North Star Politics

This post by Trillin highlights an excellent question: why is Kelly Doran running the way he has been? Many of his political moves, capped by his pick of Sheila Kiscaden for Lt. Gov., have made almost no sense viewed in the context of winning a primary. It appears that he's counting on conservative DFLers and independents to make it to the general election, but these constituencies present a huge problem, namely that they're very unlikely to come out and vote in a primary in the kinds of numbers that are likely to carry the ticket. Doran's money will only win him so many more reliable primary voters, so the question must again be asked: how is he going to win?

I particularly agree with Trillin's assessment that Doran would have been much better off tapping a known DFL name. If I'd been giving him political advice, I would have said that he should pick a female, outstate liberal. While Sheila Kiscaden certainly fits the first two characteristics, she sure doesn't meet the third, which may well be the one that's most important to survive the primary. He's just not such a great candidate that he should be expecting unproven voters to show up for him in droves, especially when there's no proven progressivism on the ticket that more liberal DFLers can vote for. Doran's strategy would make a lot of sense if he was the only DFL candidate, or even the front runner, but unfortunately for him, the way the race looks, he's well on his way to a stomping in September.