Question of the day . . . What is Franks’ Tanks gonna do now?

One of two things:
1) CELEBRATE the fact that Franks removed himself from House Rep and Mississippi removed him from LG possibility.

2) Realize that Franks will now move back to Mooreville full-time… Franks Tanks may be rethinking this whole thing.

I will have to say this again and again: Less than a week before the 2003 elections, 68% of likely voters had no idea who Gary Anderson was.  This year, some Anderson supporters got angry because a Chaney ad included a picture of Anderson--as if his campaign were supposed to be so invisible that nobody even knows what he looks like.

All the Anderson losses prove is that an obscure, underpromoted candidate with no policy platform can’t win statewide office.  I think we all knew that.  But white leaders in the Mississippi Democratic Party will continue to use his losses to issue the self-fulfilling prophecy that a black candidate can’t win statewide office in Mississippi so that underqualified white candidates, such as Eaves and Franks, will have the field cleared for them.

Fun fact: Gary Anderson STILL got more votes than Franks and Smith, and almost as many votes as Eaves. 

As far as George Dale goes, it was high time for him to go.  I can’t see why anyone, on either side of the aisle, wouldn’t see Mike Chaney as a vast improvement over Dale.

You make an interesting point, albeit obtusely.  Good candidates win races.  Republicans ran against 30 something trial lawyers and no name bureaucrats.  They won as they should have won.

Downticket in legislative races, Democrats had gains in the Senate because they had better candidates.  You saw that with folks like David Baria and David Blount.  They were better candidates than the incumbents they faced.  House is still TBD.

The job is not yet over.  70+% of every sheriff, supervisor, DA, etc. all have Ds by their names in Mississippi.  To really win for the long term, the state GOP has to do a MUCH MUCH better job of candidate recruitment there.  Taking 7 of 8 statewide is a good step, but Herring/Barbour must do a better job at penetrating the ranks at the County level.  That will mean new County GOP chairs and much more energized organization.

By the way, did anyone notice that Socrates Garrett was in frame during Barbour’s acceptance speech.  There is about to be some major energy from African American leaders getting more active in the State GOP and that realize that their interests will be better served there.

Meanwhile, the “regressives” are calling Garrett a “sell-out”, which is just PC code for saying something much more offensive.

Yet the GOP is racist when it doesn’t reach out to black voters and when people liek Socrates climb on board they don’t represent. yeah.

If the rumored number of Barbour carrying 22% of black voters is true, this may change.

It’s also approaching the point, I think, when the Mississippi Republican Party can field a black candidate for statewide office.  When that happens, and I hope it will in 2011, then the dynamic will change considerably.

There was a comment on the JFP thread to the effect of “once again, a slate of all-white male candidates got elected.” Well, sure--and if the Democrats swept every race but insurance commissioner, there’d still be a slate of all-white male candidates.  There is a huge racial difference in terms of votes, but in terms of who controls each party, it still looks to me like two groups of white men duking it out.

anyone have the contact info for the local Young Republicans? Nothing on the state GOP website. thanks.

Kingfish - Call the party office.  They’ll get you in touch.

no one answering today. my email is

Tom Head wrote: “All the Anderson losses prove is that an obscure, underpromoted candidate with no policy platform can’t win statewide office.  I think we all knew that.  But white leaders in the Mississippi Democratic Party will continue to use his losses to issue the self-fulfilling prophecy that a black candidate can’t win statewide office in Mississippi so that underqualified white candidates, such as Eaves and Franks, will have the field cleared for them.”

I would maintain that it was Anderson that had the field cleared when Dale was not certified as a Democratic candidate by the black leaders of the Mississippi Democratic Party.  Unfortunately, actions like that cause a counter reaction.  When a member of a minority group needs the support of some of the majority group to obtain election to a statewide office, he has to cast a wide net.  Anderson wasn’t able to do that this time around.

House Seat 111 went to the Dems by 11 votes after absentee and affidavit ballots were counted.

Tom Head wrote:  “It’s also approaching the point, I think, when the Mississippi Republican Party can field a black candidate for statewide office.”

The 1983 Republican nominee for state treasurer was Wilbur Colom, and the 1995 GOP nominee for attorney general was Bill Jordan.  Most of Colom’s and Jordan’s fellow blacks voted for their white Democratic opponents.

“... it still looks to me like two groups of white men duking it out.”

Ebbie Spivey and Evelyn McPhail both chaired the state Republican Party, and McPhail had a high post on the GOP National Committee when Haley Barbour was national chairman.  For women to have leadership positions, they have to offer themselves, which is relatively rare.

