I had a wide-ranging talk with Alabama Democratic Party Chairman Joe Turnham the other night. Because of the sheer number of things we discussed, I’m breaking up our conversation into two parts for you.
Turnham isn’t impressed by the Alabama Republican Party’s “Good Morning, Democrats” feature I told you about here yesterday. “I just think sophomoric castigation of Democrats as being lazy, liberal bums doesn’t work in 2008 when the GOP has run all the deficits up and catered to the big oil industry, and people are fed up and they’ve had it,” he said. “They’re interested in, ‘What are you going to do to solve my problems?’ I just think people are ready for a new kind of pragmatic, problem-solving campaign that doesn’t shoot them a lot of political rhetoric but is able to get to the core of it,” he said. “It’s unfathomable to me that the Republicans in the (Alabama) Senate will not let the 4 percent tax on food go when 80 percent of people in Alabama will get a tax break, yet they won’t vote to let you vote to get the tax cut. I thought Republicans wanted to give power to the people and cut taxes and get government out of your business and put more money in your pocket ... If (the grocery tax repeal) fails, it’s going to sweep Republicans out of office.”
Did you know that Alabama nearly supplanted South Carolina as 2008’s “First-in-the-South” primary? Turnham said a group pushing Alabama, along with Arizona as the site of the first Western caucus, nearly had the change in the bag. “We had the votes about a week out going into the Rules & Bylaws Committee,” Turnham said. But then Senate Majority Leader (and Nevadan) Harry Reid and influential U.S. Rep. James Cliburn got involved and … well, Nevada and South Carolina led the way.
On the impending May 31 meeting of the Rules & Bylaws Committee that will determine the fate of the Michigan and Florida delegations: Turnham said negotiations are ongoing and Democrats are “trying to backchannel on that and get as much consensus from the camps as possible” ahead of May 31. But, he said, “I think it depends on what kind of bump Hillary gets out of West Virginia and Kentucky (Clinton is expected to win big in the Bluegrass State Tuesday), and “if the Obama inevitability were to dampen some.” And it could happen, he said: As Clinton wins big in Kentucky and Puerto Rico and gains delegates from the resolution of the Michigan-Florida issue, “she’ll pick up some delegates, and this thing will get close again. Those remaining 150, 200 superdelegates will have some ability to bargain and negotiate on how we can move forward as a party,” Turnham said. “That’s why I’m staying out (not endorsing a candidate), to effect those changes.”
On Obama’s electoral map: Turnham said he has “some real concerns.” Although Obama does put places like Virginia, Colorado and Nevada in play and “probably does better than (Clinton) in those places,” Clinton “absolutely carries all the major Democratic states he carries,” plus Arkansas, West Virginia, Ohio and Pennsylvania – and does better in Florida against McCain than Obama. “I just think the electoral math is a lot stronger there. I don’t know if that argument’s going to rule the day … it doesn’t look like it will.” But for the sake of party unity – and fundraising – it’s important to “close the circle” in a positive way and try to “hold some of those 33 percent of her supporters who say they won’t support Obama,” he said. “But I think, people like me, if we have anything to say at the end of the day, (electoral math) is the reason a lot of people like me won’t cave in. If people won’t talk about this, we’ll just to have to take it to Denver,” Turnham said. “I’m holding fast.”
On an Obama-Clinton ticket: Turnham said that instead of a floor fight at the convention, “I think more likely what you may see is a fervor and insistence that she be given first right of refusal on the ticket. It’s a growing buzz and chatter among the DNC and a state chair or two I talk with,” he said. But Vice President Clinton would have to take place on “her terms and conditions” that created “some kind of working vice presidency.” Turnham said that could take the form of Clinton serving as a “policy czar on a couple of issues that are dear to her,” like health care and education. In addition, he said, Obama could “carve out a role for former President Clinton to play, such as tackling world poverty or HIV/AIDS or serving as a roving ambassador,” he said. “You might have a Kennedy-Johnson situation without all the acrimony; at the end of the day, Johnson built on some of the legacy of Kennedy with civil rights and poverty in America,” he said. “As much as this thing is a stalemate, I think it goes to heart of that Hillary has earned something here, if not the nomination, the ticket for sure.” Turnham said Obama picking Hillary would go a long way toward uniting the party: “If that were to happen, you’d see the chill get out of the air and everything settle down,” he said. “You could probably see this joint ticket raise about $100 million online in about two weeks.”
On how an Obama-led ticket will affect other Democratic candidates: “Eight years ago, you couldn’t even find a Gore bumper sticker; you had to order one,” and that hurt Democrats running for office in Alabama in 2000, Turnham said. “What will (Obama) spend in states that aren’t targeted for coordinated efforts, and will he do campaigning in places he’ll have a tough time winning in November? That will have an effect on downticket races, and people like me are concerned about that … We’ll have to wait and see what the ticket looks like and what his campaign appeal will be, but I wouldn’t want to be a Republican incumbent judge in Jefferson or Montgomery county in 2008,” he said. “You may have turnout numbers of traditional Democratic voters that we’ve never seen before.”
On the effect the drawn-out race will have on the Democratic Party’s efforts in the fall: “When you think about it, Clinton and Obama have had tens of thousands of staff and volunteers on the ground in every single battleground state, and the voter files that have been built, the volunteers lists, the fundraiser lists, are unprecedented in presidential contests,” Turnham said. “The e-mail lists that have been built are unprecedented. When Huckabee bowed out, the GOP basically gave up.” To that point, Turnham said that more Democrats voted in the Texas primary than in the general elections in 2004. In addition, all the new registrants, new donors and new volunteers the Obama campaign identified will be appended to the Democratic voter file, Turnham said. “We don’t have party ID in Alabama, so if I can tell a registered voter is a Democrat, that’s like gold bullion. If we close it well and it ends well, it will be a tremendous exercise, and the net effect will be positive,” he said.
Check back here tomorrow for the rest of our conversation, including Turnham’s assessment of Democratic prospects in congressional and state races across Alabama.
