Sore Losers

One interesting aspect of the 2010 midterm elections is that multiple candidates who have bucked the traditional party system are playing important roles in multiple races. Ordinarily, this would be something I'd be delighted about. I like the idea of candidates running as individuals and not attempting to mush their personal ideas to fit with the prevailing ideology of a particular political party. Even though independent candidates rarely win elections, many voters are registered as independents -- I think that's because a lot of them don't feel entirely represented by either the Republicans or Democrats. A lot of people agree more with one party on certain issues and more with the other on certain other issues. An independent candidate of the Ross Perot mold has the freedom to be as idiosyncratic as the voter because he or she has no party to please. Unfortunately, in 2010 a couple of important senatorial candidates are running contrarian campaigns not so much because they rejected the parties but rather because their parties rejected them.

I'm speaking of course of Charlie Crist who is vying for attention from Florida voters with Marco Rubio and Kendrick Meek as well as Lisa Murkowski who is trying to hold on to her Senate seat in Alaska against Joe Miller and Scott McAdams. The two took different paths to get to where they are today: Charlie Crist is running as an independent while Murkowski is trying to be elected via a write-in campaign as a Republican even though Joe Miller is the official Republican nominee. What the two have in common is that both kept running after seeking their party's nomination and failing to receive it. Crist launched his independent campaign in response to polls that showed Rubio the Republican favorite in the primary. Murkowski was even more audacious in that she competed in the Republican party primary to the bitter end and lost to Joe Miller yet still did not end her candidacy.

I won't argue that Crist and Murkowski don't bring anything unique to the table. Both are considered more moderate than their Republican opponents yet more conservative than their Democratic opponents. Had they chosen to leave their parties right from the get-go and run as independents I'd have completely respected their decision to do so and welcomed their attempts to shake things up in this stultifying two party political world. Under the circumstances, though, they both seem like sore losers and utterly untrustworthy to me. It's one thing to say, as Crist does now, that the Republican Party has left him and others of similar views behind -- it's another to seek the Republican nomination only to suddenly discover your independent roots when it becomes apparent you aren't going to be your party's nominee. Both Crist and Murkowski seemed to respect how their party did things right up to the point where they didn't become nominated candidates; that's exactly why I can't respect them. They thought the Republican Party was great...as long as Republican voters made the "right" choice in the primary. Had Crist polled better and Murkowski won her primary, they would never have bumped heads with their party. To me, both Crist and Murkowski seem absolutely desperate to gain power, and their candidacies seem an almost pure reflection of their personal ambition. I don't support "sore loser" laws which try to legally prevent independent candidacies from primary losers, but at the same time I don't support "sore losers"...I just don't see how you could ever trust a candidate who wants to win that badly.

Nonetheless, Murkowski and Crist are picking up votes according to the polls. Indeed, both are currently running close to their Republican rivals and beating the Democrats in their races. In Alaska, that perhaps reflects the difficult position the Democratic Party currently occupies in that state. In Florida, Crist's success seems to have come partly on the back of the Democratic nominee Kendrick Meek who has lost support from members of his own party. I find it rather puzzling that there are Democrats who would have voted for Meek over Charlie Crist had Crist been the Republican nominee yet are willing to vote for Crist over Meek as long as Rubio in the race as well...but that's the wonder of strategic voting at work. Unfortunately, Murkowski and Crist's great adventures may well inspire more sore loser candidates in the future...and make it even more difficult for real independent candidates to be noticed.