I'm bored, so here's some stream of consciousness thought on whether we could ever pick off a district like that which I reside in, SC-4.
As for why I chose SC-4, there are a lot of seats, particularly in the South that fall into this mold. They were mostly represented by Democrats until the late '80s and early '90s, with '94 being the realignment year.
Let me take my home district, SC-4 as an example. For those who don't know it, the district is basically Greenville, Spartanburg, and Union counties. It has Bob Jones University in the district and is the area that put GWB over the top against John McCain in the primaries. The two last GOPers to come from the district are Bob Inglis (impeachment manager against Clinton) and now Sen. Jim DeMint (Inglis retook his seat in '04). In otherwords the buckle of the buckle of the Bible Belt. It's somewhere around 64-65% GOP, which is a steep hill to start from. Despite all this, we had a Democratic representative as late as 1992, and a woman at that, Liz Patterson (one of the seven wonders of the world, I tell you).
But there are Democrats like Chet Edwards in Texas and Jim Matheson in Utah that hold even slightly more GOP districts. Under say, 99% of all circumstances, a Democrat is never going to win this district. But there's always that one percent chance.
So I sat down and asked myself, what circumstances would it take to win SC-4? Here's what I came up with.
- Open seat race. A GOP incumbent will never lose this seat.
- Either extreme disgust with the GOP or a strong wind at the back of national Democrats. Probably both.
- A brusing, nasty primary where either a really really moderate GOPer wins OR where an absolute neandrethal comes out of the primary. Probably the latter, but a really conservative (read: evangelical Christian) Democrat who ran to the right of a moderate Republican has some possibility as well, especially if the moderate GOPer's candidacy in the general makes it a situation where a 3rd party nut can steal some votes from the GOP's candidate.
- Multiple repeated gaffes by the GOPer on the campaign trail, especially late in the game. Somethingg like if the GOPer said "I support abortion rights" (a moderate GOPer's gaffe) or "Gay people should be sent to state funded rehab centers" (something I can actually imagine a winger down here saying).
- A candidate for us who is well known and has unimpeachable credentials and is preferably very wealthy (although that matters less than you think. The GSP media market isn't that expensive as compared to say, Atlanta). They would probably have to be from Greenville County, which is the most Republican large county in the state so they could cut into the GOP vote. If you follow this line of thinking, someone who is a textile CEO or owner might fit the bill.
- An out of this world grassroots operation that would drive up the vote in what Democratic leaning areas we do have, specifically those in the African American community. Conversely, GOP turnout would have to be pretty abysmal too.
- Luck. Lots of it.
Even then, our guy/gal would probably not win by much and end up being a one-and-done termer. But some, like Ken Lucas, Jim Matheson, and Chet Edwards, will be able to hold these seats.
Thoughts?