Sympathy vote...
WRONG!!!
It was JUST a sympathy vote.
"Now that Barber comes out on top, the GOP will not be able to use Tucson as an example for voters wanting a change from the status quo.
Again WRONG!!!
It was JUST a SYMPATHY VOTE!
You have to love the way they tell you that it was NOT but yet it IS!
Question: Was the election just to fill the UNEXPIRED term? In other words, will there be another election for this seat in November when Giffords’ seat was due to expire anyway?
BS. A dim replacing a dim in a dim district. . . I heard a report that started with the words "Score a big one for the democrats". That would be like a dim replacing Queen Sheila in Houston.
Waiving the bloody shirt.
Those who think it was all about a sympathy vote might want to think about what the GOP-E has done in District 8 in recent years...using money in the PRIMARY to try to get a moderate picked, and then refusing to support the conservative candidate. Pulling all support from Jesse Kelly in 2010 when he ran against Giffords, losing to her by 2%.
This:
“Former state lawmaker Pete Hershberger was one of a number of well-known Republicans who endorsed Barber over Kelly.
“The citizens of District 8 recognized that Ron was a practical guy who would work across party lines to get stuff done, and Kelly was an ideological bomb-thrower,” he said.
Another Republican who supported Barber, Tucson City Councilman Steve Kozachik, was blunt about the quality—or lack thereof—of the GOP candidate.
“I think people saw Ron as a more-serious candidate,” Kozachik said. “And Jesse was not fully baked.”
The last Republican to hold this seat was Jim Kolbe:
“Kolbe is a leading moderate Republican...Like his mentor, Goldwater, he is pro-choice. He was generally more supportive of environmental legislation than most Republicans, especially those from the West. He is a member of various moderate Republican groups such as the Log Cabin Republicans, the Republican Main Street Partnership, the Republican Majority For Choice, Republicans for Choice, Republicans For Environmental Protection and It’s My Party Too. He is one of the four Republicans who voted against the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act which was passed by the House of Representatives with 281-142 votes on October 2, 2003...
...In contrast, Kolbe was a strong supporter of guest worker programs for immigrants. Immigration is a hot-button issue in the 8th, which takes up about half of Arizona’s share of the Mexican border...
...Graf won the five-candidate primary on September 12, 2006. Kolbe refused to endorse Graf, who lost to Democrat Gabrielle Giffords in the November 2006 election....
...Kolbe came out as gay in August 1996 after his vote in favor of the Defense of Marriage Act spurred efforts by some gay rights activists to out him.[3] He won re-election that year. In 2000, he became the first openly gay person to address the Republican National Convention, although his speech did not address gay rights....”
Folks, this is NOT a conservative district, and the GOP-E here has no tolerance for anyone who is conservative. They HATE conservatives, and will not back a conservative who wins the nomination.
The GOP base in the district is conservative. Look at who wins the nominations. But in a general election, the GOP-E and ‘moderate’ republicans open support democrats over conservatives.
Redistricting will probably make the new district I’ll be in even more liberal. It is depressing, but the GOP base has virtually no chance of getting a good guy elected here.
It wasn’t a sympathy vote. It WAS evidence that this is a pretty liberal district - not in the outlying towns, but East Tucson and particularly Vail.