New San Diego Mayor Is A Republican, But Not Exactly A Ted Cruz Republican
Kevin Faulconer proves that Republicans can win in California, but not if they follow the path laid out by the party's far right wing.
On Tuesday, voters in San Diego voted in a Special Election to select a new Mayor in the wake of the resignation late last year of Bob Filner in the wake of a rash of allegations that he had sexually harassed, and in several case actually sexually assaulted, employees for the City and young women who worked in his office when he was a Congressman. In the end it was the Republican candidate, Kevin Faulconer, who ended up winning the race with 54.5 percent of the vote. While this resulted in many people expressing surprise yesterday, or even suggested that it indicated some kind of anti-Democratic trend developing for 2014, it’s worth noting that San Diego has historically been a Republican city. Indeed, of the seven people who have served as Mayor of San Diego stretching over the 43 years from 1971 to today, only two of them have been Democrats. One of those, of course, was Filner, who had previously represented most of the city in Congress, and the other was a woman named Maureen O’Connor, who served from 1986 to 1992. The longest serving Mayor during that period was a guy named Pete Wilson, who went on to become a Senator from California and then served two terms as Governor of California after serving more than 10 years as San Diego’s Mayor. So, at least in its recent history, San Diego has been friendly territory for Republicans and Faulconer’s election this week really shouldn’t be seen as a surprise but as a return to normal after Filner brief time in office.
While Faulconer may be a Republican, though, David Weigel points out that he’s not exactly the kind of Republican you’re likely to see on Fox News Channel:
Until Filner won, on the Obama-Biden coattails, Republicans had controlled the mayor’s office for a generation—they won every election from 1992 to 2008. Republicans typically took San Diego with moderate candidates, and Faulconer fit the mold. In a party that’s grown increasingly skeptical of green initiatives and urban planning, Faulconer took credit for a 24-mile bicycle route, a bike share program, and electric vehicle charging stations. Last year, Faulconer flipped his stance on gay rights and celebrated the demolition of Prop 8. Becoming pro-gay, he told Voice of San Diego, “was the best personal decision for me.”
So, Faulconer might be an interesting national figure; he might become a credible statewide candidate in a party that’s starved for them.
There have been signs in recent years that California Republicans have been working to reinvent their party in an image that is far different from that projected by the national party, not to mention the conservative talking heads that show up on television and the Internet. This includes being far more open on issues like same-sex marriage and even abortion than you’d expect a Republican to be, and differentiating themselves from the national party when it comes to immigration reform. Given the beating that the California GOP has taken in the last decade or so thanks both to the legacy of Pete Wilson’s misguided support for the anti-immigrant Proposition 187 and the relatively disastrous Schwarzenegger years, this isn’t entire surprising.
There was a time when California was solidly Republican to the point where it was the linchpin for GOP domination in the Electoral College from 1968 through 1988, but that hasn’t been the case since 1992 when Bill Clinton became the first Democrat to win the state in a Presidential election since Lyndon Johnson. During that time, the GOP was also strong in statewide elections for Governor and the United States Senate. Those days are long in the past, though. If the GOP is going to come back in the nation’s largest state, it’s going to take more candidates like Faulconer. None of this means that the California GOP is on the verge of a massive comeback, of course. That’s going to take a lot more work. However, it seems as though they are taking the steps necessary to make the party more competitive in a state that the GOP really can’t afford to ignore forever. More importantly, there are plenty of signs that the nation as a whole is headed in the same direction as California when it comes to thing like social issues, women’s issues, and immigration. The hard right Tea Party message may resonate in the Deep South and Mountain West, for now, but it’s falling on increasing deaf ears elsewhere, especially in states important on national elections such as Florida, Virginia, and Ohio. To the extent that California is indicative of how the nation is trending, then it’s possible that the California GOP is showing their national party a path to the future that will once again make the state competitive nationwide. The question is whether anyone will listen.
Good luck with that.
No moderate is going to be heard over the inmates currently running the asylum.
Tragic, really.
But true.
