Campaign and Election News – Covering Key Races Around the Country
Weekly Open Thread: What Races Are You Interested In?
385 thoughts on “Weekly Open Thread: What Races Are You Interested In?”
Look to be wilder than ever! I drew a map today resembling what a final court drawn Nevada map may look like, should The Legislature deadlock on redistricting.
Of course, our Senate race now has two heavyweights on the marquee. And with three open House seats, there’s still plenty of scrambling to do as certain politicians (like Brian Krolicki on the GOP side, and Dina Titus on the Dem side) wait to see what the final map looks like.
that the entire Democratic caucus voted uniformly that I can remember. You know a budget is too far right when even Dan Boren wouldn’t vote for it.
And Walter Jones is very quickly becoming my favorite GOP congressman, congrats to him.
Makes me think he’s much more concerned about a tea party challenge than he lets on.
I laughed at a quote from him in an article on Republicans being interviewed on the vote as they left the capitol. He said something like: “Call my office.”
That’s a real profile in courage. 😉
district. But let’s actually wait until a map comes out before we keep arguing.
They finally released the numbers from Milwaukee, so I’ve been able to compute (to the best of my ability) the results of the Supreme Court election by Senate district:
District 2 (Robert Cowles – R) – 57.9% Prosser
District 4 (Lena Taylor – D) – 73.4% Kloppenburg
District 6 (Spencer Coggs – D) – 77.5% Kloppenburg
District 8 (Alberta Darling – R) – 58.8% Prosser
District 10 (Sheila Harsdorf – R) – 50.5% Prosser
District 12 (Jim Holperin – D) – 55.4% Prosser
District 14 (Luther Olsen – R) – 54.7% Prosser
District 16 (Mark Miller – D) – 69.8% Kloppenburg
District 18 (Randy Hopper – R) – 52.8% Prosser
District 20 (Glenn Grothman – R) – 74.3% Prosser
District 22 (Robert Wirch – D) – 51.2% Kloppenburg
District 24 (Julie Lassa – D) – 54.9% Kloppenburg
District 26 (Fred Risser – D) – 82.4% Kloppenburg
District 28 (Mary Lazich – R) – 69.6% Prosser
District 30 (Dave Hansen – D) – 50.01% Kloppenburg
District 32 (Dan Kapanke – R) – 57.7% Kloppenburg
The numbers… do not look promising. On paper, Harsdorf, Hopper, and Kapanke would be the only competitive Republican seats, and Holperin, Wirch, and Hansen would be vulnerable.
holy cow, I thought they were huge Dems, especially in the NE
we all need a fix from down under. Courtesy of the NSW Labor party in 2007:
As the Italian community became more “American” and the grandchildren of Italian immigrants became more wealthy/suburban they shifted from loyal Democrats to Republican supporters.
When my grandfather (nonno as I call him) came to this country with his many brothers and sisters, they were all loyal Democrats (and still are). But out of all their children my mother remains the only Democrat. They rest are wealthy/Suburban Republicans.
Once you’re in power, you’re more vulnerable. I noted above that party caucuses are more united in defeat than after a victory, in response to the notice that Congressional Dems this year have been very united against the GOP.
Ryan’s musings were never serious legislation before this year. Nothing he said or advocated was a bill that had any chance of passing.
He’ll bleed a few votes against a decent opponent (but yes might not get one in which case it’s less likely to happen) now that abolishing Medicare is the official GOP line. That opponent (Zerban?…he obviously needs to up his name rec that I can’t remember for sure!) is smart to play up this vote.
I’m not saying that Ryan will have a competitive race. He might still win a blowout. But he will perform at least slightly worse next year because of Medicare than he would have had he left Medicare alone.
Hopefully Rethugs won’t get enough valid signatures on anyone. I know they claim they got enough on Wirch, but that they haven’t filed is curious. Maybe they’re just looking for padding, but I’ll guess we’ll find out next week.
It would be awesome if come the evening of May 26th we find out we’ve got sigs set for 6 GOPers (I write off campaigns against the 2 safe ones) and no Dems.
A good campaign could change the opinions of people.
Now, again, when was the last time he proposed something so drastic with Medicare? I mean this as a serious question. Has he publicly been promoting this like Kucinich has been so publicly against the Iraq War? If so, it’s news to me. (I don’t mean to sound like a difficult asshole, but if he were proposing something this drastic back in 2006, I think we would have noticed. So please, give me some proof.) And if so, have Democrats ever tried to make it an issue? Have they ever run ads and had Bill Clinton come to the district to talk about it or anything like that?
While they were big with FDR, as suggested above, they always had problems with Irish immigrants. And the Irish dominated more urban machines.
Read my comment below. Even something rationale like the Bracero program isn’t even talked about as that is “amnesty”. I actually agreed with Bush very much on immigration as he had a reasonable basis point that would address both the supply (immigrants) and demand (employers) side. Things like the SB 1070 do nothing for the demand side and only target the supply side. It is going to be harder for the GOP to compete for Mexican-American votes in the future if they keep up their rhetoric.
