No Runny Eggs

(H/T – Charlie Sykes)

In the current issue of WPRI’s Wisconsin Interest, Ken Lamke makes the case that a primary battle between Scott Walker and Mark Neumann would actually be good for the GOP’s chances of retaking the governor’s office in November 2010.

The prospect of a primary contest between Milwaukee County Executive Scott Walker and former Congressman Mark Neumann for the Republican nomination for governor in 2010 greatly enhances the GOP’s chances of defeating Gov. Jim Doyle next year.

At least the historical record of the past 45 years of Wisconsin elections leads to that conclusion.

Each of the six times that incumbent governors or U.S. senators were defeated since 1962 occurred when the nominee of the out party emerged from a contested primary rather than having the nomination handed to him by running unopposed in the primary.

Lamke goes on to point out that the major advantages of having a contested primary is that the participants get near-monopoly media coverage, and that they get to hit the incumbent without the incumbent getting to hit back. While the latter isn’t quite true, the return fire is necessarily split between the primary participants.

Of course, winning a contested primary does not always translate to success in the general election.

Sometimes these party leaders are not so much interested in having their party nominee knock off the incumbent as they are in having the specific candidate they support win the nomination.

They really don’t care if their party wins in November—that is, that the primary candidate whom they haven’t backed goes on to beat the incumbent. In fact, they sometimes strongly oppose that outcome, although they won’t say so. Almost by definition, they are not really “party” leaders as much as they are supporters of a particular candidate.

The state GOP leadership, as well as the vast majority of the county party leaderships, changed significantly since 2006, to the point where the 2009 convention was “All Walker All The Time”. However, I’m already starting to see a similar dynamic. The old guard, while officially in the minority among the leadership, is still quite infuencial outstate, while a lot of Walker supporters are already firing “I’ll never support you” broadsides at Neumann.