Close your eyes for a moment and imagine you are State Senator Sam Blakeslee. You represent the 15th Senate District, which includes the cities of San Luis Obispo, Santa Maria, and Monterey, and which covers all or part of five different counties along the central coast. Seven months ago, in August of 2010, you won your current Senate seat by defeating former Democratic Assemblyman John Laird in a special election to replace Abel Maldonado.
You received 49% of the vote. Your opponent was close behind, with 44% of the vote. In November, 2012, you’ll be running for re-election at the same time as President Barack Obama. Your district is known as one of the most moderate districts in California – not just because it is fairly evenly divided between Republican voters and Democratic voters, but also because many of those voters are in fact quite moderate themselves.
However, for better or worse, in 2012 you will be facing a very different electorate than the one that elected you last year. I can say that with certainty, for two reasons: (1) a presidential general election always has much higher voter turnout than a special election like the one you won in August – and that almost always means more Democratic voters; and (2) this summer the California Redistricting Commission will draw new district boundaries for all legislative districts – which means your district could easily become more liberal… or more conservative.
Further complicating your re-election bid is the new “open primary” law, which allows the top two vote-getters, regardless of party, to face off in the general election.
To put it bluntly, you would have to be foolish to take your re-election for granted. And you – well, you’re anything but foolish. After all, you are a State Senator.
But you are in a somewhat difficult position right now. The state budget crisis has presented you with a vexing question: should you negotiate a deal with Democratic Governor Jerry Brown to place tax extensions on the ballot and risk losing the support of your party’s activists (who already see you as not sufficiently conservative to represent the Republican brand)? Or should you stick with your fellow Republican legislators in refusing to compromise with the Governor?
Either option carries significant risk, especially given the uncertain future of your re-election bid and the possibility that you may need to win over a more liberal electorate in 2012.
And so, savvy veteran that you are, you take the middle path: you join a high-profile group of GOP legislators in negotiating with the Governor, and you also make it known to the press that you’ve personally called the Governor’s office to continue trying to find solutions to the impasse - and yet you stop short of actually agreeing to any kind of compromise with Gov. Brown.
This strategy works perfectly, because all the headlines in your district highlight your willingness to compromise if only Gov. Brown would agree to address the long-term structural problems that you think are causing the budget crisis. You look reasonable and principled at the same time.
You even find time to fight for a Republican Party bylaw that would ensure an automatic endorsement for you in the 2012 primary – which would help to alleviate your concerns of being challenged from the right by a more conservative candidate.
Yep, you’re doing a good job of navigating these dangerous waters so far. As the budget negotiations continue, you just need to keep one thought in mind: At all costs, avoid compromising with the Governor on a budget deal – unless you can wrangle some kind of historic structural reform from him in the course of your negotiations. It would have to be the kind of policy achievement that would raise your profile and make you a sort of hero to conservatives, moderates, and independents (and maybe even some Democrats).
In fact, it would probably have to be one of two things: pension reform or a state spending cap.
Voting for such a deal would have risks, to be sure, but it’s not like there isn’t any precedent:
Abel Maldonado on the Colbert Report
And if you do it, one thing is for sure: after all the television appearances and the glowing newspaper reports, that 2012 re-election battle would seem a little more certain.
So, Senator, what will you do?
Crossposted at www.CapInsider.com