I think Brady is a lot better for Democrats and I don’t have a ton of great things to say about him, but Rich points out some of his characteristics that could make him dangerous in the general election to Democrats:
Yes, Brady is ideologically far to the right of this state’s center. He’s a guns, gays and God conservative who wants to cut taxes and borrow our way out of the pension mess. But he’s also a true happy warrior in the Reagan mold. He’s telegenic, decent on his feet, and will likely tear into Quinn on issues that Illinois actually cares about.
I added in comments:
I think Rich left off one-maybe two things about Brady—One he works his butt off. From his first race against Ropp he puts all his efforts into his races.
Second, he’s the only guy who seems to have run a field operation of any note this cycle and it paid off. In a close election, these are big deals.
That’s one or two things depending on whether you consider working hard part of a field operation.
His first race was Gordon Ropp in McLean County where he beat longtime incumbent Ropp by outworking him. Nany many years ago my late uncle was Ropp’s campaign treasurer well before Brady ran. For disclosure–though I think we can all agree I obviously have different politics from all involved in that race.
If it was just ideology OR just geography, I’d give him a punchers chance. He’s looking at an AND function. See Glenn Poshard 1998.
Cohen is sucking all the air out of the room now, but look at the results in any Chicago area county. Brady’s problem isn’t retail politics. It’s name ID in one of the more expensive media markets on the planet. We ain’t one-at-a-timin’ here. We’re MASS communicating! His best Cook townships:
total votes: Wheeling – 628 (5.41%)
percentage: Barrington 11.2% (201).
(GOP leaning townships in which Quinn did 48.1% (4,924) & 43.46% (319) respectively)
The Republicans will come home but he needs ALL of them and a bunch of disaffected Democrats. To get what he needs in NE IL will require a couple of metric tons of cash.
It doesn’t help that Brady is from Central Illinois, which has a large swing vote that helped elect Blagojevich in ’02. Quinn did poorly in many downstate counties. Add the fact that there’s not a single downstater on the Democratic ticket this year.
If Cohen isn’t replaced with a downstater, it could cost Democrats the Governor’s office.
HappyToaster, I don’t think Brady is too worried about the most Democratic county in the state. He’s going to lose Cook anyway. That’s not where most of the swing voters are.
Right. Ignore the county with the largest GOP vote in the state. If he comes stumbling out of Cook 1/2 million votes down those 3000 votes in Lincoln County won’t mean squat.
There is no Lincoln county in Illinois, but thanks for sharing your expertise.