Democrat Becky Greenwald has been low on cash the last few weeks, but her campaign bought 60 seconds of air time on the CBS and NBC affiliates in Des Moines and Mason City immediately before Barack Obama’s prime-time special on October 29.
Greenwald’s ad was outstanding and could not have been more clear about the contrast between her and incumbent Tom Latham. Click the link to watch the commercial, which made clear that Latham is a Republican who’s voted with George Bush 94 percent of the time–even more often than John McCain. Meanwhile, the ad made clear visually and in the voice-over that Becky Greenwald is a Democrat who will support Barack Obama’s policies.
I hope they will be able to air this commercial during the final days of the campaign. Please donate to Greenwald’s campaign if you can afford to, so that more viewers will be exposed to this message. It’s much stronger than the biographical ad Greenwald was running in late September, which didn’t make much of a case against Latham.
We’ll find out next Tuesday if Obama’s coat-tails are enough to overcome Latham’s big edge in paid media. It’s a D+0 district where Democrats have made huge gains in voter registration in the past two years.
UPDATE: I forgot to mention that the United Auto Workers PAC has been running a radio ad criticizing Latham for voting for tax breaks for corporations and against equal pay for women. The ad also says we need Becky Greenwald in Congress.
Perhaps the timing of this diary is irregular considering we want to see as many Democrats as possible elected next week, but my own selection is connected to the current state of the electoral battleground in a sense. There are a number of strong contenders particularly in the House, and perhaps Tim Mahoney is currently the most obvious choice, at least for his brief remaining tenure in the House. Those with the stench of corruption encircling them, such as William Jefferson or even John Murtha, would also be worthy selections. Jim Marshall seems to be against the Dems on virtually ever major issue so I’m sure he’d get some votes. But after the final clincher this spring, I offer the dubious honor to Dan Boren of Oklahoma….
Boren has always essentially been Lieberman on steroids in terms of bad-mouthing the Democratic Party, making several cringeworthy quotes about his party’s “out-of-touch leadership” going way back to his first election in 2004. And of course he votes against us on essentially every major issue. But I was most disgusted with him last spring after the primaries ended when Boren publicly declared he would not cast his superdelegate for Barack Obama, twisting the knife in the chest of an already divided party and making a destructive spectacle out of a vote that would have been uncontroversial.
One could almost understand if Jim Marshall had done this because Marshall is in a hotly contested district. But Boren would not have lost his Congressional seat by keeping his mouth shut and casting his superdelegate for his party’s nominee….or even casting the superdelegate for Hillary in silence. Instead, Boren stuck it to Obama and gave comfort to every Oklahoman with doubts about Obama.
I realize Boren won’t be going away and that a conservative Democrat is the only kind that can hold this seat, but I would love to see Brad Carson take this seat back. At least he didn’t go out of his way to trash his party, and when pressed by Tim Russert back in 2004 on who he planned to vote for, said without hesitancy that he planned to vote for his party’s nominee.
Hi everyone! My name is James and I am interested in running for Congress.
Why? Well, I think every American has a right to run for Congress, regardless of their social class or economic class.
I am a Democrat from a centre-right district. My congressman, Paul Kanjorski, is in the political battle of his life. This one’s gonna be a nailbiter, folks.
If Lou Barletta wins, I think the Democrats need to field a strong candidate in 2010. If nobody’s gonna run, I think I’ll give it a try.
There’s a few problems for me though:
1. I’m 23. I will be 25 by Election Day 2010 and therefore meet the age requirement to serve in Congress in January of 2011.
2. I’m gay. That one kinda speaks for itself. This district has no gay base to speak of. Remember: This is Scranton, not San Francisco.
3. I have never held elective office before. Now I know it’s not a requirement one does, and really this year inexperience is all the rage. Let’s be honest, folks, even if I had a Harvard degree in law and served 8 years in the State Legislature, I could still lose and lose badly.
These are the issues that I plan to read up about and talk about in the campaign:
1. Border and Port Security- The cargo on the ships coming to the United States is not properly investigated. That whole fiasco with the ports being owned by Saudi Arabia a few years back? Let’s bring it up again. And we need to secure the borders. Lou Dobbs is right.
2. National Security- The President of Iran is a nutjob. He wants to wipe Israel off the map. We cannot let that happen. I’m very pro-Israel.
