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

  3. What’s the most ridiculously vicious attack one candidate has ever made on another same-party candidate against whom he/she was running in a primary?

    One contender would have to be Susan Bitter Smith’s attempt to nuke the entire Republican field in her 1998 Congressional primary, by leaking damning information about another candidate to a third candidate and pressuring Candidate #3 to make the information public.  (The two other candidates got together and collectively burned the documents, and then both badmouthed Bitter Smith to the press.)

  4. but I am tacking a family vacation to New York City and was wondering if anyone knew of some good places to go that I wouldn’t think of. It is my fourth time there, so I have done all of the normal tourist stuff, but I am looking for some interesting sights that only New Yorkers would know of. Also if it relates to politics that’s cool. Sorry if its too off topic.  

  5. Great to see a sign that makes me just kind of want to verbally abuse the person holding it instead of rushing them to an elementary school to learn how to spell and to find out what the founding fathers really thought.

    Here is my all time favorite “holding sign” picture.

    Dont be wearing some hideous ankle-length skirt protesting gays, we will lash out at fashion stupidity more so than intellectual stupidity at times.

  6. Another staff change in the Culver campaign:

    Culver’s campaign finance director, Grace Van Cleave, announced she was leaving this week and was no longer with the campaign on Thursday.

    “It just wasn’t the right fit,” said campaign manager Abby Curran, who was hired last month.

    Van Cleave was hired last month and came to Culver’s campaign after working as a top fundraiser for the Democratic Governors Association. She had also worked as a finance aide for former Gov. Tom Vilsack’s Heartland PAC.

    Deputy campaign manager Jesse Harris gave his notice this week that he was leaving to become a senior adviser to Iowa Secretary of State Michael Mauro. Harris was still working on the campaign Thursday and plans to begin his new position March 8. […]

    Harris was a key staffer in Culver’s 2006 election campaign and had rejoined him as deputy campaign manager for his 2010 bid late last summer. Harris said the position in the secretary of state’s office offered an opportunity to broaden his largely political background to include policy work in government.

    Meanwhile, the Republican field is down to three candidates, and dark horse State Representative Rod Roberts insists he will stay in until the June primary. I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, I think his presence in the primary will mostly help Terry Branstad.

    On the other hand, I am glad Roberts is leaving Iowa House district 51 open, because we should have a decent shot at picking that up. The Carroll area is one of the more Democratic pockets of western Iowa. Iowa Democrats have a 56-44 majority in the Iowa House. It’s not hard to think of seven or eight vulnerable Democratic-held seats, but I think we will pick up House district 74, and if we can pick up Roberts’ district too it will be a tremendous uphill climb for the GOP to take over the lower chamber.

    Fortunately, Iowa Republicans still don’t know how to run an absentee ballot drive and hired a relatively inexperienced executive director (Jim Anderson) to handle their GOTV this fall.

  8. http://voices.washingtonpost.c…

    Money quote:

    “If Griffith foregoes fundraising until the session ends in mid-March, he’ll have barely two weeks to begin filling his federal coffers before the next reporting period closes, meaning that his April 15 finance report will be skimpy indeed. But if he does raise money, he’ll open himself up to criticism from his opponent, who  won’t have to look too hard in the archives to find comments from Griffith criticizing Democrats for holding their annual Jefferson-Jackson fundraising dinner during the legislative session.”

    First, context: In Virginia, members of the state legislature are prohibited from fundraising during the legislative session, but the restriction can’t be enforced for federal races. So, I’m honestly shocked that Griffith is even considering forgoing fundraising for the next two weeks. If he doesn’t start raising money immediately, he’s not going to have a chance in hell at beating Boucher. There’s the hypocrisy angle, sure, but that’s never stopped a Republican before from using the IOKIYAR logic to allow it.

  9. Republican Congressman John Linder announced his retirement this morning at the Gwinnett County GOP’s HQ.

    The GOP Primaries in Georgia are insane this year. Governor and Insurance Commissioner and GA-09 all have a ton of candidates running. GA-07 will probably end up the same way.

  10. So, here’s a question I thought would make a good weekly open thread topic. It’s become almost a cliche on this site and other progressive sites like Kos to use the term “This is good news for John McCain” or other variations as a way of making fun of pundits who spin bad news for one candidate as just the opposite.

    I became a member of this site recently. I did use it last year but not as much, and I’m wondering of some you grizzled veterans of SSP could tell me where this phrase originated? I assume it was some pundit of the Michael Barone variety who tried to spin bad news for John McCain, or maybe several pundits, but I’m curious if anyone remembers when this was first picked up on.  

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