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AK-AL: Berkowitz Ponders Rematch

by: James L.

Wed Dec 03, 2008 at 5:46 PM EST


It comes as no surprise that Democrat Ethan Berkowitz is considering running for Alaska's at-large House seat again in 2010, but his reasoning might cause a few heads to explode among the "doom and gloom" crowd: he thinks that the environment will be better for a Democrat in two years. From Roll Call (sub. not req'd):

Berkowitz said in a phone interview Tuesday night that he is "considering" a second bid against Young, who is still under federal investigation.

The Democrat said he planned to take the next few months off from the campaign trail before making a final decision, but he was quick to point out that he received more votes than any other Democrat in state history with the exception of Sen.-elect Mark Begich (D).

"It seems to me that as Alaska sees the sensible course that the Obama administration takes, some of the demonizing of Democrats will evaporate," Berkowitz said.

Of course, the state of this seat is still very much in flux. Don Young could end up indicted, on the losing end of a primary challenge, or maybe living in a retirement complex on Coconut Road in two years.
James L. :: AK-AL: Berkowitz Ponders Rematch
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AK-AL: Berkowitz Ponders Rematch | 43 comments
he would have a better chance in 2010
It's a non-presidential, non-Sarah-Palin-for-VP year.
Won't she be up for re-election that year though?
Still sounds pretty tough.
[ Parent ]
Yes
but she won't get the same kind of turnout that she got last month.  Alaska Republicans were excited to get out and vote for McCain/Palin.  I don't think as many of them will turn out to easily re-elect Palin over whatever sacrificial lamb the Dems put up.
[ Parent ]
At least 4 improvements
1.  Sarah Palin will not be running for Vice President.

2.  Don Young's war chest has been spent.  He was down to $157 K as of October 15 so he's stony broke right now and not likely to attract large donations.  So instead of spending $3 million, he'll be c;oser to $1 or $1.2 million.  Berkowitz can outraise him.

3. Plus I think we will be out of the Bush recession by the time the 2010 midterms roll in (We are a full 12 months in and have 10 to 13 months to go).

4.  Re-alignments normally cover four elections, not two.  In some cases like 1800 and 1860, the third or fourth elections are at least as good as the first two.

Alaskan oil revenue checks will be a lot smaller than the $3,200 announced before the election.  At $1,200 or $1,500 per head, Palin and the Republicans may be less popular.

And, Alaskans voted out a crook in 2008.  Young was the surly curmudgeon and Stevens was the crook.  Now, Don is the crook.  Murkowski is the "clean" Republican.

Those ruby red Alaskan ticket splitters
had a hard time voting out a convicted felon, but Young will probably be one in two years.

This time Young was Mussolini, and Stevens was Hitler.  Next time nepotism Murkowski will look pretty good next to indicted Young.

I doubt Young will be running, but if he is, it's better for him that Stevens isn't around to suck up all the attention.

[ Parent ]
Better for Berkowitz I meant

[ Parent ]
Palin would be running for Governor
maybe Berkowitz thinks Young is likely to be indicted or convicted of a crime or something.


Liberty Avenue Politics - a place for politics in Southern Queens
[ Parent ]
Good on him
I hope he does. If Young's their candidate again I think we can win.  
Had Palin not been on the ticket
Alaska would've probably been a lot more competitive on the presidential level which would've made it a lot easier for Berkowitz to win.

That said, if Don Young isn't on the ticket again, that House seat will be next to impossible to win in the near future.

Your go-to source for great sarcasm

Yup yup yup.
Without Palin, I think Obama could have pulled 45% of the vote. Also, I think she brought out a lot of Alaska Pride jingoism in voters making it harder for potential ticket splitters to, you know, split their tickets.
[ Parent ]
I think it is reasonable to assume conditions will be better in 2010.
I hope he runs.  He could keep Republicans on the defense here and he can raise some solid cash.  
I think it being an off year
is a bonus.  While Palin will be on the ballot, it helps in these red districts to not have the number of people voting double as those other people are much more likely to go with the trend of their district, and since the trend is heavily Republican, that is where they will be voting.

