You heard it here first; John Robitaille Governor

You heard it here first; John Robitaille Governor

I’ve been waiting to drop this bomb on you folks for a few weeks now. John Robitaille is going to be the next Governor of the State of Rhode Island. You heard it here first. While most news organizations and blogs are focused on Chafee v. Caprio they continue to forget about one John Robitaille who is now officially the Republican candidate for Governor.

I know what you’re thinking…Come on, Don, you’re just feeding us the GOP kool-aid. Robitaille doesn’t have a shot to win this thing. Well, I think you’re wrong and here’s why. Back in 2002 when Don Carcieri won the Governor’s race we all know he ran against Myrth York. What many forget was how large an underdog he was in that election. Coming out of the primaries, one poll had him behind by a 49 to 35 margin! He was unknown, unproven, but ultimately defeated York handily (55/45). In a recent Rasmussen poll, Robitaille trailed Chafee, who was leading, by only 10 points with 9 percent still undecided.

You see folks, the only people who want you to believe this is a two horse race are the people supporting the two horses. But Robitaille has a great opportunity – like Don Carcieri – to get his messaging out over the next 30+ days and win the election. I’ve always been fascinated by the fact that Rhode Island is one of the most Democratic leaning states in the union but for the past sixteen years has had a Republican running the state. That leads me to believe that above everything else, Rhode Islanders are independent and have a unique understanding that if you give power exclusively to one party it usually signals bad things for everybody in the state. Why? There aren’t any checks and balances.

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Yes, I know Lincoln Chafee is running as an independent and used to be a “Republican” (and yes the quotes are on purpose). So the dynamic in 2010 is very different from 2002. But I think that favors Robitaille who may not have the same war chest Carcieri did in 2002 and also doesn’t have to make up as much ground. Further, I’m not sure if Robitaille could defeat either Chafee or Caprio heads up this year, honestly. Both have far too much brand equity above and beyond what Myrth York brought to the table in 2002 and would have been difficult to beat individually.

In a three-way race however, very few standard Robitaille supporters are leaving for Caprio or Chafee but Robitaille can go into the base of either Chafee or Caprio and pick economic conservatives backing Caprio and/or the Republican moderates supporting Chafee. I’m not sure if either Caprio or Chafee can do the same thing within Robitaille’s base. In fact if you take Rassmusen’s polling numbers of the past several months Robitaille has stayed relatively consistent with 19-25 percent of the vote whereas Chafee and Caprio have had significant swings in popularity. That suggests to me that voters really aren’t 100% sold on any candidate giving Robitaille a serious chance to pick up those voters and win in November in a more shocking upset than Carcieri in 2002.

Again, I know what you’re thinking…Robitaille only appeals to 19-25 percent of the Rhode Island electorate, Don. Thank you Captain Obvious, but over the next few weeks if polling starts to move the way I think it will, I believe you will see Robitaille begin to poll better and better each time out as, in my opinion, his messaging has appeal to many different types of voters in this political climate of anti-incumbency. Now that we’ve finalized who will be in this race it’s all about which candidate can get their message out and appeal to the most voters. I think that person will be Robitaille.

And when he does win, remember you heard it here first. See you on Election Day!