Posted by Last Friday night, the NAACP held a Gubernatorial forum (have you ever wondered why we don’t call these guys “gubernators?”) featuring Artur Davis and Ron Sparks. I was asked to share the moderating duties with Rev. Anthony Johnson. The crowd numbered about 150. The questions were submitted to the NAACP, and members of that group selected 11. Each candidate had an opening and closing statement and each got a chance to respond to each question. I came away with these impressions:
• First, there was little if any confrontation. In a couple of instances, Congressman Davis tried to take on Commissioner Sparks—he argued that Sparks changes his positions depending on the audience he addresses. For example, Sparks told the crowd he would support a “public option.” Davis claimed he told the BCA just the opposite.
• Sparks went after Davis for acting like a Republican.
• There was some back and forth on the issue of gambling, with Davis taking the position that he was not against gambling and wanted to tax it NOW as the same rate as other states. He contended that Sparks would not say how much gambling would be taxed. Davis would put most of his eggs in the Constitutional Reform basket. Davis also wants to tax big out-of-state timber.
• Davis also criticized Sparks for going to Selma and advocating the building of a casino, instead of building new and better schools. Sparks shot back that what Selma needs NOW are quality jobs, and a new casino might be just the remedy.
• Both candidates acquitted themselves well. No real “sparks” flew (OK—that was cheap). I don’t think any minds were changed, nor did I think the audience was engaged. It was Friday night after all.
I have to say I was impressed with the way Ron Sparks handled himself. He has a populist message that serves him well, and I thought he connected well with this largely African-American audience. Though I still think he has a mountain to climb, were he to survive the primary, I think he could be very competitive in the general. Could we have another case of a candidate who wins the primary but falls short in the general vs. a candidate who loses the primary but has a better shot at winning the general? Been there…done that.
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Left in Alabama has done a good job of recapping this debate. Go to the below website to look for video clips and summaries of the candidates on the debate:
http://leftinalabama.com/diary/5000/artur-davis-and-ron-sparks-at-the-naacp-forum
Now a couple of thoughts regarding your post:
1) My understanding was that Davis was hitting Sparks for saying one thing to one audience and another thing to different audience. In reference to casinos, it was placing casinos in Druid Hills and Selma, but not saying the same thing to the more affluent areas in Birmingham. The debate is why does he want casinos in areas that have issues with poverty? Will that help to alievate the situation of residents there?
2) It also seemed that Sparks was on the defensive on the clips I saw. He seemed to press the message, “my plan, which everyone has criticized” wondering why people are criticizing it. It seemed he needed to develop a better response to that.
3) On what basis do you make the claim that Davis would get beat in a general?
Nat:
Were we all at the same forum?
myself and the rest of the forum got a very different opinion.
(In case you all missed it, check out http://www.leftinalabama.com for a recap and also http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZas–2pLrs
-thanks LIA)
Ron Sparks was very very very inconsistent on at least 3 of the issues.
Do you want a public option or not Mr. Sparks? You said you wanted one the other night but following your press you told BCA the opposite (yup, its documented).
I am wondering if Sparks is just wearing the jacket to the meeting and changing it depending on the meeting.
We didn’t feel that Sparks connected to the audience AT ALL. It was very strange-he almost seemed out of place. Maybe it was the inconsistencies that made him uncomfortable.
Again, all the polls have shown Artur Davis ahead of ALL candidates both Democratic AND Republican. That’s fact. Do you have a public reliable poll to share to back up your opinions? This blog is almost seeming a tad biased.
We need responsible blogging that gives TRUTH. Artur Davis is consistent on the issues, genuine and the people of Alabama are with his message.
We expect better blogging than this Nat.
I wasn’t at the forum (I didn’t know about it) but I did see the LiA video clips. After reading this post and the comments – I want to see the whole thing to make sure I didnt’ miss snippets that weren’t included in Mooncats post. To me, it looked like Sparks missed the mark on several questions.
Anyone know if public access is going to re-air this event?