We can win in an off-year.  Especially if Obama has completely rocked it out, and he just may well do that.

Bill Nolan:  BAH YOU'RE WRONG DOOM AND GLOOM!!!!!  

just watch.......

1994!!! 1994!!!

[ Parent ]
1994!!!!
oh my god we're going to lose another 27 house seats in the south and midwest that haven't been Democratic in forty years!!! We're going to have dozens of retirements in heavily Republican areas and lose several seats in the south to racist midterm VRA gerrymanders that condense the black vote into one or two districts, which is what happened in Georgia, North Carolina, and Alabama. Oh my god the sky is falling.

But seriously, the difference between 2006 and 2008 and 1994 is that while Democrats have won mostly districts that lean against them in 1994 Republicans won almost nothing but strongly Republican districts, and the few Democratic ones, (like that one in Chicago), that they won they lost the next cycle.  

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus

[ Parent ]
There were a few Dem leaning seats they managed to hold
They still have NJ-02 and IA-04, which are Dem leaning and they won them in 1994.  They also managed to hold Dem leaning seats like NV-01, WA-01, WA-02, WA-03, CA-53, CA-01, PA-13, IL-11, MN-01, and NH-02 for at least a couple terms.  
[ Parent ]
So Good
we should have no problem keeping GOP leaning seats for a long time then.  

Liberty Avenue Politics - a place for politics in Southern Queens
[ Parent ]
Thats what I always said
If Republicans held NH-02, IA-04, NJ-02, and MN-01 for so long, why cant we hold NY-13, NY-19, NY-20, NY-24, PA-03, PA-04, CA-11, and FL-08 for a long time?  
[ Parent ]
well for one FL-08
is rapidly trending Democratic and OBama won it this year. CA-l11, NY-19, NY-20, NY-24, they are moving our way anyway.  

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus
[ Parent ]
Its pretty much the opposite of what happened in the South
in 1994.  Republicans won seats like KY-01, KY-02, TN-03, TN-04, OK-02, OK-04, and GA-08 that had never been represented by Republicans and still were known as Democratic leaning districts.  Since then, all of those seats have trended heavily Republican and they still hold all but two.  
[ Parent ]
OK-02
is still a strong dixiecrat district that gives big margins to state Democrats. Democrats have since easily held it agaisnt Republicans in two subsequent special elections. Tom Coburn was just special. And GA-08 was redrawn to be more favorable to Democrats in 2002 though Republicans tweaked it back a bit in 2006.

My point is Democrats were not winning those districts then and htey could not be considered Democratic leaning. TN-03, (Chatanooga), supported every Republican from 1956 to present. Democrats were just barely able to compete their before the 1950s. Even with Gore Clinton lost the district handily and moderate nine term incumbent Marilyn Lloyd beat Zach Wamp, (then mayor of Chatanooga), by less than a percentage point. In TN-03 Republicans were able to compete even all the way back in the 1870s and 1890s period of total southern Demoination by Democrats.

Democrats still hold TN-04 actually, Lincoln Davis picked it up in an open seat election in 2002. William Natcher is the only thing that kept KY-02 Democratic for decades. That special was only a surprise because an unknown bible store owner defeated a prominent state senator by a narrow margin. I'll give you OK-04, somewhat. (I'd also like to note KY-01 has also not been Democratic in a long long time).

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus

[ Parent ]
sorry open seat elections
Dan Boren got 64% in an open seat in 2004, even while Bush was getting 59% of the vote in it. And in 2000 Brad Carson took 55% of the vote in an open seat, also while Gore was easily losing it.

And Marilyn Lloyd retired after 1992 becuase she realized she could no longer hang to the district she had held so precipitously.  

