Indiana Weekend Review
I’m in Chicago today taking care of some family matters; however I wanted to make sure I jotted down a few thoughts about political activities this past weekend. I managed to attend both the Indiana Democratic Party’s Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinner Friday night and the Indiana Young Republicans Convention this weekend. Both functions were well attended, particularly by statewide candidates and a lot of people had 2012 on their minds.
Speakers at the Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinner spent a lot of time playing to their base. There was a lot of talk about attacks on unions, school teachers, working families and hate legislation targeted at women and other Hoosiers (i.e. gays). I was not a big fan of the marriage amendment or the legislation that defunded Planned Parenthood, however both those measures passed with a good chunk of Democratic legislative support, so to blame the Republicans for those measures were a little disingenuous. I did find gubernatorial candidate John Gregg’s speech most interesting. Particularly when said that education and good paying jobs were also social issues. Gregg’s energy and personality will make him a very formidable opponent if Democrats can get him the resources to compete.
On the Republican side of things, Young Republicans were just as energetic and enthusiastic about 2012 as their Democratic counterparts, however privately many of them express concerns about the direction of their party on social issues. While many of them are pro-life, they aren’t rabid about it. And a clear majority of them either don’t care or support gay marriage; following the trend suggested by national polling data. They are big supporters of Indiana Congressman and gubernatorial candidate Mike Pence, but they really want him to focus on jobs and the economy. They seemed split on the Dick Lugar/Richard Mourdock U.S. Senate primary. Some of them think Lugar has been in office to long, others think his experience is invaluable.
The one person who impressed me the least this weekend was Democratic National Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz, who was the keynote at the JJ Dinner. I expected the partisan rhetoric, but some of her statements were either half-truths or just plain wrong. She said it was Democrats who passed the Civil Rights Act and Voting Rights Act in the 1960s. Actually, it neither of those measures would have passed without Republican support as they were opposed by southern Democrats. In addition she also talked about the 2 million jobs created under the Obama administration. However 2.2 million jobs have been lost under the administration as well. The best thing about her speech was that it was not as long as it could have been.
After watching both parties, I’m looking forward to seeing what develops over the next few months. Leaders in both emphasized the need to focus on the Mayoral and city-council races this fall, which will help lay the groundwork for 2012. I don’t think anyone is going out on a limb to say Republicans have an inherent advantage since they hold all the statewide offices and since Mitch Daniels is not running for President, a lot of people who might have left Indiana to play on the national stage will still be here to work on campaigns. The pitfall will be for the GOP to not get hung up on social issues but really focus on job creation and the economy.
The other race to look at it will be to see who Democrats nominate for Superintendent of Public Instruction. Democrats and teachers unions appear to have a personal grudge against Dr. Tony Bennett who to them personifies what they describe as the war against public schools. Although he hasn’t said yes, I don’t see any reason why Bennett would not run for re-election, so keep an eye out for that race as well.
This should be fun to watch. I’m back in town tomorrow.