One of my best friends is Italian, and that’s exactly what they call his grandpa. They’re also Republicans. I always thought they were in the minority though.
I do believe though that Republicans will eventually pull even in the hispanic vote, and then all bets will be off on TX, FL, AZ ect becoming Dem strongholds. I don’t believe Republicans will ever take CA back though, but who knows what 100 years will bring!
Branstad confirmed that he will sign off on the new Iowa maps; Latham confirmed that he will move to IA-03 to run against Boswell. The DCCC and Boswell already have statements out on the IA-03 race today.
No Democrat voted for H.R. 1, the original House GOP spending bill for the rest of FY 2011.
And there were only 3 Democrats who voted to repeal health care reform, with 9 remaining Dems who voted against it in 2009/2010 turning around and opposing repeal this year. (The other 27 anti-HCR Dems retired or got beat last year.)
Defeat unifies a party. I’m surprised people haven’t noticed that phenomenon. And the bigger you lose, the more unified you are. That’s why Congressional Republicans voted “no” en masse on everything in 2009/10. And it’s why Democrats are unified in voting “no” on much of what the GOP wants this year.
We’ll see continued unity on Team Blue all this year and next year unless something unforeseen throws Democrats into an electoral panic.
in Jersey we’re getting ready for Legislative/Local elections coming this November. Democrats are expected to keep their majorities in both Chambers but the elections will be seen as a referendum on our bully Governor so we would like for the Dems to win across the board to show Christie who’s in charge.
I’d love to see some more on NV-Sen and VI-Sen
Tomblin’s on the air. And when you hear the end of the ad, you can tell they aren’t kidding when they say he’s part of the Chamber of Commerce wing of the WV Democratic party.
Hey guys, I think this is the best place to post this, so I’m going it lay it out for a moment.
I’ve been pursuing a Masters in Public Administration at University of North Texas for the last 2 years after getting my BA in PSCI here and . . . it’s not working for me. I split up with my girlfriend back in October and my life has been kinda of a wreck sense then. I’m not in love with this degree, and I need to do something else with my life, I think. I have a friend who is in southern Indiana and told me to visit him this summer. He suggested I try and work on the Obama re-election team while I’m out there, so I checked out the re-election website and it said they are taking applications for summer internships until Monday. I have no debts, I’m 26 years old, and nothing tying me down.
I worked on a state house seat in Houston in 2008 from July-November. I was President of College Democrats at my University. I did some light volunteering for Bill White, I didn’t get along with the county coordinator so once it was obvious the race was over, I hung that up. The 2008 campaign was exhausting and I was worried I’d never be able settle down and have a family or anything with that kind of life; So that worries me.
So, yeah. The question I put out to you all, knowing this little about me: should I quit school after this semester, pack up my stuff, move to a new state, and join the Obama re-election campaign (and possibly a Senate or House campaign once they form up later on)? Or should I continue getting a Masters in Public Administration and go work in a non-profit zoo (something I’ve romanticized a bit) or some other government/non-political office?
Via Felix Salmon, this is from the Union Leader:
Santorum by and large stayed on message but was tripped up a bit when a student asked him if he knew that the choice of his slogan, “Fighting to make America America again,” was borrowed from the “pro-union poem by the gay poet Langston Hughes.”
“No I had nothing to do with that,” Santorum said. “I didn’t know that. And the folks who worked on that slogan for me didn’t inform me that it came from that, if it in fact came from that.”
The student, whose name was not immediately available, was referring to the poem “Let America Be America Again.” When asked a short time later what the campaign slogan meant to him, Santorum said, “well, I’m not too sure that’s my campaign slogan, I think it’s on a web site.”
It was also printed on the campaign literature handed out before the speech.
The last one was insane, of course, and Fiorina’s ad was way, way too long. Halfway through, we hear, “Wait, we’re not done yet…” HAHAHA! Did that air on television? If so, how many times? Were Whitman’s ads that long? If so, now I can see why people were so turned off by them.
Rep. Rehberg was one of 4 Republicans in the House to vote against the Ryan proposal that included privatizing Medicare.
A smart move for his Senate campaign against Tester, methinks. But will he be teabagged to death now? I’m not big on Montana politics, so insight would be great.
he will survive no matter what when Democrats haven’t made a serious effort to unseat him since he was first elected? (At least that’s what I would think based on how little his Democratic opponents have raised over the years.) I really, really don’t get that. At the very least, shouldn’t we try to seriously contest his district before we make a judgment like that? It’s one thing if, for some reason, it’s made far more Republican than it is now, but if not, there’s no reason not try to knock him off, especially now that he’s the face for a reviled piece of legislation.
Also, when has he done something this politically dangerous? He’s always been a big tax cutter (see the link below, which is amusing for a lot of reasons), but that’s hardly a politically risky position to take.
but not impossible.
Why don’t we take a page from Karl Rove’s playbook? Figure out his strengths, and then make them crumble.