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus

[ Parent ]
and I'm sorry,
I looked Wamp up, he wasn't mayor of Chatanooga, he was director of the Hamilton County GOP, (Chatanooga).

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus
[ Parent ]
with the exception of TN-04


Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus
[ Parent ]
KY-01 was carried handily by Clinton
in 1992, 48%-40% and even Michael Dukakis got 46% there in 1988.  
[ Parent ]
Bush carried TN-03
by less than 100 votes in 1992 and Carter carried it in 1976.  
[ Parent ]
where are you finding this information?
I would really like to know. It would be extremely interesting and useful.

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus
[ Parent ]
We probably will
Many of the those seats are in states that dems will control redistricting in for 2012 and can fairly easily be made into more favorable districts.
[ Parent ]
one more thing
CA-53 didn't exist in 1994. It was created to give Susan Davis a safe seat after census gains in 2002. and Bilbary is not a good example because the district wasn't neccesarily Democratic leaning and Lynne Lowry was the first to represent it in 50 years. It was definitely trending our way though which was why he lost to Susan Davis in 2000, though it was by an extremely narrow margin.

And you have to remember that the old NV-01 was all of Clark county nearly two decades again. It had only the slightest of Democratic leans.

MN-01 is also not a Democratic seat. The area has been consistently conservative for a century and onnly recently started moving our way. Conservative Democrat Tim Penny was the only Democrat to represent it in the 20th century and he retired in 1994. Tim Penny later left the Democratic party and ran on the Independence party line getting 16% of the vote and allowing Tim Pawlenty to squeak in and become Governor with 42% of the vote, (something the IP did again in 2006 when Pawlenty won with 46% of the vote). NJ-02 and IA-04 are marginally Democratic, and NJ-02 is really socially conservative and Lobionodo is just a uniquely good fit for it, and he's also one of the most economically liberal Republicans in the house.

And CA-01, in its previous drawing, was a swing district for many decades. It leaned quite Republican at one time but hte the San Fran suburbs went far blew, (the southern anchor of the dsitrict). Under it's current drawing Kerry improved over Gore's margin by 9 points and Obama did around seven points than Kerry by my estimates, so it is becoming a Democratic strong hold. But Mike Thompson won in a much swingier district in a much swingier California, so did Hamburg.

And IL-11 is not Democratic leaning, both Gore and Kerry lost it and it is at best a Democratic trending, but Republican leaning, swing district. Democrats held onto it for so long because it used to contain part of Northwest Chicago until the 1990s when coincidentally the first Republican congressman in fifty years won an open seat.

Got anymore examples you'd like me to debunk? I seriously spend my freetime studying the demographic trends and histories of various major counties and swing districts and am a walking encyclopedia of political information.

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus

[ Parent ]
I think it was CA-49
And her name was Lynne Schenk.  It was clearly a Democratic leaning seat by the time 1994 rolled around.  Bill Clinton won it by a healthy 43%-31% margin.  

CA-01.  Again, another healthy Democratic seat where Dan Hamberg never should have lost and Frank Riggs should never have held for more than a term.  Clinton carried it 47%-29% in 1992.  Clearly a Democratic seat.

NV-01 was also Democratic leaning by 1994.  Clinton won it by 43%-31% in 1992 and 51%-37% in 1996.  Ensign should never have held on here in 1996.  

[ Parent ]
Ensign's good as worming his
way on top. Anyway, are you sure have the right CA-01, are you sure that's not the margins for the CA-01 with Yolo in it?

Also, the margin you gave me for CA-49 would make it a D+0 district as Clinton got 43% of the vote nationwide that year.

And Ensign didn't hold on in 1996 by much. He won 50-45 and in 1994 he unseated the incumbent by like only a thousand votes. He also came within like 400 votes of beating Reid in 1998. Just a testament to Reid's longtime lack of popularity in Nevada.