3. Law and Order- It’s time to do what Nixon did in ’68 that won him the election. There’s a lot of crime out here, a lot of thugs and criminals, there’s school gangs now. It’s time to crack down on crime. We need more cops on the street and harsher penalties for those who try to hurt innocent people.
4. Social Security- A BIG ISSUE for a Democrat running in Pennsylvania. It’s time for the people in Washington to be straight with the American people. Is it going to last for my generation or not? If not, then let’s start thinking of new ideas NOW. The Trust Fund has been ROBBED. The Bush tax cuts stole money from the middle class to give to the upper crust elites. That money could have been used to make Social Security solvent.
5. Veterans – There’s Vietnam veterans sleeping under the bridge out here by Walmart and I’m disgusted at the treatment they have received. They are still suffering from post traumatic stress and therefore aren’t able to readjust well to civilian life. They sacrificed their lives for us. Now it’s up to us to take care of them. I will bring up this issue because somebody’s got to talk about it.
I need to form the Clinton Coalition again. Mrs. Clinton was popular here because she took the words right out of our mouths and said the things we were feeling about feeling invisible. I always thought Barack was more of a Starbucks kind of Democrat. I’m reluctantly supporting him. I would have preferred Hill.
Elitism is very much hated out here.
To win here, a Democrat needs to get “the Walmart voter” and convince them that their economic interests are best served by the Democrats than the Republicans.
I’m going to need some help here, and I’m asking you all now to offer some advice for me. So reply back to me!
In the list of last week’s DCCC independent expenditures posted by James this weekend, the comments section contains, well, let’s just say “scattered boos” concerning the money the DCCC is spending on incumbent defense instead of long-shot pickups. To give that discussion a little more form and focus, I thought I’d put together a table listing the races that are on SSP’s competitive house ratings chart but aren’t getting DCCC independent expenditures… and order them according to their position on SSP’s Bang for the Buck index, which is an approximate measure of how expensive it is to advertise on broadcast media in that district (smaller numbers are cheaper).
Got a race on there that you like that isn’t getting DCCC IE support? There’s still a week left, so contact the DCCC and ask… or better yet, give directly to the candidate and hope they can sneak a last minute media buy in.
Turning to SSP’s House Ratings, every race where we’re on offense that’s rated Likely D or Lean D is getting DCCC expenditures. Of the tossups, only 2 out of 23 are not receiving DCCC expenditures, and in neither case is that a problem: LA-04, where the primary runoff hasn’t even happened yet and all the action is going to happen after Nov. 4, and FL-08, where Alan Grayson seems intent on self-funding and doing things his way.
Of the 12 races currently rated Lean R, only 1 is not receiving DCCC expenditures: NV-02. This one is kind a puzzle, as Jill Derby has been hanging around within the single digits, and Nevada, especially Washoe County, has been seeing a Democratic surge. This may be one of those cases where both candidate and DCCC agree that a DCCC-branded campaign wouldn’t really fit the district’s still-sagebrushy nature.
When you drop down to Likely R, though, only 4 of the 19 races are receiving DCCC expenditures: SC-01, VA-05, WV-02, and WY-AL. (And bear in mind that some of these four races may get upgraded to Lean R soon… not that we specifically base our upgrades on DCCC decisions; after all, we see many of the same polls that the DCCC does.) The rest of the Likely Rs should be considered the true long-shots, but remember that in 2006 we did score a couple victories out of that pool (Loebsack and Shea-Porter).
Here are the non-DCCC-funded races, in order of expense:
District
Markets
Score
LA-07
Lafayette (220)
Lake Charles (94)
314
IA-04
Des Moines (414)
Rochester MN (143)
Cedar Rapids (negligible)
Sioux City (negligible)
557
LA-04
Shreveport (382)
Alexandria (93)
Lake Charles (94)
569
LA-01
New Orleans (672)
672 *
NV-02
Las Vegas (651)
Reno (255)
Salt Lake City (811 *)
906
CA-50
San Diego (1,026)
1,026
AL-03
Birmingham (717)
Montgomery (245)
Columbus GA (205)
Atlanta (negligible)
1,167
FL-08
Orlando (1,346)
1,346
OH-07
Columbus OH (891)
Dayton (514)
1,405
FL-18
Miami (1,523)
1,523
NC-10
Charlotte (1,020)
Greenville SC (815)
1,835
TX-07
Houston (1,939)
1,939
FL-13
Tampa (1,710)
Ft. Myers (462)
2,172
VA-10
Washington DC (2,253)
2,253
TX-10
Houston (1,939)
Austin (589)
2,528
PA-15
Philadelphia (2,926)
2,926
CA-46
Los Angeles (5,536)
5,536
NJ-05
New York (7,380)
7,380
(* = LA-01 was not researched as part of the original Bang for the Buck index. I’m not sure, but it may also extend into the Baton Rouge market.)
