SSP Daily Digest: 7/20 (Morning Edition)

  • WV-Sen: Gov. Joe Manchin is holding a press conference at 10am today to announce his intentions with regard to the special election for the late Sen. Robert Byrd’s now-vacant senate seat. Apparently, Manchin is paying for a live satellite feed, leading Mike Memoli to quip that this has to mean he’s running.
  • OH-Gov: Is this really the right way to be doing things? The Cleveland Plain-Dealer explains John Kasich’s strategy for dealing with the media:

    • Until now, Kasich has run a low-profile race with the exception of showing up on national Fox radio and television programs. His campaign advisors repeatedly dodge or refuse to answer questions from local media covering the race.

    Kasich must know it. Even as one of his spokesmen tried to pull him away from the media on Monday, Kasich held his ground and with one parting shot vowed to be more accessible.

    “There is this perception in some quarters that Kasich is not available. You think I am not available you call me,” he said. “Because I don’t think I’ve ever turned down any of your interviews, unless they are just stupid questions.”

    Uh, no. It’s not the right way. And nor is Kasich’s first ad, which we discussed yesterday, where he basically repeats Ted Strickland’s (dead-on) accusations against him. I’ve learned from a source that Kasich’s ad buy is actually for real – about $200K over three weeks, in Cincy and Columbus – but I don’t know if I’d be too unhappy about that if I were the Strickland team. Kasich is proving to be his own worst enemy.

  • TX-Gov: File this under “TX-Gov, 2006”: Rick Perry just settled a lawsuit with Chris Bell, his Democratic opponent from the last time Perry sought re-election, for some $426,000. Bell had accused Perry of trying to mask the source of a $1 million donation from Bob Perry, the kind of Swift Boat pond scum, in the waning days of the 2006 race.

    • Meanwhile, Obama alert! The POTUS is coming to Texas on August 9th to do two fundraisers, one for the DNC and one for the DSCC. I’m filing this under TX-Gov, though, because Dem gubernatorial candidate Bill White says he has no plans to attend either event.

  • ID-01: It was a bridge too far, even for Walt Minnick. The Democratic frosh is rejecting the endorsement of the Tea Party Express, on account of their refusal to refudiate racist jerkwad Mark Williams. (Click the link if you really need the backstory.) Minnick is still touting his support from local teabaggers, though.
  • NC-02: Remember Renee Ellmers? I don’t, either, but fortunately Politico reminds us she’s the GOPer who was hoping to capitalize on Bob Etheridge’s seriously over-the-top response to those weirdo Republican kids who were trying to videotape him doing something embarrassing (boy did they ever). But as one brave anonymous consultant says, Ellmers is clearly “not ready for prime time”: she utterly failed to capitalize on the gift she was handed and has only $42,000 in the bank, while Etheridge has $1.2 million.
  • NY-01: Good news: Rep. Tim Bishop scored the Independence Party line in his bid for re-election. Bishop also has the Working Families Party line.
  • NY-14: If there’s one thing Reshma Saujani is good at, it’s protesting too much. She’s as touchy about her Wall Street connections as John Kasich, claiming that “only” 25% of her donors in 2Q work in the banking industry. Justin Elliott at Salon crunched the numbers and found that this actually amounted to a full 48% of Saujani’s cash haul – even worse than the one-third I calculated represented her share from financiers in the first quarter. Another Salon writer, Alex Pareene, also points out how whack-ass Saujani’s messaging has been, trying to downplay her own extreme reliance on Wall Street while attacking Maloney for raising money from from financial types. Moreover, as Liz Benjamin details, Saujani has had a high burn rate ($1.2 million raised, $770K spent, and no TV as yet), and only $272K of her $428K on hand is primary money. The rest is only good for a phantom general election.
  • NY-20: More good Independence Party news: Rep. Scott Murphy will have the IP line free and clear. Republican Chris Gibson had hoped to challenge Murphy for the line in a primary, but the party refused to give Gibson the necessary “certificate of authorization” (known to hardcore NY junkies as a “Wilson-Pakula”) that allows candidates to run on the line of a party they are not a member of.
  • PA-07: Biden AND Pelosi alert! The fearsome twosome did a fundraiser in Philly yesterday that raised $250,000. Half will go to Bryan Lentz’s campaign coffers and half will go to the D-Trip.
  • VA-02: Republican Scott Rigell, trailing Rep. Glenn Nye by about a million bucks in the cash department, is dumping another $500K of his own money into his campaign, according to a spokesman. That brings his total self-loans to a pretty hefty $1.4 million.
  • WI-07: An interesting catch from WisPolitics: Just a week before announcing his retirement, Rep. Dave Obey spent $30,000 on polling. That means he took some very thorough surveys before deciding to hang up his spurs. He also still has a million bucks on hand – which will hopefully be making its way to the DCCC before long.
  • NY-AG: Definitely down in the weeds, but this is SSP, after all: SurveyUSA has a poll of the New York Attorney General’s race, a seat that’s open this year because the sitting one-term AG, Andrew Cuomo, is running for governor. Nassau County DA Kathleen Rice is the clear frontrunner with 32%. Assemblyman Richard Brodsky and state Sen. Eric Schneiderman are both at 9, while wealthy trial lawyer Sean Coffey and former state Ins. Comm’r (not an elected job)/former Securities Bureau chief at the AG’s office Eric Dinallo are both at 7. Part of the reason I’m posting this, though, is because I genuinely have no idea who I want to support. So I’m asking the New Yorkers here: who are you backing in this race, and why?

