Indiana

WAS IT REVENGE OR A REMINDER

By Abdul Hakim-Shabazz

The dust is settling over yesterday’s State GOP Convention where current Attorney General Chief of Staff Greg Zoeller beat Valparaiso Mayor Jon Costas.  Zoeller beat Costas by more than 300 votes.  There is a lot of speculation as to what happened.  I mentioned some of those reasons in my last post; Zoeller ran a good campaign, Costas was slow to get out of the gate, angry Ron Paul supporters, etc.

However, one theory that was floated by two politicos I ran into yesterday was the vote might have also been a backlash against the Governor, not necessarily for any heavy-handed campaign tactics, but government consolidation.   Daniels has been pushing consolidation as part of property tax reform and many of the delegates in the room were guess what…I’ll wait…that’s right, local government officials.

Remember, local government and it’s one unit for every 2,700 Hoosiers would be reduced in size and hopefully scope under the Kernan-Shepard report.  So why would a local official want to vote themselves out of a job or support the person who is trying to put them out of a job, for that matter?  Now that may not the sole reason that Costas lost, I actually attribute more of it to the fact that he never laid out a vision for the Office or why he as qualified to hold the office as evidenced by the two videos the candidates presented to the delegates.  Costas talked about evangelical issues while Zoeller talked about his record.  But you can’t ignore the fact that some of the people whom Daniels was asking for help, were some of the same people who think he’s trying to put them out of a job.  

Revenge or a not so friendly reminder?  You decide.

Full post as published by Indiana Barrister on June 03, 2008 (boomark / email).