Another GOP establishment vs. Tea Party showdown

What happens when you pit a popular, well-funded Tea Party candidate in a open, contested statewide primary against the establishment GOP candidate? Writing for the American Spectator, Robert Stacy McCain takes a look at the Tim James gubernatorial campaign in Alabama as this re-emerging theme in post-2008 politics continues.

Before I continue, I'll disclose that Tim James is my guy in this race and that my firm is contracting with the campaign. However, as I've stated before, I'd be writing about this anyway, as this local-to-me race highlights the disconnect between the Tea Party/conservative movement and old-school Republican candidates.

Tim James was Tea Party before Tea Party was cool. Before the federal bailouts, before most Americans had heard of Barack Obama, before Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck became household names, James helped lead the 2003 effort to stop a tax increase proposed by Alabama's Republican Gov. Bob Riley.

The battle over Amendment One, as Riley's $1.3 billion tax measure was known, was a defining moment for the state's conservatives. James, who had challenged Riley in the 2002 Republican gubernatorial primary, sided with the anti-tax activists who organized an opposition campaign that became known as the "Alabama Tea Party."

Alabama voters rejected the proposal by more than a 2-to-1 margin in a September 2003 referendum and, if politics were logical, James would be the front-runner in this year's GOP gubernatorial contest. Instead, one recent poll showed that the early leader is Bradley Byrne who, as a state senator in 2003, voted for Riley's tax-hike plan.

So far so good, but (after the jump)...

...I'd be remiss in my duties if I didn't mention that our polling data doesn't exactly match the survey McCain cited.  Whichever poll is more accurate, Byrne (and Moore) show some vulnerabilities right now. As James's campaign manager Sandra Lucas notes:

For starters, most political observers in the state don’t anticipate additional growth for Roy Moore’s numbers. More importantly, if Bradley Byrne is already advertising on television and only receiving 20 percent of the vote, he’s got some serious problems of his own with which to deal.

Moore has been ducking campaign event after campaign event. His most recent last-minute cancellation was for a state Christian Coalition debate, for which even the Democrats showed. McCain continues:

Fundraising reports show Moore ended 2009 with a modest $145,000 in his campaign chest, while James had more cash on hand ($2.6 million) than either Byrne ($1.8 million) or the leading Democratic gubernatorial candidate, Artur Davis ($1.4 million).

Byrne is a formidable player with a very professional campaign team and he's enjoying the support of many of Alabama's political players.  At the other end of the spectrum, James is well-liked by the Tea Party crowd (McCain first met James when they both spoke at an April 15th Tea Party in Birmingham).  Even if I wasn't involved in the race, watching this match up in Gallup's most conservative state in the nation would prove interesting.

Both candidates are hitting hard on themes recommended by multiple writers on this site: jobs and the economy.  Byrne seems to be going after big business support while James concentrates on the small businesses which employ three-quarters of the state's workers. Byrne hit the airwaves with the first TV ads. James has more money in the bank, though. Byrne received a significant amount of PAC donations while James is partially self-funding his campaign.

McCain writes that "James is clearly the slingshot-wielding shepherd boy in this David-and-Goliath story." I'll argue that the James war chest is filled with more than just slingshots.  He also writes that "it's a good time to be a [political] outsider."

The jury is still out on this one, but they'll be convening on June 1, when Alabama holds its GOP primary election.

UPDATE: It now appears that Quin Hillyer plans to duke it out with McCain over at the Spectator regarding this race.