The GOP will have a tough time in California because we all know that once we crushed the last of the Republicans and elected Jerry Brown, the state really started to come back.
All the dire predictions that raising taxes on high earners would drive them out of the state were nonsense. In fact, it’s the working poor being driven out by high real estate prices, while the rich have gone nowhere. Our credit rating has been largely repaired, our budget is in surplus, and our employment is outpacing most other states. All things Republicans told us we couldn’t do without them. All things we could only do without them.
San Diego is nowhere nearly as conservative as it was in previous decades, when it was a Navy town, and politics were dominated by a very conservative political establishment.
@al-Ameda:
The Democrats probably ran just about as bad a candidate as they could have found: a former social worker whose biggest contributors were out of town unions. And yet with all that, the Democratic candidate almost still won even through the previous Democrat left office in a scandal.
The future of California is a one party state and who has actually left the state is the white middle class where there is no place for them Squeezed between the high cost of living and the massive number of immigrants.
@michael reynolds:
You mean Republicans have been wrong all this time?
You don’t say…
@ superdestroyer
Yo, Rain Man. Get some new material.
@anjin-san: Pfff, Rain Man (both the character and the real person on whom he’s based) was endowed with mental capabilities far greater than those of superdestroyer.
@superdestroyer:
I sincerely hope you’re right about that one-party state business, especially when it comes to national politics. Also, I am white, I am middle class, and I am not leaving California
@superdestroyer:
Just out of curiosity, given Kevin Faulconer’s moderate stance on numerous social issues, does he even count as a Republican in your entire “one-party” model?
@anjin-san:
What else should be said about California where it is news that a Republican actually managed to win an election after a Democrat left office due to scandal and the Democratic Party candidate was so poor.
As the demographics of the rest of the U.S. becomes more like the demographics of California, how can the U.S. be any thing else but a one party state?
Everyone in the Democratic Party is California knows that the easiest way to win more local elections in San Diego is not work work hard to attract more white voters but to just change the demographics of the area so that candidates like David Alvarez can win.
@mattbernius:
When looking at his website, it is clear that his advisors know that only white people vote for Republicans so the key to winning is to support programs that benefit whites and take away from of the positions from Democrats. Bike Paths for upper middle class whites is a great way to do both. However, since it actually believes in balanced budgets and is willing to take on unions, it would be hard to call him a Democrat. The same for better safety on beaches and more trains.
However, I suspect that he will soon be supporting tax increases but moderate Republicans like Mr. Faulconer are almost always “rolled” by Democrats to support higher taxes that make the Democratic Party stronger.
@superdestroyer:
Do you actually mean to say that Republicans, unless they are crazy tin-foil addled nuts like Steve King, Louie Gohmert or Michele Bachmann, are always pathetic victims of liberal Democrats?
@superdestroyer:
Serious question…do yo really believe the nonsense you type…or are you just trolling?
@superdestroyer:
You are mentally unbalanced, you realize that, right?
Race and ethnicity do not create voting patterns, racism and intolerance do. When Republicans were the tolerant party (pre-Nixon) blacks often voted GOP. When the Republicans were not anti-Mexican, (pre-Wilson) they also often voted GOP. It’s unhinged racist morons like you that are creating the one party state.
Marin County California is 86% white, 73% non-hispanic white, and it votes overwhelmingly for Democrats. 80% for Obama. I realize I’m talking to a cretin, but how do you suppose you get that 74% Obama vote out of the 18% of the population that are either black or hispanic? Pretty sure white people here in Marin are voting Dem.
Across the water in San Francisco Obama took 83% of the vote, despite black and hispanic together being just 21% of the population.
Now, down in Santa Barbara County the population is 45% black or hispanic. But they only gave Obama 57% of the vote.
In Sutter county black and hispanic are 27% of the vote and that county went for Romney.
So, Sutter County, with more blacks and hispanics than Marin went for Romney, while lilly-white Marin went big for Obama.
