Author: babaloo

My co-author at The Progressive Connection, Matt Lockshin, recently received a solicitation letter that was disturbingly disingenuous and duplicitous, even while still managing to maintain that elusive whiff of incompetence we’ve all come to associate with the Democratic Party. The letter was addressed to Matt at his address in Emeryville, California. Problem is, Matt doesn’t live in Emeryville; he lives in Oakland. But, as it turns out, that’s the least of our worries.

The letter started off with this grand statement:

Emeryville Area

Democratic Party 2007 Annual Fund Drive

Dear Matt Lockshin,

As one of Emeryville’s most committed Democrats, you played a key role in the sweeping 2006 election victory that helped our Party make history.

Now we need your help to enact our agenda for change and move America in a New Direction. That’s why I’m asking you to join other leading Democrats in the Emeryville area in supporting the Democratic Party 2007 Annual Fund Drive with a generous gift of $15, $25, $35, $50 or more today.

So let’s stop right there. Who do you think sent this letter to Matt?

Was it the Emeryville Democratic Club? The Alameda County Democratic Central Committee? The California Democratic Party? The DNC? (Hint: there is no Emeryville Democratic Club)

Wrong. The letter came from the DCCC.

Now, if you were an everyday resident of Emeryville, maybe even one of its “most committed Democrats,” you might receive that letter and think that donating to the Emeryville Area Democratic Party 2007 Annual Fund Drive was a handy and useful way to spend your donor dollars — sort of a United Way for politics. You might reasonably assume that your money would be going to support various local candidates and local party building activities. You know, in Emeryville.

So you might be very surprised to learn that your contribution to the Emeryville Area Democratic Party 2007 Annual Fund Drive was going to support candidates like Heath Shuler (NC-11), who opposes a woman’s right to choose. You might be even more surprised to find out that your dollars were going to support candidates like Gabrielle Giffords (AZ-08) who voted against  the McGovern bill to redeploy the troops within nine months and for  the Bush blank check last week. And you might be downright shocked to discover that your money was going to support Chris Carney (PA-10) who voted against the expansion of federal hate crime legislation to include crimes against people based on their gender, sexual orientation, and gender identity.

But the DCCC is banking on the fact that most of the people who got that letter are going to be low-information Democrats. They’re going to send in their money to support the Emeryville Area Democratic Party 2007 Annual Fund Drive. They’re not going to ask too many questions about how their donations will be spent. And they’re going to feel good about the fact that they helped to support their Democratic Party.

But here’s the problem. When candidates in Emeryville’s local Assembly District race come looking for support, when candidates in the local State Senate race come looking for support, when candidates for Congress come looking for support — even when candidates for president come looking for support in Emeryville, the residents of Emeryville are going to say, “Oh, I already contributed — to the Emeryville Area Democratic Party 2007 Annual Fund Drive.”

Read the whole thing and weep:

Cross posted at The Progressive Connection

(And so it begins. This is just a taste of what will be in store for many of our freshman class over the next two years. We need to be prepared to weather this storm and push back aggressively. On another note, it’s pretty interesting that the NRCC would hone their attack on the subject of immigration, considering that it’s next to impossible to find a race where that “hot button” issue gave the Republicans a decisive assist–with the exception of the CA-50 run-off, perhaps.



Update: It’s also possible this this mailer was a holdover from November that somehow got “stuck” in the mail. Stranger things have happened. I’d keep your eyes peeled on the FEC’s independent expenditure page to see if the NRCC reports spending any money in this district. – promoted by James L.)

Cross posted at Say No To Pombo

UPDATE:  This story has now been picked up by the largest newspaper in CA-11, the Contra Costa Times.

Last Thursday, Jerry McNerney took the oath of office as a member of the 110th Congress. A scant five days later, with what must surely be unprecedented speed, the NRCC has sent out its first anti-McNerney campaign mailers of the 2008 election to voters in CA-11. 

It’s worth noting that in the run-up to the 2006 elections, the NRCC spent over $1.3 million to prop up threatened incumbent Rep. Richard Pombo, all to no avail. In the days leading up to November 7, the NRCC sent out no less than 20 anti-McNerney mailers (strikingly, they couldn’t think of one single pro-Pombo message). Looks like old habits die hard.

So if anyone out there thinks that McNerney’s 2008 re-election will be easy simply because he won in 2006 by a 6% margin — er, not so much. Expect a steady drumbeat of anti-McNerney disinformation over the next two years. The only real question is, what are we going to do about it?