20060419 Dems Smear Politics in Maryland

Dems Smear Politics in Maryland

April 19, 2006

Although it has received only perfunctory coverage locally, it appears that our state continues to grab national attention for what happens when a single “state-sanctioned” majority party runs a state government and ignores the citizens it is supposed to be serving. It’s a storyline that sounds like the fodder for a paperback novel about intrigue in a developing nation.

Read what Gregory Kane said here, and what the New York Post and the New York Sun have recently said…

What is capturing nationwide attention is a March 27 confidential report prepared for the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee by a top National Democratic Party strategist - Cornell Belcher - and paid for by the Democratic National Party.

The March 27, 2006 report reflects what many have understood to be the Democratic response to Lt. Governor Steele for quite some time – smear him before he starts being a perfect suitor for Maryland voters in this fall’s election and inspires a full fledged revolt in the Democratic forty-year strangle-hold on African-American voters and Maryland politics. (From my April 19, 2006 Tentacle column, “Guess Who’s Coming to the Election.”)

Republican Maryland Lt. Governor Michael Steele is a front-runner to replace the retiring longstanding liberal democrat, U.S. Senator Paul Sarbanes, in this fall’s Maryland election.

Conservatives from both parties have historically governed Maryland. However, in response to the warning signs of the mid 1990s, the Democratic Party incomprehensibly took a precipitous turn to the left, leaving many party members behind shaking their heads and counting on voter inertia to sustain them.

Voter inertia is no longer working as voters want vision, new ideas and approaches and all they are getting from the majority party is partisan politics.

Like the incoming tide lapping upon the fragile wall protecting a castle in the sand, what started as a trickle is continuing to become a major breach as liberal Democrats in the state increasingly whisper that the times are a changing.

Consider the following statistics cited in the March 27 Democratic National Committee report. According to the Washington Post - Black voters most likely to consider backing the GOP Senate candidate:

Voters ages 18-29: 60%;

Men under 45: 55%;

Baltimore residents: 53%;

Voters with a high school degree or less: 51%;

Women under 45: 51%;

Weekly churchgoers: 50%;

Men 60 and over: 45%;

Women 60 and over: 36%;

Prince George's voters: 35%;

Voters earning more than $75,000: 30%.

The warning signs have been appearing for years, yet the Kool-Aid drinkers are still in denial. In 1994, a Democrat was narrowly elected Governor; the party faithful said it was a fluke.

Many political scientists actually credit the hard right wing of the Republican Party for the Democratic victory for not fully supporting the candidacy of Ellen Sauerbrey.

A mistake not repeated in 2002, when Republican Robert L. Ehrlich was elected governor of the State of Maryland. The first Republican governor in Maryland in almost four decades.

As voter discontent is starting to become obvious over the temper tantrum thrown by the Democratic leadership in the single party controlled 2006 session of the Maryland General Assembly, many thinking Democrats are starting to see the handwriting on the wall.

Snubbing and attempts to discredit good people voicing discontent or outright defecting from the Democratic Party is becoming a major department in the organization of the Maryland Democratic party apparatus.

While the Democratically controlled Maryland General Assembly plays the blame game and “let’s change the rules,” other African-American leaders are finding their voice and stating the obvious.

In July 2003, then-Denton Mayor Victoria Goldsborough said, “This party is moving and shaking, and I just want to be in it.”

With that parting comment, Ms. Goldsborough, an outspoken Eastern Shore African-American joined with Easton Mayor Robert Willey and changed to the Republican Party.

Both had been taken for granted by the Democratic Party and coupled with their differences of opinion with an increasingly liberal agenda, petty annoyances compounded into major friction and they bolted.

In February 2005, Annapolis Alderman George O. Kelley Sr. defected. A life-long Democrat, Alderman Kelly, a former police office and minister of an influential African-American church in Annapolis cited core values, public safety policy and fiscal responsibility differences with the Democratic Party.

Granted, several local elected officials here and there does make for a flood of defections. But coupled with the information that more first time voters are registering Republican and increased numbers of citizens are switching party affiliations; it all leads up to not just a qualitative shift but a quantitative sea change that is sure to continue to be reflected at the polls.

Former Prince George's County executive Wayne K. Curry, a 1972 Western Maryland College (now McDaniel College - in Westminster, MD) graduate, was quoted: “There hasn't been this kind of revelation of the diversity of thinking among African-Americans, and Steele's campaign has brought that into focus…”

As the majority party in Annapolis continues to react badly to the growing threat of republicans, we saw many votes in the 2006 legislative session cast, not according to the merits of the legislation, but on mean-spirited partisan politics.

Memo to the Maryland Democratic Party: a leader like Lt. Governor Steele is not an anomaly as you would like for the electorate to believe. He is simply a sign of things to come.

At present, we may not even know the name of the next “Michael Steele,” but their will be many more as Republicans continue to be relevant and Democrats continue to give African-Americans lip-service or otherwise simply take this vital Maryland constituency for granted.

Republicans are often their own persons, as has been evident in recent well-publicized disagreements between the President George W. Bush’s administration and the national Republican leadership.

Political scientists note that it is a sign of the growing relevancy and strength of the Grand Old Party that it is tolerant of leadership disagreement in pursuit of service to the citizens they serve. This also serves to attract additional folks to the Republican Party as the mantra of the Maryland Democratic Party is: “their way or the highway.”

Picturing the Lt. Governor with President Bush is inside baseball and in the end, is meaningless to the average voter at the polls. (Although, I for one would love to have a picture of the Lt. Governor and Condoleezza Rice for my office. It will not affect how I vote but it would brighten my day.)

In a recent interview with Steele campaign spokeswoman, Melissa Sellers, she summed it best when she said: “Michael Steele is committed to uniting Marylanders behind his vision of opportunity and empowerment. This stands in clear contrast to his opponents’ documented strategy of divisive race-based attack politics.”

Kevin Dayhoff writes from Westminster Maryland USA.

E-mail him at: kdayhoff@carr.org

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