From the News-Gazette in Illinois:
llinois Democrats have a gubernatorial candidate favored by only half the members of his own party, who faces a difficult budget battle this spring and – for now – is stuck with a running mate who is a political nightmare…
The Republican ticket has a gubernatorial candidate favored by 20 percent of his party, with views on social issues that are to the right of the mainstream and who has run poorly in the Chicago area and the suburbs, where the vast majority of the general election votes lie. Sen. Bill Brady, R-Bloomington, got 11 percent of the primary vote in the six-county Chicago area last Tuesday – where 53 percent of the GOP vote was cast…
Are either of these candidates electable?
“Gentlemen, many voters see you as flawed candidates,” opined the Chicago Tribune last week…
“Our position is better because we’re able to run a full-year campaign which we weren’t able to do in 2006, plus we have Green Party candidates all around the state (although not in Champaign County). We should get some synergy with that,” [said Rich Whitney, Green candidate for governor of Illinois].
The Greens, now an officially established party in Illinois, ought to be included in any gubernatorial debates, Whitney said.
“It will be much more difficult for news organizations or sponsoring organizations to exclude me from debates,” he said. “If they do there will be a political price to pay if the other candidates go along with that.”
Whitney got a higher percentage of the statewide vote four years ago than Dan Proft, who was invited to all the Republican gubernatorial debates, got this year. Whitney, in fact, got more than twice as many votes four years ago (361,336) as Brady got Tuesday (approximately 156,000).
“I think we have a fair shot at winning,” said the Carbondale attorney, who said he is campaigning to win, “not to make a statement or to be a protest candidate.”
Hat tip to Independent Political Report and Richard Winger of Ballot Access News for this story.
5 responses so far ↓
1 Wes Rolley // Feb 8, 2010 at 12:33 pm
You missed the latest Il fiasco. Lt. Gov. Candidate drops out less than 2 weeks after Democrats anointed him. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RaLnIlm55EU
2 Third Party Revolution // Feb 8, 2010 at 4:56 pm
Personally I find that video to be lulz.
3 Chicago Voter // Feb 9, 2010 at 12:40 am
It is kinda of misleading to compare the amount of votes that Brady got in a primary and the percentage that Proft got once again in the primary to the amount that a candidate received in a general election, particularly since it is likely that the most of the supporters of the losing Republican candidates will likely rally around the winner of the primary.
Considering the problems that the Democrats are likely to have in the general election, I would say that Whitney might have a chance of doing something in this election but to win he is going to have to find away to attract a lot of conservative-moderate voters. If he can not find a way to do this the best that I think he can do is make a statement and deny Pat Quinn election, which the Dems might well lose one way or the other.
4 Dave Schwab // Feb 9, 2010 at 6:44 am
“it is likely that the most of the supporters of the losing Republican candidates will likely rally around the winner of the primary.”
You mean the guy who got 20%? Have you seen any polls that back up your statement?
“Whitney might have a chance of doing something in this election but to win he is going to have to find away to attract a lot of conservative-moderate voters”
I think he can win by mobilizing progressives and independents who are sick of both Repubs and Dems. Luckily, he’s in Illinois, so there should be plenty of those. I don’t think he has to change his message at all; the trick is to articulate his strategy for winning to enough people so he can steadily climb in the polls and build momentum through election day.
5 Chicago Voter // Feb 9, 2010 at 2:01 pm
I am not trying to be overly rough on Whitney or the Greens in Illinois but realistic.
Illinois is a blue leaning state but it also has a lot of conservatives-moderate voters, Cook alone has 500,000 to 600,000 that vote pretty reliable Republican, and Whitney is already to be competing with one other candidate for that side of the political spectrum, Gov. Quinn support with in the Democrat has historically come from the more progressive wing.
Yes in the end most of the GOP base will fall behind Brady for a couple of reasons, the first is that most of the leadership sees this as there best chance to retake both the Governorship and a US Senate seat in years so there will be great pressure for unity. Another reason is that there were two other candidate that ran with almost identical message to Senator Brady’s and there combined vote total was around 43-45% and to that you can add in that the candidate that finished campaigned on similar economic issues.
With the strength of the machines in Cook and the Metro East( St. Clair county, ect,) it is extremely unlikely that any Democrat Party Nominee will get less that 30%, so if you do the numbers I think that the only conclusion that you can come to is that Whitney would have to pull off a fair number of conservative-moderate voters in order to win.
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