Wipe out
As it seems likely Democrats will enjoy large majorities in the Legislature, I wanted to note a Clark County race in the 17th LD.
Democrat Pat Campbell was leading Republican incumbent Jim Dunn 51.7% to 48.3% after the count last night. Campbell was the surprise victor in the Democratic primary who spent oh, $68 or so in that race. From The Columbian:
What this does to a political party is destroy the farm team. It makes it that much harder to find good candidates to run and move up, and the quality usually goes down, something the GOP can't really afford anyhow.
Or even if they recruit a candidate who looks good on paper, as the GOP did with Harris in the other 17th race, they have a very hard time raising money and bucking the trends.
Harris was a long time school board member with deep community roots whose campaign amounted to almost nothing. (To be fair, Wallace raised something like eleventy billion dollars and probably spooked potential Harris contributors. But that's the game.)
Over the years many people speculated about what was wrong with Clark County Democrats. The simplest answer is 1994 was what was wrong with them. When you get wiped out that badly, it takes a long time to come back.
Now the shoe is on the other foot, and I'm guessing it's even more severe for Republicans in other areas of the state. Republicans down here were lucky that their state senators in the 17th and 18th Districts were not up this year.
Which means they are up in 2008.
Democrat Pat Campbell was leading Republican incumbent Jim Dunn 51.7% to 48.3% after the count last night. Campbell was the surprise victor in the Democratic primary who spent oh, $68 or so in that race. From The Columbian:
Campbell declined to declare victory Tuesday. He said that if the results held, he would start contacting constituents this week to get advice about how he could serve their needs in Olympia.Which brings me to something I wanted to touch on. As delighted as we all are with results in the US House and Senate, notice that a lot of the damage to the GOP has been done down-ballot.
Dunn did not concede Tuesday and could not be reached for comment.
In the other 17th District race, Rep. Deb Wallace, a Democrat, easily defeated Republican Paul Harris for election to a third term in a race marked by acrimony on both sides and lopsided spending. Wallace raised $235,000 to $9,000 for Harris.
Democrats last held both House seats in the 17th a dozen years ago, before the Republican sweep of November 1994. That year Republican Marc Boldt defeated five-term incumbent Democrat Kim Peery and Republican Don Benton won an open seat after Holly Myers, the Democratic incumbent, decided not to seek re-election.
What this does to a political party is destroy the farm team. It makes it that much harder to find good candidates to run and move up, and the quality usually goes down, something the GOP can't really afford anyhow.
Or even if they recruit a candidate who looks good on paper, as the GOP did with Harris in the other 17th race, they have a very hard time raising money and bucking the trends.
Harris was a long time school board member with deep community roots whose campaign amounted to almost nothing. (To be fair, Wallace raised something like eleventy billion dollars and probably spooked potential Harris contributors. But that's the game.)
Over the years many people speculated about what was wrong with Clark County Democrats. The simplest answer is 1994 was what was wrong with them. When you get wiped out that badly, it takes a long time to come back.
Now the shoe is on the other foot, and I'm guessing it's even more severe for Republicans in other areas of the state. Republicans down here were lucky that their state senators in the 17th and 18th Districts were not up this year.
Which means they are up in 2008.
