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Study The Past So I Don’t Have to Repeat It

I have heard Democrats and Republicans referring to the 2007 Mayoral race in Indianapolis as a reason not to trust polls because of Greg Ballard’s come from behind victory over Bart Peterson.

Might I suggest looking at the actual results.

In the May 2007 primary, there were 17,150 Republican votes for Mayor cast and 21,435 on the Democratic side.  That means 38,535 voters cast a vote for Mayor.  Since everyone knew who Peterson was and only a handful of people knew who Ballard was, we need to focus only on the Peterson votes.

Peterson received 18,794 votes, or 46% of the total votes for Mayor.  So in a primary, a two-term incumbent Mayor got less than 50% of the vote.  In the general election, Peterson only got 47% of the total votes. 52.7% of the voters chose Ballard or Fred Peterson.  Like I said, anyone who paid attention at the time saw this coming.  Now a lot of other things fell into place (the tax increase, Council antics, etc.) but the primary was the first real indicator that Peterson was in trouble and the GOP had a shot at winning.

So if you’re running behind and want to draw a Ballard-Peterson analogy, feel free but you might be looking at the wrong candidate.

Posted: 11|3|08 at 5:38 pm by Abdul Hakim-Shabazz
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  • Pine Rider
    Hindsight is 20/20, Abdul.
  • Shorebreak
    Robert, I wouldn't say nothing. He's done an excellent job maintaining the integrity and smooth operation of illegal gambling and the associated money laundering, RICO activity, police corruption, and genreal neighborhood blight that goes along with it.
    .
    You obviously don't recognize talent when you see it. It's not every day that you find someone with the pedigree required to run a major city, yet the character to partner with the DoJ in protecting a racketeering system and criminal enterprise that's used to generate illicit funds for who-knows-what.
  • Robert
    Yes, Ballard won the Mayor's Election.......and then what? .........A Big....NOTHING!
  • Taxpayer 834512
    Unless there's a hot contest, aren't primaries traditionally less participative than the general election? Or, there's enough prior statistical history to tell us Concerned Clergy/tax increase/Monroe Gray was a bad moon on the rise?
  • It's really tough reading a lot into primaries. Republicans are typically much better at voting in primaries than Democrats. Plus, a lot of African Americans will not vote in the Democrat primary but vote Democrat in the general election.

    In 2000, I faced the State Treasurer Joyce Brinkman's son in a primary contest in a house district on the northwest side. I won that contest. If you look at our Repubican primary votes compared to the Democrats (Jeb Bardon was running for re-election.), we had something like a 1.5 to 1 lead. It could have been as high as 2-1. On election day, the district got swamped with people coming out to vote for against George Bush.

    I think there were signs on the wall that Peterson might be in trouble long before Election night. I'm not sure they date back to the primary though. Certainly Ballard was within the margin of error in the last poll before the election. His election was not that much of a surprise. In fact on a Saturday morning radio show before the election, I predicted a Ballard win along with Republicans taking control of the council.
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