I saw this and wondered how difficult such a language must be to learn:
Is it possible that Dems are having a hard time finding a challenger for Scott Brown because there is a high likelihood that Sen. Kerry would be chosen to replace retiring Sec. Clinton to head up the State Department in early 2012 and that race(Kerry’s open seat) would be much cheaper and not run into a popular GOP incumbent with $8M already in his war chest?
I have to say, I love me some Dick…Durbin.
(that joke’s for the gay caucus)
No but seriously, the dude gave Chase CEO Jamie Dimon the letter equivalent of a skullfucking followed by a body slam followed by a hip check followed by a swift kick to the balls. And. I. Loved. Every. Minute. Felix Salmon’s quick-take is here:
And for the record, Chuck Schumer, you can kiss my ass, with your namby-pamby nanny state banning-bath-salts bullshit. This right here, this is what I like my Senate Majority Leaders to do. Dick Durbin, you did the people’s business with that letter and I now officially, openly and adamantly want you to be the next leader of Senate Democrats once Harry Reid is gone.
I officially love Dick even more than I did before.
Which is a huge part of why a lot of people choose to do it illegally. If you really wanted to cut down on the number of illegal immigrants, you’d make it easier to get in legally.
Gov. Rick Snyder can look at his latest poll numbers released this morning and come to only one conclusion: That budget proposal really irritated people.
Just before he proposed sweeping changes to the state’s tax system, including a plan to tax pensions, Snyder had a favorable rating of 54 percent, according to Michigan State University Professor Charles Ballard. But after Snyder pitched his plan to save the state’s budget, those favorable numbers plummeted to 39 percent.
This was not at all surprising. What is surprising was this:
Snyder is slightly more liked among black residents than white ones (49.8 percent favorable to 43.7 percent), and is doing better in the Upper Peninsula and West Michigan.
As a black person, myself, if I had to guess why his average approval is so high among blacks is that they still don’t much know him. And, as a guy who’s not a fire-breather, I guess they are giving him the benefit of the doubt. Kind of odd, though.
For whatever reason, they combined the the quarters to give an average of 44.5% as the “current” approval rating. Also, for background:
The survey was conducted by the university’s Institute of Public Policy and Social Research. It has been doing the survey since 1994 and the current one was conducted during the winter and spring and involved talking with 979 residents. The margin of error is 3.1 percent.
The poll does not target likely voters and the political makeup of its respondents was 35 percent Democrats, 22 percent Republicans and 33 percent independents. Republicans were strongly supportive, with 67 percent giving Snyder excellent or good ratings. Snyder received good marks from 46 percent of Democrats, but just 30 percent of independents, Ballard said.
I posted about this late in the digest but I’ll elaborate a bit here because it’s an interesting redistricting tidbit.
Paul Ryan is currently in a purplish district in southeastern Wisconsin that he has always easily won reelection in. Some folks attribute this to weak Dem candidates, but whatever…
Some folks also think Ryan is vulnerable now for being point man on the GOP budget. Sadly, this is not the case because of redistricting.
Check our RRH’s map of Wisconsin redistricting. They make a coastal Dem district (like Lois Capps current one in California) where part of Milwaukee is connected to the cities of Racine and Kenosha, making an uber-blue district, while Ryan and the 1st retain only the red inland areas of Racine and Kenosha counties plus some of Waukesha. This makes the 1st far more Republican than now, and makes Ryan a virtual lock for reelection — assuming WI Republicans are not total fools and risk losing their point man because they “forgot” to protect him when they can easily do so.
WI is a redistricters dream. The 1st, 5th, 6th (and a bit less so the 8th) could be redistricted into a 3-1 Dem advantage but also could be a safe red 3-0-1. By totally packing the 4th with the cities of Milwaukee/Racine/Kenosha the 1st becomes safe Republican while not endangering the 5th and 6th (for now, when Petri retires the 6th is purple).
Anyway, losing any veto in Wisconsin sadly should lock Paul Ryan in for a decade.
working on a pretty long diary, and is it possible to have two completely separate HTML tables in a diary?
…likely to challenge Steve King! I’ll note the article linked below clarifies she hasn’t made a final decision, but it looks good from my vantage point, given that this leak happened at all.
This is a best-case scenario for us, and the Republicans’ worst nightmare. I’ve never questioned Vilsack as a strong candidate, but I never thought she’d beat Boswell in a primary. But she’ll clear the field vs. King and energize IA-04 Democrats in the biggest possible way. King has never represented a whole slew of counties in the new district which is now far less conservative than he’s ever enjoyed, he’s in for the fight of his life.
We’ll have a very good shot at a 4-0 Democratic delegation next Congress.
I don’t think it’s even the life issue which is an automatic no-no in Texas; Independents in the suburbs couldn’t care less. It really seems to be D vs. R which decides things here. I suspect you could nominate a center-right Blue Dog against a right-wing Tea Partier and the latter would still prevail by double-digits. Republicans never budge from the party line and Independents are staunch fiscal conservatives. It takes a Clayton Williams for a Democrat to win here.
nt
Fmr. Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez. Recruited by Patty Murray. It’s a bite, which at this point, is all i want.
