Weekly Open Thread: What Races Are You Interested In?

I can’t believe it, but I just finished the last day of classes for my degree.  While it’s a relief, it’s a bit surreal to be finishing college.

I’m going to be going into semi-bunker mode during the next couple of weeks while I write my exams, but I don’t anticipate that the level of posting will dry up too badly, because I was already keeping up with a hectic schedule for the last couple of weeks to begin with!

So, do tell: what’s on your mind?

Friday Night Discussion Items:

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

  1. is out.  I offer a preliminary analysis the next set of options here:  http://www.dailyking…

    Former Atty. General Richard Ieyoub, Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu and former US Rep. and Senate candidate Chris John are all speculated to be candidates.  Foster Campbell is in the race, as is state Sen. Walter Boasso for the Republicans.  John Georges, a wealthy businessman, is considering a run.  This is a mess.

  3. It’ll be painful to have to say that.  This hurts Landrieu too–whose defeat would mark the end of dems in LA.

  5. If these charges of corruption pan out and he’s either recalled, or spends the next four years as a reviled figure of the republican party, we might be able to sweep Nevada come 08.  we barely lost a few of the races, but that’s only because nevada resisted the flow of the country and became less democratic.  Now that they have a perfect example of republican corruption in their own backyard, Nevada might go the way of ohio come 08.  Every house seat counts and their electoral votes would be nice.

  8. first, where and what do you study, james? 

    now to clizzila’s line:

    10. NC (Dole-R)
      IA (Harkin-D)

    9. SD (Johnson-D)

    8. NM (Domenici-R)

    7. VA (Warner-R)

    6. ME (Collins-R)

    5. OR (Smith-R)

    4. LA (Landrieu-D)

    3. MN (Coleman-R)

    2. NH (Sununu-R)

    1. CO (OPEN-R)

    I first have to express my disagreement with the rating of NC at 10.  Dole’s approval ratings are in the mid-40s, and her disapprovals are hot on the heels of that rating in the polls I have read.  She clearly has a large target on her back, and she is running in a year when she will have to compete for voters’ attention with a Presidential race and a gubernatorial race.  The carpetbagger argument as well as her ideological extremism will haunt her, as many thought she was the moderate alternative to Jesse Helms.  That candidates such as Brad Miller are allowing their names to be circulated reveals that this should move up a couple of notches.

    Harkin will probably attract a better opponent than the Congressmen mentioned in Clizzila’s short precis.  It will be close, but Harkin will emerge the victor.  He should remain where he is on this list.

    Johnson is in the process of recovering, and South Dakotans are fond of him.  He won a campaign on his wife’s cancer, and he will win this one after he recovers.  The SD base is thin, and he and Herseth will mutually buttress one another to victory.  This should be at the bottom of Clizzilla’s line, especially as Johnson has what appears to be the beginnings of a warchest.

    Now we have to deal with Domenici.  Wilson’s vulnerability already creates a vacuum, and Madrid is now damaged for at least two years.  Richardson is also running for president, which leaves us with Udall.  Another scandal or slip of the tongue can sink Domenici, but we have no control over his behaviour.  I say leave this where it is until someone with name recognition emerges as a challenger.  As much as I would want Madrid to run a campaign not handled by professionals, I believe she will be pulled into the Iglesias scandal, making her incapable of winning against Domenici.  But she would keep the campaign on message, as she was the focus of the Republicans’ corruption.  Somehow a coordinated NM-Sen and NM-01 campaign has to be waged, where Wilson and Domenici are removed from office and indelibly stained with the charge of corruption. 

    Warner has sent a signal that he is not interested in running for office.  I want to see Davis’s fundraising numbers, and I want to see George Allen’s numbers.  That the Virginia GOP will spend this cycle engaging in the difficult process of self-examination will be to our advantage.  I say move this up a notch or two, for this is clearly amorphous, and that is not a good sign for the incumbent party.

    That Collins is airing an ad on YouTube and not in Maine is a big mistake.  And that she did not cast symbolic votes against the war in Iraq is also a big mistake.  She may think Lieberman is an asset, but this, I believe, will backfire on her in ways she will dread.  If Snowe is smart, Snowe will try to avoid embroiling herself in Collins’s campaign, for this election cycle will do major damage to the Maine GOP.  And if Pingree emerges as a House candidate, then Snowe and Collins will be unable to convince women to vote for them, as that argument will be neutralized.  This needs to move up on the list.

    That Smith has assumed a visible role during the Iraq War and Stem Cell debates reveals he is aware of his vulnerability.  An argument of election cycle conversion against consistent advocacy can sink Smith, but the largely Democratic Oregon delegation will have to work together in order to end Smith’s career.  Because this seat will have to be bought, I do not view it as competitive as the race in Maine.

    Landrieu should have joined the circus, because she knows how to create a spectacle, and she is quite adept at walking tightropes.  She has made no mistakes since her 2002 reelection, and her oil bill is the keystone in her campaign edifice, which makes her difficult ot dismantle.  Alexander is embroiled in scandal, McCrery has lost clout, Boustany knows he is flawed statewide and on life support, and a race with Jindal would be expensive and close, which is why Jindal will not run against her, for he knows she would terminally damage his reputation.  Baker’s fundraising reveals he is either retiring or relying on a noncompetitive House race.  Because the GOP in LA is not attacking her as much as they should, I see this race moving down the line.

    Now Coleman is delusional, and his arguments during the stem cell debate reveal that he is not convinced of his political stances.  He is prolix, desultory, and he has a tendency to whine.  This, I believe, will not work with voters.  Klobuchar needs to corner him with some blunt statements and her middle class appeal, and Franken needs to travel to every nook and cranny of that state.  If the GOP Convention can be mined for quotes that make it into the imagined Wellstone spectacle, Coleman is finished.

    Sununu seems to think irreverance will result in reelection.  He is not listening to his constituents, and he seems to think the dice are loaded in his favor, which they are not.  Sununu is in the position Landrieu was in 2002, but he is not as adept as Landrieu, and he is also not as shrill and cunning.  Sununu thinks his patrician presentation and his arrogance will drag him over the finish line.  But as Carol Shea-Porter demonstrated, ordinariness is what the voters in NH want.  Landrieu exploited populism in 2002, and she staged an upset none of us anticipated.  I was convinced she was finished, but I guess we in the River Parishes came out in force for her once that sugar ad hit the screen.  Sununu does not understand populism, and he frankly has no other cards up his sleeve.  And there are no sugar growers in NH.  I seriously think Sununu will wage a kamikazi campaign, which leads me to believe that he will become a Santorum by the time he has to debate his opponents.  I compare him to Landrieu in 2002, as his behaviour as of late resembles hers in 2002.  But Sununu is no product of circus culture.

    Regarding Colorado, the Republicans already conceded this seat.  But Howard Dean better work magic with the unions in Denver, or else we may have a few surprises. 

    11.. SD (Johnson)

    10. IA (Harkin)

    9. NM (Domenici)

    8. NC (Dole)

    7. LA (Landrieu)

    6. VA (Warner)

    5. OR  (Smith)

    4. ME (Collins)

    3. MN (Coleman)

    2. NH (Sununu)

    1. CO (OPEN)

  9. It is so goddamn frustrating that a state that has a more than two to one Democratic voter registration advantage and voted for Bill Clinton easily in 1996 is looking like a lost cause.  The state party would be smart to abandon the governor’s race and put everything into holding on to the state legislature.

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