Dawidziak: Tea party picked the wrong fight with Saladino

You've got to pick your battles. This is as true in politics as it is in war or, for that matter, life. The local tea party's failure to oust Assemb. Joseph Saladino (R-Massapequa) in last week's primary proves the wisdom of this maxim.

Maybe it seemed like a good idea at the time. Reapportionment this year shifted Saladino's southeastern Nassau County Assembly district further east into Suffolk and partially away from Saladino's Nassau base. Incumbents are often at their most vulnerable in redistricting years, when they have to compete for the votes of citizens who've never before cast a ballot for them.

But if this was the tea party's logic, it certainly didn't pan out. Saladino crushed his opponent, retired New York City Police Sgt. Richard Young of West Islip. Unofficial primary night results show Saladino getting over 81 percent of the vote even though Young was backed by the Conservative Society for Action (CSA), which claims to be the largest tea party group on Long Island.

One reason it's crucial to pick your battles carefully is perception. It's everything in politics. Political parties and organizations, from Tammany Hall to today, want to be respected or even feared. The perception must be that your influence can make a real difference. You damage that image terribly when you fight and lose in a lopsided fashion.

What factors made this the wrong battle? First, the tea party underestimated the strength of the Nassau Republican Party. Party committees aren't as powerful as they used to be, but the Nassau GOP is still one of the strongest organizations in the country. As soon as the challenger's petitions were filed, political insiders were saying that chairman Joe Mondello was not going to let his party be embarrassed. The results bear out the prophetic punditry. While only 43.8 percent of the district's registered voters are in Nassau, it provided 58.1 percent of the turnout.

Second, while the CSA might be the largest of the tea party groups, it didn't make sure it had unanimity before going ahead. In fact, the Massapequa tea party backed Saladino. This kind of division is a common tea party problem because there is no national, state or local structure. Who speaks authoritatively for the tea party is often an open question.

Third, and maybe most important, they just plain picked the wrong guy to target for extinction. Besides being personally popular with the voters and respected by his Assembly colleagues, Saladino is known to political insiders for his work ethic. In low turnout elections, the effort put in by candidates often makes the difference. Every door knocked upon is another vote in the bank.

Last, the tea party made a mistake in this case by straying too far from its core values. Sometimes you decide to fight a battle you know you're going to lose because it's a matter of principle, but it's hard to see that here. The tea party tried to target Saladino as "not conservative enough." As proof, members cited his F rating in 2010 by the National Rifle Association, a bill he sponsored that would require parents to drug-test their high school kids, and his acceptance of labor union contributions. But the tea party message is mainly lower taxes and smaller government. On these issues, Saladino's opponents failed to make their case.

Low-turnout primaries are fertile ground for political groups to make their influence felt. Nationally, the tea party attacked strategically, by helping defeat Sen. Richard Lugar (R-Indiana) and forcing a primary challenge to Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah). Hatch won, but was a reasonable target and was pushed even further right.

You can't win all the battles. So you certainly don't want to fight the wrong ones.

Michael Dawidziak is a political consultant and pollster.