If you at all follow Kentucky politics you know that the annual Fancy Farm picnic is the super bowl of Kentucky politics. It originally started as a simple Church picnic but Kentucky legends like Happy Chandler helped to make it into a must see political event. It is never news when a politician confirms they will go to Fancy Farm, it is only news when they do not. If you are anybody in Kentucky politics you will go to Fancy Farm, it is a must. This year was quite interesting as it looks to be one of the best years Kentucky Democrats have had in a long while. For the most part they have nominated an amazing line of candidates with great futures ahead of them. Republicans, well lets just say that they decided to go with the ever successful approach of nominating a bunch of duds.
First off for those not that familiar with Kentucky politics here is a list of all the speakers I covered.
Governor
Steve Beshear- Incumbent Governor. Democrat.
David Williams- Senate President. Republican.
Gatewood Gallbraith- repeat candidate. Independent.
Lieutenant Governor
Jerry Abramson- Former longtime Louisville Mayor. Democrat.
Richie Farmer- Agriculture Commissioner and ex basketball player. Republican.
Dea Riley- Marketing Consultant. Independent.
Attorney General
Jack Conway- Incumbent Attorney General. Democrat.
Todd P'Pool- Prosecuting Attorney. Republican.
Secretary of State
Alison Grimes- Attorney, daughter of former state party chairman. Democrat.
Bill Johnson- Businessman. Republican.
Auditor
Adam Edelen. Former Beshear Chief of Staff. Democrat.
John Kemper. Businessman. Republican.
Treasurer
Todd Hallenbach. Incumbent Treasurer. Democrat.
K.C. Crosbie. City Councilwoman. Republican.
Agriculture Commissioner
Bob Farmer. Marketing Executive. Democrat.
James Comer. State Representative. Republican.
Others.
Incumbent termed out Auditor Crit Luallen and incumbent appointed Secretary of State, who was defeated in the primary, Elaine Walker both gave farewell speeches. They are both Democrats. Ed Whitfield is the Republican Congressman that represents Fancy Farm in Congress.
Part one: Speeches
The Winners
Republicans:
Mitch McConnell- The tortoise managed to find his way to Kentucky and to this event. As expected McConnell chose to focus his speech on helping David Williams. Lets just say that he did not talk hardly any about Williams, but rather talked about Beshear and Obama. Much more so about Obama and tried his best to make Beashear into an Obama clone. He managed to get a good zing in there about his 1996 victory of Beshear. He also came off as stately like when he managed to calm the crowd down to get a moment of silence for the helicopter that was tragically shot down yesterday. Overall it was an effective enough speech. He did everything he needed to do and came off well. He was obviously very much booed by the crowd, but it was a liberal crowd to start so that is to be expected. I would say that he probably convinced a few undecided tea party folks to suck it up and vote for Williams.
Todd P'Pool- Todd P'Pool (prounced Pee Pool) did not have an easy job to attack Conway's record as it is a very accomplished one. However he did present himself well and attacked Conway over not suing for health care. He riled up his base and was fairly enthusiastic. He did well, I'll give him that.
James Comer- Comer did a very good job in attacking his opponent and came off as extremely competent and capable. He was a very good public speaker and riled up the Republicans and maybe it was just because a lot of people had left because he was the last speaker, but I did not hear any boos and negative chants from the Democratic side. That was probably the only speaker who was not jeered at all, and to me that says something about this race.
Gatewood Galbraith- I count him as a Republican simply because he spent the night courting pissed off tea partiers. That was what his speech was and I think he got some of them. There are many Republicans not happy with Williams and Galbraith attacked Beshear at a much fiercer level than anyone else did. It was a disgusting hateful personal attack speech, but it was an effective one. He attacked Beshear's patriotism and hit both him and Williams hard. He played up the independent card and still managed to court young liberals, who seemed to like him.
Democrats:
Adam Edelen- Clearly the absolute best speaker of the night by a country mile. I talked to someone who has gone to Fancy Farm for years and years and she said it was one of the best she has ever seen. He was extremely energetic and passionate. The kid has chops. The Democratic side was cheering extremely loud and chanting at a fierce rate. He had us riled up good. Republicans were meekly holding up their Kemper signs, and really I think more than anything were too shocked to jeer much. Lets just say that I bet Kemper wishes he would have won the coin toss and went first because he did not do a good job following that.
Jack Conway- In no surprise at all Jack Conway delivered a great speech. It would only have been a surprise had it not gone over well. Jack Conway is genuinely a great speaker, plain and simple. He defended his record well and did a good job re-presenting himself to the voters. Like I said, he is a good speaker, that simple.
Alison Grimes- I can say with confidence I saw more Grimes stickers than I did for Beshear. She also had a brilliant idea to give out miniature trees you can plant in your yard with the message "Help Kentucky grow with Alison" on them. They were really popular. Its a gimmick, but a good one. Her speech was a good one. She came off as very stately and leader like. It was enjoyable to say the least. The crowd loved her.
Crit Luallen- She gave her parting speech but it was pretty much everything but. She basically all but said she was running for higher office and the worst kept secret is she is going to run in 2014. She did a great job and still has a future in the party.
Meh Speeches- These speakers did ok but not great.
Republican:
John Kemper- It was a pretty standard generic R speech. Not controversial but really nothing special at the same time. He got some got boring chants for the Democrats but held his base well enough. Pretty meh.
