At this morning’s House Republican Conference meeting, party leaders will unveil a new campaign fundraising and infrastructure program designed to strengthen vulnerable incumbents and hold Members more accountable if they expect any help from the National Republican Congressional Committee in 2010. …
The primary component of the new program will focus on 30 to 50 targeted GOP incumbents who could find themselves with a serious challenge on their hands in 2010. Those “patriots” are the ones who will likely be leaning on the NRCC the most this cycle.
In that sense, the Patriot program is similar to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee’s “Frontline” program, which directs fundraising and other resources to vulnerable Members and has existed since the 2004 cycle. The DCCC released its list of 40 Frontline Members for 2010 on Monday. …
[T]he Patriot program will immediately help targeted Members most likely to need NRCC support this cycle…. (Emphasis added.)
* yawns *
* looks at calendar *
Huh, it’s already the middle of April. That NRCC list must be around here somewhere, right?
* checks Internet *
Weird.
* checks Internet some more *
Come on….
* e-mails Crisitunity *
No kidding. Very well, then. Take all the time you need, Pete Sessions! No hurry at all!
I couldn’t find more than 10 or so “endangered” Republicans with strong fundraising numbers.
If they ever do come out with this program, they should definitely focus on holding their own members more “accountable.”
Vulnerable R’s are exactly the people who need more heavy-handed pressure from the NRCC & leadership, so that they can more easily be shown, in moderate districts, to be No-bots. All that arm-twisting of Joseph Cao, for example, was quite clarifying for all involved.
Why must everything the Republicans do be so jingoistic?
What does it say about the state of the Republican party that even after losing 49 seats over the last 2 cycles, their own campaign committee thinks that there are 30-50 additional incumbents who could face serious challenges? How much lower can they go?
Sure, who knows what the political environment will actually be like next November, but if this reflects the state of play now, it is a very sweet insight to the trainwreck which is the NRCC….
30-50? At least they are taking us seriously now.
Seems they have no money to go around though. Plus they aren’t even sure how many of their vulnerable incumbents are going to run again. What’s the point of fundraising for Bill Young, Henry Brown, or Mike Castle if they’re on the verge of calling it quits? For Jim Gerlach or Mark Kirk if they’re planning on bids for higher office?