As Madison County Goes ...

Davis better get his act together (0.00 / 0)

The state's leading journalist has proclaimed that Ron Sparks is "the leading candidate in the Democratic Party’s race for governor of Alabama in 2010."  This is an unmitigated PR disaster for Davis.  I don't know how he'll be able to overcome this assessment from Alabama's liberal bellwhether!

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by: Brian @ Sun Nov 15, 2009 at 05:43:38 AM CST

Yep, I hear Davis' PR team are throwing in the towel (0.00 / 0)

They definitely lost the critical Saturday evening news cycle in the wake of another brilliant press release from the Sparks camp.

 

Confession: This is all snark.  The PR yesterday didn't even mention the substance of the Supreme Court ruling so that anyone wanting to write about it had to either follow the link to a TV news story or just guess that it was something about gambling.  Surely to goodness there's some class in PR operative school where they tell you to put everything you want to see in a news story in your press release.  Or at least put enough in it for someone to write a news story.

Work harder and work smarter!

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by: mooncat @ Sun Nov 15, 2009 at 10:00:38 AM CST

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With apologies to " Apocalypse Now " (4.00 / 1)

    "I love the smell of snark in the morning." 

 

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by: Go Blue @ Sun Nov 15, 2009 at 10:06:33 AM CST

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The state's leading journalist??? (4.00 / 1)

Who made that decision?

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by: melmel @ Sun Nov 15, 2009 at 10:46:39 AM CST

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"Beetlejuice" (4.00 / 2)

Brian is trying to bait us into saying "Beetlejuice" 3 times. Don't do it.

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by: Go Blue @ Sun Nov 15, 2009 at 10:53:46 AM CST

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Almost.... (0.00 / 0)

Paid attention until I saw the newspaper's name and the realization that it had no way of determining anything especially who is the true front runner in this race.  Sad....Mr. Sparks go back to sleep nothing to see here.

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by: Takenoprisoners @ Mon Nov 16, 2009 at 06:45:49 AM CST

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From Daily Kos, a Progressive blog (0.00 / 0)

 http://tinyurl.com/yhd798l

AL-Gov: Any Alabama Democrats who have grown frustrated over Artur Davis' pandering to the right in advance of his 2010 bid for Governor should know that they have an option--in the person of Agriculture Commissioner Ron Sparks:

"Hear me loud and clear," the gubernatorial candidate said at a luncheon today for the Madison County Democratic Women's Division. "I support health care reform and the public option."

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by: yellowdog @ Sun Nov 15, 2009 at 10:28:13 AM CST

Umm, the Daily Kos (0.00 / 0)

Not a source for info on candidates that actually win other than the POTUS. 

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by: Takenoprisoners @ Mon Nov 16, 2009 at 06:47:25 AM CST

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Actually, kos is often a pretty good resource (0.00 / 0)

They do focus on national issues - particularly on the front page, but lots of people in the states do diaries about their congressional, senate, and gubernatorial candidates.

I'd say it's most useful for Congress and Senate.  DailyKos is where I first heard about Larry Kissell in North Carolina and some other good progressive Democrats who couldn't get funding from the national party.

If Sparks can get some good press on Kos and generate some netroots excitement, it will help his national visibility and his fundraising.

Never try to teach a pig to sing.  It wastes your time and annoys the pig.

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by: countrycat @ Mon Nov 16, 2009 at 07:58:13 AM CST

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The one thing though (0.00 / 0)

Is that in 2006 only 18,000 people in Madison County voted in the Democratic primary while 30,000 voted in the Republican primary.

  I suspect that even less people will be voting in the Democratic Primary and even more in the Republican (local elections after all, and Madison has been trending Republican) so, viewing primary performance in Madison as a state bellwhether might not be the best idea because the primary vote in Madison will be blacker and more well heeled than the primary vote statewide.

 In the meantime, Walker County had 14,000 Democratic primary voters, most of whom will still opt for it for the locals and counties like Lauderdale and Jackson that are far lower in population than Madison will still pull Democratic primary votes out above 10,000.

 Just yet another quirk of the state primary system.

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by: jacool @ Mon Nov 16, 2009 at 15:45:55 PM CST

So are you saying (0.00 / 0)

That the black voters are irrelevent? 

I'm just saying last time I remember Madison County was 72% white and 22% black and Alabama is 72% white and 26% black, so it's pretty close in percentages...

"It is what it is."

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by: kayman @ Tue Nov 17, 2009 at 12:28:55 PM CST

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Primary numbers are not as relevant (0.00 / 0)

I understand the ease to look at primary numbers to project the vote; however, in Alabama these are not as influential in projecting the general election as they are in other states.  The primary reason for this is the fact that Alabama has open primaries without party registration.  AS a result, people gravitate towards ballots that have local issues or candidates they truly support.  (For example, in the 2006 primary in Madison County, I knew of a number of voters who knew Baxley would win the Democratic nomination so they voted in the GOP primary to knock out Roy Moore.) 

Based upon the previous election maps, it generally takes winning the I-65 corridor to win a race.  The only races since '86 when the winner did not win 3 of the largest 4 counties (Jefferson, Mobile, Madison, Montgomery) was Guy Hunt's reelction in '90 and Rileys election in '02 (whihc many of us remember being razor thin.)  

Because of the population diversity of Madison County, much of the campaign strategy needed to win here reflects to tactics used in other parts of the state (the number of African-American voters, college educated graduates, farming/manufacturing voters, etc.)   It also doesn't hurt that Madison County is one of the faster growing areas of the state.

Now the weird thing about this is the fact that Madison County generally has not placed as much emphasis on politics in Montgomery.  Due to the federal government's influence on the area (including TVA, Redsone, and NASA), traditionally this area has placed more stock in their ties to Washington (where the manna comes from).

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by: csduke @ Tue Nov 17, 2009 at 15:00:46 PM CST

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