HD 12 Questions Answered Tonight
Voters in the Cullman area have the opportunity today to choose the parties’ nominees for the House District 12 seat vacated by Democrat Neal Morrison.
The Democratic side has several questions of interest. Will voter support for pastor James Fields outpace support for school board member Sheila Kretzschmar and the Democratic Party apparatus behind her? Will publisher Ed Flaig gather enough votes to cause a run-off? Or will James Fields do less well than polls suggest because of the Wilder effect?
On the Republican side, will county commissioner Wayne Willingham win without a run-off? Many have expected that Willingham and former county GOP chair Bill Floyd would be in a run-off, but Willingham has been heard to say that he thinks he will win without a run-off. Key will be whether lawyers Greg Johnson and Stephen Parker will draw enough supporters to the polls to keep Willingham from reaching 50%. Or could one of them surprise in a bigger way?
The Parlor is hearing anecdotally that turnout is “very light.” “Very light turnout” is like the downpour on the football game; it gives the heavy underdog more of a fighting chance to create a surprising outcome.
We will also be looking with interest to see the turnout numbers for each party. It would be a mistake to infer too much from them particularly if turnout is light, but they will allow the fun of speculating on how partisan the district has become. For example, Republicans expressed some hopes of picking up the House District 22 seat after Democratic Rep. Albert Hall died last November. But when the Democrats turned out three-and-a-half times as many voters as Republicans did in the primary, you got the sense that the district did not have as many active Republicans as the GOP hoped. Democrat Butch Taylor went on to claim the seat in the general election by a wide (58%-42%) margin.
A run-off or the general election (if there is no run-off) for House District 12 will be held December 18.
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Butch Taylor - IIRC wasn’t his very first vote for a pay raise?
Comment by Reactionary — November 13, 2007 @ 5:38 pm
Dems should have gone with Brad Williams — afterall he beat Ken Guin for delegate afterall.
Comment by CullmanKid — November 13, 2007 @ 6:41 pm