[Mb-civic] A 'Straight Talk' Test For 2006 - George F. Will - Washington Post Op-Ed

[William Swiggard]

A 'Straight Talk' Test For 2006
Can Republicans Compete in Illinois?
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By George F. Will
The Washington Post
Thursday, April 6, 2006; A29

CHICAGO -- Illinois' northernmost bit is north of Cape Cod and its 
southern tip is south of Richmond, Va. Scattered the length of the 
state, from the Wisconsin border to Kentucky's, are fragments of 
wreckage from the state party that produced the first Republican 
president -- who was born in Kentucky and nominated by a Republican 
Party born in Wisconsin, at Ripon.

In the past four presidential elections, Republican candidates have 
averaged just 40 percent of the Illinois vote. In 2004 the Republican 
Senate candidate, a raging resident of Maryland, won just 27 percent of 
the vote. Judy Topinka, 62, the effervescent three-term state treasurer 
and Republican gubernatorial nominee against Gov. Rod Blagojevich, 
thinks she can put Humpty Dumpty together again. Republicans everywhere 
should hope a new poll is accurate in showing her three points ahead 
among registered voters.

In California, Republican presidential candidates have not been 
competitive for three elections. Since 1994, when California Republicans 
backed an anti-immigrant measure offensive to the Latino population that 
now is more than one-third of the state's population, Republicans have 
won an average of just 41 percent of the presidential vote.

In New York, where Republican presidential candidates in the past four 
elections have averaged just 35 percent, one candidate for the Senate 
nomination against Hillary Clinton this year has zero political 
experience and less than zero credibility, having inflated her résumé. 
And if the state party chairman gets his way, the senatorial candidate 
will be a former Yonkers mayor who, as a married man, had two children 
with his unmarried chief of staff, which he says was "ironically" fine 
because "I didn't have to make an appointment with my chief of staff to 
go over everything." (He has since married her.) From Illinois, 
California and New York, Democratic presidential nominees currently 
receive, without exertion, 107 electoral votes -- 40 percent of the 270 
needed to win the presidency. Can Topinka begin the process of making 
Republicans competitive for Illinois' 21 votes?

If former governor Jim Edgar had sought and won the Republican 
gubernatorial nomination, he might have been elected: Polls showed him 
trouncing Blagojevich. In the past 42 years, four Illinois governors -- 
two from each party -- have been indicted, and the trial of one of them, 
the most recent Republican, George Ryan, on 22 counts of fraud and 
corruption, has provided an unwelcome -- by Topinka -- background 
libretto for what already was a daunting year for Republicans almost 
everywhere.

Edgar, a moderate, was leery of a low-turnout primary dominated by 
social conservatives. He endorsed Topinka, who is pro-choice (but favors 
parental notification and opposes public funding of abortions and 
late-term abortions). She was nominated with just 38 percent of the vote 
but thinks Republican factions will be fused by the heat of their 
dislike of Blagojevich, who, she says merrily, may become the fifth 
governor indicted since 1964.

He is, she says, the person referred to as "Public Official A" in one or 
more of five ongoing investigations by Illinois' Inspector Javert -- 
Patrick Fitzgerald, the Chicago-based federal prosecutor who also is the 
pursuer of Scooter Libby. Topinka merrily says that "there is no loyalty 
in [Blagojevich's] administration whatsoever." His "own staff rats him 
out" and "some of his staff have been wired."

Topinka speaks about her opponent with a Chicago vigor: He is "slick" 
and "has little weasel eyes." He also has big liberal spending plans for 
the state (e.g., universal preschool) and for the private sector (a 
$7.50 minimum wage, $2.35 above the federal minimum). Although 
Blagojevich, 49, in his clear-sighted youth voted twice for Ronald 
Reagan, he has become a standard-issue contemporary Democrat whose base 
is the public employee unions. His creative accounting includes counting 
as current revenue some savings he forecasts in future pensions.

Topinka's task is to tap into, or perhaps foment, voter anxiety about 
the suffocation of the state's economy by the state's government. She 
says Illinois ranks 45th among the states in job creation. Actually, 
since February 2005 it is 38th, which is bad enough. She charges that 15 
trucking companies -- "They have assets on wheels" -- have fled the 
state to escape new fees.

Topinka says Karl Rove urged her to run, hoping to offset in Illinois a 
probable gubernatorial loss in New York. Would she like President Bush 
to campaign for her? An aide says not exactly: "We just want him to 
raise money." Topinka does not demur as the aide adds: "Late at night." 
Pause. "In an undisclosed location."

Maybe Illinois Republicans have found their John McCain. Now they will 
find out whether such "straight talk" works.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/05/AR2006040501955.html?nav=hcmodule
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