You know what I see there? More urban, better-off, better-educated whites (Marin, SF, Silicon Valley) vote for Democrats. At least in California. So your team is not “white folk” but white rustic, older, less-educated, less successful white folk. Our team is blacks, Hispanics, gays, Asians, the young, the urban, the better-educated.
How do we assemble a coalition out of rich techie kids in Palo Alto and gays in San Francisco and urban poor blacks across the bridge in Oakland and white bankers and lawyers in Marin? The answer is we don’t. You create our coalition. People like you are what weld together the disparate elements of the Democratic party. Your ignorance, narrow-mindedness make it impossible for us to make common cause with Republicans.
In short, you are bringing about the one-party state. So maybe rather than boring us all to f-cking hell with your monomaniacal, obsessive, BORING, BORING, BORING repetition of your same stupid talking point, maybe you could ask yourself why you are bringing about the very thing that obsesses you?
Just a suggestion.
@superdestroyer: As a member of the white middle class that lives in LA, I dispute this assertion.
@michael reynolds:
Before Republicans jumped on the crazy train, it was not uncommon for people in Marin to vote for moderate Republicans.
By the way, I believe that even Michael Savage, as much as he hates communism, has the good sense to live in Marin County (in Tiburon ?) Why he chooses to not live in a low tax sunbelt paradise like Oklahoma City is a mystery to me.
@C. Clavin:
Mr. Faulconer ran on a platform of balanced budgets and controlling the long term costs of pensions and other government programs. http://www.kevinfaulconer.com/issues/details.htm?PageDataID=27630
Thinking about the long term costs of government programs is somethng that Republicans should be doing more of to overcome the legacy of the extremely short-sighted Bush Clan and Karl Rove. However, I suspect that as soon as Mr. Faulconer gets a taste of power, he will find ways to expand spending and reward his friends. that is why the U.S. will soon be a one party state, there is not one politician that has the skill set to be a successful conservative politicians. And if there are no conservatives, why have two parties?
@superdestroyer: More trains ? To where ? Around here train service has been in decline for years. It is not the cost. It is the time. Two days (counting a layover in D.C.) to get to Orlando, which takes 10 hours by car . I would pay to get there by train if it was that or less. The trains also need to model airlines and offer first class service for a higher price. No, cost is not the problem. They could charge more if they were faster. The other good thing is a lot simpler security check compared to the drawn out ordeal at airports and trains have less restrictions on what you can carry on.
More is not better. Get the speeds up, run it for a profit. Then there will be more riders.
@al-Ameda:
According to the demographic section of the entry for Marin County, the county is actually only 65% non-Hispanic white (down from 80% in 2000) and that 20% of the country were born outside of the U.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marin_County,_California#Demographics
Of course, that does not mean that the whites in Marin County do not vote at a much higher rate than whites in the U.S. but many have speculated it is because being a Democrat is a status symbol in Marin County much like in San Francisco or Manhattan.
So if all of you yearn for a one-party state/nation, what shall we call that party? National Socialists or International Socialists?
@Tyrell:
I think you are confused between interregional trains and commuter trains. Upper class whites love commuter trains but hate the bus.
@John425:
The “Intelligent People Party” – IPP is a modern tech-sounding name.
@superdestroyer:
Actually, there is a practical reason to prefer a commute train to a bus – the bus is stuck in traffic, while the commute train is …. NOT.
Heh, California just continues to confound the skeptics. The land of fruits and nuts and hippies and Mexicans everywhere somehow just keeps plugging on, despite voting Republicans into oblivion and doing all that green stuff. The worlds biggest solar plant just opened in the Mojave.
@superdestroyer:
You don’t warrant a reply anymore, but this made me laugh.
Being a Democrat is a “status symbol” in these places? What a joke. Do you even know how status symbols work?
I’m in basic agreement that GOP policies made the GOP in California unpopular, but I also think much of it has to do with the rank and file’s willingness to swallow pure unadulterated bullshit like this.
@John425:
So if all of you yearn for a one-party state/nation, what shall we call that party?
