BOB ANDERSON 40642 10.04%
MICHELE BACHMANN 187805 46.41%
EL TINKLENBERG 175784 43.44%
Who are these people that voted Bob Anderson? The IP endorsed El Tinklenberg! MPR’s Bob Collins:
Who is Bob Anderson? Michele Bachmann’s best friend.
Bob [Collins]’s theory of politics in Minnesota is if you put an Independence Party candidate not named Jesse Ventura on a ballot, Republicans win.
Independence Party fans hate me for saying that but for the most part, it’s true.
They can logically point to Al Franken’s Senate race tonight — so far — as proof the theory doesn’t stand up.
And I’ll counter with Bob Anderson, a veritable unknown who is clearly pulling votes from Elwyn Tinklenberg tonight, paving the way — again, so far — for Michele Bachmann.
MinnPost’s Doug Grow (emphasis mine):
Anderson – who had no money and only one issue (health insurance coverage for mental health problems) – managed to get 10 percent of the vote running as the Independence Party candidate.
Funny thing, though. Anderson really wasn’t the IP’s candidate. Tinklenberg was. In fact, the IP hierarchy – such as it is – is offended by Anderson, who is seen as a gadfly.
But when the IPs endorsed Tinklenberg, Anderson grabbed a golden opportunity. He ran, unopposed, in the primary as the IP representative. He won the IP spot on Tuesday’s ballot and, coupled with that comfortable Minnesota name, managed to win thousands of independent votes.
Here’s the kicker:
It could also be that nobody offered to give him anything. No matter, Anderson said he spent less than $200 on his campaign, which begs the question: If he’d spent $300, could he have won 15 percent of the 6th District vote?
More at MinnPost, MPR’s News Cut.
Sidenote: if it was an Instant Runoff Voting election, I strongly believe Tinklenberg would have won.
Just as in the senate race, I’m sure that IP voters were most likely voting “neither”
How many important races does the DFL have to lose before pushing for IRV statewide?
It’s a shame that Bob was on the ballot. I believe that parties should have more control of their ballot lines. Specifically we should have fusion voting, like in New York, where a candidate can appear on multiple party ballot lines. So the IP and DFL both could have listed El as their endorsed candidates, thus negating the problem. The DFL would be wise to pursue this option in the legislature. It’s been proven, time and time again, that they can’t win without the support of IPers and independents. Amy Klobuchar was able to attract us away from the IP and GOP candidates in 2006 and win in a landslide. Perhaps the DFL needs to give some serious consideration as to how they can attract independents and retain a majority in MN.
With the crazies taking over the GOP in Minnesota, the ranks of the IP will only grow as disaffected liberals and moderates leave the other two parties. I’d hop on board with the DFL if there was more consideration of financial and fiscal commonsense.
The 6th as currently configured is probably going to be an impossible nut to crack for any democrat. All the more reason to choose a really good candidate for guv in 2010, redistricting and all.
Blaming this on a lack of IRV is like blaming traffic jams on a lack of flying cars. Sure, it would fix the problem, but it aint gonna happen any time soon.
At this point we may want to start considering IP candidates more as serious contenders than spoilers, more oppo research, directed messaging, ect.
Hard to say. Here are some interesting stats.
1. The tone of the federal races was soooo bad that 45-75% of Barkley’s supporters said they would not
have voted without him on the ballot. I suspect the same is true in the 6th. You centainly can’t disenfranchise these people.
2. The rural and NW areas of the 6th are one issue country…abortion. There was a lot of misunderstnading at the IP convention where El was cross-endorsed that Binkowski 2006 + Wetterling 2006= victory. Problem is our federal candidates are pretty big on limited government. Anderson was more in vein with Binkowski- who wanted to go to a flat sales tax and get rid of the Dept. of Education among other things. Knowing the district, I am inclined to think that Anderson may have pulled more from Bachman.
3. Spending $200…come on guys. If anyone can get 10% on $200 clearly you better look at how pissed off people are at 527s. Don’t blame BOB!
Peter Tharaldson
IP Minneapolis (who knows a little about polling)
It does no good to bitch about the IP - these morans are going to run their loser candidates no matter what. Maybe stop giving them a free pass - if people knew that Barkley was a tobacco lobbyist or that Peter Hutchinson had made a career out of defrauding people, those numbers would drop. I am sure most voters knew nothing about Anderson - spend some time exposing him for the jerkoff he is instead of letting people think he is somehow above the fray.
The fact that Dan misspelled moron says a lot.
What Dan- Totalitarianism….we will legislate you away rather than use elections? Here is a thought: fusion voting- party ballot lines like New York. Wait a minute…Arne Carlson helped push that through when he got our endorsement…but you guys, the Dems and Repubs, killed it. Absolute power does the dirt we saw in this election…pure and simple.
Peter (again)
Kerosene Hat,
He intentionally spelled it “morans”. It’s a joke from here.
Dan - the problem was NOT the IP’s loser candidates. The problem was the DFL’s loser candidates. Al Franken had way too many negatives and El Tinklenberg wasn’t much better. As DavidD says in post #3, start running candidates like Amy that can appeal to more moderate voters, especially in statewide races or tough to win districts.
To say that Bob Anderson gave the election to Bachmann, we have to assume that at least 64.8% of his supporters would have gone for El if Anderson weren’t on the ballot.
I suspect that at least some of them would have made Bachmann their second choice, and that even more would have left that race blank. I think we’re going too far when we say that 64.8% of them would have made Tink their second choice.
