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AL-Gov: Sparks Set to Run for Governor

by: DavidNYC

Wed Apr 01, 2009 at 7:17 PM EDT


Hot on the heels of Jim Folsom's announcement that he'll run for another term as Lt. Gov., term-limited Ag Comm'r Ron Sparks looks like he'll be running for the open governor's seat:

State Agriculture and Industries Commissioner Ron Sparks said Wednesday he plans to hold a series of press conferences that will conclude in Fort Payne on Friday to announce his campaign plans for 2010. ...

Sparks indicated Wednesday afternoon his plans are to run against Congressman Artur Davis for governor. Davis is the only Democrat who has declared a run for the top state seat so far.

"I will not run against Jim Folsom," said Sparks, who would not elaborate on his statement.

Assuming Sparks does take the plunge (as looks likely), this sets up what could be a very contentious primary with Rep. Artur Davis. One of the reasons Sparks sat out a race against Sen. Jeff Sessions last cycle was to avoid precisely this kind of internecine battle - state Sen. Vivian Figures insisted on making what turned out to be a rather quixotic run. So I'm not sure why he'd want to get into the mix now, especially with a much more formidable opponent.

Sparks lives in AL-03, and as a several folks have suggested, it could be fertile territory for another Democratic challenge. But seeing as Sparks is holding four different press conferences around the state to announce his next move, that's not in the cards.
DavidNYC :: AL-Gov: Sparks Set to Run for Governor
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AL-Gov: Sparks Set to Run for Governor | 44 comments
Sparks is a slight underdog
in the primary against Davis.  Obama beat Clinton 56-42 in 2008 in Alabama.
Then again
Sparks, unlike Clinton, probably doesn't intend to just completely cede the black vote.

Politics and Other Random Topics

24, Male, Democrat, NM-01, Chairman of the Atheist Caucus, and Majority Leader of the "Going to Hell" caucus!

[ Parent ]
I don't remember that
Joe Reed campaigned for Clinton and I don't remember them "ceding the black vote" in 2008.  I also remember Ron Sparks being the co-chair of the Clinton campaign and campaigning around the state with Bill Clinton just before the Feb. 5 primary.  Sparks worked hard for Hillary, but they still came up short.  

Progressive voices for Alabama at Left In Alabama
[ Parent ]
Could be it was later on after the Alabama primary
The exits showed Clinton getting 15% of the AA vote in Alabama (which was actually a bit better than I thought).

Actually, now that I think about it, it was the Mississippi primary I was thinking about, Clinton only won around 8% of the AA vote there (and this was around the time Clinton started emphasizing the whole white-working class nonsense).

Politics and Other Random Topics

24, Male, Democrat, NM-01, Chairman of the Atheist Caucus, and Majority Leader of the "Going to Hell" caucus!

[ Parent ]
I doubt that it's that simple
At least I hope things don't just break down along white/black lines. May the best candidate win.

20 years old, male, GA-12 (home), GA-10 (school); previously lived in CA-29, CA-28, CA-23, IL-06, IL-14, GA-01.
[ Parent ]
Good
Hopefully he wins the primary.  Davis has no chance in a general.  Sadly I Davis winning the primary.
Gah
So he wouldn't run against Figures, a weak candidate who barely campaigned and had not announced but he will run against Davis, a strong candidate who's been running hard?

Davis will win, Sparks is on a suicide mission. Don't do this Ron, run for AL-03.  

why would he want to demote himself?


Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus
[ Parent ]
AgCom > Congressman ?

[ Parent ]
No way

[ Parent ]
it depends on
how you look at it. Freshman voice out of 435, weak, new and unused to the scene or statewide officer in charge of numerous departments and whom people have to work with him, not the other way around.

