After picking up five state legislative seats last weekâthree state senate seats and two state house seatsâthe Democrats now control 11 of the 12 seats that make up Seattle's suburbs. This big victory, however, calls attention to a clumsy lost opportunity for the Democratsâand perhaps, the secret to bigger victories in 2008.
If you count the district just east of the Eastside, the 5th legislative district, there were two more seats to be had. And the Democrats didn't run any candidates there. If they had, they could have picked up more seats at the state levelâand better, they could have helped failed U.S. House candidate Darcy Burner win at the federal level.
There's an old adage in political organizing: Don't try to change the minds of people who don't agree with you. Instead, find the people who do and turn them out to vote. While the Democrats knew the demographics on the Eastside were trending their way (the gas-tax repeal lost on the Eastside by 66 percent last year), they initially failed to go out and find those new people.
One of the Democratic winners on the Eastside, Eric Oemigâwho displaced a GOP house member in the fight to be the new state senator from the 45th (Woodinville, Duvall, Kirkland, Redmond, Carnation)âhas a telling anecdote from the campaign trail. He says that when he first started doorbelling, his campaign manager had divvied up households into "Democrats," "Probably Democrats," "Independents," and "Unknown." The campaign manager focused on doorbelling the "Democrats." However, after Oemig had done about 1,500 doors, he noticed that most of the "Unknowns" were Republicans who were fed up with their party. Oemig told his campaign manager to shift strategy and start focusing on the "Unknowns." Oemig beat former GOP state house representative Toby Nixon last week, 53 to 46 percent.
Oemig believes that merely by venturing into unfamiliar territory, the pack of three Democratic candidates who doorbelled in the 45thâOemig, Roger Goodman (who snapped up a formerly GOP state house seat), and Democratic incumbent Larry Springerâsmoked out supporters they never knew were there.
Herein is the lesson for Burner and the Democrats: flood the zone. It's not so much that Burner didn't hit traditionally conservative turf (she did), but the party didn't have any state house candidates running in the 5thâthe eastern fringe of the Eastsideâwhich falls in the federal district, Dave Reichert's, that the Democrats wanted so badly. When I asked Oemig why he thought Burner didn't win in the 8th, while so many Democrats at the state level did, he said Burner was alone in the 5thâno one else was doorbelling with her. "In the 45th, you had me and Roger and Larry doorbelling all the time. People heard our message. Repeatedly."
So, the secret to winning Reichert's federal seat may actually be to amp up Democratic efforts for the state seats in that district. All the state seats in that district. Even in the 5th, where Democrats, evidently, currently don't think they have support. 
