SSP Daily Digest: 6/3 (Morning Edition)

Note: This digest was written entirely by DavidNYC.

  • AR-Sen: SEIU has a new ad out hitting Lincoln for her TARP vote and for her disloyalty during the health care debate. Props to CQ’s Matthew Murray for trying to nail down the size of the buy from SEIU, which would only say that the run is “comprehensive.” SEIU has gone pretty large in this race from day one, so they probably aren’t going cheap on us now.
  • CA-Sen: Carly Fiorina, in a move which will no doubt endear her to the teabaggers but embarrass her in the eyes of the state of California, has taken to decrying concerns about climate change as “worrying about the weather” in a new ad.
  • CO-Sen: I Do. Not. Care. about this stupid non-story. Why are journalists so damn breathless about crap like this? It’s like they’ve never heard of politics.
  • NV-Sen: According to an analysis by the WaPo, Chicken Lady may have spent $100K on her primary out of funds that were designated for the general election only. Lowden bought $220K worth of ad time, but had only about $100K of primary money (mostly a loan from herself) on hand, so that extra hundred grand had to come from somewhere. God, you know, I just can’t decide whom I’d rather face more: this crazy lady, or the other crazy lady. Harry Reid, you are one lucky dude. Just pray Danny Tarkanian doesn’t pull an Alice Kryzan/Creigh Deeds.
  • NV-Gov: A district court judge enjoined a shadowy conservative group, Alliance for America’s Future, from running ads until it registers with the Secretary of State, saying that voters have the right to know who is behind political advertising. The group, which has ties to Dick Cheney, had planned to spend $250K on behalf of GOPer Brian Sandoval.
  • SC-Gov: I don’t care about this story, either.
  • AR-02: In the AR-02 runoff, state House Speaker Robbie Wills, a white male, has been arguing that he’s “more electable” than state Senate Majority Leader Joyce Elliott, who is black and a woman. The chair of the Arkansas NAACP sees that a “code word for racism.” Wills responded by saying that Elliott has “extreme views” which are out of step with the district. I hope this primary doesn’t get much uglier, because words like that will be used by Republicans against whomever our nominee is.
  • CA-19: Dick Pombo is trying to win a GOP primary by reminding voters that he’s a longtime creature of Washington, DC. No wonder he lost.
  • ID-01: Dear Vaughn Ward: socks before shoes. Also, hire publicists to get your side of the story out before election day, not after. Actually, no – we love you, don’t change a thing!
  • MI-08: This is unfortunate. Kande Ngalamulume, the only Democrat running against GOP Rep. Mike Rogers, is dropping out of the race, just three weeks after formally announcing his candidacy. Though Ngalamulume hadn’t filed any FEC reports, Obama actually won this district 53-46 (a major swing from Bush’s 54-45 win over Kerry), and even being able to pin Rogers down just a bit would have been helpful. Michigan’s filing deadline was May 11th, and I’m not sure if local Dems can nominate a replacement.
  • NH-02: Some Teabagger Andrew Hemingway says he won’t get into the GOP primary in NH-02. Meh.
  • NY-13: It’s always confusing in NY-13, but here’s the deal: The state Conservative Party has given its backing to GOPer Michael Grimm, who was also endorsed by the Brooklyn wing of the party – even though the Staten Island Cons  recently got behind Dem Rep. Mike McMahon. (Party chair Mike Long wasn’t going to let McMahon get their nod, though.) To make things even more complicated, the SI Republican Party endorsed Grimm’s primary opponent, Michael Allegretti, as we mentioned last week, and the Brooklyn GOP did as well the week before. But Grimm has at least one big player on his side: Rudy Giuliani, who did a fundraiser for him earlier this week. Anyhow, I’m sure you can sniff the cat fud: Grimm has already locked up the Conservative line, but Allegretti could definitely win the Republican primary. There’s already a lot of bad blood between the two Republican Mikes, which means we could see something of an NY-23 redux here.
  • NY-18: Biden Alert! The VPOTUS squeezed in a fundraiser yesterday for… Nita Lowey? She has over $1.1 million on hand, and I’m not aware of any meaningful Republican challenger in this race. (Obama/Kerry: 62/58.) So what gives?
  • OK-02: This is interesting: Democratic state Sen. Jim Wilson says he’s going to launch a primary challenge to conservative Rep. Dan Boren. Wilson specifically cited Boren’s opposition to the healthcare reform bill in launching his campaign. The primary here is pretty soon, July 27th, though there’s also a run-off on August 24th. However, as of now, there are only two candidates in the race.
  • TN-08: The internal warfare continues in the GOP primary to replace retiring Rep. John Tanner. Though the NRCC is still touting agribusiness kingpin Stephen Fincher, ex-Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott is doing a fundraiser for Shelby County Commissioner George Flinn. An establishment divided against itself… yields to a teabagger?
  • WI-07: Hah! We mentioned the other day that establishment efforts to clear the primary field for Dem Julie Lassa hit a snag when Some Dude Joe Reasbeck said he was going to run. Well, turns out he’s run for office before: as a write-in (wait, there’s more) in Texas (heh, there’s still more) as a Republican (not done yet), earning 89 votes. Hold on, hold on – more! Who was he running against? Well, only the most famous write-in candidate of all time, Snelly Gibbr! Shit like this is why I love politics.

