Why it’s too early to be ’10 election know-it-alls

By Jon Ralston (contact)

Sunday, Nov. 1, 2009 | 2 a.m.

One year before the 2008 election, GOP Rep. Jon Porter seemed like a good bet for reelection.

Stories written at the time focused on Porter’s untested opponent, Robert Daskas, who was well behind in fundraising and not ready for prime time. One year later Porter was out of office, but not because of Daskas, whose name did not appear on a ballot. Daskas surprisingly dropped out in April, soon replaced by an opportunistic Dina Titus, who went on to ride the Democratic wave to victory.

This series of events is instructive one year before the 2010 balloting as conventional wisdom on many fronts has begun to settle in with a strong GOP wind forecast. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is a Dead Man Walking. Ex-Judge Brian Sandoval is a heavy favorite to become the state’s next governor. The Democrats may lose seats in both houses of the Legislature. Two Reids on the ballot — Harry for U.S. Senate and Rory for governor — represent a ticking time bomb for the Democrats.

As 2007 waned, no one could have foretold — and that is painful for supposedly omniscient pundits to acknowledge — Daskas’ withdrawal and Titus’ entrance. But observers also were stunned by the massive turnout at the presidential caucuses that directly resulted in a dramatic Democratic Party registration surge and an organizational dynamo that helped catapult Barack Obama to victory here, changed the legislative matrix and seemed to presage a protracted Republican drought.

The lesson: What we think now may not be even close to reality a year hence, or for that matter six months or even two months. But what is true is that we generally know what questions remain unanswered that should determine the results on Nov. 2, 2010. Here are the five critical ones:

• Who will actually file in March? Many candidates have announced their intentions to run, but not all will file. Snow White (Sue Lowden) and the GOP dwarves seeking to replace Harry Reid can either nail the majority leader’s coffin shut or reanimate his political life. But will they all file? Doubtful. In the governor’s race, conventional wisdom has it that because he has nothing else to do and because no one will give him a job, Jim Gibbons will run for reelection. If he does, he could complicate that GOP primary. And if Mayor Oscar Goodman, widely expected to be all talk and no file, has a few too many Bombay Sapphires and stumbles over to the election department, all bets are off. Expect the unexpected.

• What will happen in June? The newly advanced primary is a boon for incumbents and others who will have more time to recover from money-siphoning internecine battles. Will Snow White get battered by the dwarves and survive? Will Gibbons run and take enough of the vote to force Sandoval to spend money? Will ex-North Las Vegas Mayor Mike Montandon be a spoiler or a surprise? Battered winners will have more time to get well, but June will set the table for November.

• What will the state of the local and state economies be? Nevada’s economy will not rebound quickly even if the national economy does. And those in office, mostly Democrats, will wear that. If Gibbons calls a special session and does a no-new-taxes dance on the heads of Democratic legislative leaders, that could be painful for them. And Harry Reid especially needs both economies to show robust progress a year from now or he will be added to the state’s unemployment rolls.

• Will the GOP be able to reduce the Democratic registration margins? Democrats still have close to 100,000 more voters in the state than Republicans. If the GOP cannot substantially reduce that edge next year, Republican candidates will have to count on independents, who make up almost 16 percent of the electorate, voting in large numbers for the GOP — as it appears now they will. Now, that is.

• What is predictably unpredictable? Twelve years ago, on Nevada Day, Las Vegas Mayor Jan Jones announced she would not run for governor because she wanted to spend more time with her family. Seven months later, on the last day to file as a candidate, Jones, only months after having been diagnosed with breast cancer, shocked the political world by getting into the race against The Anointed One, Kenny Guinn. The anointment held, but not until Jones gave the Guinn campaign a scare. I am not suggesting a Barbara Buckley-Jan Jones analogy for 2010, but expect to be surprised, maybe even shocked by some development before the balloting.

That is the nature and the beauty of the ever-mercurial world of Nevada politics.

Jon Ralston hosts the news discussion program “Face to Face With Jon Ralston” on Las Vegas ONE and publishes the daily e-mail newsletter “RalstonFlash.com.” His column for the Las Vegas Sun appears Sunday, Wednesday and Friday.