National Security: It's Primary Posted by Heather Hurlburt

Michigan's leading poll-watcher predicts that turnout will be "pathetic", but I've still got a voting stop scheduled for later this afternoon.  In preparation, I'm thinking about the ways national security is -- and isn't impacting the Michigan races, of which there are a number of interesting ones.

The Republican Party seems to be having authority problems -- a couple of incumbent Congressmen are being challenged from the right, and the party's handpicked African-American opponent for Senator Debbie Stabenow stands a good chance of being rejected by GOP primary voters.

Statewide, the Dems look more controlled -- but in my local area, we've got a progressive slate of Democrats spitting with rage about city leaders taking money from "outside interests" and focusing too much on "growth."  But I digress.

I notice a national security/terrorism and Iraq undercurrent through several races on both sides of the aisle; and I see a number of local issues that ought to tie back to energy policy, and thus to national security, but which don't seem to in the minds of cadidates and voters alike.  And that's interesting too.

The state GOP thought it was oh so clever to sign on Detroit-area minister and former city councilman the Rev. Keith Butler to challenge Stabenow. Party rank and file didn't agree and are striking back with Sherriff Michael Bouchard, whose ads make much of his experience with violence and disaster, and his post-9-11 service at the World Trade Center site.  It's not a line of voter appeal I've heard in a while, but it seems to be effective, as he's passed Butler in the polls.

Over on the Democratic side of the aisle, though, we've got a retired CIA man, Jim Marcinkowski, set to win his primary today and mount a very strong challenge against incumbent Mike Rogers -- so strong that political observers have moved the race into the tossup column.  You might expect a CIA guy to be a little reticent about his background, but no -- and Marcinkowski has even had Joe Wilson out here stumping for him, whipping up voter outrage about the Valerie Plame outing.  I confess I hadn't believed there was so much voter outrage about that, but Marcinkowski is clearly doing something right.  (Full disclosure:  I staffed a political training that Marcinkowski attended and have donated to his campaign.  Come to think of it, I've given to Stabenow too.)

What both men seem to have in common is an ability to make their national security experience part of the background music, something they're not putting forward as their only asset but something you're subtly aware of all the time -- and something they clearly think works in their favor.  Given that neither national party seems to have that down smoothly right now (check out this cringe-inducing LA Times article about a GOP strategy memo encouraging candidates to make Iraq a winner), is it just possible that the elections this fall will turn on which party's individual candidates are better-prepared to tell their own, credible, national security stories?

And is that going to be the real sense in which Lamont/Lieberman is a bellwether?

The dog that didn't bark

Meanwhile, I've got to give just a brief final note about how strange it is to live in the so-called "people's republic of Ann Arbor," (an epithet which, if it ever was deserved, certainly isn't any more, let me tell you); watch self-defined progressive and moderate Democrats slugging it out in primary races over sprawl, transportation, green space and urbanization issues; and be able to count on approximately one finger the number of times candidates connected those issues back to energy policy and international issues.  Just wondering if anyone else noticed.

Comments

[Zathras]

If the Soviet Union's collapse doesn't move foreign affairs off the American voter's radar screen by 1992, Bill Clinton never gets elected President.

In general elections, Democrats will always operate at a disadvantage if they are perceived to be uninterested in foreign and national security affairs, unless they run in a year like 1992 or 1996. Democrats that have been around for a long time will have trouble altering their image of disinterest and general lack of zeal for protecting American interests. The corrective is more Democratic candidates with personal backgrounds in either the military or the intelligence services.

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