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus

[ Parent ]
CA-01
Im certain about that district, it says so in the 1994 Almanac of American Politics.  Dukakis also carried it 53%-47% in 1988.

It would make CA-49 more like D+3 since Bush got 37% nationally and got just 31% in the district.  

[ Parent ]
What about CA-01?
Republicans held it for a bit because of a huge Peace&Freedom/Green vote.  It's no example of anything.
[ Parent ]
They won it because of that in 1990
In 1990, Riggs upset Democratic Rep. Doug Bosko because the Peace and Freedom candidate got 15% of the vote.  
In 1992, Hamberg beat Riggs then in 1994 Riggs beat Hamberg 53%-47% in a two way race.  Then in 1996, Riggs held on 49%-44% with the rest going to a libertarian.  
[ Parent ]
Again, that doesn't say anything
Riggs beat Hamberg in their rematch, and avowed pothead, after hamberg had a very divisive primary against Bosco, the Democrat before him.

In 1996 Riggs beat Michela Alioto, whoc couldn't have beaten Ghengis Khan in the north woods.

CA-01 is no district to use in any discussion about trends.  It has a very unique history.

[ Parent ]
I'll take back the Ghengis Khan part
Alioto was 27 or 28, and basically a carpetbagger from San Franciso (where she is on the Board of Supes now).

The point again is just the district was immune to any national trends.  Everything there was due to local circumstances.

[ Parent ]
CA-01 Timber Dems vs EnviroDems
   Bosco was more of the traditional logger type Democrat. Hamburg was the environmentalist who later ran for Governor as a Green. I think he was for legalization of cannabis but not a pothead. One of the major agricultural products of northwestern CA is marijuana, and even some non-growers or non-users are not happy about the heavy-handed tactics of the prohibitionist forces. Too many helicopters, roadblocks, and so forth for liberty-minded folks.
  Alioto was a flawed candidate for sure; not local enough, too young and inexperienced, riding on her family name. I thought she was ok (and she sure was cute!) but didn't come across as super knowledgeable about issues. Two years later she was a really bad candidate for Secretary of State, even less up to speed on election law and such but still almost won.
  CA-01 is quirky and unique for sure. I'm glad that we are done with Frank Riggs. I hadn't even thought of him for years. I'm glad that Michaela found a good place to serve; I don't follow S.F. politics closely enough to know whether she is doing a good job.
[ Parent ]
I've been digging into California election history
and know some things about past candidates. Michela Alioto-Pier has gotten mixed reviews on her service on the S.F. Board of Supes.

Positive: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/...

Negative: http://www.fogcityjournal.com/...

Check out the 2010 California races (http://2010californiaracetracker.wetpaint.com) and help us take back Red California! (http://www.takebackredcalifornia.org)

[ Parent ]
He should
You don't just walk away from a 5-point loss without thinking, "maybe next time".  Hopefully Young gets convicted the week before the election.
He definately should run again
simply to try and keep the Republicans on the defensive.  
another consideration
is that a big issue for alaska on the federal level is getting earmarks.  this can be easier to accomplish when in the majority.
One concern
Either CQ or Politico had an article this week that showed that of 16 rematch elections, only 3 went to the challenger, and in most the incumbent won by a lot more than the last time.  Doesn't mean Ethan shouldn't run, but he does have the risk of a second straight solid defeat which could all but end his political career.
The difference between
the two races was presidential turn out, when you are competing in red districts, the regular electorate who doesnt show up for midterm elections do for presidential and then their vote total racks up for the incumbent, as these voters lean Republican.  Do it in a midterm, however, well we'll see.

This could be best exampled by OH-2.  Educated voters who come out for midterm elections I would venture a guess are much more knowladgable of the candidates and are probably more apt to ticket splitting.

[ Parent ]
oil prices
with oil prices coming down the repubs might not have such an easy time with reelection.  
AK-AL: Berkowitz Ponders Rematch | 43 comments

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