Wanting the Republican Party to die the death it so richly deserves is not the same thing as desiring a one-party state. San Diego’s new mayor belongs in a new party, not the GOP. Maybe he’ll start one as more bigots die off and the GOP continues it’s (too slow) descent into irrelevance.
@superdestroyer:
Riiiiight. A status symbol. In the form of a secret ballot that none of your friends or neighbors can see.
It’s interesting to see some of the punditry trying to tie Alverez’s defeat Obama’s endorsement, which just shows that they don’t follow San Diego politics. Alverez lost because he was seen as too young and inexperienced. His loss was pretty much a given.
Ultimately, this loss doesn’t hurt local Democrats as much as you’d think it would as it actually gives them an improved standing in the (still very powerful) city council. Faulconer now has to vacate his seat which the council itself can fill with whoever they want for the remainder of his term. With a Democratic majority and city council president it’s going to be filled with another Democrat which will give them a veto proof majority.
@superdestroyer:
Tautology. Being a Democrat is a status symbol? Why would that be, then? Because Democrats are popular since, by definition, status symbols are symbols of something popular.
So your explanation for why Democrats are popular is that…they are popular.
@michael reynolds:
Well, no, you also get the lapel pin, the “Kiss Me, I’m a Democrat” t-shirt, and the wallet card that you can use to access the special welfare entitlements not available to white rural folks.
@superdestroyer: The bus has some advantages. Most of them travel on the interstate and will usually go faster than the 18 wheelers. They also can stop for breaks, meals, and shopping as they wish. I have been on some field trips. We would stop at a shopping center where we could choose from several fast food places or a mall food court (my dream world: hamburgers, fried rice, milk shakes). Field trips with school students are always exciting. Those charter buses have tv screens and we saw a lot of “g” rated movies.
@Rafer Janders:
I’m hoping for an oil exploration subsidy. I will totally drill a hole in my yard.
@superdestroyer: “However, since it actually believes in balanced budgets and is willing to take on unions, it would be hard to call him a Democrat. The same for better safety on beaches and more trains”
Newsflash, stupid. The Democratic governor of California has balanced the budget and “taken on” the unions. And PS — It’s Republicans who hate trains and all forms of public transportation.
Oh, and I’m a white voter who will happily vote for a black or brown candidate, you disgusting racist piece of filth.
@Tyrell: “Get the speeds up, run it for a profit.”
It’s not the running it for a profit that’s a problem, it’s that there are huge government subsidies for air and road travel, but Republicans think that supporting rail travel is communism.
Believe me, if your airline ticket included everything that the feds pay for, only the Kock brothers would fly…
Hey Ya’ll….
It’s 88 degrees here in the San Fernando Valley, just a pinch past noon. There is a tiny breeze coming in from the desert, making it nice and dry. A few wispy white clouds high in the sky. Yesterday, it was 87 with almost no humidity.
This morning my day started out with a rollerblade around Balboa Park (not the one in San Diego), followed by breakfast at Brent’s Deli.
Tomorrow, I’m playing 18 holes at Rustic Canyon. It’s early February. What’s it like where you live?
I love when people criticize California. I hope people keep criticizing California. Alot!
Leave us be in our crappy, horrific, socialist, minority majority, soon-to-be hell hole.
We’ll just keep enjoying the fact that we live in California.
@superdestroyer:
Who knew Marin wasn’t part of the US?
@michael reynolds:
You aren’t even in the US, why do you get to vote?
@Rafer Janders:
The first rule of tautology club is the first rule of tautology club
@mantis: “…as bigots die off…” WTF? Since when did the GOP switch names? Democrats are the true bigots. Lincoln, the founder of the modern day GOP, freed the slaves. Democrats bought ’em right back with pennies and the fear of their night-riders. Blacks who now fawn over the Democrat crony party are the true Uncle Toms.
@EddieInCA:
After a week of non-committal rain the sun is out over San Francisco Bay, low fog obscuring Alcatraz but letting em see the city clearly, low sixties. I should be able to put the top down on the convertible when I go to pick up my daughter later. A red-tail hawk just floated by my deck riding the thermals. Last night I almost had to close the window – the sea lions were getting loud.