The campaign schedule has been pretty intense over the last week and will continue to be so until the BIG day on Tuesday, November 4th. I want to congratulate everyone for putting so much effort into this year’s election, not just for an individual campaign, but for the entire Democratic ticket. I’ve seen people in every community throughout the 5th district working to make sure the message is getting out.
I want to remind everyone it is important that we finish strong. Don’t take anything for granted, ignore the polls and work like the polls show our candidates 5 points down. Remember, while all indications show Barack Obama will be our next president, if we believe the polls, Al Gore would be concluding his second term or we would be working to re-elect President John Kerry right now.
On a personal note specifically dealing with our campaign for the United State Congress, I want to assure everyone that I am working as hard as I can heading into the final week of the campaign. Back in January when Kelly and I decided we would enter the race we knew that 2008 would be a difficult year for our family. We’ve missed opportunities to do things as a family but we knew solving the problems besieging our nation required a sacrifice. What is encouraging is watching the work everyone is doing and seeing people giving of their time and donating their personal skills to bring a positive result on November 4th.
For the final week, I ask that everyone keep in mind what the real goal is. The real goal isn’t just to win an election, what we are working for in 2008 is to take back our future. I’ve been stressing to voters the last couple of weeks to realize over the last 8 years poor decisions in Washington have put the future for our children and grandchildren in jeopardy. The one issue more apparent than any other is the outrageous deficit and debt that George W. Bush will leave behind when he moves out of the White House in January.
My Republican opponent constantly says the “Bush tax cuts are our tax cuts” when the real truth is the Bush debt is our debt. The only way we are going to get our future back is by voting for the right people on November 4th who will make the tough decisions to put our country back in order. It all starts with making our federal government fiscally strong so we can invest in our nation and make the lives of all our citizens better. Sacrifice will be necessary, but in the end our country will be better.
A Very Important Endorsement:
I am please to announce that my candidacy has received the endorsement of the Veterans and Military Families for Progress. In the letter informing our campaign of the endorsement the organization stated “Veterans and Military Families for Progress has chosen to endorse your campaign. We do this in recognition of your support of veteran, active duty, guard, reserve, and military family issues. We hope that in some way our endorsement provides you an electoral advantage and ultimately ensures your election to the Pennsylvania Fifth Congressional District seat”.
This is a very important endorsement to receive from a prestigious organization that is dedicated to supporting the issues important of the active military and their families along with our veterans. This is an endorsement our campaign can be very proud to receive.
Campaign Commercial:
We are getting our message of fiscal responsibility out to the people of this district. We have a plan to right the ship and move in a new direction that includes balancing the budget, paying down the debt and investing here at home.
We can’t afford any more of the “borrow and spend” mentality that has gotten us in this situation. This debt is a national security issue and we intend to confront it with the experience and even-handedness it requires.
Review of the Past Week on the Campaign Trail:
I participated in 4 more candidate debates this week. We started off Monday evening with a 2 hour debate from Mansfield University in Tioga County that was broadcast live on PCN. Tuesday and Wednesday brought debates in smaller venues with stop in Bellefonte on Tuesday and an event on Wednesday in Lewistown. On Thursday all 3 candidates participated in a live 1 hour debate broadcast live on WPSU-TV.
The one thing I’ve taken out of all these debates that I’ve participated in, some just with my Republican opponent and others that also included the Libertarian candidate, is I am on the right side of the issues that affect the majority of the people in the 5th district. When you list off the issues we are regularly asked about in the debates — Fiscal Responsibility, Health Care Reform, Social Security, Public Education Policy, Energy Policy and the Iraq War, the stances I take which mostly mirrors the rest of the Democratic Party platform are in line with what I am hearing from voters in the 5th district. We won’t know until next week if what I’m saying is really resonating with the voters in the 5th district but I feel confident that our message is strong and voters are listening.
