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Consider the needs of our region when you vote in this presidential election

THE NOVEMBER 2008 presidential election will be historic in one way or another. We’ll have the first African-American commander-in-chief, or the first female holding office one heartbeat from the hot seat.

The Democratic ticket of Barack Obama and Joe Biden offers a fresh-faced idealist and a foreign relations specialist. The Republican candidates, John McCain and Sarah Palin, are respectively a maverick war hero and a maverick hockey mom/governor. As espoused during the national conventions, each duo represents the change this country needs.

Fine and dandy. But I’m reminded of an ancient Saturday Night Live catchphrase popularized by comedian Al Franken (before he became an actual partisan pol). On Weekend Update, he’d announce some topic du jour. Then he’d ask: “But I’m sure you’re wondering — how will this affect me, Al Franken?”

Flash forward to the Me Generation, San Diego chapter. I want to know this about the presidential election: What’s in it for we, San Diego? The federal government is decidedly and naturally working on a national level of constituency concerns, things like foreign policy and security. That affects us, of course. But while we don’t expect the president and the veep to help us keep the Chargers in town, we do have city-specific concerns, like clean beaches and proximity to illegal immigration, that are touched by federal policy.

I decided to seek out the San Diego chairs of the Dem and GOP parties, to do extreme localization of the presidential election. It’s much easier to talk about what a president can do for a country than for a city/county. But I want the latter.

The chairman of the San Diego County Democratic Party is Jess Durfee. He’s a retired schoolteacher and was elected this year to a spot on the Democratic National Committee. That makes him the first superdelegate from San Diego in the last 24 years.

Durfee notes that California has voted for the Democratic presidential candidate every cycle since 1988. However, San Diego has traditionally been a state Republican stronghold.

“But that’s changing,” says Durfee. “In the last cycle, 46 percent of San Diego voters were registered Democratic. That’s the highest ever, and I expect it to become the majority this time.”

Why the demographic shift? “Urban settings traditionally go more Democratic,” says Durfee. “Plus, you could say there’s been a backlash to the Bush presidency. But San Diego has become a more significant force in the state party — the fact we now have a superdelegate shows that. After Los Angeles, San Diego has the second-largest number of Democratic voters in the state.”

The chairman of the Republican Party of San Diego County is Tony Krvaric. Inspired to move to America by the words of Ronald Reagan, he arrived from Sweden in 2002.

“This is a Republican county,” says Krvaric. “Yes, the margin has shifted. It was undoubtedly negative for the Republicans in 2006 — we took a drubbing in that election. And that was rightly so, because Republicans came in to reform the system, and did well for a while but lost their way. But we are looking at resurgence now, and getting back to our roots.

“San Diego will go for McCain-Palin — you can take that to the bank. Our challenge in San Diego is to do particularly well to make up for other parts of the state.”

Krvaric notes most of the San Diego GOP delegation at the St. Paul national convention thought former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney was going to get the vice presidential nod. Since Romney now has a house in La Jolla, that could have been a double dose of home cooking for San Diego; the McCains are already longstanding homeowners here (in the interest of neutrality, I ask you to supply your own “Count the McCain homes” quip).

But bypassing neophyte San Diegan Romney wasn’t a San Diego shun, notes Krvaric. “It just shows how much of a maverick John McCain is,” he says.

DURFEE SAYS the Obama-Biden ticket will address social issues neglected over the past eight years — namely, healthcare. “There are 500,000 San Diegans without healthcare, including 100,000 children,” he says. “Obama has a plan for providing access for all Americans. McCain is not offering that.”

San Diego won’t get specific assistance on crawling out of its city pension debt, says Durfee. But the economy in general would get help.

“We hear nothing from McCain on the economy,” he says. “Obama supports assisting people facing foreclosures. Obama offers a return to the vibrant economy of the Clinton years that has seen such a downturn during the Bush years.”

Durfee also criticizes the McCain-Palin ticket on pushing for new sources of domestic oil. “If McCain allows drilling off the shores of San Diego, how would you like seeing derricks off our coast? McCain has said he will create federal legislation for more drilling off the coast of California.”

I ask if there is any evidence of oil off the coast of San Diego. “I don’t know,” says Durfee. “But even if they put up derricks off Orange County, that’s close enough where if there was a spill, it would affect San Diego beaches.

“And regarding clean beaches, there’s no comparison on environmental issues. The Republicans put very little interest in clean air and reducing pollution.”

Rather than the specter of drilling that McCain-Palin represents, says Durfee, an Obama-Biden administration would enhance the hopes for alternative energy sources in San Diego County.

“The high-tech community here is vibrant,” he says. “More alternative energy sources would mean jobs in this sector, not to mention the possibilities for long-term sustainable energy.”

KRVARIC AND I START our conversation talking about immigration. “McCain has heard the people of America, and he has taken an enforcement-first approach,” he says. “Americans and San Diegans want us to secure our borders.” Immigration is a powerful topic for this Swedish native son. He says he spent 11 frustrating years working to become a legal American citizen. “I can’t imagine coming here illegally. But whether it’s more fences or more border guards, we’ll see Senator McCain work for national security.”

On the topic of environmental care, Krvaric says everyone — not just Democrats — wants clean beaches. “I don’t know anybody who’s not for that,” he says. “I don’t have specifics. But if there is something that can be done, it will be a part of the plan.”

In discussing gas prices, Krvaric says the McCain plan will focus on “an all-of-the-above approach. That includes drilling. We can drill very safely. We are handing over billions of dollars every month to foreign powers that aren’t even friendly with us. Governor Palin offers great perspective on this, since she’s from Alaska, where the topic is so important.

“But it will be all of the above — solar, natural gas, drilling ... and nuclear, which is some of the cleanest energy we can harvest. We haven’t seen anything from the Democrats on nuclear.”

One thing Palin mentioned in her St. Paul acceptance speech was deference to special-needs children. Her newborn son was born with Down’s syndrome. “We ask at our county meetings if anyone in the audience is affected by a special-needs child or knows one,” says Krvaric. “Most of the time, half the hands go up. She said she will be an advocate in the White House. That cuts to the hearts of people who face that.”

I WON’T PRETEND TO BELIEVE huge blocs of locals will vote solely along pro–San Diego lines. You’re more moved by concerns about abortion, war and defense, taxes, constitutional issues or the propriety of gay marriage — you know, those peripheral issues.

But keep this in mind: We watched financial giant Bear Stearns get bailed out. We saw lenders Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac taken over. And we observed Wall Street-ers Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers nosedive, followed by insurance giant American International Group. (Recall that San Diego was ahead of the fiscal roll-the-dice curve, with our city pension deficit.)

So it remains that the most important factor facing San Diego is ... our economy. Vote if you can with the interests of our local economy in mind.

Our next president needs to lead the charge for reform. For oversight of big business. For clarity and common sense. Krvaric says you can “take it to the bank” that McCain-Palin will win the day in San Diego. Well, there was a day when taking it to the bank, even recently sold Washington Mutual, engendered unwavering faith. We’re no longer living in that time. Prediction: The fulcrum will tip, and San Diego’s Democratic revolution will be a reality. This once-conservative stronghold will no longer be affixed with the label of “Nixon’s lucky town.”

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