Political prediction is a fool’s game, but what the hell. Here’s what I think is going to happen in the Kentucky governor’s race.
Currently there are four major, and fairly substantial Republicans in the Republican primary: Hal Heiner, a former Louisville councilman and wealthy businessman; James Comer, the current and widely popular Agriculture commissioner, Will T. Scott, a former state Supreme Court Justice, and Matt Bevin, a successful Louisville businessman who unsuccessfully challenged Mitch McConnell in the 2014 Republican Senatorial primary. This means that the Republican primary will be hotly contested.
On the Democratic side there is one major candidate, the current Attorney General, Jack Conway, and a minor candidate, a gadfly named Geoff Young. This means that there will be essentially no Democratic primary.
The primary is in late May. For the next five months we will have a vigorous and well reported Republican primary, and we’ll hear next to nothing from the Democratic side. So, for five months we’ll get the standard Republican view of the world and the economy in the early 21st Century. We will hear that virtually every economic problem in America is the result of the last fifty years of failed liberal policies, and we’ll hear virtually nothing from the Democrats, since there is no real Democratic Gubernatorial primary. So the next five months will be a free campaign commercial for the standard, run of the mill Republican crack-pot political and economic theories.
There will certainly be some disagreement in the Republican primary. One candidate will say that Democratic economic policies are hamstringing the American economy. Others will disagree, and say that those Democratic policies are destroying the economy. One candidate may say that we need to roll back “Obamacare,” another will say we need to repeal it immediately, and a third will say that not only do we need to repeal it, we need to imprison anyone associated with it.
We will hear that not only should we not raise the minimum wage, we should repeal it. We should gut unions, create charter schools, end welfare, abolish the state income tax, and on and on. Every conservative theory will be presented. Some will be sensible, but others, many others will be bizarre and borderline delusional. But the media will report it all as if it were sensible policy options presented by serious politicians.
And we will hear nothing to counter these ideas. I’m fairly certain that Jack Conway will spend the primary season raising money for the general election, which is certainly important, but will spend no time in refuting some of the crazy things the Republicans say. I assume that his advisers will tell him that he should let the Republicans fight it out, and weaken and diminish themselves. They will remind him what the Republican Presidential candidates did in 2012, when the mass primary made them all look pathetic and out of touch.
I don’t see that happening in the Republican governor’s primary in Kentucky, for a couple of reasons. First, the state is pretty conservative and becoming more so, which means that the candidates’ messages will resonate with the public. And that means that the news media will treat the candidates favorably, since they can’t alienate their readers and stay in business.
But the main reason is that there will be virtually no push back on the crazy stuff from the Democrats. The few contested races are far enough down ticket so that there will be few reasonable Democratic voices. And, as noted, Conway sees no reason to respond.
So, after five months of the Republican candidates talking about the economy, and how Democratic policies have destroyed America, we will go into the general election. The Republican candidate (my prediction is James Comer) will continue to talk about the economy, and how Democratic policies have destroyed it. And Jack Conway will talk about how may pedophiles he put away as Attorney General, and about how he sued the Obama Administration over coal permits. It will be like they are running for two different offices. It will be, I predict, a repeat of the 2010 Senate race, when Rand Paul easily beat Conway.
The sad thing is that it doesn’t have to be this way. The Republicans will say some bizarre, nearly delusional things. With just a little effort the Democrats (which really means Jack Conway) can push back, point out the truth, and make them look crazy. It doesn’t have to be much, but there needs to be some response with just a few facts to force the media to point out the truth. It may not be enough to change the outcome of the race, but it may change a few mind and help in future races. And at this point in Kentucky that may be all we can do.