Just did some googling around. Looks like it will air this Thurs & Friday at 5pm on Ch 4 and On Demand Ch 1040. It’ll also show next Thurs & Fri.
To #1 and #2: I’m trying to see where we disagree on Davis’s charge that Sparks is inconsistent. He is. That was clear. We disagree on whether Sparks connected. Substantively, Sparks cannot compete with Davis on the facts, nor with his skill in argument, nor with his grammar, but what I was watching was eye contact and body language. Maybe I need to go back and look at it again. With respect to the polling on the race, it is equally clear that Davis should win the primary. And yes, Davis leads in the general,too, but the undecided vote is large. I see it now as a 40-40-20 race. I do not say he will lose the general. I question how he more than doubles Obama’s share of the white vote. I know people get very uncomfortable about political arithmetic when it comes to race. But I have watched, polled, and studied Alabama politics for nearly 40 years; this is the way it is played. How many significant truly competitive statewide races have DEMS won since 1998? Sue Bell Cobb is the outlier. Lucy Baxley did win too. Interestingly, both are women. DEMS have to get 38 percent of the white vote to win. It’s been awfully hard since 1986.
This blog has no axe to grind. I don’t have an agenda. I see my job as offering as objective a take as I can. Some of what I write will be pretty political sciency; some will be less than systematic pundity, but my effort will be an honest one.
I’m trying to get folks to talk about politics from different perspectives. If people want to spin on behalf of their candidates that’s fine, too.
People should be able to disagree without assigning all kinds of bogus motives to others. I’m going to continue to work at it.
I’ve seen Sparks at a few events (DFA in Homewood, OTM debate, and this NAACP forum) and each time his supporters are outnumbered by Davis supporters. Like usual, Sparks fled Boutwell after it was over while Davis stayed longer, talking to folks who wanted to meet him. Dr. Davis, to say that Sparks “connected with people” at NAACP is really untrue. If they “connected,” then why weren’t they wearing his sticker, chatting with his staffers, signing up to volunteer at his booth etc?
Natalie,
I think next year’s governor’s race is difficult to predict because we’re in new territory. Alabama hasn’t had a governor’s race no incumbent since 1986 and we’ve never had 2 competitive primaries and a competitive general election with no incumbent.
Although I agree with your assessment that Davis has the inside track in the Democratic primary and that the Republican nominee will probably have an advantage for the general election, there’s a lot of room for strange twists in the race next year.
I did not attend, but watched the youtube clips. I agree with the apparent sentiment in these responses that Davis overmatched Sparks on style and substance. I also noticed that Sparks tellingly did not explain or rebut any of the contradictions Davis hit him on. Davis also manages to jab without losing the high ground, a tough debater’s trick.
As for Davis’ electability, does that not depend on the economy first and second, whether his many Democratic detractors make up with him when the alternative is (likely)Bradley Byrne?
I didn’t do a count in terms the distribution of supporters–it looked like a wedding, where many Sparks people (those wearing his stickers) seemed to be sitting on one side. I was “in the moment” listening to each answer. My question to those of you who were there–on a scale of “1″ to “10″, how would you rate Sparks in terms of “presence?” I’d give him a 6, maybe 7. I assumed Davis would overwhelm Sparks, but that’s not what I saw. Maybe my expectations were so low that Sparks could only overachieve.
Ron Sparks was caught red-handed telling outright lies on major issues like health care. And this performance earns him a 7? Remember, the press caught him in August doing the same thing on unemployment insurance. So this has now become a pattern. This whole dialogue makes me want to watch the full debate for myself, so I’ll be tuning in on Thursday and forming my own opinions.
To #2. I posted all the video I had at http://leftinalabama.com/diary/5000/artur-davis-and-ron-sparks-at-the-naacp-forum and that was all of the forum except the final question and the closing statements. It’s all there, one question at a time. My camera battery inexplicably died just as Natalie was asking the final question so I only posted notes from an audio recorder for those.
