With the primary election tomorrow, I feel like the political atmosphere is as unstable as the weather.
Democratic primaries in key races are, at least according to the published polls, pretty much toss-ups.
Hee vs. Tsutsui.
Takai vs. Kim.
Schatz vs. Hanabusa.
Abercrombie vs. Ige. Not really a toss-up, at least according to the advance polling, but still a result of that unstable environment.
That’s a lot of internal conflict and uncertainty within the party.
Do the latter two races reflect, to some degree, the same power blocks facing off? The specter of Senator Dan and his circle of insiders seeking to retain key positions of power?
After the votes are counted, we’ll have to make sense of it all. Who are the successful power brokers, and what do the constellations of interest groups behind the winning candidates look like?
And then there’s the real job of pushing whoever is elected to do the “right” things. That’s a task that begins when the election ends, even when we those we consider “our” candidates are winners.
Discover more from i L i n d
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
a poll is but a moment in time.
fortunately, so is an election.
Bushie beat Gore in 2000; in some ways, this may have caused more damage for modern conservative Republicans than we could have hoped for. In the past decade, Americans have gained genuine ill feelings against war, and (most) Americans have gotten over their ridiculous ill feelings against homosexuals.
And a black person is STILL the president of the United States.
So many people will not be happy with this Saturday’s results.
But it’s just one day of your life. enjoy the other days. once you die, you will never get them back. Happy Friday all!
“After the votes are counted, we’ll have to make sense of it all.”
Hey, wait . . . in three months we have to do it all over again in the general.
The results will surely be over analyzed – and who knows if anyone will be able to figure out if there is/was a ‘hurricane effect,’ especially with 8,000 registered voters on the big island blocked from their polling places tomorrow. Some may already have voted, of course, but for those who haven’t, will some be influenced by the already-announced results Saturday night? Will more or fewer vote or not vote given a delayed opportunity? Maybe the numbers won’t be significant enough to make a difference.
As Ian points out, “unstable.”
I am not voting in the Primary although I am a political junkie because I don’t feel that I can choose between two candidates I like.
As for Brian Schatz whom I first supported in 1998 and was on his 2006 and 2010 teams, I cannot vote for him in the Primary because he is a major supporter of Liquid Natural Gas – even though he brags bout being a natural energy/climate change person.
Inouye must have gone soft in the head in his last days … or else he is merely misunderstood. He certainly understood that we don’t do dynasties. He also understood that it’s perfectly OK for anyone, including himself, to endorse anyone for any office at any time.
Even so, who gets his job is not his decision to make.
Schatz has done an excellent job of representing Hawaii, and he’s young enough to gain the seniority that’s needed for a small state to become a power in D.C. Hanabusa is too old and too much of a traditional island-style party hack, with all the dubious baggage that entails.
If I were in Abercrombie’s shoes, I think that in order to avoid this AJA backlash, I would have installed Hanabusa in the Senate, per Inouye’s (supposed) request. Even if one considers Hanabusa a distasteful choice for the Senate, elevating her to that position might not be consequential because she is 59 years old. She and her supporters, and those of Mazie Hirono, might like to think that these two will be in the Senate for the next 30 years, but a more reasonable estimate might be 10-15 years. Brian Schatz could in the meantime work in the US House, building up contacts and experience, and later run for the Senate.
There is a certain irony in praising Schatz and saying that he is young enough to build up seniority in the US Senate, and asserting that Hanabusa is a typical party hack with a shady past. The seniority system is the real corruption. It should be abolished or modified.
Personally, I like Mazie Hirono, but I think that she is out of her depth in the Senate. Likewise, Hanabusa just does not belong in the Senate, albeit for reasons of character. I see Schatz as the least bad choice for the Senate. That’s not based on ideology or ethnicity. But it seems that most people vote according to ideology or ethnicity.
I keep hearing that the local Japanese want to keep their patronage machine running by electing Hanabusa and Takai and Ige. But the average local Japanese really does not benefit from patronage. Instead, it seems that the average local Asian voter is very much a creature of habit, and has a very narrow comfort zone. They pick up their ballot, vote for the Asian last names, then drop it in the box. They shop at Longs every Sunday. They still socialize with their high school friends.
Also, the inner core of what remains of the so-called Burns faction that Inouye descended from is not dominated anymore by AJAs, as we see in the deathbed wish spectacle, with prominent roles played by Jennifer Sabas and Walter Dodds. What these insiders seem to have in common is not corruption, but mediocre levels of talent. They actually seem like nice people. But it was largely through political connections that they rose so high during a simpler era. They grimly hold on to the past.
“They shop at Longs every Sunday. They still socialize with their high school friends.”
Nothing wrong with that.
“Nothing wrong with that.”
If it is is part of a pattern of doing the same thing all the time, including automatically voting for Asians every time because they are Asians, there is a big, big problem. Nice people generally, though, don’t get me wrong.
Karla nailed it.