Call no man happy until he is dead-Aeschylus
[ Parent ]
Adam Putnam seems to think so


28, Unenrolled, MA-08
[ Parent ]
No he doesn't
It's obviously just a job to raise his name ID statewide for a future run for Governor.  I'll guarantee he runs for Governor if Crist switches to run for Senate.
[ Parent ]
Who demote himself?
Congress is less important then Ag commissioner? Also, is being a losing candidate more important then being a Congressman?    
[ Parent ]
I don't see how Sparks beats a black Democrat who also is to his right on economics
and who also has great DC connections.  Davis is going to outfundraise him by a mile, I'd guess, and has a big block of primary voters.

Suppose a racially-polarized electorate.  Do white Democrats outnumber black Democrats in a primary?  As someone upthread mentioned, the fact that Obama carried Alabama against H. Clinton by 14 points suggests that the white vote might well be smaller than the black vote.  Depends on how many white liberals were in Obama's corner that time, but might be in Sparks' corner this time.

I'm talking out my ass, can anyone who knows Alabama please arrive?

28, gay guy, Democrat, CA-08

Might having great DC connections be a bad thing?
since he's running for governor, and noting how badly our presidential nominee did in the state?

party: Democratic, ideology: moderate, district: CT-01
[ Parent ]
He seems to be referring to the primary
And the primary voting pool is dominated by the black vote.  Obama did poorly statewide, but not among the democratic base.
[ Parent ]
Great News
No offense to Artur Davis, but he would be an underdog against a decent Republican candidate. Let's be honest the he did not want a primary battle in 2008 was just an excuse. I think he knew he could not beat Sessions, so he did not run, plus I think he prefers staying in state government. I think he can win the primary, but yes Davis will be hard. In the 2008 Presidential primary, blacks made up 51% of the vote, whites 44%(www.usaelectionpolls.com), so yes if it breaks down to race Davis has an advantage. Keep in mind though, Alabama has an open primary, so there are ways to change the turnout model.

I should have learned by now, but how do you put a link on here?

And this assumes that all black voters will vote Davis..
and that all white voters wil vote Sparks.
[ Parent ]
Yeah,
I think it is a bad assumption the vote will split on racial lines. If Davis looks bad to black voters, I doubt they will vote for him, same with white voters and Sparks.
[ Parent ]
This is Alabama
not Illinois, of course they will split on racial lines.  The only deviation from that is if blacks come to the conclusion that this is Alabama, not America in general, and that Davis is unelectable, and enough vote for Sparks on that basis.

Whites are not going to vote for Davis.  Obama got 49% of the white vote (tied with McCain) outside the South.  He got just 10% in Alabama.  He got just 13% among whites under 30, and he got just 17% among non-evangelical whites.  Compare to 57% and 52% for Obama nation-wide.

[ Parent ]
I'm trying to think of all the ways to tell you you're wrong, but
you're not.  Those numbers are just brutal -- there's really not any substantial white voting block that came close to giving even 1 in 4 votes to Obama.  Rich, poor, young, old, religious, not religious, etc.

This is the downside of the political realignment for Democrats -- Alabama up through Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia are all trending away from us, at least at the Presidential level.  Fortunatly, there are many more places trending towards us.  I'm not terribly optimistic about Sparks winning the governors race, but I'm not at all writing him off like I would Davis.

[ Parent ]
Sparks has a chance to win
in a statewide race like Governor, where national issues aren't in play that much.  Depending on the Republican opponent and how nasty the Dem primary gets, I would give Sparks as much as a 50% chance of winning the Governorship if he is the nominee.
[ Parent ]
Another interesting number from Alabama
White Democrats split 51-47 for McCain, and these aren't your daddy's Democrats-in-name-only anymore.  White independents and Repubs gave 82 and 98% to McCain repectively.
[ Parent ]
In the 2008 general election
only 11% of Alabama voters identified themselves as white Democrats. Sparks really has his work cut out for him if he's running against Davis.

Why isn't he running against Mike Rogers in AL-03?

Why isn't he running for Sec. of State?
We need a strong, HONEST, Democrat in that spot to assure that we have honest elections in the future.  That's a statewide position that really matters.