In my opinion Ron Sparks comes off better in the video than he did in person — in this campaign he always seems a little defensive and his repeated reference to criticism of his gambling proposals reinforced that. I wonder if he’s trying to project the underdog image and maybe overplaying that? He’s less genuine and likeable than he was in 2007, imho.
“Could we have another case of a candidate who wins the primary but falls short in the general vs. a candidate who loses the primary but has a better shot at winning the general? Been there…done that.”
Who exactly are you referring to here?
I find it very strange that Sparks continues to beat the gambling drum, especially for casino style gambling. Regardless of what one thinks of gambling on an individual basis, it’s not a winning strategy in Alabama, except, I guess, in the Democratic primary. Sparks must know he has to have an explosive issue to beat Davis and thinks gambling’s it. If I were Davis, I wouldn’t be too concerned.
Natalie:
I know the NAACP is a traditionally Democratic-leaning group, but did it extend invitations to the debate to GOP contenders as well or plan to have a GOP forum?
Natalie,
In 2006 Democrat Susan Parker beat Perry Hooper Jr. in a competitive race for the PSC. You forgot her.
Also, I would have to say it was going to be really hard for any Democrat, you included, to beat Jeff Sessions in 1996. Democrats did very poorly that year. Lost the Tom Bevill seat & the Glen Browder seat.
Professor Davis,
Thanks for your response. I wasn’t trying to insinuate anything in those comments (and I probably could have worded my question a bit differently). I think the two dynamics currently present that make this hard to predict are both the competativeness in the primaries and the fact that there is no incumbent. A Democrat’s chance at winning changes depending on the Republican nominee. (The national mood will also influence this race–1994 might have been different for Folsom had it not been a Republican election).
Another factor that is important is incumbency, which can help explain some of these races (such as the US Senate races and the 2006 Governor’s race). In the races you cited, only in the 2006 Chief Justice race was an incumbent involved–Drayton Nabers (who had been appointed) was defeated by Cobb. In 2002, Baxley ran for an open Lt. Gov. spot, and in 2006 both Folsom and Strange ran for another open spot (another Dem. victory).
I also wonder how Davis will be able to distinguish himself from Obama, which he is working to do.
Lots of great comments. I don’t think the NAACP did much to try to get the word out. In fact, I wondered if it were going to get cancelled. I was told that Joe Turnham was asked to announce the forum at the JJ dinner, but he did not. Flyers were distributed. There was one short piece in the BHAM NEWS.
WilliamC makes a great point in raising the issue of how Davis could/should distinguish himself from the Pres. I know that Davis has thought this through carefully, because he is very methodical–it’s tricky because he needs Obama to win the primary, but probably has to distance himself to win the general. He doesn’t want to be accused by the Republican nominee of saying one thing to DEMS and have a different message for the general. Of course, that’s true of all elections, and the REP candidate will be in the same boat. You have to satisfy the base first to get to NOV.
Back in 1998, I recall counting 21 statewide races (including State Board of Education). Eleven were won by Democrats, and ten were won by Republicans. Of the 11, 8 were women. My argument at the time was that to the extent women get nominated by the Democratic Party, they have a better chance of being elected than their male counterparts. Of the 10 Republican victories, only one was female. Just sayin’.
Wow, we are still living in the past.
How does Artur Davis garner the votes that Barack Obama did not get in Alabama? He can’t.
It’s simple math. Game, set, match. R’s retain the top spot in 2010.
Reality in #18, why do Obama’s numbers in Alabama represent the ceiling for Davis? Thanks.
The more voters learn about Ronnie Sparks, the less they’re going to like him. In his two races for Commissioner of Ag. and Industries, he was not in the spot light like he’s going to be now that he’s jumped into the big league. A lot of skeletons in his closet that will surely come out. Ronnie has a problem with the truth. He could be the poster child for how the public feels about crooked politician. If he is, by some unforseen miracle, the nominee, the republicans will make a fool out of him in the general. The goods are there, and you better believe they’ll air them out! It would nearly be worth it to see him get the nomination! Let the good times begin!