| The Republicans put up Ellen Sauerbrey the last two elections...Not the best choice in the world. She narrowly lost to Glendenning in the 1994 Election but she decided to challenge the results because apparently the Democrats had some dead people that voted. Then it was discovered that they weren't dead and in fact some of those allegedly dead ones voted for her. She was far too conservative in all areas. She could not get anywhere near the amount of minority votes in Montgomery and PG counties in order to be respectable and the Republican bases in the other counties could not be energized. She came for a rematch in 1998 but lost by a larger margin and mostly due to her failed challenge and a pro-incumbent wave throughout America. That and while Glendenning was not the most popular governor, he was an incredibly shrewd politician.
The reason that so many Democrats won between the 1960s and the 1990s was that the state legislature was dominated by Democrats and so were local officies. This is due to the southern Democratic roots found in Southern Maryland and the Eastern Shore plus the urban base of minority Democrats. Republicans throughout much of the last century solely came from Western Maryland due to its mountain heritage. There just wasn't a significant base for Republicans to start from. For instance the last GOP governor, Spiro T. Agnew, was the county executive of Baltimore County, a major jurisdiction that could actually jumpstart a GOP candidacy. But after Agnew left the county executive position, it was captured by Democrats. The other two largest jurisdictions, Montgomery and PG counties were also dominated by Democrats. This thus created a lack of prominent GOP leaders besides the GOP congressmen. Thus when GOP congressman Bob Ehrlich decided to run, it energizing the Republicans here as well as conservative Democrats that were weary of voting for another liberal Democratic gubernatorial candidate. The terrible organization and message of the Townsend campaign also made Ehrlich's candidacy seem much more attractive. Thus with an unusually strong Republican and an unusually weak Democrat, the GOP can win here just as last election. |