The Schatz campaign prepared a strategy memo detailing why they predict he'll win his Hawai'i Senate seat in the face of Colleen Hanabusa's challenge.

Holy Moly - Hanabusa and her new campaign manager, Peter Boylan, went ballistic!

Veteran Hawai'i political observer Bart Dame (who was a neutral observer) wrote an insightful commentary on this which he has given us permission to reprint:



"When I got this email from the Hanabusa campaign, I was alarmed to see how much they are trying to milk this leaked memo and try to turn it into a "scandal." So wherethe "scandal"?

I see now they are trying to say Schatz only cares about the haole votes. Here is the text meant to convey that message without making it explicit:

[The Schatz campaign is ]"...arguing that the ideology of a single group of voters will trump the broad coalition of interests that has made Hawaii the warm, inclusive place we all love."

The "ideology" alluded to here is "progressive" ideology. It might be helpful if Hanabusa would say she has given up on progressive voters.

I HAD been arguing both candidates have arguments they can make to win progressive voters and neither yet has a lock on this group.

But if Peter Boylan wants to fan hostility towards progressives as people outside of the "coalition of interests" which are part of the Hawaii we love, he can say so directly. It would make the election easier for a lot of us.

But the Hanabusa campaign is deliberately misreading the original Schatz campaign memo. The reference to progressives in the memo was in the context of a demographic analysis of who votes in the Democratic primary. Everyone knows Hawaii's voters are overwhelmingly Democratic in outlook. Almost everyone also knows the "Democratic Revolution" of 1954 was animated by a very PROGRESSIVE social vision and agenda.

But, as the Democrats became the Party of Governance, a kind of corruption and bureaucratization of that social vision occurred. We can read about some of the processes responsible in the well-known book, "Land and Power.."

Prominent Democrats, their family members and cronies began to take advantage of their insider connections to enrich themselves and their allies. In part, this explains the rift between the Burns and Gill factions which expressed themselves in the 1960s and early 70s.

The rise of the environmental, sovereignty and community anti-eviction struggles in the 1970s, the Protect Kaho'olawe movement, were a struggle AGAINST the crony, establishment wing of the Democratic "Machine." Bishop Estate trustees, appointed because of their political connections, were given a license to enrich themselves with over-the-top lucrative salaries and TOO MANY Democrats were fine with that.

Senator Inouye tried to keep the peace between these factions. Some might say he tried to co-opt community rebels. Others, would say he was seeking compromise, through concessions. But he was unashamed about his role in bringing pork to Hawaii, much of which went to well-connected contractors. And those who benefited became his supporters.

With the death of Inouye, a group of people who gained power as part of his inner circle faced a serious loss of power. They had backed Mufi Hanneman, first for Mayor and then for Governor, but his defeat and political ruination weakened their prospects.

They glommed on to Colleen Hanabusa and ran her for Congress. And successfully transitioned from Hanneman to Caldwell, who they supported for Mayor as his replacement, against Ben Cayetano. Neil Abercrombie, for all his faults--and we can make a list--is not controlled by the dark side remnants of Team Inouye.

Let me make clear, I think Inouye himself was a balancing act between a liberal social vision and a kind of "realpolitic" which engaged in special interest politics.

With the passing of Inouye, the remaining network is mostly an expression of cronyism and special interest politics, stripped of Inouye's social vision.

It was leading members of this group, Walter Dods and Jeff Watanabe, who hand-carried and apparently leaked Inouye's PRIVATE letter to Governor Abercrombie in an effort by them to embarrass Abercrombie if he failed to "honor" the Senator's dying wish.

I think the Senator had every right to make his preferences known about his possible replacement. I also think the Governor, having listened to the Senator's views, had every right to apply his own judgment in making the decision.

