Republicans come to their senses, bury Toby Doeden and his wild ideas

Toby Doeden’s absolutely awful showing, losing 71-to-29, in yesterday’s Republican runoff was a function of factuality overwhelming fantasy.  

Doeden’s relentless insistence that he could do away with property taxes in this state just didn’t pass the simplest of tests:  basic arithmetic. There’s no way that a spending scheme replacing the loss of property tax revenues could develop in this state.

Yes, toward the end of his campaign he tried to make people believe that he meant only homeowners would see their property taxes disappear, but that proved to be a dodge. Examination after examination of his earlier campaign statements made it plenty clear that he came on with a full frontal assault against all forms of property taxes. His last-minute hedge was weak and transparent. 

Beyond that, I think it dawned on a lot of people that replacing local taxation with some never-explained scheme to collect taxes on a statewide level would do the very thing Republicans abhor: Take spending decisions away from local officials and hand them over to the politicos whose perspectives are Pierre-based.  

The thought of that is repugnant to Republicans. The fact that Doeden never thought it through is an indication of the shallowness of his campaign.

There was also a strategically stupid political element to Doeden’s campaign. After he won the first primary, Doeden boasted that he ended Dusty Johnson’s political career, which just about guaranteed that he wouldn’t get much, if any, support from Johnson’s followers.

That kind of obnoxious crowing just plain turns people off.

Even the voters who know him best, his fellow Brown county Republicans, chose Rhoden over Doeden by a 68-to-32 margin.

Though I’ve never been much of a Rhoden fan – I thought he was weak and wimpy with his approach to the coming state budget – I can acknowledge that, compared to Doeden, he at least has a grip on reality, which is probably the consensus among most Republicans considering the size of the shellacking that Doeden just got.

John Tsitrian is a businessman and writer from the Black Hills. He was a weekly columnist for the Rapid City Journal for 20 years. His articles and commentary have also appeared in The Los Angeles Times, The Denver Post and The Omaha World-Herald. Tsitrian served in the Marines for three years (1966-69), including a 13-month tour of duty as a radioman in Vietnam. Republish with permission.