Starting in 1959, Evelyn Gandy was elected to three different statewide offices, and she ran twice for governor.  In the 1950s, Gov. Tom Bailey’s widow was state tax collector, which was an elective office.  And “Miss Julia” Kendrick was the longtime elected clerk of the Supreme Court.

What happened to Barbara Blackmon?  In 2003, she was the Democratic nominee against the incumbent lieutenant governor, but this year, with the seat open, she did not run.

Well, ole Reagan Dem called all the state-wide race wins correctly, but didn’t come close to getting the score right in any of them, except the Ag Commissioner’s race. 

The percentage spread in the LG’s race, SOS race, AG’s race, and Insurance Commissioner’s race struck me a little.  Those elections just weren’t close.  It’s as then entirity of the independent swing voter population went for the winner in those races, as opposed to those swing voters splitting between the two candidates in one degree or another.

It hasn’t been discussed very much, I don’t think, but I thought Lynn Posey’s win was a little bit of a surprise.  Don’t get me wrong, I like Lynn Posey and voted for him myself, but I didn’t think he’d done enough as compared to Charles Barbour to win the General Election contest.  Posey literally won without any money.  There had to be an unorganized word of mouth type of Pro-Posey campaign out there, that I wasn’t privy to, nor heard anything about.  This was probably the most surprising contest of the night, for me.

I did a pretty poor job calling the Senate races overall.  I knew that Doxey had a district that was set against him, pretty badly.  You have to admire Ralph, though.  When he switched parties he said that he’d felt so free from having done so, and didn’t really care about the consequences of possibly losing re-election.  I think I’d called that one a loss in my predictions post, but I maybe I was wishing him through it, and called it a squeak win, but at this point I can’t remember.

I also think that I remember predicting Gloria Williamson to hang on in another squeaker, though I’d heard that alot of folks thought Ward was going to win it.  Well sure enough he did, and he should be congratulated for winning a tough contest.

I know I remember predicting Richard White to win, and boy was I dead wrong.  Blount ran a solid campaign, and deserved the hard fought win, and should also be congratulated.

I missed the Shannon Walley contest as well, as he lost in a pretty close contest down in his district.  This was one of the more odd contests of them all with Walley a Dem to Republican switcher, and Dickerson a Dem to Repub back to Dem switcheroo.  I’d thought that the Walley boys campaign vigor would get them through it, and it did for Shaun who beat Ladd Pulliam, but Shannon didn’t quite get over the line.

Finally, I thought the changes down on the gulf coast would give Ashley Skellie a lift into the winner’s circle, but she lost also by about 500 votes.

Without a doubt it was a very tough night for Republicans in the Senate.  Party switching issues in districts that lean Democrat, and what I’d believe is the first blush reflection that Hinds County is becoming increasingly Democratic, while at the same time Madison and Rankin counties have grown increasingly Republican, was demonstrated in the White, John Reeves house race and the Supervisor District 1 contests.

In the House races, since I mentioned the John Reeves race above, let me say that while the state media howls about race as an issue in the Insurance Commissioner’s race, they ignore two races that suggest race may have been a factor in one, and not a factor at all in another. 

Reeves, without a doubt, was a blatantly honest legislator (sometimes to a fault if there is such a thing).  As a legislator he did more for the City of Jackson than anyone in the Jackson delegation, and no one can argue with that.  John’s district changed as far as it’s demographics, and I know that John agonized over whether to switch parties because of those demographic changes.  John’s vote in the house wasn’t at all a normal conservative vote, as his vote was just as likely to be in favor of Speaker McCoy’s agenda, as it was in anyone else’s agenda. 

Given Reeves’ concerns for voting in the manner that best reflected his district, and helped the City of Jackson, it’s disappointing that he lost.  Moreover, while certainly not the only factor, his opponent a black female better reflected the changing demographics of the district. 

I wasn’t close enough to the situation to know what kind of campaign his opponent ran, but did see ads from Reeves that had strong Democrat support for Reeves.  He didn’t run away from his race or party, by doing commercials without his picture, or anything like that to try to trick the voters.  In fact he said something to the effect of “Let me first state the obvious, I’m a white male Republican, and I’m asking you to look past that...”

Anyway, my point here is that race and party to some degree did seem to be a problem for John Reeves, yesterday.  Before you jump on me, regarding this, I don’t think it was his only problem, but it was a factor nevertheless.

