Election 2004

George R. Ariyoshi

I wished her well. The governor of Hawaii has such extensive powers that our island society needs him or her to do a good job. Lingle presents herself well. I give her credit for stirring up the issue of education and waking up some of my fellow Democrats.

However, from the beginning, she undertook apartisan approach based on a high-risk tactic of transforming Hawaii into a conservative-leaning, Republican state. At the core of her stated agenda, she declared that the public education system was "broken." What it needed foremost, in her view, was reorganization into elected, district-level school boards, which she couched in terms of decentralization. She raised the stakes hugely by making this a for-her or against-her issue. Implicitly, if you were a legislator or school board member who did not agree with her, you likely would be opposed in the election.

Previously, as Republican Party chairperson, she had made some headway in reviving the Republican Party at its base, at the state House level. The 18 Republicans elected in 1998 (18 of 51) comprised the highest number in many years. The public may not have noticed that the number slipped back to 15 when she became governor, but she and the Legislature both did. It meant she had less than the one third of the House required to sustain her veto, giving Democratic legislators the space they needed to put together their own education program last year (briefly, a program focused on the individual school while retaining the oversight features of a state school board).

The governor's response was narrowly political. She transformed her school reform group (CARE) into a lobbying group. Through CARE she ran a school board slate. She developed an impressive slate of state House candidates. Along the way, she became visibly enmeshed in the presidential campaign, speaking for the president, flying around the country with him and, in the closing days, promoting the idea that he might carry Hawaii.

All came to naught - in the school board, the state house (now with only 10 Republicans) and Hawaii's votes for the presidency.

As a former governor, I can say that the idea of determining the outcome of other people's elections is largely myth. Influence with voters must be used with great discretion. As she presumably has learned, you may have good approval ratings but no political coattails.

Much more important is the effect of all of this on Hawaii. Who are we, and what do we stand for? We have great respect for diversity. At a moment when the Republican Party might have made significant gains, a majority of Hawaii's voters again shied away from the social conservatism that is deeply embedded in the Republican Party. People shied away from a narrowness of vision, an assumed moral superiority and an implied intolerance of differences.

While campaigning is politics in the narrow sense, leading a government is politics in the broad sense. The opportunity that still lies before the governor - and with her the Legislature - is to engage in a genuine dialogue that is both two-way and widely inclusive. I believe we are socially progressive and fiscally conservative, and the party that projects that understanding will do the best in the long run. To develop policies based on those foundations, the governor must engage in politics in the broad sense, and the Legislature must respond in kind. This could happen. If it does, we will all benefit.