first, a disclaimer: i am an abercrombie appointee. i want to be up front about this, if only so i can’t be tagged with hiding it later.

in the past, a post of this nature would be written on my other “political” blog, but since it is sorely in need of an update, i’ve opted to post here until i get around to doing it….

i understand politics… well, mostly. i understand that to win, often a candidate has to appeal broadly to as many voters as possible. this means a campaign is built on easy to understand and readily digestible sound bites; talking points. it is, frankly, one of the things i dislike most about our electoral process. that’s for another time, but i bring it up here to try and frame how i (and many others) perceive david ige, the other major candidate in the democratic primary race for governor.

as i understand it, ige threw his hat into the gubernatorial race not as a result of his own desire to serve in that office, but because a handful of very powerful democrats, angry with abercrombie for one reason or another, asked him to run, promising all the support they could offer. their primary selling point? david ige is not neil abercrombie.

look, i get that abercrombie has angered a lot of people over the last four years. there have been gaffes and policy choices the governor has made that turned people away, or out-right pissed them off, but is this enough of a reason to vote for a guy who, it seems to me, doesn’t have any real passion to move up to the fifth floor? i don’t think so, but let me try and make my case….

i do work for the governor, but as a progressive democrat, i haven’t agreed with everything he’s said or done. i was disappointed when he went to “the last, best, and final offer” with the teachers union. i supported an increase in the general excise tax (with offsets) to address the budget crunch, rather than doing so with the 5% salary cuts for public workers. and i support him on other things. early education is a much needed policy in hawaii that will benefit the whole state. he forced a special session that finally gave us marriage equality and his effort to build up the urban core (i.e. developing kakaako) is a must.

abercrombie came into office with a massive budget shortfall hanging around his administration’s neck, larger than anyone really knew. his campaign four years ago had a plan, the new day plan. it was ambitious and broad and he’s been implementing it. now, four years later, the 5% pay cuts have been restored, plus some. test scores in schools are up and so is the economy. early education is moving forward, the minimum wage is slated to increase in less than six-months (arguably he can’t take credit for that, but he did support it), and a deal has been struck with Turtle Bay Resort to preserve land on the north shore.

you may not like how we got here, but it’s hard to deny the progress that’s been made. and i believe the governor, if reelected will continue to move us forward.

david ige, who i like personally and has been a good legislator, has no plan. his talking points, as far as i can tell, center around a simple and unmistakable point; he is not neil abercrombie. and his campaign hopes you won’t delve too much deeper, because there isn’t much else to find.

i was in the audience during their first debate, sponsored by the japanese chamber of commerce, watched a few minutes of the forum presented by bytemarks cafe (the governor wasn’t in attendance) on development of kakaako, and watched the island insights debate on pbs hawaii. as a person concerned primarily with policy, this is what i can deduce of david ige; he has no specific policy ideas, no plan, nothing to offer the state except one thing. he is not neil abercrombie.

ige is, i believe, simply pandering to those people who dislike the governor so much that they’ll vote for anyone else and he wants to be that anyone else. again, the primary goal of his campaign is to continually remind you about all the things you don’t like about abercrombie, while at the same time not offer a single alternative policy of his own.

ige doesn’t like the hawaii health connector (a product of the legislature). fine, what’s his alternative? give us specifics.

ige doesn’t support the way abercrombie is implementing early childhood education? fair enough, how would he do it differently?

ige believes the kakaako development should be done differently? he believes there aren’t enough schools and infrastructure to support the current plans? ok. what’s his plan to fix it?

it seems to me he hasn’t a single substantial answer for any of these questions, or countless others. there’s more.

in one of the two debates (i can’t recall which) both candidates were asked if they supported raising the general excise tax. Both unequivocally stated that they do not, but david, three or four years ago, supported such an increase. in fact, he supported it so much that he had a hearing on a proposal in his ways and means committee and despite his support for it, the majority of the committee members did not.

for my part, i supported the bill and was impressed that he called for the vote in his committee, knowing the likelihood of it’s failure. he’s clearly not proud of it, because he’s lied about it on at least one occasion.

finally, i have to comment on one of ige’s responses to a question about the “soda tax” during thursday night’s debate. now, in case you’re not aware of it, this was a proposal introduced by the abercrombie administration which would have levied a tax on sugary beverages, like soda, as a means to curb its consumption by people, particularly children, and to raise funds to develop and implement programs to help turn the tide on growing childhood obesity (and diabetes). this is an initiative i strongly support.

when asked about it, governor abercrombie stood by his support of the proposal. ige, on the other hand, said he believed there were other ways to deal with the issue of childhood obesity (though he didn’t give a single example) and claimed he didn’t think the state should tax people’s behavior. i believe this also to be a lie. why do i think so? because he supports other taxes with similar purposes: alcohol and tobacco. how many times has he approved increases on tobacco since he’s been in the legislature (or even since he’s been chair of ways and means)? more than once, i’d guess.

i like david ige. he’s a nice guy and for the most part a fair legislator. but do i think he’d make a good governor? no. he may say often over the next few weeks that he’s not a typical politician because he’s soft spoken and not a skilled debater or public speaker, but don’t be fooled. he’s just like almost every politician out there in one important respect; he’s going to tell you exactly what you want to hear.

love him or hate him, neil abercrombie, on the other hand, has passion, has a vision, and will do what he thinks is best for the people and the state of hawaii. you may not always agree with him, but at least he’s not pandering and i respect him for that. for all these reasons and more, he’s got my vote. i think if you take a closer look at david ige, you just might decide to as well.