Post Election Analysis

There has been some really crappy election analysis floating around so allow me to weigh in.

First of all, the big theme of election night that no one seems to focus on is the fact that two very significant things happened. First and probably most easily recognizable, is the fact that the Brown faction got their clocks cleaned.

There wasn’t a single one of them in serious contention. Hell Manny Hinojosa probably did the best of all the Brown acolytes and he did his level best to not sound like one of them.

The other significant thing about election night is that it was a major defeat for conservatives. The only conservative to do well on election night was a conservative Democrat, Eddie Holguin. He easily defeated a challenge from his left in Gerardo Rosiles, and a challenge from outer space in Zulema Lazarin.

Every other conservative did very poorly. I think that says a lot and should teach the fiscal conservatives a valuable lesson. Last Saturday’s results were an indication of what happens when you let the small, but loud segment of social conservatives become the face of your party. Perhaps they will learn from this since all their good ideas seem to wither away because the social conservatives hijack the ideas.

I think the Republican gains made in November were about their brand. The people that won, won because of their brand, not because of who they are. I need only point to Charlie Garza and Tim Besco (who didn’t win but his performance was exaggerated by the fact that he benefited from people voting for the Republican brand).

I know, some people will say that City Council races are non-partisan.

Sure they are.

City Council races are about governing values and principles. Anyone who has studied the candidates can probably pick out the Democrats and Republicans pretty easily. So when the conservatives ran on their own, without the benefit of a brand, they all lost and none of them were ever in serious contention.

District 1 – Ann Morgan Lilly is in trouble. She’s under 40% heading in to a run-off. For some reason people are spinning it as though everything is hunky dory in her campaign, but the fact is, a large majority of people who voted in the election didn’t vote for her. She has to figure out a way to make them vote for her. Her flip-flop contract signing with two of the also-rans is an indication that she feels the heat. More on that later.

Tim Besco. What a joke. I hope he sees how futile elections are for him. He has to give people a reason to vote for him, he doesn’t. I don’t think it has much to do with his now-infamous letter where he went all C-Lo Green on the Republican Party. I think it’s just proof of what many of us said, the votes he got in November were anti-Reyes votes, they weren’t votes for him. He should never run for anything again…ever, but part of me hopes he does because it’s so comical to see him and his campaign manager Oscar.

Rick Schecter – Retire the mullet. He’s a much smarter guy than people give him credit for, but he’s been on the ballot enough times, and lost enough times, to finally get the hint. He doesn’t campaign the right way and so he will not ever be looked at as credible. He will still be a thorn in the side of people at city hall, which is why I root for him. I hope he continues to do that.

Lyda Ness-Garcia – She has some work to do, but she’s solidly in the run-off. She gained the most amount of support from the undecideds that were profiled in the El Paso Times poll done before the election. In fact, she gained a pretty significant amount of support, despite the efforts of the two conservative bloggers to trash her personal life and people around her. She lived through the scorched earth portion, the question now is if she has the organization to get enough of the votes that went to other candidates behind her as opposed to the incumbent.

Manny Hinojosa – Well, if there was an award given for the Most-Improved Candidate, it would go to Manny hands down. The guy came a long way in his campaign. From crazy religious zealot, to fiscal conservative, and now back to religious zealot. He tried his best to not come across as anti-gay and sound like a fiscal conservative, but once the election was over he sent a letter showing his true colors to Ann Morgan Lilly in which he gets back aboard the hate slate.

Dr. Theresa Ware-Asbury – She shouldn’t have run. She wasn’t the stronger of the two progressive candidates. She didn’t have a clearly articulated message, she didn’t have much of a campaign structure, or money. Her core support likely would’ve gone to Ness-Garcia and that would’ve changed the race much earlier. She also improved a lot as a candidate along the way, but she split a key voting bloc unnecessarily.

Abe Peinado – Simply put, he was never viable. Nor will he ever be. He didn’t have financial support but ran as a conservative. I didn’t see a lot of substance in him and let’s be honest, who takes someone seriously that puts on their campaign announcement press release that they enjoy weight lifting? He’s not a top-tier Republican so it’s doubtful he will ever be in line for one of the three or four seats the Republicans have in town.