It’s hell on earth, man. I wish I was in North Dakota. Those folks are free! Free I say! Or will be if they can get the front door unfrozen and push their way out into the blizzard.
@John425:
Yep. That was true. 50 years ago.
Have you checked your alarm clock? Because I think you overslept by a few decades.
@EddieInCA:
Not yet fire season….
(This summer’s gonna be bad out there. I envy you now, but come June, July I think roles will be reversed.)
@James Pearce:
There’s an oil tanker going by trailed by a tug boat. The fog is doing one of its cool layering tricks where it’s between the ship and the city, making the ship seem isolated and surreal, making it appear as if the city is floating on a bed of mist, and Alcatraz is just gone, all beneath a blue sky with just a few wisps of high cloud.
Fire season may be bad this year. And we have a drought which will hurt the farmers in the valley. And there are earthquakes to consider. I could move to Vegas, save 10% a year on my taxes and get three times the house for half the money. Or Texas. Or Florida. And yet, I don’t. California costs me $100,000 a year over Texas or Florida. But I’ve lived in both states and will most likely keep on paying the 100k surcharge to be here.
@michael reynolds:
Two points:
(1) How very convenient of you to ignore the political and electoral reality since passage of the Civil Rights Act in 1964. You know, “Southern Strategy” and stuff like that?
(2) How very un-PC of you to label 90% of Black Voters as “Uncle Toms.”
By the way, for all my Republican friends, the Obamacare sign-ups are at or over 100% of projected in 12 states: CT, RI, NY, ME, NH, NC, ID, CO, WI, MI, IL, and FL. And they are between 75% and 99% in 11 more states including California and Pennsylvania.
7 of the 10 largest states are either ahead of, at, or very near projection, despite the screwed-up website and Republican obstruction.
Among high-population states, only two, Ohio and Texas, are really behind the curve at 51% and 48% respectively. Utah is at 83%. Utah.
Oh, and 25% overall are in the demo, which is what we were hoping for.
And all of February and March still to go. It seems the death spiral has a pulse.
@michael reynolds:
Come to New York City. I’m looking out at the harbor now, and you get the same views of tankers and tug boats, the same islands out in the water, the same sense of the city floating on a bed of mist, the same lonely wail of the foghorn warning small craft away. Only without the fires, earthquakes, mudslides and crippling droughts….
@al-Ameda:
Well, they’re like children, those negroes. They can’t be expected to know what their own best interests are. They need white folk to handle all of that.
Have you looked up John 4:25 by the way? Here’s the King James:
The woman saith unto him, I know that Messiah cometh, which is called Christ: when he is come, he will tell us all things.
Maybe when he cometh he’ll telleth some things to our friend.
@Rafer Janders:
Dude, I just got off the phone with my lawyer who is in NYC. You know what he just told me about the weather there right now.
@michael reynolds:
The older I get, the more I think I need to flee south to warmer climes. The Front Range is nice….but I am gradually losing my tolerance for winter.
California would be my number 1 choice of locales –love that Mediterranean climate– but your real estate situation is a deal breaker. Even if I made a profit selling my house, I’d need to win the lottery to afford a down payment on some property out there. Californians can cash out, sure. But it’s hard for one of us Okies to buy in.
If I had an extra 100K….I’d be there in a second. Not sure I’d be on the coast though. I like the desert.
Which is why I’ll probably end up in New Mexico.
@michael reynolds: Drill There. Drill Now. C’mon down and collect your tax credit.
@michael reynolds:
I know, it’s lovely! Beautiful white snow and crisp cold air outside, comfy and cozy inside.
@wr:
But white moderates like commuter trains and having more police at the beach and more open space. When was the last time that a minority-majority district pushed for open space and more parks for the good of the environment.
Those who argue that the way for the Republicans to survive as a rump party to the Democrats is to appeal to suburban whites in the coastal states by focusing more on issues like parks, commuter trains, and Nimbyism while stop focusing on issue like abortion, school choice, or prayer in schools. However, I believe that Democratic Party strategist are way ahead of the Republicans and that the Democrats will always find someone to focus the hated of the left on to keep everyone distracted and automatically voting for the Democrats.
