I am very pleased to announce that our esteemed Sacramento Area Correspodent Tom Ross now has reinforcements. I was quite pleased when Republican strategist Tab Berg accepted my offer to come onboard with the FlashReport. Tab and I have had a long-time relationship based on mutual respect and admiration, but admittedly over the years, Tab has been the genius behind a number of moderate Republican candidates, officeholders and campaigns — folks that I wouldn’t back in a primary in a million years. But then, some of Tab’s clients — for example his successful Assembly candidate this cycle, Paul Cook — are quite conservative. And as we say here at the FR, we represent the center-right to the right-right. [Fascinating Fact: Tab, pictured above to the right, is a licensed whitewater river guide.] Anyways, the reason I reached out to Tab is because he… Read More

Republican Assemblywoman Bonnie Garcia will be returning for a third term in the California State Legislature. Hers was the final legislative race in the state where the outcome was not considered official. Yesterday, enough of the remaining absentee ballots were counted in Riverside County to give Garcia an unbeatable lead — and her opponent, former Assemblyman Steve Clute, conceded the race. Congratulations Bonnie! You can be sure that Clute’s near-victory will mean he will try another crack at the apple in 2008 when Garcia will be precluded from a re-election run due to term limits.

Not one seat in the legislature changed partisan hands in the 2008 election cycle. It is a win for Democrats who control the status quo, and a win of sorts for legislative Republicans who staved off the ‘blue tide’ that crossed the country.

When you win a narrow race, you can look to just about every facet of your campaign and say that each part ‘made the difference’ in winning — but there is no doubt that one of the groups that played a major role in Garcia’s victory was the California College Republicans. Their Chairman,… Read More

It’s been 14 years since Vice President Dan Quayle made headlines for criticizing Hollywood’s portrayal of the TV character Murphy Brown’s single motherhood. Unfortunately, his words of warning about the effect of single parenthood on childrens’ lives didn’t seem to take with the nation. Yesterday, the federal government announced that out-of-wedlock births have hit an all-time high, with four of out every ten babies born to unmarried mothers. Interestingly, while the out-of-wedlock birth rate rose, the teen birth rate dropped to the lowest level. It’s the 20-somethings that are had the most dramatic increase in out-of-wedlock births last year.

Once again, California seems to be setting the trend for the nation. After all, doesn’t seem like every time you pick up a People magazine there’s yet another Hollywood… Read More

Republican Assemblywoman Bonnie Garcia will be returning for a third term in the California State Legislature. Hers was the final legislative race in the state where the outcome was not considered official. Yesterday, enough of the remaining absentee ballots were counted in Riverside County to give Garcia an unbeatable lead — and her opponent, former Assemblyman Steve Clute, conceded the race. Congratulations Bonnie! You can be sure that Clute’s near-victory will mean he will try another crack at the apple in 2008 when Garcia will be precluded from a re-election run due to term limits.

Not one seat in the legislature changed partisan hands in the 2008 election cycle. It is a win for Democrats who control the status quo, and a win of sorts for legislative Republicans who staved off the ‘blue tide’ that crossed the country.

When you win a narrow race, you can look to just about every facet of your campaign and say that each part ‘made the difference’ in winning — but there is no doubt that one of the groups that played a major role in Garcia’s victory was the California College Republicans. Their Chairman,… Read More

In the time honored post-election tradition, here are San Diego’s big winners and losers from the election (with absentee and provisional ballots still to count). For every winner, there is usually a loser, but I’ve tried to distinguish between which is which. I know its been two weeks since the election, but I got violently ill right after (the most vile flu you could ever imagine) and am only just recovering.

WINNER – CONGRESSMAN BRIAN BILBRAY (CD50). Three weeks out public and private tracking polls had Brian Bilbray (disclosure Coronado Communications client) winning or losing within the margin of error, and national trends weren’t getting any better. Democrat Francine Busby had actually saved hundreds of thousands of dollars from her failed June campaign, and was therefore actually able to outspend Bilbray. However, Bilbray ran a disciplined campaign – and probably the strongest and most effective ground campaign in his history – and ended up 54% – 43%. Furthermore Bilbray made great strides in repairing his GOP base, which had been divided by the earlier primary campaigns. A primary challenge to Bilbray, always a… Read More

With a shout out to GOP Board of Equalization Member Bill Leonard’s blog, we ‘lift’ (with encouragement to check out his blog) the following posted by Leonard today, which is worth reading and thinking about…

A state Democrat blog last week had this headline: “CDP Field Operation Defeats $20 Million GOP Elephant.” Indeed, as the above results show, statewide Republican candidates did not fare well. Yet the CRP and the Governor had touted this year’s Victory ’06 effort as the end-all, be-all of voter identification and activation. I had been excited about it. I saw what microtargeting accomplished for the President in Ohio two years ago and was eager to replicate that success in California. That excitement faded as results were tallied.

Accusations have been flying that the CRP’s Victory ’06 was actually Arnold ’06, Period. I have heard that the CRP’s phone banks… Read More

Datamar has released a report showing the actual election results in several categories up against the last polling done by some of the majors. Interesting compilation for those who like to study this stuff, chew it up, regurgitate it, and spew it out…and probably dream about it as well.

I asked Datamar’s Raul Furlong to comment on the results. Here’s what he had to say:

The election is over and the votes have all been counted — well almost all, and it is time to ask how the pollsters did in testing the voters mood.

Modern political polling has become a big part of candidate and initiative campaigns measuring the sense of the voters and tracking throughout campaigns whether certain ads or messages are working and whether the electorate is coming together in support of a measure, or a candidate, or turning away.

Datamar has been successful in measuring most races. Our polling is based on the concept of keying on high-propensity voters, that is, voters that have consistently voted in past elections, and we expect, will continue to vote in future elections. Past behavior is indicative of future… Read More

From FR reader James Sills:

Late last night the Riverside Registrar of Voters FINALLY posted an add-on count of results. The new numbers show Bonnie Garcia has come from behind to beat Steve Clute in that county, reversing his earlier edge. Combined with Bonnie’s edge in Imperial, she’s now + 2,202 votes, district-wide.

Sounds to me like AD 80 goes to Garcia eliminating the only possible Dem pickup, and with the Dems preventing a GOP pickup in SD34, the partisan elections are over. Status quo in the State Legislature. Lots of new faces, but no new seats for either party. That said, the legislature is slightly less liberal with a small shift towards the center by Senate Democrats, and a heave-ho to the right for Assembly Republicans as all of the "open-primary babies" of 2000 term out.… Read More