tax Tea Party rallies earlier this year and had courted the party’s conservatives. Peacock ran a more middle-of-the-road campaign, a strategy that paid off, despite some grumbling about his lack of conservative credentials from the right wing in his party.
This is a fabrication. We pointed out the differences between Bokhari and Ridenhour back in September when this myth first surfaced.
Bokhari ran for city council in 2007, Ridenhour had not sought office before he used the Tea Party structure he put together to seek office this year. Bokhari and Ridenhour are friends and share many of the same positions, but they are not both creations of the Tea Party movement. Bokhari was endorsed by former mayor and transit tax supporter Richard Vinroot. McCrory did a robocall for Bokhari (and Jaye Rao) and to my knowledge not for Ridenhour.
Further, any objective take on their campaigns would put Ridenhour further away from Peacock than Bokhari. In fact, it would not be unfair to put Bokhari equidistant between Ridenhour and Peacock, with Ridenhour slightly to the right, and Peacock to the middle. But such details mess up the simplistic narrative the Uptown paper wants to hawk. As ever, I simply cannot tell if the Tryon Street crew believes its own propaganda or just does not care to get the facts straight.
For now, understand that the Uptown paper wants you to know that any city-wide candidate who is not the son of a former mayor and does not support a publicly subsidized farmers market in Uptown cannot possibly be elected.
Bonus 2010 Prediction: The state GOP is gonna rue the day it decided to stand by and watch Charlotte turn into a blue-vote generating machine.
November 4th, 2009 at 11:09 am
[...] Deck’s bonus 2010 prediction is the “state GOP is gonna rue the day it decided to stand by and watch Charlotte turn into a [...]
November 4th, 2009 at 1:18 pm
Ummm Jeff,
I had a phone call months ago with Ridihour just before a public meeting and felt he needed to be careful with his protests. I was VERY concerned that the group was MIA when we had a Republican President in office last year and where was the group when the banks were getting cash with no strings attached? To his credit he told me he called ALOT of elected officials with concerns of the great bank bailout.
BUT! I also received a phone call from Tariq that same day with concerns with what I said to Ridihour. I saw allot of connections with current and former elected officials with that group. I was very happy to see Ridenhour file for office as I felt his group was being USED by insiders in the Mecklenburg GOP. The downside was that I suspected this could hurt the GOP chances in the general election. It appears that it split the republican votes. Tariq WAS close to the Tea Party people but I would not say he was a card carrying member of that group. They have every right though under the US Constitution to speak out. I wish Tariq and Ridenhour the best.
November 4th, 2009 at 1:27 pm
Not to diminish Bokhari, because I think he was a great candidate and I wouldn’t mind him giving it another try, but Ridenhour lagged behind him by only 41 votes, or .01%. And like you said, that’s without the McCrory robocalls and party-bigwigs fundraising.
Jaye Rao came in 8th but didn’t trail as badly as the 7th and 8th places in 2007. Jaye’s biggest mistake was not putting her face on her signs; it probably would have gotten her some votes from Burgess one-shotters.
They all did as well as or better than Ramirez and Peacock did last time, in terms of vote totals… Am I desperate and stretching here, or is this a sign of hope?
And how about that PPP? Should we ever take them seriously again, at least when they’re polling around here?
November 4th, 2009 at 1:32 pm
“DISCO CHICKEN” is just great writing and branding. Jeff, is this an original of yours? Brilliant! Made me laugh for 15 minutes.
November 4th, 2009 at 2:04 pm
Nope DEF, follow the link to the Keeping Up with the Belks post that started the Disco Chicken meme. I feel it is destined to go down with the Headless Gumby as great commentary on the CLT arts scene.
And cmitchz, I hope both Tariq and Matt consider running again. Both are committed, talented candidates who are not afraid to step outside status quo straightjacket.
George, I think what happened was that when the Tea Party showed up in force to blunt the drive for ANOTHER half-cent for transit back in the spring — and embarass Lassiter in the process, who voted along with Foxx for the authority to levy such a tax — the local GOP moved to try to “control” the issue, by manufacturing the $4.5m. streetcar study veto theater and positioning Peacock as apart and different than the “Tea Party guys.”
I think you could say that approach was an utter failure. So many echoes come to mind — Dole’s Kemp Commission which was supposed to blunt and control federal tax reform fever amongst GOP activists in the mid-90s and most vividly, McCain opting NOT to side with House Republicans against the Bush bailout.