And it seems like very little is happening in the campaign.
There are five major parties running:
Conservatives
Liberals
NDP
Bloc Quebecois
Greens
The current situation: minority conservative gov’t. Conservatives accuse Liberals of wanting to form a coalition against them even if they don’t win the most seats. Liberals deny it. BQ calls the conservatives liars. NDP backs them up. Yada yada yada ensues.
The Greens were left out of the 2 debates, one in each national language.
This is like the 4th election up there in 7 years. When it was called just over 2 weeks ago, it looked like the Conservatives might eke out a majority. Now it looks like they might just miss one.
Basically Canada is split into 5 regions, BC/Alberta & Praries/Ontario/Quebec/Atlantic. Conservatives (as almost always) will get almost all of the Alberta/Prarie seats. The BQ will likely get a big majority of seats in Quebec, in part because the Liberal/Conservative/NDP are splitting the Quebec opposition vote almost equally. The Greens still look shut out everywhere. Basically, if the Liberals can pull even in Ontario, the status quo (minority Conservative gov’t) will continue.
Gosh, this analysis could go on for a while. If I have time on May 2, I might live blog it a bit here.
Steelman pulled in a mere $186k, about 1/5th of McCaskill’s numbers. Ed Martin apparently raised $162k.
Democrats and Republicans come out with 8 maps total (6 from Dems, 2 from Reps) for proposed redistricting.
Coffman is a backbencher with no real “base” of support, and flips his shit, claiming that Dems “screwed” him by moving him out of his district in each map.
After very simple fact-checking, it’s clear he can’t read a map. Democrats kept him in his District in every map they produced, while BOTH Republican maps moved him out of his district and into the 7th (where popular Rep. Perlmutter would await him).
The guy is either (a) lying, (b) doesn’t know what precinct he lives in, or (c) can’t read a map. Though (c) is the funniest, I’ve got a hunch it’s (a).
that Maine will have another ballot initiative on gay marriage in 2012. Anyone know more about this?
Rep. Lynn Woolsey, often mentioned as a possible retirement, raised only 39k in the first quarter. In the April 2009, she reported raising 61k, in April 2007 she raised 50k. I just looked at off-year numbers for the April quarter but I think her paltry numbers do reinforce that she will announce over the summer her retirement from Congress.
CA-36
Janice Hahn (D) – $275k raised, $104k spent, $171k on hand
Debra Bowen (D) – $195k raised, $102k spent, $93k on hand
Craig Huey (R) – $2k raised + $250k loans, $158k spent, $94k on hand
Kit Bobko (R) – $33k raised, $17k spent, $16k on hand
Mike Webb (R) – $30k raised, $19k spent, $11k on hand
Stephen Eisele (R) – $23k raised, $20k spend, $3k on hand
Unless Huey’s bucks can buy him enough name recognition (or if Mike Gin, the Redondo Beach Mayor, ends up a fundraising powerhouse — no report’s filed for him yet), this may very well end up being a D-on-D affair in the runoff.
NY-26
Kathy Hochul (D) – $357k raised, $51k spent, $306k on hand
Jane Corwin (R) – $103k raised + $1m loans, $590k spent, $512k on hand
Jack Davis (I) – $1.6m loans, $1.5m spent, $125k on hand
Corwin seems to be banking on the natural Republican lean of the district, since her need to kick in her own money suggests a lack of organization. Crazy Jack Davis has managed to spend more than the other candidates combined already; over $1 million of that was on radio ads alone. Hochul had a pretty respectable showing, but I don’t know if the vote will be split enough for her to slip through.
Also, I noticed some interesting numbers in IL-03. Dan Lipinski has a primary challenger by the name of John Atkinson who’s raised $223k and put in another $300k of his own money. Remember, Illinois’ primary is crazy early; less than 10 months away, to be precise. Who knows what may happen, especially with redistricting set to reconfigure the district in some manner.
This is good. I was getting worried that our efforts were stalling. Sheila Harsdorf had the best (for our side) district performance in the supreme court election and is the most likely third pickoff candidate. So, that is very good news for our side.
after NOT running in IL we we needed a better candidate.
I’ve been working on a redistricting diary but can’t figure out how to post the images
Giffords has $556K CoH for whatever she wants to do next, but Grijalva’s getting worried that Ds can’t wait much longer for a senate candidate: http://thehill.com/blogs/ballo…
California Rep. David Dreier, the 16-term congressman who chairs the powerful House Rules Committee but who raised a relatively minuscule $14,000 – about three-times less than what he raised during the first quarter of the 2010 cycle.
Anyone know when the NY map will be decided? And the NJ congressional map?
Anyone know what happened to either of these two? They were prominent Obama supporters in 2008, and both will no longer have districts to run in after re-districting. Anyone heard anything on these two?
