Posted on 02/06/2006 4:44:28 PM PST by Clintonfatigued
The last U.S. Senator to lose reelection in Maine was liberal William Hathaway, who was overwhelmingly defeated by then-Congressman William Cohen in 1978.
"Yes, Gov Brennan lost out to McKernan, Olympia Snowe's hubby. He only served one term. King won the next election and served 8 years. Horrible Then Baldy has been in the house since. Lousy."
This is somewhat incorrect. After Gov. Joe Brennan served 2 terms, he was ineligible for a 3rd term in 1986 and ran for Jock McKernan's vacant House seat. The liberal RINO McKernan won a 4-way race (much like Baldacci) with only 40% for the Governorship over 2 other liberals (the Democrat was the sitting Attorney-General, and a radical environmentalist RINO indy) and 1 Indy Conservative. Joe Brennan hated Washington and returned home in 1990 to try to reclaim the Governorship, but lost by 3% to McKernan (who only got 47%). McKernan retired in 1994 undefeated. Brennan made one last try for his old job in '94, and came within 1% of defeating liberal Indy Angus King (poor Susan Collins came in a distant 3rd).
In any event, the last sitting Senator to lose in Maine was Democrat Bill Hathaway in 1978 (to Bill Cohen). He had beaten the legendary Margaret Chase Smith in 1972 (after taking considerable advantage of the fact that Smith had no real campaign workers (!) and caught her completely off guard). Not since 1966 has a sitting Governor lost, when Republican John Hathaway Reed went down for a 3rd term to Democrat Ken Curtis.
What's most notable was that Hathaway lost by such an overwhelming margin (57% to 34%), and that the third-party candidate was a conservative who siphoned votes away from RINO William Cohen.
It's very rare when an incumbent Senator wins only 1/3 of the vote when seeking reelection.
Hathaway's margin of loss was quite shocking, especially given that he was scandal-free. All Barone could theorize was that Hathaway had a gruff personality, couldn't identify with any leading positions and that Cohen's attractive youthfulness painted the liberal Hathaway into a corner. The big disappointment that year was losing the Governorship (which was an open seat that the Independent Jim Longley, Sr. vacated after a single term), when Joe Brennan won with 48% when 2 Republicans split the remaining 52% (an old-line RINO won the GOP nomination and a Conservative GOP ran as an Indy).
Brennan's final run for office in '96, when many expected he'd probably be able to win Cohen's open Senate seat, exposed an interesting dynamic in the demographics of the state that Collins took advantage of. The older voters, whom I'd call the old Muskie Democrats (since FDR and the Democrat party wasn't much of a presence in the '40s, not until Muskie's overthrow of the old GOP guard in 1954 and his establishing a viable 2-party system in the state) are far more Democrat than the emerging younger voters, whom are far more GOP (that's why I believe a potential trend to bringing ME back into the GOP fold is very much a possibility -- if only we could do the same for the most lost sheep in New England -- Massachusetts !). Had Brennan run for the open Senate seat in an earlier time, he probably would've won, but by '96 (as Collins took delight in blasting him), he was a relic from 1965, same old ideas.
I just know for sure that since coming to Maine in the summer of 83, we have lived under the following Governors:
Brennan, McKernan, King and Baldacci.
I wasn't into polictics much in 83, but my interest started growing when King became Governor.
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