    • 79 thoughts on “SSP Daily Digest: 7/20 (Morning Edition)”

    2. Why is that down in the weeds? People in that position (Spitzer, Cuomo) can have big careers, and given its powers relating to Wall Street it can be a job with national implications. I don’t live there but I’m not crazy about Rice. She seems so purposefully moderate, and being hand-picked by Cuomo, well, her candidacy just seems so political.

    3. He’s done a masterful job in stretching out the special election suspense for nearly a month now, and he will almost certainly benefit from the fact that the length of this campaign will be about 3 1/2 months.

    4. Undoubtedly, he’s the most progressive candidate of a rather moderate bunch. Kathleen Rice is a notorious flip-flopper, loathed by progressives and a lot of downstate liberals, and, yet, because she’s the only female in the race, she’s probably the front-runner. My second favorite is probably Richard Brodsky, and then the other two I couldn’t care less about.

      I suspect, demographically, this race will be drawn upon geographical lines. There’s a long way to go between now and primary day, but if I had to take a stab at predicting this…

      NYC: (50%)

      Schneiderman – 40%

      Dinallo – 30%

      Rice – 20%

      Brodsky – 5%

      Coffey – 5%

      Upstate: (27%)

      Rice – 40%

      Schneiderman – 30%

      Brodsky – 10%

      Dinallo – 10%

      Coffey – 10%

      NYC Suburbs: (23%)

      Rice – 35%

      Brodsky – 20%

      Coffey – 20%

      Schneiderman – 15%

      Dinallo – 10%

      Overall: (100%)

      Schneiderman – 31%

      Rice – 29%

      Dinallo – 20%

      Brodsky – 10%

      Coffey – 10%

    7. …because he is the most qualified to actually do the job.

      He has worked in the AG’s office where he helped Spitzer transform it into a power to oversee Wall Street. He was the Insurance Superintendent of New York State where he forced insurance companies to cover same sex marriages from other states event though NYS hasn’t passed marriage equality. As an Ass’t DA in Manhattan, he helped lock up violent criminals.

      In short, he is exactly what you want in an AG….AND, he doesn’t want to use the office as a stepping stone to run for Governor.

      My $.02.

       

    10. Chuck Grassley will vote no on Elana Kagan. He also voted against confirming Sotomayor last year. Prior to that, he had never voted against confirming a SCOTUS nominee.

      Democracy for America just endorsed Roxanne Conlin. EMILY’s list endorsed her a few weeks ago. That should help her fundraising; Conlin’s brought in a lot, but Grassley still has a big cash on hand advantage.

      I won’t be at Netroots Nation, unfortunately, but Conlin will be there, so maybe some of you SSPers will get to meet her.

    11. I’m also very undecided.  I like the idea of Schneiderman, but I agree with the comment above that his mere presence in Albany during this last legislative session is grounds for voting against him.

      I don’t know much about Kathleen Rice, but she seems okay to me.  I have no problem with ambitious politicians — they’re all ego-centric and looking for the next thing–as long as they are effective.  If anyone knows a major, specific reason of why she’d be no good, please post it here…

    Comments are closed.