Extreme Candidates Risk OKGOP Defeat

Dem. Cyndi Munson won a legislative election with the
help of hundreds of republican voters who rejected
the special-interest, Chamber Republican. 

How Safe Red Seats Turn Blue

  The Oklahoma Election Board has released some detailed numbers on the HD85 special election from last week. Rep. David Dank passed away this Spring after being reelected last Fall.

  Here are the 2014 General Election poll results:

Results as of: 11/8/2014 12:11:17 PM  FOR STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 85
		16 of 16 Precincts Completely Reporting
		ABSENTEE MAIL			EARLY VOTING		ELECTION DAY		TOTAL
CYNDI MUNSON (DEM)		331			259		4,545		5,135	43.6%
DAVID DANK (REP)		516			246		5,873		6,635	56.4%
Total		847			505		10,418		11,770

  As you can see, Rep. Dank enjoyed a vote of confidence to return to the legislature by a more than 10% margin.
  Now, we compare those numbers to a special general election held just last week.

Results as of: 9/11/2015 5:27:27 PM
FOR STATE REPRESENTATIVE DISTRICT 85 (UNEXPIRED TERM)
			16 of 16 Precincts Completely Reporting
			ABSENTEE MAIL			EARLY VOTING		ELECTION DAY		TOTAL
CYNDI MUNSON (DEM)			270			63		2,308		2,641	53.76%
CHIP CARTER (REP)			245			28		1,999		2,272	46.24%
	Total		515			91		4,307		4,913

If the voters had all voted "straight party ticket", Chip Carter would have had a 13% edge on Munson.

  What transpired in 10 months was a net 20% swing in the vote, going from a Republican safe seat to a solid win for a Democrat. And it is not a credible theory to suggest that demographics or national issues imposed this massive shift.
  So, matters central to the candidates themselves are the very likely reason for this phenomenon. Did Cyndi Munson change? Was there some new birth of Republican ideas permeating from her formerly failed campaign platform of 2014? No. She largely stayed with her message of 2014.
  Did Munson  mount a massive voter mobilization which brought an unusually high number of Democrats to the polls? No! Not only 'No!' but it's even more curious when we find that some sources claim:
If the voters had all voted "straight party ticket", Chip Carter would have had a 13% edge on Munson.

Hundreds of Republicans  voted for a Liberal Democrat

  Roughly 20% of the registered Republican voters not only refused to go support the selected GOP nominee, they actually were motivated enough to cast a vote for the Feminist Democrat nominee. Was it a special attachment to the Democrat? There may possibly have been some community connections, but there may also have been a rejection of the extremely divisive Republican nominee.  It's good to know the Republicans are still disciplined voters and faithfully go to the polls. But it's also sobering to realize they will not swear to blind party loyalty.

This egregious example of dirty primary campaigning was
 roundly vilified by the pundits on the Fox News Channel.

  The Primary campaign was so nasty that the winner was scorned on national news for, among other things,  'sandwiching' campaign signs of opponents. The massively-funded Carter campaign brought in outside, narrow-interest PAC money, big name consultants, and heavy-hitter endorsements. None of that moved the community sufficiently enough to stay true to the Republican values they registered with.
  In the end, we may reasonably wonder if the special interest outside money turned off the community and they just wanted someone who is known and who listened to them; the people - all the people. If over 600 Republican voters 'pulled the lever' for a Democrat, that's not just some fringe small group trying to take over the OKGOP. Most of those voters don't even go to party precinct meetings or county conventions. They are just disgusted voters who appreciated how Rep David Dank fought to end crony capitalism and they believe it is an insult to his memory for them to endorse the candidate who ran on the platform of a crony capitalist utopia.
  The State Chamber has big extremist 'crony capitalist' designs and a good collection of "Tall Building Republicans" who push their bills and agendas. But the Republicans who identify with the Tall Building gang (especially those who conduct extremely nasty campaigns) is still a minority in much of Oklahoma. And especially the extremist Chamber Republicans who slander others to the point of wide-scale dismay. The OKGOP would do well to recruit high-character stable candidates from within the community who can do more than raise campaign money. They need to inspire voters and earn trust.

David Van Risseghem