As many Kentuckians get ready to give thanks that
a new governor will be taking office in a couple of weeks, let me help you get
ready for the holiday season by serving up some leftovers from this month’s
election.
*****
By now, the tired old false rhetoric from the
left should come as no surprise. Liberals continue to insist that conservatives
hate females and minorities. Opposition to abortion on demand as a form of
elective birth control is termed a “war on women.” Efforts to protect the
integrity of elections are declared “racist” and an attempt to suppress the
votes of blacks. Even positives are turned into negatives by those on the left
looking to demonize conservatives. When Mitt Romney talked during his 2012
presidential campaign about actively recruiting women to work in his
gubernatorial administration in Massachusetts and collecting their resumes,
somehow having “binders full of women” job applicants became a bad thing.
The same untrue narrative made its way to
Kentucky’s statewide races this year. Apparently those trying to tear down
Republicans didn’t pay very much attention to the election results.
In case you didn’t notice, two of the Republicans
elected to statewide offices are women. And one of them, Lt. Gov-elect Jenean
Hampton, just happens to be the first black ever to win a statewide election in
the Bluegrass State. Hampton and Treasurer-elect Allison Ball are success
stories. Yet their wins appear insignificant to Kentucky Democrats. They’ve belittled
Hampton’s victory by implying that voters who supported her ticket with
Gov.-elect Matt Bevin didn’t know she was black, as they continue to claim that
Bevin won because of racially-motivated animus against President Barack Obama,
whose father was black. Rubbish. It’s doubtful that many, if any, Bevin voters
weren’t aware of Hampton’s race. Yet the party that just elected a black
lieutenant governor is somehow racist. Unbelievable.
Further proof of the true diversity of
conservatives can be found in the presidential candidate field currently vying
for the GOP nomination. Three of the top-tier candidates are minorities (Ben
Carson is black; Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio are Hispanic). Bobby Jindal, who quit
the race last week, was another minority candidate. Carly Fiorina is female.
Youth is also well-served in the Republican field.
Despite evidence to the contrary proving the
claims of the left wrong, they keep on insisting that Republicans hate women
and minorities. Hampton and Ball are probably enjoying a good chuckle every
time they hear that worn out falsehood.
*****
As the campaign wound down, I started to wonder
if Jack Conway himself even believed he was qualified to be governor. That’s
because he and his surrogates rarely talked about his positive attributes.
Instead, they were constantly on television attacking Bevin.
Candidates say they don’t like to use negative
advertising, but they have to because it works. Turns out it didn’t work out so
well for Conway.
Conway said very little about why he wanted to be
governor, what he intended to do or what qualifications he possessed. One of
the few positive traits he bragged about was being a lifelong Kentuckian, which
was an obvious dig at Bevin because Bevin’s not a Kentucky native.
Wonder how Brereton Jones, the former Democratic
governor in whose footsteps Conway wanted to follow, felt about that? Jones
isn’t a Kentucky native either, and I don’t recall Larry Hopkins using that
against Jones in the 1991 gubernatorial campaign.
There’s evidence that voters tired of Conway’s
attacks against Bevin, especially since he never offered his own positives.
It’s reminiscent of Conway’s failed 2010 U.S. Senate campaign, when he turned
the unproven and unverifiable “Aqua Buddha” allegation against Rand Paul into a
television ad, and it backfired.
Conway ran a terrible campaign. He didn’t connect
with the voters on a personal level. Bevin did. Despite being branded by his
detractors as an out-of-touch rich carpetbagger from the Northeast, Bevin was
able to relate to everyday Kentuckians. And they were able to relate to him.
I’ve heard stories about Bevin’s interaction with people as he campaigned
across the state. Those interactions were 180 degrees different from the
interactions with reporters that many of them were so eager to write about.
Several pundits have theorized that Conway’s
career in politics is over. I wouldn’t be so fast to write him off. After all,
outgoing Gov. Steve Beshear fashioned a political comeback several years after
a couple of statewide losses. But Conway would do well, if he ever runs again,
to forego the negative campaigns and try to focus on his positives. He’s now
been burned twice by attacking his opponents instead of promoting his
strengths.
*****
Another politician who may have been bitten by
the negative advertising bug is Adam Edelen, who lost his re-election bid for
auditor to State. Rep. Mike Harmon in what was widely viewed as an upset.
Edelen ran an over-the-top television ad late in
the campaign, attempting to portray Harmon as some sort of living-the-high-life
party boy who had himself a good time on the state’s dime. There was never any
real evidence to back up those charges, especially one that depicted Harmon
drinking and living it up.
Edelen was regarded as one of his party’s rising
stars, and the same pundits who have now written Conway off think Edelen will
be able to come back from his loss. Those who supported Edelen pointed to what
they called a successful term as auditor. They should have counseled Edelen to
run on that record instead of coming out with a nonsensical attack on Harmon.
Edelen’s loss was arguably the low point on a bad election night for Kentucky
Democrats. With a little care, they could have avoided it.
*****
Here’s wishing everyone a happy and healthy
Thanksgiving. Take time to thank God for your blessings.