Progressive voices for Alabama at Left In Alabama
[ Parent ]
Yeah..
What great news.  I am behind Sparks and really hope he wins.
Davis vs. Sparks
As much as i like Ron Sparks i like Davis for governor. Not only do i think it would make some history I think Davis is a better step in the right direction for Alabama.  
.
There is something to be said for the same party that nominated George Wallace nominating a black man in Alabama.
[ Parent ]
My dog has a better chance
to be elected Governor in Alabama than Davis.  Obama got 10% of the white vote, which is half of what Kerry got in 2004.  (Hint: They really really really hate ******* in Alabama.)
[ Parent ]
Kerry only got 19% of the white vote in Alabama
Are there racists in the south? Undoubtedly, but it's not like Southern whites are predisposed to voting for Democrats anyways (well, at least not in this day and age...)

Politics and Other Random Topics

24, Male, Democrat, NM-01, Chairman of the Atheist Caucus, and Majority Leader of the "Going to Hell" caucus!

[ Parent ]
No but it is worth noting
that 51% of white Democrats in Alabama voted for McCain.  That resulted in a total of 14% of Democrats voting for McCain, compare that with only 7% of Democrats voting for Bush against Kerry.  The result was that many white Democrats voted for Kerry and then voted against Obama based on the color of his skin.

13% of whites under 30 voted for Obama (compared to 57% nationally), and 17% for white non-evangelicals (compared to 52% nationally).

Why are Southern whites predisposed to voting against Democrats?  Because they are the party of *******.   Lets face the facts instead of trying to sugarcoat them and appease the KKKonfederate sympathizers.

[ Parent ]
A few things
First of all, White Democrats made up only 9% of the original sample (meaning that the sub-sample could only have been about 95 people, at best). For any poll, that would have a high margin of error, but for an exit poll, which relies on sampling clusters, that MoE is even higher; but to make a long story short, that number is unreliable.

Second of all, in 2004, the exit polls gave the Republicans a 14 point edge in Party identification, in 2008, that edge was only 8 points. It could be that in 2008 people identified themselves as Democrats who voted for McCain but in 2004 identified themselves as Republicans who voted for Bush. The fact is the exit polls don't give you the necessary information to make any real claims about how white Democrats voted in 2004.

Finally, in 2004, there is no way to prove how well Kerry did among Whites aged 18-29, the exit polls from then don't break that down by race and age (though it is interesting to note that Kerry lost 18-29 year olds generally by a massive 16 point margin, while Obama won them by 2).

Politics and Other Random Topics

24, Male, Democrat, NM-01, Chairman of the Atheist Caucus, and Majority Leader of the "Going to Hell" caucus!

[ Parent ]
I dispute this
Second of all, in 2004, the exit polls gave the Republicans a 14 point edge in Party identification, in 2008, that edge was only 8 points. It could be that in 2008 people identified themselves as Democrats who voted for McCain but in 2004 identified themselves as Republicans who voted for Bush. The fact is the exit polls don't give you the necessary information to make any real claims about how white Democrats voted in 2004.

The primary reason why the Repubs only had an 8% edge in 2008 compared to 14 in 2004 was that whites made up 65% in 2008 compared to 73% in 2004.  This was a big difference.  Some white Repubs may have become independent since, but few became Democrats IMO.    

While you are correct about the sampling error, and the possibility that it is unreliable, I tend to think that number is reasonable because it agrees with all the other theories and evidence about Southern white Democrats, that they may vote for white Democrats but will not vote for blacks.  

Finally, in 2004, there is no way to prove how well Kerry did among Whites aged 18-29, the exit polls from then don't break that down by race and age (though it is interesting to note that Kerry lost 18-29 year olds generally by a massive 16 point margin, while Obama won them by 2).

