444 thoughts on “Weekly Open Thread: What Races Are You Interested In?”

  4. I have this sinking feeling Tom Latham is going to be my representative for the next decade. Totally disagree with the spin that this IA-03 map is good for Leonard Boswell. You could hardly draw a worse district for Democrats that contains Polk County.

    I’ve been looking at lots of the state House and Senate district maps. I don’t see a huge advantage for either party. Some vulnerable incumbents are in worse districts, others are in slightly better districts. In some cases it’s hard for me to know whether an incumbent would be better off moving to a neighboring empty district or duking it out with another incumbent.

    I noticed that Iowa Senate Majority Leader Mike Gronstal’s Council Bluffs district is virtually unchanged.

  6. of the members of the Wisconsin 14, Julie Lassa, was Sean Duffy’s opponent in 2010. Maybe after everything that has happened she could have a rematch in 2012 and do a lot better.  

  7. On the face of the earth! This just fuels the stereotype that Las Vegas really is the stupidest city in America.

    Several of the leading candidates for Las Vegas mayor have come under fire this week for their surprising lack of knowledge about basic current events.

    First, at a debate Wednesday night hosted by Si Se Puede, a Democratic Hispanic group, City Councilman Steve Ross was left speechless by a question asking whether he supports the DREAM Act, which would create a path to citizenship for qualifying undocumented young people who were brought to this country as children.

    “I don’t know enough about that to answer one way or the other,” Ross said.

    The DREAM Act has dominated headlines for years and is of particular interest in Nevada because of its support and advocacy by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Las Vegas students have protested to advance the measure, and supporters and opponents have written dozens of editorials on the topic.

    But wait, there’s more! Carolyn Goodman has no clue what domestic partnership is, and she can’t yet “form an opinion” on marriage equality.

    Friess: The other question asked of all the candidates [at the mayoral panel] was whether they would support repealing the state’s domestic partner law. And of the people on the panel, Commissioner Brown and Councilman Ross said yes, they would like to stop the state from recognizing domestic partners.

    Goodman: A crystallized commentary on that for me is difficult because you know I am about the rights of the human being but I’m also about legal rights. I’m certainly accepting of anybody and anybody’s rights to determine for themselves their own lifestyle as long as it’s not causing problems for anybody else and it’s legal. One of the things I remember asking years ago of my uncle who is a very astute lawyer because I didn’t understand, I had many friends and I’ve had friends all my life who are gay. I said I don’t understand why a legal contract wuldn’t suffice to bind two people together. You and I would have a legal contract, same sex let’s say, and I would agree that everything that’s mine it’s 50-50. If I die you would get everything, split down the middle. All I would say is why a legal binding contract wouldn’t work for a couple.

    I wish this was just an April Fool’s joke.

  10. Anybody see the National Journal’s series on the white vote and Obama’s reelection? Ron Brownstein did a write-up and there are some nifty charts and graphs here showing what percentage of the (non-Hispanic) white vote Obama would need to win in each state to carry it under two scenarios: (a) minority support constant from 2008 (“baseline”) or (b) minority support reduced by 10%.

    It makes for an interesting look. Brownstein looks at Georgia, in particular, where Obama would only need to carry 25% of the white vote if he can keep the minority vote at the same level as 2008.

    Link: http://www.nationaljournal.com…

    Writeup: http://www.nationaljournal.com…

  12. http://www.newstimes.com/news/…

    Two state Democrats, who spoke on condition of anonymity to avoid upstaging Heinrich’s formal announcement, told The Associated Press that Heinrich will announce his candidacy for U.S. Senate on Saturday. Heinrich, 39, is the first prominent Democrat to jump into the race as his party seeks to hold onto the seat that has been held by Bingaman since 1982.

  14. I just realized there are quite a few elections on Tuesday.  There’s the Wisconsin ones, Nevada mayor races, Chicago City Council-runoffs, and Wichita.  Are there any other races on Tuesday that SSPers may find interesting?  

  15. About the WA gov race. I believe the gov is term limited, so who is lining up to run on both sides? Rossi doesn’t have a chance in heck, and I cant think of another prominent republican who would try, and then, I’d say the den side is wide open. Hopefully polling will start coming soon.  

  16. According to Politico

    http://www.politico.com/news/s…

    Former West Wing staffer Jim Messina, Obama’s likely campaign manager, has been holding donor meetings around the country, and the president is scheduled to hold a series of fundraisers in New York and California over the next few weeks. The campaign expected to raise $750 million to $1 billion.

    Holy god. I had a feeling that’s around what the number would be, but it’s still ridiculous to actually see that show up on paper.

    1. The GOP tea party types love giving us freebies!  Would Vilsack ever run for the new IA-4?  It’s the most Republican seat but if she runs against King, I’d like that clash of the titans.  (No point in her doing so, but just curious.)

  18. here’s an article on redistricting

    http://www.marshallnews.com/st…

    you can click on the GOP & Democrat submitted house maps for congressional seats.  In Iowa I looked at the western border and if it was split that would be good for the GOP. In MO there are two things to look at.  

