In today's Journal Gazette, Washington Bureau chief Sylvia Smith reported, "When Hoosiers vote in November, their ballot choices will decide more than their representatives in Washington for the next two years. Indiana will likely determine whether Republicans remain in charge of the House."
Political observers early this year gauged Democratic chances of a House takeover by hinging them on the scope of the election---whether or not voters would frame the choice in national or local terms. But now, Republicans are embracing the national frame, even using it against their Democratic opponents. The NRCC began running a television ad in IN-08 Friday that asks, if Democrats took control of the House, whether Democrat Brad Ellsworth would support Nancy Pelosi as Speaker. "She and other Democrats want to raise your taxes, cut and run in Iraq, and give amnesty to illegal immigrants," it said. (IOM has requested a copy of the ad from the NRCC.)
But for the GOP, it's a tactic that requires voters to apply guilt by association---to a candidate that has never even served with Pelosi. It is either indicative of polling data that shows national figures like Pelosi as intensely disliked in Indiana, or a complete lack of issues with which to attack Ellsworth legitimately. It has to be hard for Chris Chocola to credibly charge that Joe Donnelly "opposed the ethanol bill" when he has no voting record in Congress. By that stretch, it's even more incredulous to suggest Ellsworth should have to justify the ideology of Nancy Pelosi.
In IN-09, though Mike Sodrel has the luxury of Baron Hill's tangible, 6-year long voting record, he too is deploying the same tactic. During the WTIU debate last week, Sodrel said Republican leaders were "from the heartland of America...If this House turns over, Nancy Pelosi will be Speaker of the House, from San Francisco, California. The likely Majority Leader would be Steny Hoyer, from Maryland. If you look at the various committee chairs, you're basically taking the leadership from the heartland of America to the coasts. And I think that has to be something you consider when you are considering who you are voting for in this election."
By running against the party, instead of the party's candidate, Hoosier Republicans are constructing straw men, imaginary candidates that need not accurately reflect the actual views of the actual candidates.
But are they also inadvertently nationalizing what they so wanted to be a local election?
