I didn’t actually go to Alabama last night, but I felt like it after staring at county returns half the night trying to understand the capricious will of that state’s electorate–or rather the 30% or so of them who voted in statewide primaries.
The shocker of the evening, of course, was Ron Sparks’ landslide 62-38 victory over Artur Davis in the Democratic gubernatorial race. Davis was the prohibitive front-runner for many months, and though there was sparse public polling in the race, he did have an 8-point lead in an R2K/DKos poll done less than two weeks out.
Now some people will look at the phenomenom of a black candidate unexpectedly losing a primary in Alabama and assume it’s all about race. And some progressives who think Artur Davis is a sell-out pseudo-Republican will assume it’s all about ideology. But I think Davis simply deployed a mistaken strategy, and that Sparks ran a smart campaign. Davis clearly tried to position himself for a general election far too early, and in keeping his distance from traditional Democratic groups, he managed to convey the sense that he wasn’t interested in their votes any more than in their public support. In a low-turnout primary, that was fatal.
It also shouldn’t be completely ignored that in an otherwise largely issues-free environment, Sparks had an issue–support for greatly expanded and regulated public gaming–that’s a proven vote-winner among Alabama Democrats.
In any event, Davis managed to lose upwards of half the African-American vote–which is why you can’t chalk up his defeat to some sort of southern-fried Bradley Effect–while getting crushed in heavily-white northern Alabama. It was truly shocking to see the first viable African-American statewide candidate in Alabama lose majority-black counties in his own congressional district like Dallas (Selma), Hale, Marengo, Perry and Wilcox. But it’s possible to over-interpret this election: with the exception of Mobile, Artur Davis didn’t do well much of anywhere. And so, ironically, Ron Sparks enters the general election with the kind of biracial coalition behind him that Davis sought to create, in all the wrong ways.
The Republican gubernatorial primary is going to a recount because only 208 votes separate the second- and third-place finishers, Dr. Robert Bentley and Tim James. Bentley’s performance was nearly as surprising as that of Sparks; he was in single digits in the R2K/DKos poll, while James spent $4.4 million–nearly half of that his own money–and made his constant feuding with Bradley Byrne the central focus of the entire race. And it appears Bentley’s impressive showing was at least partly attributable to voters tired of the Byrne-James slugfest.
Meanwhile, Parker Griffith became the latest and no-so-greatest of party-switchers to go down to ignominous defeat, in his case losing a multi-candidate Republican primary without even making it to a runoff. At the end of a long evening, his fate brought a smile to the face of even the weariest of Democrats.

I try not to react–much less overreact–to every sparrow that falls to the ground from the Gods of Public Opinion, but there is a survey just out today that is really interesting.
From PPP, it represents the first publicly released data from the Iowa Republican gubernatorial contest in many months. As expected, former Gov. Terry Branstad is leading Bob Vander Plaats and Rod Roberts. But unexpectedly, Brantstad is under 50%, and leads Vander Plaats 46-31, with Roberts receiving 13%.
Dean Debnam of PPP had this to say:

It’s going to be very interesting to see if Terry Branstad is the next victim of the Tea Party movement. He’s still ahead but the momentum seems to be on Vander Plaats’ side.

In his latest ‘Public Opinion Snapshot’ at the Center for American Progress web pages, TDS Co-Editor Ruy Teixeira reports that U.S. public opinion overwhelmingly favors repeal of the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t tell” policy. As Teixeira explains:

The House voted last Thursday in favor of repealing the military’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy, and final repeal of this noxious policy is surely very close. Gay men and women will at last be able to serve openly in the U.S. military, a move that has strong backing from the American public.
Consider this result from a recent (May 3-6) Gallup poll on the issue. An overwhelming 70-25 majority of respondents said they were in favor of “allowing openly gay men and lesbian women to serve in the military.”

And if a 70 percent majority isn’t quite enough,

Lest that crushing majority be thought a fluke, consider this result from an even more recent (May 21-23) CNN poll. The public, by an even larger 78-20 margin, said in that poll that “people who are openly gay or homosexual” should be allowed to serve in the military.

Teixeira concludes that “in this particular instance lawmakers are thoroughly in tune with progressive public opinion” — a welcome development for all Americans who oppose bigotry and believe that the women and men who serve in our armed services should not be subjected to discrimination and harassment in the military because of their sexual orientation.

Today is primary day in Alabama, Mississippi and New Mexico. Mississippi’s contests of national significance are pretty much limited to the Republican primaries to choose opponents for U.S. House members Travis Childers and Gene Taylor. New Mexico’s Republicans do have a gubernatorial primary in which county D.A. Susana Martinez is favored over self-funding former state party chair Allen Weh. The winner will face popular Democratic Lt. Gov. Diane Denish.
But most of the national focus tonight will probably be on Alabama, which has competitive gubernatorial primaries in both parties, several interesting congressional races, and even a couple of downballot constitutional officer races that have demanded out-of-state attention.
I’ve done a long write-up of the Alabama landscape over at FiveThirtyEight, and you can check it out there if you are interested.
But suffice it to say that there’s quite a constrast between the over-the-top nature of the campaign–particular in the highly competitive multi-candidate Republican gubernatorial primary–and the interest-level of the electorate. It’s revealing that the big moment of excitement was probably the viral rumor that candidate Tim James (an Auburn grad whose father, former governor Fob James, was an all-American football player at Auburn) was threatening to fire or cut the salary of Alabama football coach Nick Saban. When James put out the fire by donning a “Saban Rules” hat at a campaign event, public interest in the race seemed to subside.
Early reports are that voting in Alabama is very light, with some speculation that holding a statewide primary the day after a major holiday weekend might not be the best way to encourage maximum participation.
It’s hard to say who will benefit from low turnout, other than very well known candidates and ideologues. Low turnout is probably good for Judge Roy Moore in the governor’s race; his core vote will show up. Depending on the patterns, it could also represent good news for underdog Ron Sparks in the Democratic gubernatorial primary; very poor African-American turnout is congressman Artur Davis’ potential achilles heel.
Still, the betting going into this election is that Davis will win the Democratic nomination, with Republicans Bradley Byrne and Tim James extending their nasty and expensive grudge match into a six-week runoff campaign.