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LAST YEAR--on August 16, 2003, speeding in a borrowed white Cadillac down one of those long, dusty South Dakota highways that glide across the plains like endless ribbons--a Republican congressman named Bill Janklow ran a stop sign at 70 miles per hour and killed a passing motorcyclist.
It was a horrible incident, and it brought an end to Janklow's long domination of South Dakota politics. Though routinely reckless, he'd always gotten the good breaks before, pushing his luck so often that it must have seemed to him not luck at all but his right, his privilege, always to have things go his way. His subsequent manslaughter conviction, resignation from Congress, and jail term formed a sad apostrophe to his winning campaigns, his 16 years as governor, his power, and his visibility. "All of my elections have nothing to do with the issues or whoever else is running," he told me in 2002 after he had defeated a perky young Democrat named Stephanie Herseth for Congress. "All of my elections are only about me."
The line seemed at the time breathtakingly arrogant--but it was also true, and it remains true even now that he's out of office. With Janklow's conviction last December, a special election gave the congressional seat to Herseth--which made every member of South Dakota's delegation to Washington a Democrat. The destruction of the Republican party in a majority Republican state is the real legacy of 30 years of Janklow's personal dominance.
One hardly needs to add it up: Janklow campaigned against an incumbent Republican named James Abdnor in 1986, and the result was Democrat Tom Daschle's election to the Senate. He systematically undermined every rising Republican from Clint Roberts to Dale Bell, and the result was Democratic Senator Tim Johnson's election in 1996. He opened up South Dakota's sole congressional seat with his manslaughter conviction, and the result was Democrat Stephanie Herseth's special election. Outsiders sometimes wonder why a strongly pro-life state like South Dakota is represented in Washington entirely by pro-abortion officials; the answer is Bill Janklow.
With Janklow gone at last, is this the year South Dakota Republicans recover? Many are excited about Republican John Thune's chances against Daschle in the Senate race, and, indeed, Daschle seems to be in more trouble than he has known since 1978, when he pulled out a last-minute congressional victory by swearing, "I will do everything in my power to persuade others that abortion is wrong"--and getting the nuns who taught him in grade school to write a public letter declaring, "We know and we tell those with whom we speak of your abhorrence for abortion--and of your commitment to life."
Needless to say, that was Daschle then. The Daschle of today writes fundraising letters for the largest abortion lobby in the country and filibusters pro-life judges.
The opposition to Daschle has been making much of this trope of the "two Daschles." Mostly it's been heard from various political action committees and 527s. In 2002, the two main Republican candidates for governor slanged each other so viciously that the state elected in self-defense the nearly unknown Mike Rounds, who ran on a platform that consisted of little besides saying: "I'm a really nice guy, and I don't use negative ads." The Thune campaign seems to have learned the lesson. Of course, the Daschle campaign has learned the lesson as well, screaming "Negative ad!" whenever his record is called into question. But the truth is that Thune's campaign has been very mild.
Still, the message has gotten out: Daschle is one person back home, and another person on the East Coast. In South Dakota, he proudly announces his support for the president; in Washington, he's the minority leader of the Senate who does his best to thwart the president. In South Dakota, he campaigns as a man of the people; in Washington, he and his lobbyist wife recently bought a $1.9 million house, for which they promptly claimed a "homestead" tax credit that requires declaring the house one's primary and legal residence--leaving curiously unresolved the question of how the couple remain registered voters in South Dakota.
On it goes: At home, Daschle supports the war in Iraq; in Washington, he helps the Democrats oppose it. At home, he runs television ads with a picture of a hug from President Bush; in Washington, he gave Michael Moore a congratulatory hug at the premiere of Moore's anti-Bush movie Fahrenheit 9/11 (or so at least Moore told Time, though Daschle denies the embrace). Even on locally important issues--from ethanol development to trade agreements--Daschle presents himself one way while debating Thune at the Dakotafest show in Mitchell, South Dakota, and another way while raising money at ritzy parties on Long Island.
There's reason to think that widespread knowledge of the two Daschles will help Thune. Local commentators made much of the fact that by mid-summer Daschle had already spent $9 million and achieved no significant advance. Indeed, the latest poll from Rasmussen Reports has Thune three percentage points ahead of Daschle, a lead within the margin of error but promising.
President Bush's coattails look like another help, as John Kerry is down by 18 points in South Dakota and falling fast--a disaster for local Democratic candidates even in a state like South Dakota whose voters are practiced ticket-splitters. As Stephanie Herseth maintains her lead against Republican opponent Larry Diedrich, some residual unease in the state against having all of its congressional seats filled by Democrats may also hurt Daschle. In Washington, Senate minority whip Harry Reid just gave $1 million to the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee--an opening salvo in a campaign to get his colleagues to choose him as minority leader and a not-very-subtle statement that he thinks Daschle's position is going to be open next year.