The other race was in Travis Little’s old seat in the Corinth area.  That area probably has a black voting age population of 5 percent, but those and a lot of the other 95 percent in a pretty conservative district combined to elect a black Democrat to the Senate yesterday.  This case is one in which the candidate’s race didn’t seem to matter one bit to the electorate.

It will be interesting to watch Senator-elect Powell, in terms of how he fits into the normal black caucus voting pattern, which is generally a more liberal vote, or will he like John Reeves break away from his party and the senate black caucus to vote more in the way most in his district would want to vote.  We’ll see soon enough.

Footsoldier, what’s your source?

Steve, I completely forgot about Bill Jordan!  So you’re telling me the Republican Party has been nominating black statewide candidates since 1983?!  Incredible.

I’m the source. I was there all day yesterday. Heartbreaking experience to say the least, but the people have spoken. There are some irregularities that need to be checked, and a recount should be done. The Jackson County Election Commision has its act together, however. We’ll see what happens.

One correction.  Attorney General Jim Hood was the top vote getter on Tuesday with 421,525 to Treasurer Reeves’ 421,307.

The statewide races illustrate a point that Andy Taggert brings up:  A Statewide Democrat is virtually assured 39% of the vote by simply showing up.  He bases his point on the Treasurer election results.  I’d argue that the percentage is really higher, more like 42%; so long as the Democrat is not a complete baffoon as was O’Hara.

Hood was the highest vote getter and broke 60% in the face of unprecedented negative attacks.  This, in my opinion, illustrates that well-funded, well-known statewide Democrats are no less likely to win statewide than well-funded, well-known Repubs.

My question for Alan and this board is this:  What is the built-in-percentage of the vote for Repubs?  My premise for this question is that there are essentially three distinct voting groups in this State - Repub, Dem and something in between.  I seems the Dems answer is 42%.  What are the other two?

I think that a Democrat gets the 42 just by being on the ballot (absence any serious mental instability ala Shawn O’hara), in a LOW TURNOUT race.

In a race with high turnout such as 2003, the Dem automatics decrease, in terms of percentage.

GOP base in Mississippi is bout 35

Really, you think the GOP base is smaller than that of the Dems?  I’ve previously thought the GOP base to be larger than that, closer to 40% of the Dems. 

Aside from my non-scientific belief, your 35% figure would explain the 40% Hopkins obtained.  All of his high-priced negative attacks diverted 5% of the independent vote his way and the remaining 20% or so went to Hood.

Perhaps you are right.  It would explain why Barbour and Hood both won by similar margains.  The independent vote flipped in opposite directions in favor of each of them, illustrating the power of incumbent who has the perception of a demonstrable record of success.

Whatever the Democratic base was prior to this election, I think it shrunk a little bit afterwards.  I have a theory that those 125,000 voters were at least to a great extent folks who stayed home because they didn’t see a point to showing up; I know most of my friends didn’t bother to vote this time, and they usually do.  Personally, I was happy to push the button for Barbour, but the argument that he doesn’t care about Medicaid recipients and so forth has been very effectively sold by people other than John Eaves over the past four years.  Eaves really had to outdo himself to keep some of these folks, anti-Barbour through and through, away from the polls. 

I didn’t consider myself a real Democrat to begin with, but if I did, 2007 would have cured me of it.  And I’m sure that’s true of many people.

If the legislature does its job of re-doing our election laws and in the process requires every one to re-register, I would not be surprised to see the state come be 1/3 R’s, 1/3 D’s and 1/3 “voting for the best man”.

If McCoy becomes speaker, there won’t be any election law changes (voter ID, cleansed voter roles).  The black caucus will not let him bring any of those issues up for a vote.  The chairman of elections will pocket veto those issues on the House side.

You can also bet that same chairman of elections will reapportion in a way to keep the status quo, by splitting as many precincts as necessary to create as many left leaning districts as possible.

Yes, to confirm..... Dem base is 39, GOP is 35

Alan...great website and awesome dialogue on the recent elections and the upcoming session.  I look forward to joining the dialogue.  One comment I’d like to make is that I wasn’t surprised at all by the statewide election results.  As usual, voter turnout was horrific.

Reagan Dem...I was suprised by Lynn Posey’s win as well.  I just knew that Charles Barbour would pull through on that race.  His t.v. campaign and his last name, i thought, would pull him through to a win.

Locally...Roger Davis, Republican Candidate for Hinds County Supervisor District One, is fighting for his win.  Last I heard, he was down at the Hinds County Election Commissioner’s Office observing the counting of Absentee and Affidavit Ballots.  Roger is a great guy and I’m hoping he pulls through.

