If Hawaii Democrats are already sweating this election year, they have good reason.

Democrats are going to chew through some of their best and brightest before the August primary is done.

The Democratic primary is supposed to find the best candidate to run in the general election against the Republican opponent.

In this year’s U.S. Senate race, it is not so much a search as a slaughter in the house.

U.S. Rep. Mazie Hirono against former U.S. Rep. Ed Case is a split between two wings of the party, but not a clash of liberals versus conservatives. This fight is Hirono with the traditional local political muscle of the state’s unions and senior U.S. Sen. Daniel K. Inouye’s clout defending their position against Case’s very definite challenge to the establishment.

Hirono had her own fling with bucking the seated powers when, as lieutenant governor, she broke ranks with Gov. Ben Cayetano and picketed in sympathy with striking public school teachers.

"Her walking the picket line was about as appropriate as a backup quarterback cheering for the opposing team," Cayetano said about Hirono in his autobiography.

"There are many defining moments in every politician’s career — her decision to walk the picket line was one of them," Cayetano said, adding that Hirono’s action affected his opinion on "whether she would be the Democrats’ best hope for governor in 2002."

With this year’s early Aug. 11 primary date, voters will pick either Hirono or Case to go up against former Gov. Linda Lingle in the November general election. Hirono is boasting of her own internal poll showing her decisively leading Case in a survey of Democratic voters. Case has offered up two flights of TV ads and another poll that shows him tied with Hirono; all indications are that he will be a strong contender.

Either way, Democrats will end the primary season divided between Case and Hirono factions. If Hirono wins, Democratic leaders worry that Case’s new-blood-in-the-party Democrats will sit on their hands in the general election, tacitly helping Lingle.

If Case wins, then the bigwigs like Inouye and the AFL-CIO will have to take a big gulp and pretend they really like the Case campaign.

Cayetano as a candidate has injected a new air of excitement into the race for Honolulu mayor. Although it is a nonpartisan contest, Cayetano will be facing the nominally nonpartisan current mayor, Peter Carlisle, and fellow Democrat Kirk Caldwell.

In the mayor’s race two years ago, Caldwell was a strong Democrat, with strong union backing. While unions have not picked candidates in this year’s election, the powerful Hawaii Government Employees Association is watching carefully and appears to be leaning toward Caldwell.

In a message to members last week, the HGEA noted that Carlisle "has been a tremendous disappointment.

"He has openly adopted a negative position against public employees, calling for pay cuts well in excess of the 5 percent agreed upon," the HGEA memo said.

As for Cayetano, the HGEA, which had supported the former governor, said he is "best remembered for his efforts to reduce employee rights civil service reform, as well as the prohibition of union-sponsored health plans and the creation of the EUTF (public worker medical coverage)."

As lieutenant governor for eight years, governor for another eight and time in both the state House and Senate before that, Cayetano brings to the race his own stable of Democratic workers.

The Caldwell-against-Cayetano campaign is expected to be one of the big flash points of the 2012 primary season.

In all, the Democratic primary season is likely to bring disorder and upheaval rather than consensus and political peace to Hawaii’s Democrats.

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Richard Borreca writes on politics on Sundays, Tuesdays and Fridays. Reach him at rborreca@staradvertiser.com.