“Over the past several months, I’ve heard from many leaders and citizens asking me to consider running for Congress – to give Northwest Oregon the tough, effective leadership that we need on Capitol Hill,” Avakian’s email read. “[Monday] morning at 10 am, I hope you’ll join me at PCC Willow Creek. I’ll be sharing my thoughts about the challenges facing our country, our state and our region – and what I intend to do, with your help, to meet those challenges.”
Look to be wilder than ever! I drew a map today resembling what a final court drawn Nevada map may look like, should The Legislature deadlock on redistricting.
Of course, our Senate race now has two heavyweights on the marquee. And with three open House seats, there’s still plenty of scrambling to do as certain politicians (like Brian Krolicki on the GOP side, and Dina Titus on the Dem side) wait to see what the final map looks like.
that the entire Democratic caucus voted uniformly that I can remember. You know a budget is too far right when even Dan Boren wouldn’t vote for it.
And Walter Jones is very quickly becoming my favorite GOP congressman, congrats to him.
Makes me think he’s much more concerned about a tea party challenge than he lets on.
I laughed at a quote from him in an article on Republicans being interviewed on the vote as they left the capitol. He said something like: “Call my office.”
That’s a real profile in courage. 😉
district. But let’s actually wait until a map comes out before we keep arguing.
They finally released the numbers from Milwaukee, so I’ve been able to compute (to the best of my ability) the results of the Supreme Court election by Senate district:
District 2 (Robert Cowles – R) – 57.9% Prosser
District 4 (Lena Taylor – D) – 73.4% Kloppenburg
District 6 (Spencer Coggs – D) – 77.5% Kloppenburg
District 8 (Alberta Darling – R) – 58.8% Prosser
District 10 (Sheila Harsdorf – R) – 50.5% Prosser
District 12 (Jim Holperin – D) – 55.4% Prosser
District 14 (Luther Olsen – R) – 54.7% Prosser
District 16 (Mark Miller – D) – 69.8% Kloppenburg
District 18 (Randy Hopper – R) – 52.8% Prosser
District 20 (Glenn Grothman – R) – 74.3% Prosser
District 22 (Robert Wirch – D) – 51.2% Kloppenburg
District 24 (Julie Lassa – D) – 54.9% Kloppenburg
District 26 (Fred Risser – D) – 82.4% Kloppenburg
District 28 (Mary Lazich – R) – 69.6% Prosser
District 30 (Dave Hansen – D) – 50.01% Kloppenburg
District 32 (Dan Kapanke – R) – 57.7% Kloppenburg
The numbers… do not look promising. On paper, Harsdorf, Hopper, and Kapanke would be the only competitive Republican seats, and Holperin, Wirch, and Hansen would be vulnerable.
holy cow, I thought they were huge Dems, especially in the NE
we all need a fix from down under. Courtesy of the NSW Labor party in 2007:
As the Italian community became more “American” and the grandchildren of Italian immigrants became more wealthy/suburban they shifted from loyal Democrats to Republican supporters.
When my grandfather (nonno as I call him) came to this country with his many brothers and sisters, they were all loyal Democrats (and still are). But out of all their children my mother remains the only Democrat. They rest are wealthy/Suburban Republicans.
Once you’re in power, you’re more vulnerable. I noted above that party caucuses are more united in defeat than after a victory, in response to the notice that Congressional Dems this year have been very united against the GOP.
Ryan’s musings were never serious legislation before this year. Nothing he said or advocated was a bill that had any chance of passing.
He’ll bleed a few votes against a decent opponent (but yes might not get one in which case it’s less likely to happen) now that abolishing Medicare is the official GOP line. That opponent (Zerban?…he obviously needs to up his name rec that I can’t remember for sure!) is smart to play up this vote.
I’m not saying that Ryan will have a competitive race. He might still win a blowout. But he will perform at least slightly worse next year because of Medicare than he would have had he left Medicare alone.
Hopefully Rethugs won’t get enough valid signatures on anyone. I know they claim they got enough on Wirch, but that they haven’t filed is curious. Maybe they’re just looking for padding, but I’ll guess we’ll find out next week.
It would be awesome if come the evening of May 26th we find out we’ve got sigs set for 6 GOPers (I write off campaigns against the 2 safe ones) and no Dems.
A good campaign could change the opinions of people.
Now, again, when was the last time he proposed something so drastic with Medicare? I mean this as a serious question. Has he publicly been promoting this like Kucinich has been so publicly against the Iraq War? If so, it’s news to me. (I don’t mean to sound like a difficult asshole, but if he were proposing something this drastic back in 2006, I think we would have noticed. So please, give me some proof.) And if so, have Democrats ever tried to make it an issue? Have they ever run ads and had Bill Clinton come to the district to talk about it or anything like that?
While they were big with FDR, as suggested above, they always had problems with Irish immigrants. And the Irish dominated more urban machines.