The only ones who acted offensively, in my view, were those who leaked the private letter and those who have overplayed its significance to create the impression we should all vote for Hanabusa, not based upon our assessment of her, but based upon a "respect" for the Senator's dying wishes. To me, that is a crude and insulting appeal, unworthy of those presuming to represent the Senator's best interests. I have never considered him to be "an Emperor" nor a "political boss," which is how Dods and Watanabe would have us treat him.

The Schatz memo is based upon an analysis which recognizes the dual nature of the Inouye legacy and the replacement of idealism by cronyism and special interest realpolitic in Democratic circles. It recognizes the Democratic base is pulled in different directions and that the tensions between these poles are often expressed within the Democratic primary.

The political effect of an increased number of mainlanders settling in Hawaii has been a puzzle confronting political analysts for a long time. In the 1990s, for a period, it was assumed by most observers, as well as strategists for both parties, that most of these newcomers would tend to vote Republican. And, as if to show proof of this, for a brief period, the mayors of Hawaii County, Maui, Honolulu and Kauai were ALL Republicans.

Meanwhile, the traditional base of the Democratic Party, those with ties to the plantation economy and the struggle against the Big Five oligarchy, were getting older and dying off. Particularly the solidly Democratic older AJA [Americans of Japanese Ancestry] voters. The GOP was seen as the beneficiary of a shifting demographic tide. Lingle was elected Governor. What could go wrong?

A close observation of actual voting patterns revealed some interesting things. The areas settled by these newcomers tended to vote Democratic in national elections. While many of them were able to move to Hawaii because they were more affluent, many of hem had fairly liberal views, especially on social issues and matters of foreign policy. They were NOT voting Republican as the conventional "wisdom" had predicted. And if they were tending Democratic on national issues, perhaps they could also be won over to Democrats on local issues, on the basis of the right issues.

These are the people referred to in the Schatz campaign memo as the ""influx of progressive leaning voters who migrated to Hawaii in the 1990s." Nowhere in the memo does the Schatz campaign declare ONLY these newcomers are progressive. The argument is that these newcomers are helping tip the scale in Democratic primaries by adding even more progressive votes to those which existed here before their arrival.

To its credit, the memo says the "ideological" dimension appears to carry more weight that the sort of ethnic voting bloc analysis favored by some "political analysts" in predicting elections.

The Hanabusa campaign is stuck in a bind, as they WANT ethnic considerations to be strong within the AJA community, so she can hold onto that bloc of voters who had come through for Senator Inouye.

But she does not want to send too crude a message, as that would be counter-productive. Hence the message that Schatz only cares about the votes of newcomer haole progressives and not about our multi-ethnic "coalition of interests" which defines us as local people. Not as crude as Mufi's "I look like you" remarks.

Contrary to the Hanabusa campaign's caricature of the memo, it does NOT suggest a strategy which is only concerned about "progressive newcomers."

The memo also points out the overwhelming support by organized labor for the Schatz campaign. This is a sore point for the Team Hanabusa. She had counted on the support of many of these unions. Just as she feels entitled to being Inouye's replacement, so too does she feel entitled to the support of unions, many of whom HAD supported her in the past, but now prefer Schatz for the Senate race. (Some of these unions had apparently explicitly told Hanabusa they would have supported her for re-election to the House, but not for the Senate).

Ironically, this effort by Peter Boylan and the Hanabusa campaign to turn the leaked Schatz campaign memo into a mini-scandal, reinforces a key point of the memo: the Hanabusa campaign has had difficulty articulating a positive message explaining why people should vote for her for the Senate seat rather than re-elect her to Congress.

As a result, they have overplayed the "Inouye wanted me" card by leaking the Senator's private letter and using his widow as a surrogate, and are now trying to use this inartfully drafted internal memo, again LEAKED, to try to misrepresent the views of the Schatz campaign.

If this is the example of Hanabusa's vaunted "leadership skills," I suggest most Hawaii voters are looking for a move away from negative, resentment and innuendo-based politics and will see the reform, "progressive" views and style of Brian Schatz as a refreshing change from the Old Boy cronyism at the heart of the Hanabusa campaign."