Correction: El would have needed a net gain of a little more than 12,000 votes out of the Anderson supporters.(The 64% I said above is only necessary if EVERY ONE of the Anderson voters would have voted without Anderson on the ballot.) My bad.
In any case, the idea that the DFL could have picked up a 12,000 vote net gain from only 40,000 voters in a conservative district is doubtful given that some of those voters had Bachmann as a second choice and even more had “no vote” as a second choice.
Totalitarianism? Where did you get that from? You are reading too much into it. I have accepted that the IP is going to run candidates. My point was simply that the IP nominates total losers and the other candidates and the press give them a free ride.
And I agree with you Nony Moose - again my point is that we shouldn’t be blaming the IP and instead get our own shit together.
I didn’t think I needed to explain moran, but I forgot that we have some IP folks here. From now on, I’ll try to use small words too.
Peter - Anderson pulled more from Tinklenberg’s voters - and what this shows is that the IP endorsement is of very little value, if someone else runs on the ballot line. What did the IP do, to inform voters that Tinklenberg obtained IP endorsement?
Dan - the IP didn’t nominate Anderson. Anderson just ran for the seat - but the IP failed to do enough to let voters know who they did endorse.
“Peter Hutchinson had made a career out of defrauding people, those numbers would drop.”
I had serious concerns about Peter Hutchinson, but I was NOT going to vote for Mike Hatch or Tim Pawlenty.
The 3rd Party put up David Dillon in the 3rd, and he was a quality candidate. To generalize IP candidates as losers and unworthy of the ballot is wrong. In many ways, Dillon was the best for the 3rd, in philosophy as well as presentation.
The fact Anderson took so many votes, though, does tell me that this is still not yet a safe seat for Bachmann. Who runs against her in 2010?
Dan,
“My point was simply that the IP nominates total losers and the other candidates and the press give them a free ride.”
The Ip endorsed Tinklenberg, held a joint press event with El a week ago to reinforce the point. They also endorsed Sarvi.
Tink and Al went negative early and often and that only works if there is nowhere else to go.
Exactly Beckfeld. How many press conferences did the IP have to support Barkley?
The abortion isssue is a tough nut to crack, but look at the results. Stearns county was one of El’s strongest. I would say that has a lot do with 75% of the vote at the colleges here. Anoka county was his weakest.
Checking out Anderson’s website, it’s really too bad that people actually thought he was a legit candidate.
Hi Eva-
We can’t use lack of media coverage to provide evidence that little was done…alot was done…it was literally censored off the newspagers.
Contracts were drawn requiring the candidate to reference Independence cross-endorsement in any publication where DFL or Republican endorsement was listed. Mr. Tinklenberg did that…the press did not cover it at all.
As far as resources. As long as we don’t take PAC money, and subsequently don’t get the independent support of PACS, we have to ration support. It must always go to primary endorsed candidates. I don’t think anyone could argue against that. With that said. 10 press releases went out from the IP regarding the cross-endorsement and the party chair attended several press conferences.
I personally was against the cross-endorsement of El, not because I didn’t like him or think he would be a good candidate, but because the logic was severely flawed. John Binkowski took 8% on 2006 by promoting libertarian issues. Our federal candidates skew quite libertarian (in fact folks, the gubernatorial candidate in 2006 saw our third greatest support. Policies include spending freezes, getting rid of the Dept of Education, hawkish budgeting and definitely gun rights (Dean Barkley had a pledge to gun owners).
Now I ask those of you on the left on this website to listen without attacking. Our federal races are different from our state races. Noone has taken the time to notice the fact that we have strong federalist views, and our policy positions as such can be remarkably tailored to the level of government.
Where did John Binkowski and now Bob Anderson do well? Not in the burbs and exurbs, but rather in Benton, Mille Lacs and Wright Counties, where the electorate is more social conservativism (Bachman voters)mixed with a dose of libertarianism (our voters in these areas). Dean Barkley was getting mid 20’s in many of these areas while Bachman won majorities. Bob Anderson, with $200, was grabbing 15% (anyone calculate the $ per vote?).
I am speaking with some knowledge on the sixth…I grew up just north of it in a town called Pierz. While you were all celebrating on this site last night, my high school teacher Al Doty, very nearly got beat by the Republican (70 votes). 12B, which was hardcore DFL when my dad was IndependentRepublican twenty years a go (and so was Al), went overwhelmingly for McCain, and Coleman (but they love Oberstar because he delivers).
Frankly, David is right. You need a fusion ballot like Minnesota toyed with and New York has. Each party can endorse a candidate and put him or her on their line. This type of balloting has some effect of highlighting different aspects of the candidate. In New York, candidates appearing on the Independence Party line and the Republican line will get different kinds of voters. It is kind of a coalition voting. Some the candidates that won in NY this way were Hillary Clinton, Michael Bloomberg, Governor Patacki, and most recently John McCain (didn’t do much good in the latter, ok).
The IP in New York can put a center/libertarian stamp of approval on the candidate that means something very real in the voting booth. You want to beat Bachman, then bring back that fusion ballot.
Peter
Wishing for IRV or a fusion ballot is about as productive as wishing the aliens would come and take Michelle Bachmann back to her home planet. Its not going to happen, at least anytime soon.
I don’t know anything about Dillon - I was speaking mostly about Barkley and Hutchinson. If Anderson only raised $200, his votes were “none of the above.” Again, though, we have to deal with the fact that the IP is going to run a candidate, regardless of whether there is someone qualified to do so or not. And the biggest problem is not the IP candidates, its the DFL candidates. We should have destroyed Coleman this year, just as we should have destroyed Pawlenty in 2006, but our own candidates held us back.