Again this true, however, it is very difficult to see a scenario that Kerry didn't break 20% among white under 30. The primary reason why Obama won this group by any amount was heavily increased black and Latino turnout, non-whites made up more than 45% of under 30.  And considering that general black and Hispanic turnout increased substantially and also were more likely to vote for Obama than Kerry, one could conclude that those of under 30 minorities did so, and possibly by a greater margin.  

I've also read that the blacks who voted for Bush tended to be the younger ones, older blacks were less likely to vote for Bush.

 

[ Parent ]
On the White Democrats question
It's actually more true that there are plenty of self-described Democrats who have absolutely no problem voting for Republicans (especially compared to Republicans who vote for Democrats). In fact, I'd be willing to bet you money that in Louisiana in 2004, Kerry lost white Democrats (Obama only did about 3 points worse among Democrats than Kerry did there and there wasn't any increase in the AA vote there to explain that away). Even if Kerry did better than Obama among white Democrats in 2004 there, he still probably lost the white Democratic vote there.

Politics and Other Random Topics

24, Male, Democrat, NM-01, Chairman of the Atheist Caucus, and Majority Leader of the "Going to Hell" caucus!

[ Parent ]
Actually the black vote
went up from 27 to 29% in Louisiana despite Katrina, and McCain got 4% among blacks compared to the 8% Bush got.  White voters dropped from 70% to 65%.

Despite that, McCain gained 3% among Democrats.  That's a decent amounts of white Democratic Kerry/McCain voters.  I don't think Kerry was a real powerhouse in winning white independent and Republican voters, so the defections to McCain had to come from white Democrats.

[ Parent ]
My point remains the same though
White Democrats in the South are not very loyal Democrats anyways. Kerry still only got 78% of Democrats in Louisiana but won 90% of black voters (a sub-group which is overwhelmingly Democratic). Let's assume that of 42 (the number of self-described Democrats) 25 of them are black and presume that 23 of them voted for Kerry and 2 voted for Bush (this means that of roughly 60% of the Democratic electorate, Kerry got 92% and Bush got 8%) this leaves us with roughly 40% of Democrats who are white. Assuming that Kerry won 92% of black Democrats (a subgroup that should be more Democratic than generic blacks) the best Kerry could've done among white Democrats would be to get 57% among White Democrats. While I might have been mistaken in Kerry losing White Democrats, Kerry still couldn't have done very well among them if he was only getting 78% of Democrats total (especially considering that black Democrats probably outnumber white ones 2-1).

Politics and Other Random Topics

24, Male, Democrat, NM-01, Chairman of the Atheist Caucus, and Majority Leader of the "Going to Hell" caucus!

[ Parent ]
Personally...
I think that saying the black vote will automatically go to the black candidate no matter what the circumstances or the issue positions is racist in and of itself.  Just like when one says that women will vote for the candidate that is a woman (or gag the hottest guy rolls eyes).  Here's the thing-if you work to earn folks' trust and confidence, they'll vote for you no matter who or what you or they are.  I understand that certain voting blocks tend to have certain characteristics, but let's not take that so far that we forget we're dealing with actual people, much less sound like a bunch of condescending asses trying to figure out what the black people are going to do.

That said, there's another dynamic to this besides race.  Sparks is a huge populist.  Davis is more the corporate/DLC type.  Those philosophies are going to collide in this primary, just wait and see.

http://www.bluearkansasblog.com

I don't think it is racist
Blacks have been a deeply maligned minority group for centuries.  I do not consider it racist or wrong for them to vote for one of them given the history.  There were many blacks who voted for President Obama primarily because he was black because they were excited that despite this country's sordid history of racism, a black President had a real chance of being elected.    

In the primary, he did this against the wife of a former President who was very highly regarded in the black community, at least until the primary.  Once Obama won Iowa and lost New Hampshire narrowly, he was seen as a viable President, and he was guaranteed to get 70-75% of blacks.  That went to 90% because many blacks felt that the Clinton attacked Obama unfairly.  Had Obama lost Iowa and stayed in the race, I think Clinton would have retained 50-60% of the black vote.  I voted for Obama in the primary by the way.