Read my comment below. Even something rationale like the Bracero program isn’t even talked about as that is “amnesty”. I actually agreed with Bush very much on immigration as he had a reasonable basis point that would address both the supply (immigrants) and demand (employers) side. Things like the SB 1070 do nothing for the demand side and only target the supply side. It is going to be harder for the GOP to compete for Mexican-American votes in the future if they keep up their rhetoric.
They’re pretty interesting. Check them out here:
http://coloradopols.com/diary/…
One of my best friends is Italian, and that’s exactly what they call his grandpa. They’re also Republicans. I always thought they were in the minority though.
I do believe though that Republicans will eventually pull even in the hispanic vote, and then all bets will be off on TX, FL, AZ ect becoming Dem strongholds. I don’t believe Republicans will ever take CA back though, but who knows what 100 years will bring!
Branstad confirmed that he will sign off on the new Iowa maps; Latham confirmed that he will move to IA-03 to run against Boswell. The DCCC and Boswell already have statements out on the IA-03 race today.
No Democrat voted for H.R. 1, the original House GOP spending bill for the rest of FY 2011.
And there were only 3 Democrats who voted to repeal health care reform, with 9 remaining Dems who voted against it in 2009/2010 turning around and opposing repeal this year. (The other 27 anti-HCR Dems retired or got beat last year.)
Defeat unifies a party. I’m surprised people haven’t noticed that phenomenon. And the bigger you lose, the more unified you are. That’s why Congressional Republicans voted “no” en masse on everything in 2009/10. And it’s why Democrats are unified in voting “no” on much of what the GOP wants this year.
We’ll see continued unity on Team Blue all this year and next year unless something unforeseen throws Democrats into an electoral panic.
in Jersey we’re getting ready for Legislative/Local elections coming this November. Democrats are expected to keep their majorities in both Chambers but the elections will be seen as a referendum on our bully Governor so we would like for the Dems to win across the board to show Christie who’s in charge.
I’d love to see some more on NV-Sen and VI-Sen
Tomblin’s on the air. And when you hear the end of the ad, you can tell they aren’t kidding when they say he’s part of the Chamber of Commerce wing of the WV Democratic party.
Hey guys, I think this is the best place to post this, so I’m going it lay it out for a moment.
I’ve been pursuing a Masters in Public Administration at University of North Texas for the last 2 years after getting my BA in PSCI here and . . . it’s not working for me. I split up with my girlfriend back in October and my life has been kinda of a wreck sense then. I’m not in love with this degree, and I need to do something else with my life, I think. I have a friend who is in southern Indiana and told me to visit him this summer. He suggested I try and work on the Obama re-election team while I’m out there, so I checked out the re-election website and it said they are taking applications for summer internships until Monday. I have no debts, I’m 26 years old, and nothing tying me down.
I worked on a state house seat in Houston in 2008 from July-November. I was President of College Democrats at my University. I did some light volunteering for Bill White, I didn’t get along with the county coordinator so once it was obvious the race was over, I hung that up. The 2008 campaign was exhausting and I was worried I’d never be able settle down and have a family or anything with that kind of life; So that worries me.
So, yeah. The question I put out to you all, knowing this little about me: should I quit school after this semester, pack up my stuff, move to a new state, and join the Obama re-election campaign (and possibly a Senate or House campaign once they form up later on)? Or should I continue getting a Masters in Public Administration and go work in a non-profit zoo (something I’ve romanticized a bit) or some other government/non-political office?
Via Felix Salmon, this is from the Union Leader:
http://unionleader.com/article…
tenth one and the second one?
The last one was insane, of course, and Fiorina’s ad was way, way too long. Halfway through, we hear, “Wait, we’re not done yet…” HAHAHA! Did that air on television? If so, how many times? Were Whitman’s ads that long? If so, now I can see why people were so turned off by them.
Rep. Rehberg was one of 4 Republicans in the House to vote against the Ryan proposal that included privatizing Medicare.
A smart move for his Senate campaign against Tester, methinks. But will he be teabagged to death now? I’m not big on Montana politics, so insight would be great.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/…
he will survive no matter what when Democrats haven’t made a serious effort to unseat him since he was first elected? (At least that’s what I would think based on how little his Democratic opponents have raised over the years.) I really, really don’t get that. At the very least, shouldn’t we try to seriously contest his district before we make a judgment like that? It’s one thing if, for some reason, it’s made far more Republican than it is now, but if not, there’s no reason not try to knock him off, especially now that he’s the face for a reviled piece of legislation.
Also, when has he done something this politically dangerous? He’s always been a big tax cutter (see the link below, which is amusing for a lot of reasons), but that’s hardly a politically risky position to take.
but not impossible.
Why don’t we take a page from Karl Rove’s playbook? Figure out his strengths, and then make them crumble.
I saw this and wondered how difficult such a language must be to learn:
Is it possible that Dems are having a hard time finding a challenger for Scott Brown because there is a high likelihood that Sen. Kerry would be chosen to replace retiring Sec. Clinton to head up the State Department in early 2012 and that race(Kerry’s open seat) would be much cheaper and not run into a popular GOP incumbent with $8M already in his war chest?