At least some of the usually posters hear have actually began to think about what the U.S. will be as a one party state but I doubt it will be as rosy as they anticipate.
@James Pearce:
Victorville, California City, Barstow, Indio, Hemet, 29 Palms, Apple Valley, Ridgecrest, Borrego Springs, Quartz.
Desert. Affordable, and still California. Probably less Meth than New Mexico, too.
Have an “A One Day.”
Yea, but they have a great sense of rhythm…
@michael reynolds:
Actually Michael, I believe he (John425) said he’s from Seattle, and 425 covers the eastside suburbs in the Seattle metro area.
@al-Ameda:
Ah. Thanks for clarifying.
@John425: Hint: It’s not 1865 anymore. Some stuff has happened since then. You should check it out.
PS — The British Empire no longer rules India and Arabia, and the Ottoman Empire has lost most of its power. Oh, and Queen Victoria is no longer on the throne. Just in case you haven’t been following the news.
@michael reynolds: How is the drought going? Is it as bad as it looks on the evening news? Here in Brazil there is also a horrible drought(In a time of the year where we are supposed to deal with floods), I imagine that has to do with One Party State or something like that…
@Andre Kenji:
The way it’s supposed to work is that moisture comes in off the Pacific, hits the Sierra Nevada mountains, falls as snow, and conveniently melts, filling the reservoirs. Well, not this year. Snow pack is at something like 18% of normal.
California droughts tend to trouble the farmers far more than the rest of us. It can devastate their crops, and if it persists it can kill things like almond trees. For the rest of us it means not filling up a pool (I don’t have one) or watering the lawn (I don’t have a lawn, either) and flushing the toilet only when, um, really necessary. If you get my meaning.
It’s strange because just north of us are Oregon and Washington state, both perpetually drowned by the eternal rains. Seems to me an aqueduct might be a good idea. But apparently we have to spend our money on a train that will run from Nowhere to Bumfwck.
@michael reynolds:
Which is why those almond trees never should have plenty in a semi-arid region that is totally dependent on imported water from a drought prone region. At least when the focus was on rice and cotton, those fields could lie fallow in years when the water was low.
The idea of an aqueduct from Oregon to California has been floated more than once, but the Oregonians and Washingtonians, not surprisingly, aren’t really interested in sending their water to California, and without the agreement of those states it won’t happen. There’s also some concern that it would injure the salmon population if a significant amount of water was diverted from Oregon and Washington rivers.
@Kari Q:
make that: Which is why those almond trees never should have been planted …
@Kari Q:
Most California almonds are grown in the central valley, which normally has plenty of water for them. Growing rice in SoCal is madness. Growing almonds in the central valley is sustainable in all but serious drought years.
@michael reynolds:
Washington and Oregon won’t want to give water to CA, ultimately to feed SoCal which along with Vegas is draining the SouthWest and Northern CA.
@EddieInCA: I can’t deal with California. Used to visit a boyfriend at Stanford. After about four days I was tempted to dive under a table against all that horrible relentless blue sky and sunshine.
Sorry, but all of my life I’ve lived in locations with crappy weather, rain, and changeable weather. I love snow and rain, especially if I’m inside where it’s toasty warm, the wood is hissing in the fire, and I have a sleepy cat on my lap.
@Grewgills:
The Central Valley does not have plenty of water, not to water the crops they grow. Of the water that is distributed to water customers in the state for economic purposes, over 80% still goes to agriculture, and the bulk of that goes to the Central Valley, where almond orchards are on the increase. Don’t forget that the Central Valley is over 400 miles long and stretches most of the length of the state.
Almonds are planted from Tehama County in the far north which probably does have the water, all the way down to Kern County just north of Los Angeles County, which definitely does not. Almonds are a pretty water intensive crop, and there’s no way to adjust the demand for water based on the water available.