    • 173 thoughts on “SSP Daily Digest: 6/3 (Morning Edition)”

    1. Lowey has a self-funder running against her who has raised about $250k total (mostly from his own pocket). I still don’t see why he’d fundraiser for her and not someone who needs it more, like Bill Owens.

    2. sure is amusing.

      First proper sentence of the article: “For 14 years, Pombo held a special place in the hearts of America’s environmental movement somewhere next to Capt. Joseph Hazelwood of the Exxon Valdez and the hunter who shot Bambi’s mother.”

      Best quote in the article: “”Having Pombo represent a district that includes Yosemite National Park is like electing Godzilla as mayor of Tokyo,” said Warner Chabor, CEO of the California League of Conservation Voters.”

    5. The only reason this stuff is a story is because Obama went so far out of his way to claim to be a different kind of politician.  If he hadn’t promised change and new kind of Washington I doubt the press would be making such a big out of these stories.  

    6. So, the SI Cons endorsed the Dem McMahon, but the state party and Brooklyn Cons are with Grimm.

      Whose name is on the Conservative Party line on everyone’s NY-13 ballots?

      Is it split, with McMahon the “Conservative” on SI ballots but Grimm on the Brooklyn ballots?

      Or does the state party endorsement control?

    7. I viewed the Will Folks claim as a big deal for awhile, especially when he started revealing text messages and cell phone records that really were pretty damning in their own right.  But then he stopped releasing stuff, and Haley has been adamant that the claim is an outright lie and there was no infidelity.  So the past few days I’ve revisited whether Folks is being honest.

      Now Marchant comes through with the claim of a one-night stand, and I’m even more confused.  I can’t say “I don’t care about this story” the way James does, because there’s a real issue where someone is lying outright, and it’s a real reflection on the liar’s personal character.  But I’m no longer fully convinced Haley is lying……although, if she’s not, and Folks and Marchant are, then it’s the ballsiest (pun not intended when I first typed that but in retrospect I’ll claim it!) attack on a major candidate I’ve ever seen in my life.  It’s one thing to mischaraterize, even badly mischaracterize, something that actually happened, but it’s something else altogether to completely fabricate a sexual encounter that never came remotely close to happening.

    11. It looks like primarily a boost for Nate

      http://mediadecoder.blogs.nyti…

      The New York Times said Thursday that it would begin hosting the popular blog FiveThirtyEight and make its founder, Nate Silver, a regular contributor to the newspaper and the Sunday magazine.

    12. Well this puts the nail in the coffin of the notion (shared originally by me and many others on SSP) that the NYT hit on Blumenthal was his undoing.

      Rasmussen today:  Blumenthal 56, McMahon 33.  This follows DailyKos/Research 2000 showing 52-33, and Quinnipiac showing 56-31, both also well after the “Vietnam” story had settled in.

      http://www.rasmussenreports.co…

    14. But what I do care about is Romanoff throwing Obama under the bus for his own political gain. Swings and roundabouts perhaps but I’m not happy about it.

    16. With RAS showing only a one point lead for Blunt which Is a deadheat this means some should not dismiss A democratic

      pickup here anymore.While I wish we would get some non

      RAS polling here this helps confirm me feeling here this

      race Is a tossup.RAS previously had a 7/8 point Blunt

      lead.Robin Carnahan should not be dismissed.She was the

      only statewide Democrat to win here In 2004 when she

      was elected Secretary of State.

    17. Hey, if Inglis gets teabagged and his replacement is someone awful and embarrassing, think we could get Spartanburg Mayor Junie White to run? I know it’s a R+15 seat, but SC Republicans have become soooo embarrassing lately that I’m almost thinking he could win. Almost.

      Because Junie White seems awesome: http://www.towleroad.com/2010/…

    18. Ugh, what is it about blue state Republicans that makes them so self-destructive? Tom Campbell is clearly the most electable candidate. He’s been leading Barbara Boxer by 5+ points in the polls pretty consistently. He also doesn’t put out moronic ads like those. Yet for some reason California Republicans are embracing a failed CEO whose campaign is a joke.

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