District 8 – Snoozer. This one was over a long time ago. Despite a crowded field, Niland won without a run-off. Despite some early trepidation about articulating a position on issues, she came around to be pretty well put-together as a candidate. Good poise, much stronger on issues (even if I don’t agree with her all the time) than the other candidates. This is a pretty simple equation, no one distinguished themselves from the pack, so the person with the highest name ID wins. Plus, when they actually had a chance to distinguish themselves from her in a debate, they didn’t.

Jorge Artalejo – I think he actually managed to take this race even less seriously than the previous races. He showed up in shorts and chanclas to at least one debate. He is not a serious candidate and should NOT EVER RUN FOR ANYTHING EVER AGAIN.

But he will. Sigh.

At least he gave me and Sammy a good laugh about candy bars at the Greater El Paso Republican Women candidate forum.

Only in El Paso can you have two candidates that no one knows what they are saying and one that doesn’t know where she is.

Lisa Turner – See my note about Rick Schecter.

Sergio Contreras – Not ready to run. No clear message. Has to improve communications. He came across as a burned-out stoner. But that vato is great on paper…

Malcolm MacGregor – A total joke and looks like El Paso’s answer to Mr. Magoo. He gave me one of my favorite lines of the campaign, “Let’s get back to Biblical common sense.” Even in the most conservative part of town, he really wasn’t able to grab much support. There was so much I couldn’t written, but it wasn’t worth the energy.

Ernesto Villanueva, Jr. – Probably the only candidate that lost on Election Day that might have a future in politics once he gets some fine-tuning on presentation and message. He worked hard and had a kid along the way. Some pics of him drinking didn’t harm him, so he should be good to go in the future. Next time, have the financial backing first…

District 5 – Proof El Pasoans can be really stupid. A guy who dropped out of the race, and never campaigned ended up with votes. This race is about to get really interesting. Dora Oaxaca and Alice Rosas are both backing Dr. Noe. Ken Sutherland is no long with Mayela Mejia’s campaign (this happened before the election) and Mejia bought in a pretty good duo to give her campaign a shot in the arm, Kathy Coronado and Pee Wee Mier. They came on pretty strong during the last couple of weeks of the campaign and are likely the reason Mejia made it to the run off.

Why is this race going to get interesting? 

Two reasons, money and mud. 

First, the money. I’m interested to see what kind of financial support either of them gets in the run-off and how well they put it to use. I’d have to give the edge to Mike Noe in that respect. I’m betting he can put some of his own money in to the race if he needs to.  Now for the mud, all four of the campaign workers I mentioned are very experienced. They have all cut their teeth on campaigns over the years and this is not their first rodeo. They all know one another pretty well. They have all campaigned in the valley.

And 3 of the 4 of them have a reputation for being pretty rough, some say dirty, campaigners. For campaign wonks, this is going to be the race that will be the most-fun to watch.

Precinct 111 is key in this race.

District 6 – The most conservative candidate in town to win was Eddie Holguin, a Democrat. It looks like he carried all of the precincts in his district, north and south of the freeway. In fact, I think he even carried the home precincts of his two opponents. That’s probably not going to make Troy Hicks very happy, but Holguin actually campaigned in this race, and it’s been a while since he has. Lilly Ruiz, a longtime staffer, even came off the bench to help out with his race on Election Day.

Gerardo Rosiles – I hope he sticks around and stays involved. Aside from my many jokes about his lack of English proficiency or needing to subscribe to Ingles Sin Barreras, I honestly think he has a lot to contribute. He probably shouldn’t ever run for office again, but he should get involved in boards and commissions. We could use his input.

Zulema Lazarin – I almost don’t know where to start. She should not ever run again. It’s embarrassing. She started by not knowing what district she lives in and it only got worse from there. She made so many mistakes I got tired of writing about them, which is why I never wrote about the fact that she never went back to file the proper paperwork for campaign finance. She went over the $500 self-imposed limit and needed to file another report. She should just go back to Planet LNRC and help people that are actually qualified (and know what district they are in) run for office.