    1. If you pile every democrat you can into CD5 that pleases Cleaver.  In each map Cleaver gets all of the best D areas in Jackson county, the most D part of Clay county plus three D leaning rural/suburban counties.  % wise this is a great democrat district.

    2. MO1 has to take in all of St Louis city.  If Clay gets all of st louis city Carnahan is toast.  Under both maps Clay gets all of st louis city plus the U city/Richmond heights/clayton area now held by Carnahan.  That’s a killer outcome for Carnahan.

    The GOP and democrats can argue about a third st louis area seat (open). That seat would be heavily R and its likely Lutemeyer would move to it.

    The key for MO for either party is st louis city.  If Clay gets it, IMO, Carnahan is a very hard spot.

    1. But I’d actually prefer Baldwin over Kind in a bad year. Kind is your standard solid candidate with enough appeal to moderates and Independents and in a good year when those people are already predisposed to prefer the Dem he should win handily. Having said that, he’s pretty milquetoast and he’s not going to excite a lot of people and in a bad year as a non-incumbent he’d probably lose statewide to a decent candidate. In a neutral year it would depend on the opposing candidate and a host of toher factors.

      On the other hand, in a good year Baldwin could make the race a lot closer than it should be. Her strength as a statewide candidate would be the historic nature of her candidacy. And in a abd year the fact that she could outspend her opponent 2-3:1 could be enough to overcome her weaknesses and the environment. At elast I think her chances of doing so would be better than a rathr boring mdoerate like Kind.

  23. http://blogs.wpri.com/2011/03/…

    # Barack Obama: 44% approve / 56% disapprove / 1% DK

    # Lincoln Chafee: 32% approve / 56% disapprove / 12% DK

    # Sheldon Whitehouse: 39% approve / 50% disapprove / 12% DK

    # David Cicilline: 17% approve / 49% disapprove / 34% DK

    How is this possible?

  24. But I’ve been fooling around with VRA districts in the south and I’m on Louisiana now. There seems to be a variety of ways to create 2 VAP black districts, but I’ve been trying 3.

    I have 3 black majority districts, 2 are VAP and 1 is very close to VAP, and I’m trying my hardest to squeeze that last .2% in!

    Just wondering if anyone else has tried this? The districts look AWFUL for the record. I’ll post them up if anyone wants to see.

  29. http://www.stltoday.com/news/l…

    The Missouri Republican Lt Governor and probable 2012 Governor candidate likes to spend time at luxury hotels on the taxpayers dime.

    Since 2006, Kinder has billed the state for an average of more than two months per year at hotels in the St. Louis area.

    Even with a discounted government rate, Kinder has charged taxpayers a total of $35,050 for at least 329 nights at hotels in St. Louis and St. Louis County during that time period. That includes 236 nights at the Chase and 42 nights at the downtown Four Seasons, his most frequented hotels.

        1. You’re right on that. But I’d rather keep the seat by spending Herb Kohl’s millions, than using the DSCC’s millions and diverting resources away from New Mexico, Nevada, Massachusetts, or West Virginia.

      4. Ted Strickland, former Ohio governor

        Ed Rendell, former Pennsylvania governor

        Jennifer Granholm, former Michigan governor

        Gov. Deval Patrick of Massachusetts

        Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand of New York

        Sen. Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico

        Sen. Dianne Feinstein of California

        Secy. Janet Napolitano of the Department of Homeland Security

        Secy. Kathleen Sebelius of the Department of Health and Human Services

        Rep. Debbie Wasserman-Schultz of Florida

        Or maybe someone we’ve never heard of. I mean, who the hell was Reince Priebus before he became RNC chair?

    1. Of course people will be influenced, but considering the resounding endorsement Prosser received and the fact that it’s a highly politicized race should hinder it’s effect.  

  32. really appreciate that SSP is calling attention to how tasteless the kamikaze cartoon was. I looked at the comments on Political Wire and no one realizes how offensive it is. seriously, guys…?

  35. … have a daddy who’s organization was a big doner to his campaign.

    http://www.jsonline.com/watchd…


    Just in his mid-20s, Brian Deschane has no college degree, very little management experience and two drunken-driving convictions.

    Yet he has landed an $81,500-per-year job in Gov. Scott Walker’s administration overseeing environmental and regulatory matters and dozens of employees at the Department of Commerce. Even though Walker says the state is broke and public employees are overpaid, Deschane already has earned a promotion and a 26% pay raise in just two months with the state.

    How did Deschane score his plum assignment with the Walker team?

    It’s all in the family.

    His father is Jerry Deschane, executive vice president and longtime lobbyist for the Madison-based Wisconsin Builders Association, which bet big on Walker during last year’s governor’s race.

    The group’s political action committee gave $29,000 to Walker and his running mate, Lt. Gov. Rebecca Kleefisch, last year, making it one of the top five PAC donors to the governor’s successful campaign. Even more impressive, members of the trade group funneled more than $92,000 through its conduit to Walker’s campaign over the past two years.

    Total donations: $121,652.

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