The willful decision on the part of the GOP wing of the local status quo to treat the Tea Party folks as enemies or a contagen rather than allies against an expansion of the state may have guaranteed that Pat McCrory will be the last GOP mayor of Charlotte. Ever.
November 4th, 2009 at 5:13 pm
Jeff,
The County GOP was trying to “control” the issue. That was what I warned Matt about. I asked him if the elected officials and past elected officials would be three feet from him at the 1/2 cent protest rally or would they be hiding behind trees and bushes to see how the media and public reacts to the Tea Party Group. yep folks it was the later. I thought Lassiter was WRONG to have voted to try to levey that additional tax. If that tax was a PURE tax that was RESTRICED to say police, courts,fire and COMPLETING CURRENT ROAD PROJECTS. I would have SUPPORTED IT. But the good all Chamber and City Partners wanted it. Lots of currents here. That voted KILLED lasitors chance for Mayor period.
The Republican Party has three parts. Conservative, Social Conservative and moderate. In areas like Disctrict 6 ( County ) or District 1 Conservative will win. In the north west and north of Charlotte they will never win but a MODERATE could. You will never see a 100 % Conservative Charlotte Councile and Mayor. The County GOP should have recently outed Judge Belk. What a mess.
Years ago they should have also went agianst the areana when the people said NO.
THAT is killing the GOP with average voters. It is Do as I say not as I do. Grief.
GLA
November 4th, 2009 at 5:45 pm
[...] This post was mentioned on Twitter by Jeff A. Taylor, Guy Peters. Guy Peters said: Precinct 232 (mine) pitiful turnout 24%, ensuring conservatives can't win City Council At-large. (via @MeckDeck) http://bit.ly/1CB021 [...]
November 5th, 2009 at 10:43 am
If you want a great illustration of what ‘controlled opposition’ is, take a look at those tea party protests. I was amazed that folks were so eager to use their justified anger and do nothing but trash perfectly good tea rather than say, do something that would really grab attention like going en masse to banks and withdrawing all your money on a specified day. The phony con-servative movement ‘leaders’ who were cheerleading those parties showed their true colors for anyone that was paying attention, which was apparently very few.
November 5th, 2009 at 2:58 pm
Help me out here, Jason- how would a run on the banks make anything better, exactly?
November 5th, 2009 at 5:43 pm
While I’m not sure that a run on the banks is a good idea, there is something to be said for organizing mass boycotts of corporate entities whose politics and/or coziness with the Obama administration are helping to destroy this country.
Case in point: What do you suppose would happen if every Tea Party protestor and every person who watches Fox News, as well as their families, suddenly ceased all consumption of GE product? No NBC, no GE appliances or light bulbs, no nothing from GE, not even using GE medical devices in hospitals. Yelling and screaming for the benefit of the news cameras is one thing; calmly telling someone “I will not buy or use that product” is more powerful.
November 6th, 2009 at 7:28 am
The idea of economic boycotts are very much looked down at GOP HQ becouse they worry that the Chamber would get pissed. Then thier is the issue of all the cash from busn owners might dry up too! Also boycotts is what historicaly what you saw the liberals do and we don’t want to go there! A single day boycott is near worthless. REAL boycotts DO WORK but often will cause some pain to the people who do them. If you want lower gasoline prices then if we all downsized to small cars from SUV and turned the heat way down at home lower demand would lower oil prices. Now I no some ding bat might post if we drill baby drill ( tell that to sarah palins daughter ) then prices would also drop. That production would NOT be seen for 8-10 years. Only long term oil future contracts would move.
GLA
November 6th, 2009 at 10:34 am
Not saying a bank run is the end all resolution to the issue, but it removes assets from the financial players who caused the problem. It’s an infinitely better idea than fake tea party recreations that do nothing but create an easy target for ridicule, bring absolutely no resolution to the issue, and cause a brief rise in demand for Lipton.
My main point is that citizens with legitimate concerns about the financial direction of this country were looking for a way to exercise their free speech and right to assemble, and IMO at least, were herded into a benign action that garnered publicity but did not in any way lead to a resolution. Just like the promoters of the tea parties wanted.
My question is, what’s changed since these tea parties? Goldman Sachs and the like still received astronomical bonuses this year after they served as a conduit for laundered money to European banks and no one made a peep.
Btw, I’d like to thank those that run this blog for keeping tabs on the banking HQ in NC. You have a real asset here and I appreciate it.