Post-election Blues

As predicted in the pre-election Capitol Rap, the GOP Tsunami stopped short of California. There are still three races that await further ballot counting (in the Attorney General's race, Republican Steve Cooley clings to a 19,000 vote lead [as of November 10 at 5:28 PM]; two congressional races in seats held by Democrats are currently too close to call), but the rest of the state election results were bad news for Republicans.

The collapse of the Whitman candidacy, the 13% registration gap between Democrats and Republicans (largest in almost 2 decades), and a Republican "enthusiasm factor" that never seemed to materialize in California all accounted for the results.

The Assembly will have 52 Democrats and 28 Republicans when the Legislature reconvenes for the 2011 session, the Senate will be at 25 Democrats and 14 Republicans -- with one vacancy to be filled in January via special election. Especially disappointing for CAHU was the defeat of Assembly Member Mike Villines in the race for Insurance Commissioner. Villines, the former GOP Assembly Leader, had been running even-steven with his opponent with a little over a week to go before the election. Alas, the collapse of the Whitman candidacy spelled doom for the rest of the GOP statewide ticket (with the still unresolved possible exception of Steve Cooley), and swept Villines away.

This is an unhappy result for CAHU, since Democrat David Jones is not a friend of agents and will be expected to be a major stumbling block in any agent friendly initiatives at NAIC.

Moreover, the election of Jerry Brown as Governor virtually guarantees that every bad bill that the previous Governor vetoed (and his record was spotty) will be revived and put on Governor Brown's desk -- assuring that CAHU will be fighting each of those battles.

There were some bright spots in this election: the reapportionment reform efforts that CAHU has championed are now locked into the law with the defeat of the politician inspired Propositon 27; the takeover of the House by Republicans assures that CAHU friend Kevin McCarthy will assume House leadership by becoming House Majority Republican Whip.

All of these results reaffirm a grim reality for CAHU: This will be a very dangerous year that calls for literally every CAHU member to become engaged in the legislative process if our interests are to be protected.