Dig Deeper Texas

I’ve been trying to find out how my very Republican precinct voted in the District 23 run-off election between Bonilla and Rodriguez and came across an analysis of why Bonilla lost at the Right of Texas blog. Notice how it’s never how Rodriguez won but Bonilla lost? There may be some truth to the statement, however, this analysis shows why they still don’t get why Bonilla lost. The post concludes with the following:

Republicans MIA in TX-23 Exemplifies Shameful Trend « Right Of Texas

This sort of turnout and result was seen all throughout the country this past election cycle as the Republican Party was taken to the woodshed. Not so much by Democrats, but by ourselves. Many people thought they would sit on their hands or vote for “the other guy” in order to teach Republicans a lesson. Listen very closely my fellow R’s: if you want to punish the elected officials within our party, and vote for representatives who truly mirror our values, you primary the incumbents out of office. You don’t punish the entire country by allowing the Democratic Party to take control.

First, and ultimately irrelevant point, no one ran against Bonilla in the primaries. Apparently, everyone in the Republic party thought Bonilla was doing a heckuva a job and didn’t feel the need to offer an alternative. Then they might also have felt safe in the knowledge that Delay had the district redrawn to reverse Bonilla’s steady decline in the percentage of voter support in recent years

2004 69.25%
2002 51.52%
2000 59.31%
1998 63.78%
1996 61.84%
1994 62.59%
1992 59.06%

It is the second point that I think is more important and that many Republicans don’t get. Voters start to get annoyed when politicians put party priorities above the voters interests, at least in Texas. Party loyalty can get you lots of things that benefit the district such as appointments to the appropriation committees and campaign contributions. However, when a politician places more importance on responding to the party to maintain the flow of goodies that benefits him but not necessarily the district, he (or she) is no longer “our man” in Washington but the party’s man in Washington. And eventually, (interesting that both parties consider the general voter “not smart”) this fact makes it into the consciousness of the general voter.

This was evident by Bonillas declining victory margins. Rather than trying to reconnect and respond to the district’s voters, Bonilla went to the party, Tom Delay, for help. And this is why the analysis won’t do the Republicans any good because it fails to recognize that people didn’t vote for Bonilla because he was too beholden to interests other than that of the districts. He was voted out much in the same way Bustamenta was previously.

Party hacks on either side might expect voters to hold their noses and vote for a candidate just to support their party on the national level, but then the opposite must also be true. Voters are willing to vote out the local candidate because of what the party is doing at the national level.

According to the analysis, Republicans didn’t vote for Bonilla to teach the Republicans a lesson. Yet, they also didn’t vote for Bonilla because he didn’t “truly mirror our values.” Well, if he didn’t truly mirror their values, where was the alternative in the primaries? Maybe some Republicans really wanted to punish the national Republicans and didn’t care about Bonilla.

Does anyone else remember all the articles before the election by conservatives who thought the Republicans needed to loose some to shake them up? Many felt that party loyalty and the desperate desire to stay in power was undermining the “true” values of the Republican party?

And then there is also the self-interest factor that somehow keeps getting ignored although only on certain levels. Bonilla acted in his own best interest in associating with Tom Delay and others to make sure he received the benefits of being part of the party in power. Well…the special election took place after it was firmly established that the Republicans were no longer in power. What was the motivating factor for Republican base to go out and vote? It certainly wasn’t going to help the party at a national level. Given Bonilla’s actions in the Appropriations committee, it’s hard to see how anyone thought he would still be an important player in distributing pork (you know, what they use to call earmarks before the Republicans controlled Congress) locally.

Bonilla has never come across as a bi-partisan kind of politician which would be the only reason to even consider voting for him after the November elections. But then saying a Republican lost because he was too much of a loyal Republican would suggest that the election might have been lost because of disenchantment with the party rather than any individual.

Technorati Tags: Henry Bonilla, Ciro Rodriguez, TX 23, Election analysis

Filed under: Bonilla, Ciro Rodriguez, Congressional District 23, District 23, Henry Bonilla, Runoff Election - December 12, Texas District 23, Texas House of Representatives, republican, runoff