I have to say, I love me some Dick…Durbin.
(that joke’s for the gay caucus)
No but seriously, the dude gave Chase CEO Jamie Dimon the letter equivalent of a skullfucking followed by a body slam followed by a hip check followed by a swift kick to the balls. And. I. Loved. Every. Minute. Felix Salmon’s quick-take is here:
http://blogs.reuters.com/felix…
And the glorious full letter is here, courtesy of Balloon Juice (pdf):
http://www.balloon-juice.com/w…
And for the record, Chuck Schumer, you can kiss my ass, with your namby-pamby nanny state banning-bath-salts bullshit. This right here, this is what I like my Senate Majority Leaders to do. Dick Durbin, you did the people’s business with that letter and I now officially, openly and adamantly want you to be the next leader of Senate Democrats once Harry Reid is gone.
I officially love Dick even more than I did before.
Which is a huge part of why a lot of people choose to do it illegally. If you really wanted to cut down on the number of illegal immigrants, you’d make it easier to get in legally.
MSU economics profressor Charles Ballard has done a state of the state poll every quarter since 1994, and he has Snyder’s numbers continuing to drop:
This was not at all surprising. What is surprising was this:
As a black person, myself, if I had to guess why his average approval is so high among blacks is that they still don’t much know him. And, as a guy who’s not a fire-breather, I guess they are giving him the benefit of the doubt. Kind of odd, though.
For whatever reason, they combined the the quarters to give an average of 44.5% as the “current” approval rating. Also, for background:
I posted about this late in the digest but I’ll elaborate a bit here because it’s an interesting redistricting tidbit.
Paul Ryan is currently in a purplish district in southeastern Wisconsin that he has always easily won reelection in. Some folks attribute this to weak Dem candidates, but whatever…
Some folks also think Ryan is vulnerable now for being point man on the GOP budget. Sadly, this is not the case because of redistricting.
Check our RRH’s map of Wisconsin redistricting. They make a coastal Dem district (like Lois Capps current one in California) where part of Milwaukee is connected to the cities of Racine and Kenosha, making an uber-blue district, while Ryan and the 1st retain only the red inland areas of Racine and Kenosha counties plus some of Waukesha. This makes the 1st far more Republican than now, and makes Ryan a virtual lock for reelection — assuming WI Republicans are not total fools and risk losing their point man because they “forgot” to protect him when they can easily do so.
WI is a redistricters dream. The 1st, 5th, 6th (and a bit less so the 8th) could be redistricted into a 3-1 Dem advantage but also could be a safe red 3-0-1. By totally packing the 4th with the cities of Milwaukee/Racine/Kenosha the 1st becomes safe Republican while not endangering the 5th and 6th (for now, when Petri retires the 6th is purple).
Anyway, losing any veto in Wisconsin sadly should lock Paul Ryan in for a decade.
working on a pretty long diary, and is it possible to have two completely separate HTML tables in a diary?
Presented without comment:
http://www.11points.com/News-P…
http://www.postonpolitics.com/…
…likely to challenge Steve King! I’ll note the article linked below clarifies she hasn’t made a final decision, but it looks good from my vantage point, given that this leak happened at all.
Stu Rothenberg link here: http://rothenbergpoliticalrepo…
This is a best-case scenario for us, and the Republicans’ worst nightmare. I’ve never questioned Vilsack as a strong candidate, but I never thought she’d beat Boswell in a primary. But she’ll clear the field vs. King and energize IA-04 Democrats in the biggest possible way. King has never represented a whole slew of counties in the new district which is now far less conservative than he’s ever enjoyed, he’s in for the fight of his life.
We’ll have a very good shot at a 4-0 Democratic delegation next Congress.
I don’t think it’s even the life issue which is an automatic no-no in Texas; Independents in the suburbs couldn’t care less. It really seems to be D vs. R which decides things here. I suspect you could nominate a center-right Blue Dog against a right-wing Tea Partier and the latter would still prevail by double-digits. Republicans never budge from the party line and Independents are staunch fiscal conservatives. It takes a Clayton Williams for a Democrat to win here.
nt
Fmr. Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez. Recruited by Patty Murray. It’s a bite, which at this point, is all i want.
http://www.miamiherald.com/201…
And it seems like very little is happening in the campaign.
There are five major parties running:
Conservatives
Liberals
NDP
Bloc Quebecois
Greens
The current situation: minority conservative gov’t. Conservatives accuse Liberals of wanting to form a coalition against them even if they don’t win the most seats. Liberals deny it. BQ calls the conservatives liars. NDP backs them up. Yada yada yada ensues.
The Greens were left out of the 2 debates, one in each national language.
This is like the 4th election up there in 7 years. When it was called just over 2 weeks ago, it looked like the Conservatives might eke out a majority. Now it looks like they might just miss one.
