Kansas isn't easy for Democrats, our Congressional delegation has one Democrat, the legislature is overwhelmingly Republican, and party registration is even more Republican. Many Democrats register as Republicans to vote in the Republican primary, the only race that matters.
But this year may change things. Record crowds turned up at the annual meeting of the Party, and not just because Barack Obama was there to rally the troops. We've got a strong Governor running for re-election, a strong candidate who abandoned the Republican party to run for Attorney General, and Democrats are ready to turn Kansas blue.
Excerpts from an exclusive interview with Barack Obama, as well as an interview with Congressman Dennis Moore, and more news and analysis below the fold, or at Thoughts from Kansas.
Asked how we could share the success Senator Obama's unabashedly progressive campaign had in parts of Illinois not unlike Kansas, he told me:
One, I think you can promote progressive values if you describe those values in pragmatic, common sense terms as opposed to ideological terms. ...
The second thing that's important is that you don't shy away from the so-called values debate. Being willing to talk about faith and family and the challenges of raising children. Those are things that people feel very intimately. I think sometimes Democrats are a little patronizing about those issues, but those are in fact issues that people feel very deeply. They want meaning in their life, they want a sense of community in their life, they feel overwhelmed with all the different forces coming at them. Not all those problems are amenable to legislation, but if you recognize them and talk about them people feel that at least you're identifying with their experience. Those would be the two main pieces of advice.
Dennis Moore, our lone Democrat in Kansas (at least until Nancy Boyda beats Jim Ryun), said much the same thing:
I think number one we need to start to join in discussion and debate on values, because I think a lot of Democrats are afraid to talk about values and I don't think we should be ashamed of the values we have and we should be more willing to talk about those. I think that when people hear what we really do stand for, I think a lot of people believe as we do in this state, probably a majority, especially if they really hear about it.
And the Kansas Democratic Party is ready for the challenge. In talking to candidates like Nancy Boyda, who's up for a rematch after a close race in 2004, or John Doll, who will take on Jerry Moran in a race stretching across 2/3 of the state, there was a clear sense of direction and energy. John Doll has no illusions about the difficulty of a Democrat winning in deep red western Kansas, but he said "Bucknell beat KU last year, so anything's possible."
Paul Morrison, a formerly Republican District Attorney, is running so strong that Karl Rove is rumored to be on his way out to raise funds for the incumbent, Phill Kline. Morrison describes the race as between "one who postures all the time but does little versus one who does a great deal but postures very little." His wife told me that the change in party "fits him very well." He's a great campaigner and will remind a lot of unhappy Republicans that they have another option.
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