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Thursday, August 19, 2010
034 - Reflections on elections, winners and whiners
It will take awhile to forget the 2010 primary election campaign in Wyoming.
The results mean voters will be treated to at least two spirited statewide races this fall – the race for governor and the race for State Superintendent of Public Instruction.
As of this writing, the unofficial returns indicate that former U. S. Attorney Matt Mead of Cheyenne, a Republican, will take on Leslie Petersen of Wilson. Petersen is the former State Democrat Chair and a former Teton County Commissioner.
Mead and State Auditor Rita Meyer finished almost close enough for an automatic recount but not quite enough. Former State Ag Commissioner Ron Micheli of Fort Bridger ran a spirited campaign and actually led his party’s primary with 80 percent of the vote counted. Then Mead and Meyer surged back ahead with late votes from Campbell, Laramie and Park Counties.
GOP Superintendent primary winner Cindy Hill pounded the pavement in Wyoming and ran a textbook “put on the miles” campaign. She may have personally seen more voters than any candidate in any race. Did she really put 70,000 miles on her colorful van?
In the GOP governor primary, instead of a four-way dead heat as I predicted, it was a three-way horserace. To nobody’s surprise, it was very close. To just about everybody’s surprise, House Speaker Colin Simpson of Cody fell back early and never was a factor.
Back in February, I wrote it would take just 27,451 votes to win this primary with four strong candidates. A lot of people scoffed at that low number. With the fading of Simpson, Mead’s unofficial total of just over 30,272 votes shows how close that was.
Mead’s big war chest helped, though, as he spent almost $40 per vote, way more than any other candidate. Going forward, a comment by his November opponent Petersen may be prophetic when she said about Mead: “He has more money than God. And I think he intends to spend it on this race.”
In the Superintendent’s GOP race, Hill demolished incumbent Jim McBride plus former Superintendent Trent Blankenship and former Cheyenne School Superintendent Ted Adams. Adams had perhaps surprisingly garnered the endorsement of the Casper Star-Tribune.
Hill capitalized on the anger across Wyoming against the current status quo of education in our state.
These political races will be studied intensely in the future and it will be interesting to see what conclusions will result. For example:
• In the end, did Mead’s money trump the other candidates, all things being equal? Simpson’s campaign manager Joe Milczewski complained to me back in July about how difficult it was to run against the mountain of money Mead was throwing into the campaign.
• In the last four weeks, did Meyer run a defensive campaign where she tried “not to lose,” rather than “to win?” Some think so, but I would disagree. She ran a magnificent campaign and the difference between her and Mead was probably just plain dollars with Mead outspending her by 3:1.
• Gov. Dave Freudenthal is currently the most popular governor in the country. Both Mead and Meyer certain ran as “Freudenthal Republicans.” Although the message was subtle, it came through.
• Early on, Micheli said he hoped to gather 40,000 votes, as a result of his Agriculture, LDS and southwest Wyoming bases. He ended up with 27,592 votes, unofficially. He was right. With 40,000, he could have won.
• Simpson’s supporters were frustrated by that campaign’s last-minute advertising surge. Milczewski defended that by saying it was because of limits on money available plus that strategy had always worked for 7-term U. S. Rep. Barbara Cubin, whom Milczewski worked for in the past.
• Where does the Tea Party fit into all this? Micheli seemed to be their candidate but with four strong candidates, it showed that hard work by the others cut into that base.
• Had Meyer won, Wyoming (the Equality State) would have had two women running for governor. This would have been only the fourth time in American history that this would have occurred. I found tremendous support for Meyer among women that I know and really thought that would propel her to the win. Looks like she ended up about 360 voters short on that goal.
• Total votes cast in the GOP governor primary were, unofficially, 105,336 with another 22,425 in the Democrat primary for a total of 127,761 votes cast in this very important election. This is a shamefully low total and again reflects Wyoming’s idiotic summer primary schedule.
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