December 4, 2007 - 10:02am
Smith continues to dominate
By Wally EdgeAnyone who thinks Senator Gordon Smith is sitting idle watching Rep. Jeff Merkley and lawyer Steve Novick duel it out in the Dem primary has another thing coming. It was no coincidence that his half page ad in yesterday’s Oregonian touting his vicissitudes of endorsements from across the state was printed on the same day of the Oregon Leadership Summit at the convention center. Smith has over $4 million in his bank account awaiting his challenger and continues to reach out to both eastern Oregon and the valley. DPO Chair Meredith Wood Smith can organize as many protests as she likes, but Smith continues to show his dominance with 35 county commissioners and 52 mayors lining up behind him and despite having no statewide farm team to back him up. The recent revelation of DSCC support to the Merkley campaign shows there must be some kinks in Smith’s hold on the state. However, if the Dems spend all their time and resources beating each other up in the primary it will be very difficult to play catch up this coming May.
Notable but not surprising endorsements for Smith include businessmen Tim Boyle of Columbia Sportswear and developer Jordan Schnitzer. These boys like to back winners.
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Wally Edge
Big speechs, big endorsements, and big donations were spread throughout Oregon this week. Both Democrats on the Portland City Council and newly appointed GOP State Rep. Matt ... >
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Commissioners and Mayors
The problem with this analysis is that many of the county commissioners endorsing Smith represent rural counties that trend Republican but have very few voters. There are many more rural counties with few voters that tend to vote Republican, than urban and suburban counties that tend to vote Democratic. Six counties make most of the State's electorate and endorsements from the rural counties are nice but statewide races are not won in Harney or Grant counties.
Republican candidates in Oregon will always have more commissioners on their endorsement lists than Democrats, simply because there more Republican commissioners than Democratic ones. But the Democrats represent hundreds of thousand more votes.
Smith needs Democrats to vote for him and while he has a few business folks on board he is bleeding the support he has had in the past. Merkley is coalescing the traditional Democratic base and Steve Novick is nailing down those further to left on the spectrum. Smith is stuck, he will need to move further to the left to win this race but doing that and he risks turning off Republicans in the state who don't entirely trust him.
Oregonian's Past
The power of endorsements can be fleeting... in 2000 the Oregonian endorsed Bush For president and in 2006 endorsed Ron Saxton for Governor neither endorsement mattered to those candidates, they both lost Oregon as they should have. Also let us not forget that gordon smith has also lost two people who had come out and support him but now have switched their endorsement. Rep. Debbie Boone (D) being one of them and Tillamook County Commissioner Tim Josi being the other.
I guess endorsements can be fleeting. Of course the only thing that really matters is how many votes a candidate gets and those are going to be a much tuffer thing for G. Smith to get this election cycle with his record.
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