Saturday finished the week with a strong day of campaigning. I started out the day at 1 PM in Emporium, Cameron County for the fall Democratic luncheon. I then made a 70 mile dash to Lock Haven to attend a 3 PM GOTV rally headlined by Gov. Ed Rendell. I shared the stage with Rep. Mike Hanna, Obama campaign rep. Jayson Harpster, Clinton County Commissioners Joel Long and Adam Coleman, Lock Haven Mayor Rick Vilello and Clinton County Democratic Chairman Dave Wallace. Then it was on to a 5 PM appearance in Boalsburg at the Centre County Democratic Fall banquet with Gov. Rendell and all the Democratic candidates representing Centre County. The long day ended with a final stop after 7 PM in Lewistown for the Mifflin County Democratic Fall banquet.
Schedule for Upcoming Week:
Monday — 6 PM — Meeting with Federal Credit Union Members — Hampton Inn DuBois
Tuesday — 8 AM — Radio Interview WRSC
Tuesday — 9:30 AM — Tour of AccuWeather
Tuesday — 6:30 PM — Debate in New Bethlehem / Clarion County sponsored by League of Women Voters
Wednesday — 7 PM — Penn State Political Science Debate — West Hall Commons Building — Main Campus
Thursday — 8 AM — Radio Interview — DuBois
Thursday — 7 PM — WPSU Radio Debate
Friday — 8 AM — Radio Interview with Jerry Fisher — State College
Saturday — Time TBD — GOTV Rally in Clarion County
Sunday — Time TBD — GOTV Rally in State College
FUNDRAISING REMINDER — Keep talking with people about the 5,000 Friends to Flip the Fifth project. We can win the 5th District Congressional District for the first time in 32 years but we need to be organizing our forces heading into the final weeks. The only way to turn this country around is to send people to Washington who will make the tough decisions. The choice in the 5th district is clear. My opponent regularly states that he supports the fiscal policies of the Bush administration AKA “the Bush tax cuts” and will continue them — More of the Same. While I continue to stress that we must balance the budget, built a surplus and pay down the debt.
In order to get the message out to voters we will need to advertise which costs money. Please contact your family and friends and urge them to financially support our campaign as we move into the final weeks. Donations can be made online through www.actblue.com or by direct mail to McCracken for Congress, PO Box 332, Clearfield PA 16830.
Mark B. McCracken
Your Candidate For Congress
————————————————————————————————–
This diary is cross-posted at McCracken’s campaign blog, PA’s Blue Fifth
Today, the Zeitz for Congress campaign unveiled a new radio advertisement titled “Eight Nights.” The ad draws attention to Chris Smith’s failure to live in New Jersey, having spent only eight nights in the state during 2007, and the recent revelation that Smith received nearly $80,000 in tuition breaks reserved only for official Virginia residents.
“After twenty-eight years in Congress, Chris Smith has become a creature of Washington. The voters I speak with are shocked and outraged when they learn Chris Smith refuses to live in New Jersey and does not pay our high property taxes. For many of them, learning Smith receives in-state tuition discounts in Virginia is the final straw,” said Josh Zeitz. “It’s not too much to ask that our representative in Congress actually lives in New Jersey.”
Key Facts:
* Chris Smith spent only eight days in 2007. [PolitickerNJ 4/28/08]
* Chris Smith is the only member of the New Jersey delegation to not own a home in New Jersey. [PolitickerNJ 4/28/08] He’s saved nearly $60,000 in property taxes by living in Virginia.
* Chris Smith receives in-state tuition benefits reserved only for official Virginia residents. [Politico 10/20/08]
Josh needs your help to defeat Chris Smith. Please consider volunteering as well as contributing to the campaign. To put it bluntly, the more money we can raise the more play this ad gets on the radio, and the more undecided voters we can reach. We also need volunteers to help get out the vote. To volunteer contact ian_at_joshzeitz_dot_com.
