CA 10th Congressional District

We mostly have a national political bent here at No Jibber Jabber, but this post is a bit more local. My Congresswoman, Ellen Tauscher, has been tapped by President Obama to serve under Hillary Clinton over at the State Department. If and when (and the expectation is when since it doesn't appear to be a controversial pick) Taucher is confirmed by the Senate, she will resign from Congress and a special election will be held to fill her seat.

Congressional seats don't come up that often in the Bay Area and there is a whole lot of interest when they do. Term limits in the California Legislature have made Congressional seats even more appealing. For instance, back in 1992, Ted Lempert and Anna Eshoo battled for the Democratic nomination to succeed Tom Campbell. Eshoo pulled out a narrow victory and has served in Congress ever since. In the ensuing years, Lempert was termed out of the Assembly and then had to wait 2 years to run for the State Senate. He was defeated by the then-incumbent Assemblyman Joe Simitian in 2004. Lempert has not run for elected office since then.

In the 10th, the presumed front-runner is Senator Mark DeSaulnier. A long-time County Supervisor, DeSaulnier was elected to the Assembly in 2006 and then he and Tom Torlakson switched jobs in 2008 (Torlakson was termed out of the Senate but had two years left that he could serve in the Assembly.) Torlakson is running for Superintendent of Public Instruction in 2010 and quickly endorsed DeSaulnier to be Tauscher's successor. Joining Torlakson in endorsing DeSaulnier were Tauscher herself and Congressman George Miller. Miller is a close ally of Speaker Nancy Pelosi and represents an adjoining district to the 10th.

Many people presumed that with these powerful endorsements that DeSaulnier would clear the field of credible challengers. Assemblywoman Joan Buchanan quickly let it be known that she was interested in the Congressional seat as well. This caught a number of people by surprise because she had elected in November of 2008 in a closely contested race in the 15th Assembly District. Over $3 million was raised to help Buchanan win what had been the last Republican held legislative seat in the Bay Area. If she were to leave her Assembly seat, it would instantly become a top GOP priority to retake it.

Just as we were starting to consider what would happen if Buchanan and DeSaulnier squared off, rumors percolated that Lieutenant Governor John Garamendi was looking at the race. Personally, I thought he was legally obligated to run for Governor every 8 years, but apparently there was a loop hole that might let him run. Big John was not distracted by the fact that he doesn't live in the district. I give him credit for recognizing that the Garemendi for Governor bandwagon was not really a juggernaut.

All 3 potential candidates came to the Democratic Central Committee last Thursday. Buchanan gave a succinct update on the state's financial position (not pretty) and merely stated that she'd have an announcement in the next few weeks. DeSaulnier stated he'd be running if/when there was a vacancy and then talked about the budget situation and the upcoming May propositions (he's voting for them, but doesn't like them).

I think everyone was really curious when Garamendi got up and spoke. He gave a very boilerplate speech about his current mix of anger and optimism. It was a very polished speech, but one that seemed like it could be given anywhere. His staff member gave out some very slick flyers- I was amused that they read "Garamendi 2010"- have flyers, will run. He referred to his "many friends who suggested I run", but didn't name any of them.

My take on the race is that DeSaulnier would beat either Buchanan or Garamendi in a two-person race. If all theree of them run, well, it gets more interesting. Buchanan would certainly seem to be helped by Garamendi entering- if she gets a large portion of women voters, that could be her path to victory.

One of the other fun parts of this situation is that we might have another game of electoral musical chairs. It will be hard to top the famous one in the East Bay, which involved free chicken dinners.

Also, my friend Sean Mykael has the case for Garamendi running in the 3rd Congressional district.

Social media

One of the big stories of 2008 was the convergence of politics and social media- blogs, Facebook, Twitter, texting, etc. Barack Obama was the biggest adopter of these new tools and they were part of his success. The MyBO network was the central hub for his volunteers to connect with one another. Even though there were some technical glitches, his announcement of Joe Biden via text garnered a ton of publicity and cell phone numbers.

Politicians are trying to recreate the Obama magic in the next election cycle. The biggest question is: How much of Obama's success was because of social media and how much of social media's success was because of Obama? Will politicians who lack Obama's rhetorical gifts be able to inspire people to organize online?

Fast Company has a really interesting article about Chris Hughes- he has the dual distinction of being one of the founders of Facebook and being an integral part of Obama's online operation. One snippet:

It was Hughes's instinct for satisfying Facebook's users, ironically, that would lead him beyond the site. In the fall of 2006, as midterm elections approached, Facebook took the then bold step of allowing political candidates to set up modified profile pages, well before celebrities and products could have fan pages of their own. When a freshman senator from Illinois came knocking, it was Hughes who provided the customer service. Barack Obama wasn't a midterm candidate, but he wanted a Facebook profile anyway. The approach came in an email from Reggie Love, Obama's now famous body man. "I liked the Facebook idea," says Jim Brayton, then the senator's Internet director, "but Reggie really got it immediately." After Love set up the profile, Brayton says, they realized its potential for an Obama presidential campaign. "We quickly wanted to be able to do more with it. Chris got it right away."

Another example of the growing importance of technology in campaign's is visible in my own Congressional district. Ellen Tauscher will be stepping down to take a job in the State Department. The presumed favorite to replace her is State Senator Mark DeSaulnier. The only other person on the Dem side that I know for sure is running is Adriel Hampton.

I'd never heard of Adriel until a couple of days ago, but he is pretty well-known in some of the progressive politics circles. From what I can tell, he seems like a Twitter fanatic: http://twitter.com/adrielhampton

If Twitter and Ning are going to be the cornerstones of his campaign, I'm curious to see how effective his campaign can be. He's a huge underdog to Sen. DeSaulnier so he will need something to be a game changer. From what I've seen, his Twitter posts primarily consist of asking for cash and publicity- we'll have to see if he uses it to flesh out his platform.