More Of The Same In CA-50

What do you do when you have an election to replace a Congressman guilty of bribery and corruption? Why, you replace them with a former lobbyist. That’s exactly what the voters did in California’s 50th Congressional district yesterday.

Republican Brian Bilbray defeated Democratic challenger Francine Busby in the race for a seat in Congress in a district considered one of the Republican strongholds in California yesterday (see story here). The district is in the San Diego area.

What does this tell us about the mindset of the voters? Would they rather have more of the same than change? Do they even pay attention? Is this just more apathy on the part of the voters?

What does this tell us about the Democratic party, when they cannot win against a culture of corruption? Did the voters get a clear message on what the party stands for? Sure, it was one of the closest races in that district, but close doesn’t count. Besides, we are talking about two sides here: one that has stood for corruption and lies for the past 5 years and the other which has expressed that there is a better way.

Whatever it may be, we need to learn from this experience before the fall elections in our own state. If we cannot come up with a consistent message and get the voters to understand what’s at stake, we are going to have to keep living with the ineffective and corrupt government that we have had since the 2000 election.