The only way that Sparks gets enough black votes is if blacks think that Davis is unelectable, in which case, he will win the primary.  The only way that Sparks can win the primary is to suggest in a non-racist way, that Davis is unelectable.  And as you saw in the 2008 primary, that is a tough chore.  The only way for Sparks to do this is to have his black allies make those noises.

As you said, Davis is the DLC candidate, which will give him more whites votes than Obama got in his primary, which means that Sparks has to get at least 25% of the black vote to win the primary.  

 

[ Parent ]
Yes race is the biggest factor
But party as well.  Had a republican like Condaleeza Rice been their nominee for President I doubt she would have gotten more than 15% of the AA vote in the Deep South against even a white Dem candidate like Hillary, much less Obama.
[ Parent ]
Well blacks aren't going to vote
for "Uncle Toms".  Rice, Ken Blackwell, Lynn Swann, Michael Steele fits that category.  None of them got more than 20% of the black vote.  

On the other hand if Colin Powell was nominated by the Repubs, he might well get 40% against any Democrat.  

[ Parent ]
I think you missed the point.
I'm not saying that it's racist for blacks vote for a black candidate primarily because of shared background, my point is that it's racist for us to assume that blacks or any racial group for that matter will automatically base their votes based along those lines.  And the Hillary/Obama example illistrate's an important point: Obama had to earn that voting demographic, it didn't just rally around him.

I don't see either how Davis being the DLC candidate will give him any white votes or, hell, very many votes from anyone actually.  The DLC has a financial base in corporate America, not a voting base.  And let's not forget, Sparks is a very popular figure elected twice statewide in Alabama who's probably about as progressive as you can get in the South and is known for effectively speaking his mind.  That all said, I don't think this starts as advantage Davis.  They're probably on close to even footing at the moment.

http://www.bluearkansasblog.com

[ Parent ]
Obama got those votes
once he won Iowa and was a viable option to be President (unlike say Jesse Jackson in 1988).  After that, it didn't matter what he said or what Hillary said, 70% of the black vote was in Obama's pocket.  One mistake that Clinton made was assuming that all blacks were going to Obama and let him accumulate 90% of the black vote.  If Clinton went more aggressively for the black vote, she might have gotten 20-25%(and won the nomination).

But Clinton had long time ties with blacks that would enable her to win part of the black vote against a black opponent.  Sparks doesn't have those ties.  That means that he has to convince blacks to abandon Davis, and that won't happen unless Davis is seen as a certain loser in the general.

Davis being the DLC candidate gives him an image of being a conservative Democrat, which will help him get some white votes that Obama had no chance of getting.  Obama got 25% of the white vote in Alabama.  That means Sparks will need to get at least 25% of the black vote to win the primary.

Sparks populism is nice and good, and will be an asset in the general, if he gets there.  But to get there, Sparks needs to win a significant number of black votes against what is seen as a credible black candidate.  And he won't get them unless Davis is made to be a certain loser in the general.

Davis will also have loads of money to spend because he is the DLC/corporate candidate.  Unless Sparks can raise money the Obama did, through small donors, Davis will blow him away on the air.

[ Parent ]
Your arguments
seem to make the point others here have tried to make. Obama won black votes because he was seen by the black community as an electable candidate. If Davis is not seen as electable, he cannot be guareented the black vote. My guess is Sparks can make the argument he is the strongest candidate because 1) I have won statewide twice 2) Davis's experiance is all based in Washington and everyone knows how well national Democrats do down here. Will this argument peel off enough of the black vote, maybe, although I think it is premature to say he will hardly get any black votes. I agree Davis is a strong candidate in the primary, but so is Sparks. At this point I give the slightest edge to Sparks since he has run twice statewide, so he already has a statewide network in place. Now, Davis can overcome this advantage, but if he can remains to be seen.
[ Parent ]
AL-Gov: Sparks Set to Run for Governor | 44 comments

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