Locally...Roger Davis, Republican Candidate for Hinds County Supervisor District One, is fighting for his win.

Read an estimate elsewhere that Ward 1 turnout was down 2000 to 2500 voters.

Bill Denny was unopposed.  Walter Michel had competition in name only.  There wasn’t much fear about who would win the statewides.  Too many easy excuses for Republicans to skip this one.

Low turnout levels the playing field in some local elections real fast.

Ballot Access News has a good post on the agriculture commissioner’s race and recent Mississippi political history.

It’s worth noting that Gov. Strom Thurmond got 87.2% of Mississippi’s vote in 1948, when his running mate was Gov. Fielding Wright of Rolling Fork.

And Alabama’s George Wallace got some 63% here in the 1968 presidential race.  The Republican Richard Nixon finished third with 13.5%.

As usual, voter turnout was horrific.

It could be argued that a large percentage of the non voters are making a stronger statement than they felt they could have by voting.

Of course, there are some lazy folks & people who don’t care, but many people are “voting” by not voting.

Polls show that as many as 65 to 70% of Americans ( left, right & center) would prefer more options. The “boogie man” approach that both major parites use; the lack of funding; being ignored by the big media; and having the two major parties setting election laws normally combine to make the actual votes for third/ minor party & independent candidates low, but that is slowly changing.
These numbers almost certainly would not be this high in Mississippi—where we don’t hate/ fear anything as much as change.

In August, Pres. Bush approval rating was a dismal 29%, but the Democrats in Congress made those numbers look astonishingly high by having an incredibly low 11% postive approval rating in the same poll.

I do not see much excitement about any of the Presidential candidates ( except among the Paulites) and most of the party faithful & Conservative/ Liberal base is mostly worried about who can win, not who they like.

Many European countries have had voter turnouts in the 70 to 80% range recently. This has happened most frequently in places where they had multiple parties ( even those proposing odd single-issue agendas) on the ballot. In countries with multiple parties & parlamentary systems the major parties are forced to work in coalition with the minor parties to get anything done and, therefore, more people feel like they have a voice.

I’m not claiming this is the only reason—or even a major reason—for low voter turnout, but it certainly is a contributing factor.

I read an article on the libertarian site, LewRockwell.com back in 2004 entitled : “Don’t Vote-- It Only Encourages Them”. Certainly I don’t agree with this level of cynicism. But, he did make some very valid points.

If a ultraconservative Christian can quote a hard rock band, as the Rush song says : “If you choose not to decide, you still have made a choice”

Les,

First, congratulations on the number you pulled in.  Given the money advantage your opponents had, that’s really remarkable.

I agree with everything you’re saying re: the limitations of a two-party system.  France is not a good model for many things, but I do love the way it handles elections: an open field of candidates, with a runoff for the top two. 

One of the most exciting races of recent years, to this observer, was the California recall election of 2003.  Cruz Bustamente.  Arnold Schwarzenegger.  Mary Carey.  Gary Coleman.  There were so many candidates it was almost a joke--and yet imagine that level of interest in a Mississippi election.  Imagine an election that so many people felt they were entitled to run in.  Our election on Tuesday was, in many respects, the reverse of that: lots of people shut out of both parties (especially, I’m sad to say, on the Democratic side of things), and lots of voters who subsequently felt that nobody on the ballot represented their interests.

Voter turnout is driven by interest in the top of the ticket race primarily, and secondarily by interest in the local races.

In the 2007 elections, I think those who write political history will say that most Republicans and swing voters thought that Barbour would win re-election quite easily, thus there wasn’t a fear that he would lose.  Fear is a palpable motivator in elections, as well as other things.  There was no fear that Barbour would lose, thus not motivating conservatives.

That was exacerbated by Democrats having no belief that Eaves could win, thereby depressing Democrat turnout as well.  There was some speculation that Gary Anderson would generate black voter turnout in this election.  I’m of the opinion that black voter turnout is rarely generated by down ticket state-wide elections.

On the down ticket ballot that I mention in the previous post, let me qualify that by saying that I think neither black voter turnout, nor white vote turnout is generated in down ticket races.  I didn’t mean to single out one race, in that respect, I simply left my thought incomplete.  Sorry…

The election data from the Clarion Ledger site, shows Hood, a Democrat, took every county except, Desoto, Rankin, Pearl River, Tippah, Lamar, and Lafayette (76 of 82); and Barbour only took 36 of 82 counties.  The Democrats took the Senate and House.  Were the Republican up-ticket wins due to “Money” or do most Mississippians really “vote for what they consider the best man”?