Richie Farmer- He did well with his base but it was still nothing that impressive. I found his attempt at humor to be odd to say the least. He said he wanted to be upfront about a personal issue that many had read about and heard, that personal issue he said is that Williams is actually a nice guy. Obviously he was trying to grab attention and create humor but it was just awkward to say the least and did not go over well. But he got enough shots (lol) at Beshear to do meh. The crowd had some interesting chants...
Democrats:
Jerry Abramson- I love Jerry and he certainly didn't do bad. But it wasn't great at the same time. The crowd loved him all the same. They were chanting Jerry! Jerry!, like we were on the Jerry Springer show or something. He defended the Beshear record well enough and played a bit of an attack dog. All the same though it really wasn't that noteworthy.
Dea Riley- I count her as a Democrat because she was primarily trying to court Democrats. I kid you not, this sideshow is crazy. Anyone that would actually vote for this ticket for any other reason besides a protest vote has the intelligence of Homer Simpson. It is such an act and if you actually fall for it then wow, just wow. Anyway her speech was choppy and not that great. Not horribly bad but was it not for her rather special line it would go in the loser category. The line was when she was talking about how she was looking forward to getting female voters, and really trumping up the fact she had a uterus, she then said how she might even get Richie Farmer's wife vote. It went over very well. It was a darn good line and got a lot of laughs. One of the best of the night For that it gets bumped up to meh instead of loser.
Todd Hallenbach- He defended his record well but it was a tad too defensive. It was still good enough, he got the crowd stirred up, but it just wasn't that great. Republicans really hate him for some reason.
Losers
Republicans:
Rand Paul- Paul is a spoiled rich kid who whines a lot. This is fact. His speech reflects this. He hates Jack Conway and chose to devote his entire speech to him. He came off as whiney and obnoxious because he kept rubbing in the fact he won. Besides his resources could have been much better directed at Williams than P'Pool. Conway is not going to get any Republican voters because of 2010. Beshear could potentially get a lot. I know I saw a lot of people with Ron Paul for President signs and shirts that had on Gatewwod stickers. He should have focused on getting his tea party friends to unite behind Williams, yet he spent his speech riling the Democrats up. That is all it did, it made it so Democrats would be more excited. It didn't really help P'Pool at all.
Ed Whitfield- Yawn. Yawn. Yawn. Seriously freaking boring, and I watch a lot of C-Span. He really didn't excite anyone at all. Democrats chanted boring a long time and Republicans just gave him polite applause but were probably glad when he left.
David Williams- He got the most boos of the night and really didn't get much excitement from his side at the same time. He attacked Beshear a lot and said Obama a lot, but it really didn't work well.
Bill Johnson- This guy is just awful. He did his spew about voting fraud and sounded like a real conspiracy nut. While Williams probably got the most boos overall, Johnson's attack on the homeless remark was the most booed remark of the night.
K.C. Crosbie- Tied for worst speech of the night. Genuinely a bad performance. Her speech was choppy, she lacked confidence, and had weird and extremely awkward silences sporadically throughout. She is plain and simply not a good speaker. She attacked the incumbent over weird things. Like the fact he got rid of his press secretary and janitorial staff. Who cares, it saves money and doesn't affect his job. She weirdly related that she wasn't going to take a six figure job to just clean toilettes. I can kind of get what she was trying to say, but she didn't deliver it right. It was just bad.
Democrats:
Steve Beshear- Beshear took what started as a decent idea and turned took it too far. He tried to do the better than thou approach and spent the ENTIRE time talking about the troops. It was so cookie cutter and fake. It was good for a bit, but he really should have stopped while he was ahead. It is not going to hurt him, but I really didn't like it.
Bob Farmer- I could probably put this in the meh category as it wasn't really bad for Farmer, but he really came off badly all the same. The reasons why is because he went first and it was pretty much all defensive. It probably would have been better had he gone second as he wouldn't have been defensive right off the bat. He did a decent shot defending his record, but when you spend an entire speech defending yourself it really can't be that great of speech.
Elaine Walker- No wonder she lost the primary by ten points. Yawn city.
Part two: Rankings
Governor- Likely Dem- David Williams is drastically unpopular among Democrats (you HAVE to get some conservative dems to win statewide), Independents, and even a good chunk of his own party. The alleged scandal could complicate things, but even if it is true then Beshear still wins. Gatewwod is probably a draw on who he hurts the most. He gets some lefty environmentalists and potheads, but he also gets a lot of tea partiers and even establishment R's who don't like Williams, though some of those might have deflected to Beshear had they had the option, but I doubt it.
Attorney General- Lean Dem- Jack Conway is a good Attorney General with a record to run on. Todd P'Pool is rich, but Conway is richer and can self fund more if he needs to. Conway is still popular and seems to have made a comeback according to polling. You never know, but I do not see Conway losing.
Secretary of State- Lean Dem- We nominated a top tier candidate while Republicans nominated a nutcase who rails against the homeless and who acts like voting fraud is a highly occurring thing that must be stopped. Grimes is a great Speaker and fundraiser.
Auditor- Lean Dem- Really not that familiar with the race but polling and his speech makes me confident.
Treasurer- Likely Dem- Same as Auditor plus incumbency.
Agriculture Commissioner- Likely Republican- We nominated the worst possible candidate and Republicans nominated a great one. The only way I can possibly see us winning is if it is a complete Democratic blowout up ballot. I mean our nominee has actually made fun of rural Kentuckians and has been banned from various counties by 9 judges, 6 of them Democrats(!!!). Comer even has the state teachers backing him. Plus I saw a ton of Comer stickers. Tons. This thing is in the bag for Comer. It sucks as he will likely be a tough candidate to beat for Governor down the road.