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Posted by JOE GANDELMAN, Editor-In-Chief in Politics. Jun 15th, 2010 | no responses
There may be new a problem for Sharron Angle, Nevada’s Republican running for Senate against Democrat Harry Reid. On a day when news stories detailed how she avoided reporters in Washington, and a senior Republican official insisted that she merely needed time to prepare for the national media’s questions, now the Associate Press has a story based on an investigation of Nevada government records detailing how during the Reagan years she left the Republican party — to become a Democrat.
Now, if Angle had been a Republican deemed a RINO, or someone strongly opposed by the Tea Party movement, this revelation would likely mean that she would be political toast. Rush, Sean et. all would be all over her on the talk shows, saying, see this proves she really is not a Republican or one who can be trusted. Many conservatives who hated Pennsylvania’s Arlen Specter would note that he was once a Democrat, for instance.
But due to the way politics works, here is what is most likely to happen:
Rush, Sean, et. al and the people who listen to them and then basically pick up their political narrative will not hold this against her because they want to defeat Reid. They’ll downplay it or — the most usual response — say the mean, bad, evil mainstream media is out to get her. (Note that the bad, evil mainstream media is only bad and evil when partisans feel it runs stories that could hurt their side but they quote the bad, evil media when it carries something that could hurt the other side. Then it’s good and doing accurate reporting.)
The Democrats will take the story (if it has “legs”) and run with it, perhaps featuring it in an ad suggesting that it is a sign of her being erratic. OR they will run it to get out the message to GOPers who may feel Angle is too way out there for them, based on her past statements.
The most likely problem for her is that it is part of a political drip-drip-drip of past statements (now being finessed with new words to try and soften past statements or stands’ impacts) and news stories (a story about you refusing to talk to any reporters but Fox News and a GOP source having to defend you as not being ready for the media does not confidence make) that are not helpful to her image. People may already KNOW why they may not like and feel disappointed by Reid; she is a new political product — just waiting to be defined. And the initial batch of stories about her are not defining her in a way that will help her win more votes.
