Winners and Losers in Election 2005

Anonymous 10.NOV.05
(Ed note: This analysis is such a must read that we agreed to the writer's request that it run anonymously)

I have these thoughts on the Sandoval campaign. In terms of the number votes Labor can deliver to a candidate I still think it is relatively small, but in the context of this race among voters being hit with media on a daily basis stressing the role of working folks, I have to believe the combined effect of the Democratic Party and the Labor Council was hard for Sandoval to overcome. In a different election without those non-stop ads showing working people being silenced by the Governor's initiatives, perhaps it would be different result. For what it is worth, here goes:

The Sandoval result yesterday was disappointing. It may be Monday morning quarter backing but I think the following items were noteworthy about the campaign:

Running a citywide race with a name consultant takes more than what Sandoval was able to raise. Just three mailers to the 160,000 or so most frequent voters would cost around $120K. I got one piece of mail from Sandoval and 3 from Ting. Stearns invested in robo calls which are a cheap form of contact but I have never seen a race won by them. Sandoval was doing negative robo calls on Monday, stuff than an IE or newspaper should do.

Perhaps seeking clearance from the union officials prior to making the race might have helped in terms of labor because they had just backed the D11 supervisor's reelection. I doubt it but perhaps that along with a more vigorous personal presence might have led to a different labor council decision.

No one picked up on the Asian Law Caucus investment in Walmart. Had this gotten out perhaps Roselli, Haaland etc could have been shamed away or at least into silence. Somehow I doubt it and it would be healthier to appreciate the Labor Council endorsement process for what it is -- a bargaining process between the Mayor's office and the public employee unions. If the deal is right, the Mayor gets endorsements and in exchange public employees get wage and benefits. The SF Taxpayers Union potentially could extract some blood from Newsom if the terms of these deals prove too expensive, we'll know in next year's budget the real cost.

Newsom's downtown base is still committed to "civil service reform" and so this new coalition that Newsom seems to be putting together is not made of interests with compatible goals. Access to power only can do so much to satiating them. But that is where Binder's 86 percent approval poll numbers prove most helpful, Newsom's popularity strengthens the bargaining position of a Mayor who is brokering with interests whose primary value is access to power.

Daly is accurate in Matier & Ross but Sandoval could not possibly have won the DCCC given the vote given the current makeup there. The progressive faction holds a maximum of 10 seats out of the 24 elected members and then every Democratic nominee gets another vote. You need 17 votes to win something there. Haaland was in the minority before this cycle's switch and in fairness to him he was able to extract some decent votes on some issues and candidates in exchange for delivering his block. The switch, however, made any run there by Sandoval impossible. Given the labor tilt to yesterday's state vote having to fight both the Democratic Party and the union endorsements was too much for a candidate who only got one big mailing into the postal system.

If the Democratic core vote is an important factor given the national context in future--dislike for Bush, an ongoing war that lacks an exit strategy-- liberal Democrats not aligned with the Mayor's political operation need to look seriously again at the June 2006 DCCC races because the Haaland/Milk faction is gone. That deal has been cut. The alternative is to try and put together something of a political operation with the local Green Party, but despite what you might read about its alleged potency in the Chronicle or from Arlene Ackerman on one of her many bad days it doesn't have the means to communicate a message or any message to thousands of voters. What it has had are great volunteers for campaigns, but in terms of an organization it is stuck in neutral and bogged down with internal personality conflicts that cannot be successfully resolved.

On Tuesday, Democratic voters were carrying the party card into the polls. Liberals in east side precincts that normally might reach for the Guardian or the Sierra Club cards were holding SFDCCC slatecards. Voters who have been beaten down by Bush for years, now sense that there is blood in the water for this White House and wanted to seize upon this opportunity -- voting Democratic for them was one way to do that. The last couple weeks of national news underscores this. The national filter impacted San Francisco's races too if it energized Democratic voters and their allegiances, and at the surface level anyway there seems to be other races around the country to back this up.

Sandoval in addition to labor and the Milk Club defections suffered smaller but also other types of fragmentation. The Greens were awol and stuck in neutral, Frontlines had Sandoval as a class enemy, and the editor of the Bay Guardian was at least neutralized from writing critically about the Ting candidacy. There was no parallel force over at the Chronicle to prevent critical items from being published about Sandoval.

Defeats are also opportunities in the sense that you can ask why the result happened. One of the reasons the Left gets its butt kicked a good deal is that we are too insecure sometimes to look critically at what it is we are trying to accomplish. That Noe Valley Demo club meeting on the Left didn't break much new ground, and I am sorry to disagree with Matt and probably Steve Hill but IRV is not going to save our collective rear ends.

Considering the total lack of infrastructure we've got it is quite amazing we do as well as we do.