SurveyUSA for Roll Call (8/23-25, likely voters):
Chris Carney (D-inc): 49
Chris Hackett (R): 45
(MoE: ±4.0%)
Carney is right under the magic 50% bubble of vulnerability, and Hackett is nipping at his heels. Carney’s favorables (40% favorable, 23% unfavorable, 30% neutral and 6% unknown) are okay, but clearly indicate that the freshman incumbent could stand to boost his profile at home. This race is shaping up to be pretty close.
In better news, and continuing a trend that we’ve seen in other red districts (CO-04 and KS-02), voters prefer a candidate who touts alternative sources of energy over one who advocates increased offshore drilling by a 54-36 margin. Bear in mind that this a conservative R+8 district, so you might expect the GOP’s pro-drilling talking points to sell well here. Not really, it turns out. Additionally, a full 40% of voters in the 10th blame the oil companies first and foremost for the high cost of gasoline. It won’t be a surprise to see the familiar attacks on “big oil” be a common thread in Democratic messaging here.
The poll also finds that John McCain leads Barack Obama by 50-41 in the 10th District; considering that John Kerry was blown out by a 60-40 margin here in 2004, Obama is in good shape to make it at least a slightly closer race in this district. And if McCain can’t rack up the score convincingly in a district like this, what chance does he have of winning Pennsylvania?
SSP currently rates this race as Lean Democratic.
But I’m not hoping he wins. The upside to a loss is that’s one less vote in the caucus for bad leadership in the House. 50%+1 rules the day in the House, we can’t forget that. Having Carney doesn’t help, it only detracts.
The Blue America effort against for his vote to gut spying laws and give retro immunity to the telecoms (and by extension the White House) was a good move, and I’m glad I helped the effort. For that to have contributed to his loss means that we can have a say in whether these guys stay in office. They won’t care about us until we can show that we can do that.
There are flaws in the system but every Democrat in the House has a figher Progressive Punch score than every Republican. The lowest ranked D has a score of 66 (Nick Lampson); the highest ranked R has a 39 (Wayne Gilchrest, primaried out by the Club for Growth). Within that framework, Chris Carney ranks 224th out of 236 Democrats with a score of 79. He’s significantly worse than neighboring conserevative Democrat Tim Holden (196th with a score just over 90). Carney votes with progressives just 40% of the time in the clutch.
Each piece of legislation has its own constituency. Cobbling together 218 progressive votes may get a core set of Democrats nearly every time but those last 30 or 40 voters are in no way uniform. We need a safety margin.
Is Carney as good a vote as possible for the district? Probably not. Holden, I might add, voted more xonservatively under the Republican regime and Carney probably would be more conservative also. Still, the gap shows we could do a lot better here.
Is Carney a heck of a lot better than any R, in particular the conservative robot likely to be chosen? Heck yes.
Two other factors are also at play. Does Carney “hurt the brand” by frequent criticisms of democrats, liberals, Nancy Pelosi, and invoking of Republican talking points? Steny Hoyer does not vote badly but he does more harm to the progressive agenda through his big mouth than any other Demorat.
Second, is he a constant money drain. We simply won’t know for a few terms. Leonard Boswell and the Georgia pair of Marshall and Barrow fit this to a T as does Melissa Bean.
Part of the reason that congress and the Democrats suffer dismal approval ratings is the obstruction of Republicans. But a lot of it is due to the sniping of the Hoyers and the Beans and a few others. I don’t think Carney is in this crew.
My suggestion would be to primary those who torpedo our branding efforts or who represent substantially safer districts. Otherwise, if you want to advance the progressive cause in DC actively support a progressive alternative in open Democratic seats like NY-21, support candidates running for Republican held seats who are more likely to uphold your views (Mary Jo Kilroy, Dan Maffri, Linda Stender) rather than conservative Democrats aining for Republican seats, pressure Democrats in more progressive districts to vote more liberally. It works.
I don’t think we should primary Carney – that would be folly. Carney decided he did not need our help to win reelection, so he won’t get it. Now that this race looks to be close, he’s on his own with no base to speak of. Who will come to Carney’s rescue? Only the DCCC will be there with him, and no one else.
Pennsylvania is Obama’s. The Philly suburbs are making up for Democratic slippage in other areas of the state, and then some.
Post a quick comment, go to work, come back and see all this. My goodness! Glad to have the reaction, which for the most part didn’t get personal. Rather than respond individually, I’ll just put it all in this comment.
First, if you support Carney’s politics, great, support him. I support progressive Democrats, and since we have growing majority in the House, having a Democrat in the caucus who is anything but progressive is actually worse than having a Republican from that perspective. When he votes with the caucus, his vote is never needed, and when he votes against it, it can help our caucus fail. And he gets a voice in leadership, which rules the roost in the House. That’s what the 50+1 comment was about — what the leadership wants in the House, it gets. The Senate is a different story of course. But in the House it’s all about who the leaders are, so the balance of the different caucus wings (Blue Dog, progressive) that choose that leadership of the caucus makes all the difference.
For me, what matters is about affecting changes in policy, not upping Democratic numbers in the caucus. If y’all want to focus on that, have at it, but don’t expect anything to change no matter how numerous the Dem caucus gets. If you’re not willing to differentiate, then that’s what you’ll get. And the fake Democrats will LOVE you for it as they dilute the standing and principles of the party until we lose the majority for not accomplishing anything.
Second, who ever said anything about primarying Carney? Not me. If it was a choice of dumping in $2 million to save his seat or do nothing and let him lose, I’d let him lose. Against a Republican. We don’t have unlimited resources. At the DCCC or among small donors. And encouraging a donation to him means doing it at the expense of other Dems liek Himes, or Taddeo, or a bunch of other Democrats who will do a lot more for us in the House. The DCCC and the members of the House are more into the incumbent protection racket, rather than considering what the member has actually done for the caucus, but that’s not we should be about imo.
We don’t need more Democrats, we need ones who will allow the party to achieve things in Congress so that it gets a reputation of doing what it says it’s going to. Failure to do that will mean us losing our majority.
I’ll bug off from commenting if the official opinion of this site is that it doesn’t differentiate between Democrats. Is it?