Their version of 538: http://threehundredeight.blogs…
Basically Canada is split into 5 regions, BC/Alberta & Praries/Ontario/Quebec/Atlantic. Conservatives (as almost always) will get almost all of the Alberta/Prarie seats. The BQ will likely get a big majority of seats in Quebec, in part because the Liberal/Conservative/NDP are splitting the Quebec opposition vote almost equally. The Greens still look shut out everywhere. Basically, if the Liberals can pull even in Ontario, the status quo (minority Conservative gov’t) will continue.
Gosh, this analysis could go on for a while. If I have time on May 2, I might live blog it a bit here.
http://www.rollcall.com/news/S…
Steelman pulled in a mere $186k, about 1/5th of McCaskill’s numbers. Ed Martin apparently raised $162k.
Democrats and Republicans come out with 8 maps total (6 from Dems, 2 from Reps) for proposed redistricting.
Coffman is a backbencher with no real “base” of support, and flips his shit, claiming that Dems “screwed” him by moving him out of his district in each map.
After very simple fact-checking, it’s clear he can’t read a map. Democrats kept him in his District in every map they produced, while BOTH Republican maps moved him out of his district and into the 7th (where popular Rep. Perlmutter would await him).
The guy is either (a) lying, (b) doesn’t know what precinct he lives in, or (c) can’t read a map. Though (c) is the funniest, I’ve got a hunch it’s (a).
More here: http://www.coloradopols.com/di…
http://www.democracycorps.com/…
that Maine will have another ballot initiative on gay marriage in 2012. Anyone know more about this?
Rep. Lynn Woolsey, often mentioned as a possible retirement, raised only 39k in the first quarter. In the April 2009, she reported raising 61k, in April 2007 she raised 50k. I just looked at off-year numbers for the April quarter but I think her paltry numbers do reinforce that she will announce over the summer her retirement from Congress.
CA-36
Janice Hahn (D) – $275k raised, $104k spent, $171k on hand
Debra Bowen (D) – $195k raised, $102k spent, $93k on hand
Craig Huey (R) – $2k raised + $250k loans, $158k spent, $94k on hand
Kit Bobko (R) – $33k raised, $17k spent, $16k on hand
Mike Webb (R) – $30k raised, $19k spent, $11k on hand
Stephen Eisele (R) – $23k raised, $20k spend, $3k on hand
Unless Huey’s bucks can buy him enough name recognition (or if Mike Gin, the Redondo Beach Mayor, ends up a fundraising powerhouse — no report’s filed for him yet), this may very well end up being a D-on-D affair in the runoff.
NY-26
Kathy Hochul (D) – $357k raised, $51k spent, $306k on hand
Jane Corwin (R) – $103k raised + $1m loans, $590k spent, $512k on hand
Jack Davis (I) – $1.6m loans, $1.5m spent, $125k on hand
Corwin seems to be banking on the natural Republican lean of the district, since her need to kick in her own money suggests a lack of organization. Crazy Jack Davis has managed to spend more than the other candidates combined already; over $1 million of that was on radio ads alone. Hochul had a pretty respectable showing, but I don’t know if the vote will be split enough for her to slip through.
Also, I noticed some interesting numbers in IL-03. Dan Lipinski has a primary challenger by the name of John Atkinson who’s raised $223k and put in another $300k of his own money. Remember, Illinois’ primary is crazy early; less than 10 months away, to be precise. Who knows what may happen, especially with redistricting set to reconfigure the district in some manner.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v…
http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo…
I frankly wonder where Trump’s brain went.
apparently imageshack was giving me the wrong URL
Can you name the 100 most populated US counties?
I got 73, which I felt bad about, given the amount of time I spend staring at maps around here and on Dave’s App.
http://the-leader.net/harsdorf…
This is good. I was getting worried that our efforts were stalling. Sheila Harsdorf had the best (for our side) district performance in the supreme court election and is the most likely third pickoff candidate. So, that is very good news for our side.
after NOT running in IL we we needed a better candidate.
I’ve been working on a redistricting diary but can’t figure out how to post the images
Giffords has $556K CoH for whatever she wants to do next, but Grijalva’s getting worried that Ds can’t wait much longer for a senate candidate: http://thehill.com/blogs/ballo…
http://www.eclectablog.com/201…
Williams leads heavily in the primary but all Republicans are crushed in the GE. This is from an reputable pollster, not CN2.
http://www.courier-journal.com…
Anyone know when the NY map will be decided? And the NJ congressional map?
There was a break-in at the recall office and they stole some of the petitions.
Baron Hill and Chet Edwards
Anyone know what happened to either of these two? They were prominent Obama supporters in 2008, and both will no longer have districts to run in after re-districting. Anyone heard anything on these two?
the mystery recruit that the DSCC recruited is
Ricardo Sanchez?
http://hotlineoncall.nationalj…
a somewhat weird choice
http://www.wweek.com/portland/…
state Labor Commissioner Brad Avakian