Last weekend my fellow Iowa blogger 2laneIA published a comprehensive diary on Congressman Steve King’s “greatest hits.” Click the link to read about King’s suggestion that we electrify the border fence with Mexico like we do “with livestock,” his prediction that terrorists will be “dancing in the streets” if Obama becomes president, and his pride in working to scale back funding for the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (which he calls Socialist Clinton-style Hillarycare for Illegals and their Parents). I mentioned a few more low points for King in this post.
According to Iowa Independent, King suggested that electing Obama could be a step toward totalitarian rule:
“When you take a lurch to the left you end up in a totalitarian dictatorship,” King said. “There is no freedom to the left. It’s always to our side of the aisle.”
10:12 a.m.: King gives the first of what will be two speaking opportunities, this one the longer, for nine minutes. He lays out several versions of the words “liberal” and “socialist” in describing Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. He mentions the ACORN group and earns a big “Booooo.” King said a Google search of “Acorn Fraud” gets you 2 million hits of possible stories.
King said it’s not a stretch to link Obama to the ACORN group, since he worked for them in voting matters. “Obama is ACORN… When I see Obama, I see ACORN branded on his forehead,” King said.
King has embarrassed Iowans with his bigotry and extremism for too long.
I suspected that Republican Congressman Tom Latham’s internal polling must be showing a close race when he put up a negative tv ad on the bailout. Now the first public poll of Iowa’s fourth district is out. Research 2000 for Daily Kos found this:
Tom Latham 47
Becky Greenwald 42
undecided 11
Click the link for the internals.
Interestingly, the same poll found John McCain leading Barack Obama in the fourth district by 46 to 42 percent. Given the many polls showing Obama above the 50 percent mark in Iowa, I would have thought Obama would be leading McCain in this D+0 district.
If Greenwald is doing as well in IA-04 as Obama, then I feel really good about our chances for an upset in this district. Obama’s superior ground game could easily be worth several percentage points on election day.
Paging EMILY’s list and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee: please start spending some money on tv ads in this district! Greenwald has launched a good web ad recently, but she hasn’t been on tv for the past ten days or so.
EMILY’s List endorsed Greenwald last month, and the DCCC added her to Red to Blue in early October, but I am not aware of any independent expenditures on her behalf yet. (UPDATE: Supposedly the United Auto Workers just went up on the air with an anti-Latham radio ad, but I haven’t heard it and don’t have a transcript.)
A normal House cattle call (which we have done in the past) would require you to submit a list of seats in order of their likelihood of flipping, but frankly, I find that a bit boring. Instead, why don’t we try this: Confining ourselves to the realm of realistic expectations, what is the best possible scenario for House Republicans on election night? In other words, let me put it this way: Where is “the floor” for Democratic gains in the House?
2006 was pretty bad for Republicans, but it could have been worse. They dodged a few bullets and won a fair share of squeakers (NC-08, NY-29, OH-02, FL-13, etc). It’s not inconceivable that a few incumbents could hang on again by the skin of their teeth. But looking at the key races, we have a handful in the bag already, and a number that are either leaning or tilting our way. In a wave year, “tossup” races tend to break at a greater than 50-50 rate for the victorious party, so I suspect that Democrats will be wrecking shop in this column, as well. And it’s very possible that we’ll see upsets in districts that are seemingly “leaning” or “likely” Republican, too.
So even at my most conservative guess, it’s hard for me to see Democrats picking up fewer than 20 seats. It’s amazing, but losing “only” 20 seats would count as a “good” night for Republicans — or perhaps “best-case nightmare” for the NRCC would be a better way of putting it. I’m sure that there are some people at the DCCC who would wring my neck for saying that, but increasingly, it seems to me like that’s the best that Tom Cole and friends can do right now. And even that is going to be a gloomy night for them.
One last note: that number doesn’t include any losses on our side. Tim Mahoney is a certain goner (just resign, dude), and while Kanjorski might still pull things out, he has an aura of political doom around him right now and it would be no shock to see him lose.
After the third quarter fundraising deadline, there’s one more report that candidates running for the House must file with the FEC: the pre-general fundraising report covering the period from October 1st through October 15th. DavidNYC and I have rounded up all the key numbers in this handy chart below (all figures are in thousands):
Note: Instead of listing totals raised by each campaign, we’ve gone with the broader category of receipts (which includes transfers, loans and the like).