Wampum

Duke Cunningham resigned yesterday after pleading guilty to income tax evasion and conspiracy charges. His committee assignments were Appropriations and Permanent Select on Intelligence. He's held the district since 1990, and planned to retire at the end of the 109th Congress.

In the 2004 race he raised $832,173. Francine Busby raised $235,925 and picked up 37% of the vote.
In the 2002 race he raised $796,250. Del Stewart raised $16,093 and picked up 32% of the vote.
In the 2000 race he raised $607,657. Jorge Luis Barraza raised $5,810 and picked up 30% of the vote.
In the 1998 race he raised $609,086, Daniel Kripke raised $103,462 and picked up 35% of the vote.

In the '04 race, just 20 contributors to the incumbent matched the challenger's total contributions (some rounding):

1. Lockheed Martin, Titan Corp and Peregrine Semiconductor Corp $15,000 each


2. Cubic Corp, MZM Inc, General Dynamics $11,500 each


3. Qualcomm, Aircraft Owners & Pilots Assn, American Maritime Officers, General Atomics, National Assn of Realtors, National Beer Wholesalers Assn, Northrop Grumman, Raytheon, SBC Communications, Science Applications International Corp, L-3 Communications, United Defense $10,000 each


4. Alliant Techsystems, Digital Systems Resources $8,500 each

Over a quarter (28%) of the contributions to the incumbent were from out of state, and only 3% were "ideological". It is possible that those contributors and their contributions will not "retire" with Duke Cunningham, and will find some other vehicle to advance their interests.
Francine Busby is messaging ethics reform, but her opponent ran with 73% of his paid support coming from San Diego High Tech. That money isn't going to switch parties. In addition to messaging generic reform she could consider how to run against San Diego High Tech. How to run against the Revolution in Military Affairs, or at least, the Republican/Rumsfeld reallignment of the military away from resiliance, stability and defense in depth?

Why is this important?

Democrats have to find ways to run against testosterone. They have to find ways to message effectively that women, as well as men, can think correctly about modern warfare, from its industrial base to its warfighting face. They have to find ways to message that Republicans have not been thinking correctly about modern warfare, and that Republicans have not been thinking correctly about the relationship of the Congress and the military. Modulo the half-million dollars that Francine has to raise to be competitive, and the campaign that her CM has to execute to be competitive, and the paid and unpaid workers that need to volunteer and be coordinated effectively to be competitive, Francine's campaign is an opportunity to run a Women and Democrats campaign for a military that is not a high-tech boondoggle, and isn't fragile, unstable, shallow, exhausted, and stuck in Iraq.

Voters vote against their material interests all the time for ideological reasons. Given a choice between defense of the Constitution, the Republic, and the Military, or defense of the bottom lines of ten to twenty San Diego area defense contractors, the incumbant contributions may not buy mindshare.

Here are the two testosterone-related points from Francine's current position papers.

Honesty About Iraq
Francine believes it is the responsibility of the President and Congress to develop a clear exit strategy that works to restore basic security and subsequently remove our troops. She believes that the Iraq War was a distraction from the very serious threat of terrorism. She also believes that honoring soldiers and veterans is the moral obligation of Congress.

Defeating Terrorism
Francine Busby believes that terrorism is the most serious threat to the security of American citizens and in Congress she is committed to eliminating terrorists wherever they are. She believes that the War on Terrorism has been hindered by too many Washington politicians and not enough military experts involved in the decision-making process. She also supports de-politicizing homeland security so that areas at the greatest risk for attack are receiving the most funding.

"Higher pay" is an alternative for "honoring", and given a fixed budgetary pie, leads to a direct attack on the contributions she is running against. Wes Clark articulated this theme in his run between Oct. '03 and March '04, and it was effective, in so far as Clark messaged on military reform.

"Trafficing in weapons" is an alternative to "terrorism" as "the most serious threat", and again, given a fixed budgetary pie, leads to a direct attack on the contributions she is running against. Al Gore worked the issue as Vice President, working out the agreement with Vladimir Putin to end arms, and reactor sales to the Islamic Republic of Iran, and John Kerry messaged on "loose nukes" during the '04 general election debates. Kerry did better than Bush in the debates, and in the key demographics (see MB's posts on women and votes), "loose nukes" did much better than "terrorism".

"Arresting" is an alternative to "eliminating" as the policy towards non-state actors pursuing criminal conspiracies. Law enforcement also funds high-tech, and leads to better long-term results than arbitrary summary executions. The point of killing people after all is to weaken or end criminal conspiracies, so it matters if the key conspirators are missed. Over 500 al Qaeda cadres were bagged by Iran in the Winter of 2001-2002, and another group of senior al Qaeda cadres, up to the General Staff equivalents in that organization, were bagged by Iran in the Spring of 2002. Working the InterPol system, working with Iran, with Europe, with Russia, with China, interrogating before execution, again, given a fixed budgetary pie, leads to a direct attack on the contributions she is running against. Al Gore messaged on this after 9/11. Birchers message against treaties, and Republicans message on instant gratification, but OBL is still a free man, and in all the corpses produced since military operations began, we know very, very little about the inner structure of this enemy, even with torture.

"Military policy" is a broader policy framework alternative to the narrow and dubious "War on Terrorism", and giving the retirement door to the defense industry for very senior officers, and the revolving door between the defense industry and the Special Executive Service civilian jobs in the Pentagon, "Congressional oversight" is an alternative to "too many Washington politicians and not enough military experts involved in the decision-making process".

I'm not going to repeat all my Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) and Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA) posts, but Duncan Hunter, who represents the eastern San Diego metro area, went to bat to keep the Atlantic submarine fleet intact, objecting to the proposed closures of the Groton base and Portsmouth yard. Running with the Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee on the issues of base closure and future force structure leads to a direct attack on the contributions she is running against.

At present Francine is running a non-confrontational message on the core issues of the contributions she is running against. She's not going to get them to reform just by asking, she has to beat them, or find some means to get to 51 leaving the male gender split unengaged. I'm in my pajamas, so I guess I can send her a link to this post.