BUT THESE ADVANTAGES are not enough yet to put Thune over the top. From George McGovern's 1962 triumph over Joe Bottum (my great-uncle and namesake) to Tim Johnson's 2002 victory over John Thune, the Democrats have had more of what it takes to win close elections in South Dakota. After the 2002 campaign, National Review and the Wall Street Journal made a great deal of the apparent theft of the election by the manufacture of votes on the Indian reservations. (For those interested, John Fund's new book, Stealing Elections: How Voter Fraud Threatens Our Democracy, is worth a look.) But I couldn't bring myself to follow the story with any enthusiasm. Thune should have defeated the almost invisible Tim Johnson by 10 or 20 points, I felt at the time, and almost deserved to have the election stolen for leaving it so close.
So, if Thune couldn't beat the weaker candidate Johnson in 2002, how's he supposed to beat the stronger candidate Daschle in 2004? Well, part of the answer may be better press coverage. The state's dominant newspaper, the Sioux Falls Argus Leader, for instance, ran a long profile of Tim Johnson in 2002 so puffy and sweet it should be handed out in journalism school as a model of disingenuous advocacy. A similar performance this year seems unlikely, as the South Dakota bloggers--particularly Jon Lauck at Daschle v. Thune, Steve Sibson at Sibby Online, and Jason Van Beek at South Dakota Politics--have kept relentlessly after the Argus Leader.
Another part of the answer may be a change in Thune. One prominent observer of the South Dakota scene (who doesn't want to be named) insists that Thune's success as a lobbyist during his two years out of office has brought him confidence he once lacked. Thune's Marlboro-man good looks have always contrasted with Tim Johnson's Play-Doh face and Daschle's mien of an angry elf, but if you look at recent pictures, some character seems to have come into Thune's features. One congressional figure (who really doesn't want to be named) says that Thune always seemed a weak man to his colleagues when he was a congressman in Washington, if only in the contrast between his commanding looks and his diffident demeanor. But the age lines and the experience of being out of politics may have brought him the strength he used to miss.
Certainly Thune has hired a more forceful campaign manager in Dick Wadhams this time, and he has had good success at raising money to match Daschle's out-of-state treasure chest. So, too, the higher turnout of a presidential election may help offset the Democrats' vastly superior ability to get their voters to the polls.
But October will see Daschle dashing across the state announcing one pork-barrel project after another. And how exactly is John Thune to combat this? $50,000 for a new firehouse in, say, Spearfish, and $20,000 for a theater in Watertown, or $100,000 for a retirement home in Aberdeen: They bring votes to the man who can provide them, and that's Tom Daschle.
Indeed, the biggest problem John Thune faces is the change in South Dakota. Nothing happens in the state anymore without federal funding. The pioneers and cowhands who once shocked Teddy Roosevelt with their freedom and independence have become something like servants--inhabitants of a place that seems to survive only because tourists bring in outside dollars when they visit the Black Hills and the state's senators bring home money from Washington. If Daschle's positions on abortion or gun control differ from those of his constituents, if he lives a high-celebrity life in Washington while posing as a populist at home, what's that compared with a federal-pork power that John Thune will need 10 or 20 years in the Senate to match?
During his many years as governor, Bill Janklow was always good at this game, too, culling fiscal conservatives from the Republican party and remaining close friends with Daschle. Janklow never got along with Thune, and persistent rumors suggest Janklow may announce in October that he's voting for Daschle--an unlikely scenario for Daschle to want, given that his manslaughter conviction left Janklow one of the most unpopular men in the state, and Daschle's boast of Janklow's friendship produced titters in the audience at the Dakotafest debate. More, Daschle's appearance as a character witness at Janklow's trial would make the endorsement seem a cold-blooded repayment.
Still, Janklow's associates and friends--particularly Kris Graham, who recently appeared in an anti-Thune ad--are said to be playing key roles in the Democrats' "Republicans for Daschle" campaign, which aims to convince voters that it's all right to split their ticket and vote for both President Bush and Senator Daschle.
That's the world Thune has to run against, the South Dakota of Bill Janklow, and though one poll now has him ahead, he still faces an uphill climb. Without some lucky breaks and real help from the national party, Thune may not make it.
A native of South Dakota, Joseph Bottum is Books and Arts editor of The Weekly Standard. |
