Talk Story
Governor’s race
comes down to
a photo finishI SUPPOSE only an editor would notice that the mailing from the Republican National Committee supporting Linda Lingle spelled the name of the state "Hawai'i," using an apostrophe instead of an okina, the diacritical mark for a glottal stop.
Hmm, I thought, what could this mean? I checked the Hirono-Matsunaga brochure that arrived the same day, paid for by Friends of Matt Matsunaga. It spells the state name "Hawaii" -- no okina, but no apostrophe, either.
For what it's worth, Lingle's platform booklet, "A New Beginning for Hawai'i," and Hirono's late entry, "Our Action Plan for Hawai'i," both use the punctuation mark with political correctness.
I wonder if all those undecided voters out there, struggling to decide whom to vote for, are processing similar irrelevancies.
What undecided voters are thinking about these days has to be the main focus of both campaigns. As the election looms, a clock on Lingle's Web site counts down the days, hours, minutes, seconds and hundredths of seconds left until Election Day.
The Star-Bulletin/KITV Poll published Sunday showed the candidates in a dead heat as of the week of Oct. 17-24, each with the support of about 40 percent of would-be voters. With a scant 3 percent backing other candidates, 18 percent of voters were still making up their minds.
The undecideds almost knocked Hirono out of the governor's race last September. A pre-primary poll showed Hirono with 43 percent of the vote, Ed Case 23 percent and Andy Anderson 18. In the election, Hirono slipped to 41 percent, Anderson held at 18 and Case soared to 40 percent -- winning virtually the entire undecided vote.
This time, Hirono will count on the support of folks who voted for Case, who wanted to send a message about dissatisfaction with the status quo, but who are unwilling to bolt the Democratic Party. Meanwhile, election handicappers weigh other possible explanations for Case's near-win.
Lingle, the odds-on GOP favorite, didn't need every vote to win the primary, so many of her supporters switched parties in the primary. One theory is they voted for Hirono because they feared Case would be the stronger opponent come November. Another says they switched and voted for Case so that both surviving nominees would be candidates for change. Neither theory seems to be good news for Hirono.
However, assuming Hirono holds on to the 76,685 votes she got in the primary and also snags the 33,378 who backed Andy Anderson, she could count on about 110,000 votes.
Lingle's primary tally was 70,798 and GOP opponent John Carroll got 7,616. She'll need all 78,414 of those GOP votes, plus the lion's share of Case's 74,082 votes to win.
A total of about 262,000 votes were cast for major-party candidates in the primary. Therefore, if the turnout is the same, the winner next week will need more than 131,000 votes. In other words, assuming she holds on to all the votes cast in the Republican primary, more than 52,500 of the voters who went for Case will have to vote for Lingle for her to win.
Hirono, on the other hand, would need only about 21,000 Case votes to win.
Meanwhile, powerful Democratic forces -- the public employee unions, Sen. Dan Inouye -- have now thrown their weight behind Mazie. She's tailored her message to embrace those who want change, albeit "responsible change," and gone after seniors and teachers with a vengeance.
Linda Lingle promises a last-minute blitz to avoid what happened four years ago when she ran out of money and media exposure in the home stretch. What's in store? "I'm not telling you," she told Star-Bulletin editors.
It promises to be a race to remember with no dollar left unspent, no accusation left unmade, no manini nit left unpicked.
Victory is in the details.
John Flanagan is the Star-Bulletin's contributing editor.
He can be reached at: jflanagan@starbulletin.com.