I counted 56 counties for Barbour.

The action must be slow over at the C-L forums for “Frances” to be coming round these parts.

I stand corrected.  Left off the last page!!!  But on recount I get 52 of 82 counties for Barbour.  That does sound better, doesn’t it?

I’ll get it right after a while.  53 of 82 counties for Barbour and 29 of 82 for Eaves.  I would blame it on my computer but it was really me.

76 to 53 is still pretty significant, especially when we take into account the fact that Al Hopkins was a much better challenger than John Eaves. 

I think the Hood numbers--76 counties, largest voter turnout--with the Lynn Posey win and Senate gains in an otherwise Republican statewide landslide demonstrate that Mississippians don’t care all that much about party affiliation, but will vote for candidates based on their strength and the strength of their campaigns, which of course does include money.  (Not that this is a bad thing; I can’t think of a statewide race this year where an inferior candidate won on money alone.  The well-funded candidates all deserved to be well-funded, which is probably why they were.)

But in every statewide race except the AG race, the two commissioners’ races, and maybe the auditor’s race, the Republican was clearly out of the Democrat’s league and deserved to win, and I doubt that many people looked at the commissioners’ and auditors’ races because they were so far down ticket.  And really, by the time you’ve voted for Barbour, Bryant, Hosemann, and Reeves, you may as well keep voting red on the races you’ve never heard of.

Bottom line: Field the better candidates, run the better campaigns, and you can win any statewide or legislative office in Mississippi regardless of party affiliation.  I think that’s the message this year’s elections send.  I think it also sends the message that Mississippians don’t wear, or generally acknowledge, coattails.

(76 to 56, rather, not 76 to 53.  But that still belies the “it’s still a one-party state, it’s just a different party” silliness put out there by one emeritus professor somewhere or other.)

Back in the good ole days, on the day after the election, The Clarion-Ledger and the Jackson Daily News both published a state map showing which gubernatorial candidate carried each county.

Back in the good old days, they also published the Hinds County vote by precincts.

Ronnie Agnew, Executive Editor of the Clarion Ledger, in his article “Anderson defeat a setback for minorities” wrote: “Gary ( Anderson) won all the counties one would expect him to win, mostly in the Delta, but lost the ones he needed the most - DeSoto, Harrison, Hancock, Lafayette, Rankin and Madison.” He went on to imply that folks in these counties that did not vote for Gary Anderson were more concerned about his color than his political philosophy.  That ignores the obvious alternative, that these are counties where voters are primarily Republican and would not vote for him because of his philosophy.

These are also the same counties that Democrat Jim Hood DID NOT win as he got the highest vote total of all candidates.  That indicates Gary Anderson lost because many of the Democratic voters who voted for Jim Hood did not choose to vote for Gary Anderson.

While the numbers from last Tuesday’s race are very impressive, I don’t think we can over-look the fact that Mississippi has not proven itself “black-voter friendly.” If so, Gary Anderson would have been running for re-election to the state treasurer’s office instead of Insurance Commissioner. History has a way of repeating itself. Before you scream, was race the only factor..absolutely not, but it played a part however small or large.

I think we all knew that the Republicans had a much better slate of candidates and there was ton of cross over voting..howver it does not excuse or hide the fact that some view Socrates Garrett as a sell-out. I for one share those views.

Where were the high profile African American Republicans in Barbour’s ads/leading his minority voting efforts? I voted for him, I thought he was the best candidate.

It appears the slogan “here today, gone tomorrow” applies here. Socrates will be gone tomorrow for thirty pieces of silver. He’s a sell out at best..and that’s not regressive politics, thats a dim reality!

Again, I voted mostly republican this time around..but the fact remains that race is still one of the considerations for a statewide office holder. Gary saw this and he too, played to the tune that “white is right.” I saw very few African Americans in his commericals in fact, I only saw his wife...never saw any African Americans leading his pressors or his staff.....its a sad reality!

Looks like Kaze has taken to [url="http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/comments.php?id=15438_0_7_0_C"]
ripping off your headline[/url] Lange.  Changing a few words doesn’t make it any less so Ladd.

That wasn’t the HTML statement I completed above.  What is up?

I am used to the copycat stuff.  It happens in more publications than you think.

Look below the last post for proper instructions on linking here.