Offering frequent news and analysis from the majestic Evergreen State and beyond, The Cascadia Advocate is the Northwest Progressive Institute's unconventional perspective on world, national, and local politics.

Wednesday, April 2, 2008

CQ: Burner, Gregoire gaining strength

Congressional Quarterly has just released a new brief outlining the changing dynamics of two top races in Washington State (the 2008 gubernatorial and 8th District contests). The title of the brief speaks for itself: "Democrats Gaining Strength in Washington State". Here's a summary:
Gov. Christine Gregoire and 8th District candidate Darcy Burner came within a razor‑thin edge of their opponents in their last contests. But analysts now say that the Democrats have upped their chancing of winning as the state GOP party faces structural problems and GOP efforts to appeal to the state’s large number of moderate voters has been hampered by their strong conservative base.

CQ Politics is now changing its rating of the Washington state Governor’s race from No Clear Favorite to Leans Democrat and Washington’s 8th District rating from Leans Republican to No Clear Favorite.
CQ cites Darcy Burner's incredible fundraising, work on the Responsible Plan (now endorsed by a total of fifty two Democratic challengers), and well-built campaign as important advantages over an ineffective incumbent.

Gregoire, meanwhile, has a very successful record to run on. Her many accomplishments as chief executive will blunt Rossi's attacks as well as his appeal to independent or biconceptual voters. CQ notes that recent polling conducted by the University of Washington shows the Governor faring better against Dino Rossi with voters. Gregoire also has more money than Rossi and is now asking for contributions again following the end of the legislative session fundraising freeze.

Many Republicans seem to be under the delusion that 2008 holds a lot of promise for their party. In particular, the GOP is hoping that Rob McKenna and Dave Reichert will be reelected and Dino Rossi will defeat Chris Gregoire. But chances are excellent that just the opposite will happen in all three races.

Reichert is extremely vulnerable, Rossi has nothing to sell to voters but himself (all of his attacks so far have been lackluster or worse), and McKenna will be squaring off against a Democrat with a solid base outside of King County in a tough political climate for the GOP. McKenna's reelection to the Attorney General post is no sure thing with Pierce County Executive John Ladenburg as an opponent.

CQ's brief is just a confirmation of what Democrats already know: we have strong candidates running in top Washington State races. But that doesn't mean victory is assured. Winning elections requires a huge investment of time, talent, and treasure. We have to be prepared to go to work if we want a government that responsibly takes on our many difficult challenges and listens to the American people.

Comments:

Blogger Pierce County Undone said...

"and McKenna will be squaring off against a Democrat with a solid base outside of King County in a tough political climate for the GOP."

Surely you can't mean Ladenburg. Solid base? No way.

Ladenburg's tout of "There's nothing broken in Pierce County." Reminds me of the Emperor who had no clothes. The majority of The People of Pierce County can see the serious brokenness that he apparently cannot. A clean example of this would be the fact that he wrote 8 of the 9 statements against the 2006 Charter Amendments (and the News Tribune supported his opinions), yet the people past 7 of the 9.

If he wins the AG race, the whole state’s in trouble.

April 13, 2008 10:04 AM  

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