Hope She's Said Her Goodbyes

Arkansas ConservaDem Blanche Lincoln just got herself a primary challenger and almost immediately lost the support of labor. Wonder if she will pull a hamstring trying to run to the left now.

In her case I don't think anyone can save her though. Not her big war chest nor the power of the President. Toast would have a better shot at reelection.

Just Stay The Hell Out Of The Way

By now hopefully most of you have heard that some members of the RNC and the Republican wingnut base want to conduct purity tests on candidates and current members of Congress so they can decide to deny funding to the campaigns of Republicans who do not pass said test. I think this is the greatest idea since sliced bread honestly and just about the only thing that will make this backfire on to Democrats is if we get in the way of what is sure to be a cannibalistic blood bath in the Republican Party next year.

What we need to do right now while they are having intraparty fights is concentrate on getting legislation passed. Oh sure we can do like we did back in grade school and when one GOP candidate challenge's another's conservative cred we can pump it up and make a big deal out of it in an effort to get the other guy to escalate the beef even further. But to me that should be the extent of it. These imbeciles are going to kill their electoral chances all on their own, they don't need any help at all.

Don't worry about generic ballots and polls right now, the mid term elections are still a year away. What Democratic strategists should be doing is tracking just how many contradictions all of the Republicans and I mean ALL of the Republicans are making in order to move to the right and win their primaries. As I said before the wingnut base doesn't give a shit about consistency. All they care about is conformity. So calling out their contradictions now don't really harm them at all, and it allows them to kind of catch themselves and not make too big a fool of themselves. Hell you already see Crist starting to flip flop BACK to his original position of supporting the stimulus. Thats not really what we want to have happen. We want him to stay on the wrong side of history and then bust his ass when the general comes around.

If we just keep documenting all the flip flopping it is going to be startling to general election voters in the middle how many hoops Republican candidates are willing to jump through in order to appease their base. Especially on issues having to do with global warming, something most people who aren't Republicans accept as reality. We want whomever to come out alive from a Republican primary to look like a wingnut right wing boogey man to the average person. And I can promise you that if we just stay out of the way and let them have at it, thats exactly what will happen.

Not only does this mean we won't lose as many seats as folks think we will right now, it also means we will pick up some seats that people aren't counting on. Arlen Specter had it right earlier this year when he switched parties (although I know a lot of people still aren't happy about that). He said that these wingnut groups putting wingnut candidates up to challenge Republicans who are already pretty far to the right by most folks standards don't really give a shit about winning and losing elections. For them its about taking the Republican Party as far to the right as they can go even if that means nobody trusts them to ever run the country.

So please folks, for the love of all that is good and cuddly, lets just sit on the sidelines for most of these fights. A little goading is ok once in awhile but lets not make ourselves a target that they can end up unifying behind. And lets not do such a great job of pointing out their hypocrisy NOW that they end up changing course and pulling back from the cliff.

Hell if they wanna jump, lets let em jump!

A Mountain Of Evidence

I am not sure there is anyone on the planet that is still not convinced that Charlie Crist isn't lying through his teeth about his earlier support for the stimulus bill but just in case check out this exchange from the Rolling Stone.

But when I interviewed Crist this spring for my piece The GOP Jihad, here’s what he told me he’d have done had he had a darn vote:

Rolling Stone: Just a final question: Had you been in the Senate, would you have voted with the other Republicans for the stimulus package?

Crist: Absolutely.

Like I said before, this isn't likely to affect Republican voters in his primary against Rubio because for them his conformity is a good thing regardless of the hypocrisy it shows. But should he make it out of that primary this will definitely doom his electoral prospects.

Voters kind of expect politicians to lie. What they don't expect is for that politician to try to play them for fools.

He Is Just Not Very Bright

I don't know how Charlie Crist has made it thus far in politics, but it has become increasingly clear that the guy just isn't very smart. I mean I understand how much pressure he feels now to go full wingnut after the NY 23 debacle and Marco Rubio hot on his heels. But you have to be a special kind of stupid to try to lie about your support for a stimulus bill not even a full year ago and then not have the common sense to take evidence (ie truth)to the contrary down from your own website.

Tuesday I joined President Barack Obama for a town hall meeting in Fort Myers to discuss with Floridians the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

During the town hall, I reiterated my support for the federal stimulus package, and pledged to the people of Florida that here in Florida we stand ready to use our share of the money quickly and responsibly to create new jobs and serve our most vulnerable citizens.

There is no doubt that these are historic, challenging times for this nation – and our state.

We are balancing our budget here, even when it calls for difficult decisions. We cut spending by $2.5 billion dollars during the recent special Legislative session.

But even as we tighten our belts, we need a stimulus to help the people of Florida, and to help every state that is hurting. This federal stimulus package is a bridge of help for Florida.

This reminds me of the kind of revisionist history the Bushies tried to pull off after no WMDs were found in Iraq. At what point will the people of Florida get fed up with the way Crist insults your intelligence?

Hopefully, soon...

Fugazi?

There is something fishy going on in the state of Florida and it has to do with then entrance of former Miami mayor Maurice Ferre into the Democratic primary opposing Congressman Kendrick Meek.

No, there's more than badly written emails here. For one thing, Maurice has an influential friend in longtime Republican strategist Roger Stone, a resident of Miami. Stone, the architect of (among other things) the infamous "Willie Horton" ads for George H.W. Bush in 1988 that effectively derailed Michael Dukakis' candidacy, actually is an old pal of mine, too -- I neglected to follow up on it here at the blog (and I wish I had), but a year ago when I did my on-air pre-election pundit gig for the European cable network Sky News, I went mano-a-mano (psst, Maurice ... that's Spanish, too!) with the estimable Stone on continent-wide television, analyzing political advertising -- a bit of a David vs. Goliath scenario, sure, but I didn't totally crap my pants or anything.

Anyway, Adam Smith of The Buzz delved into the Stone-Ferre connection a few days ago:

I didn't take Miami resident Stone especially seriously when he predicted months ago that another Democratic U.S. Senate candidate would emerge and very likely beat Kendrick Meek for the nomination. So when former Miami Mayor Maurice Ferre jumped in, I wondered about his relationship with Stone, who has a reputation for being in the middle of bizarre political theatrics- from the "Brooks Brothers riots" that shut down the Miami-Dade recount in 2000 to the Al Sharpton presidential campaign in 2004.

"Roger Stone is a friend of mine for many, many years, and he has been for many years an adviser...He talked to me about this race about a year ago and said you need to keep an eye on this race,'' said Ferre, who also stressed that Stone is not advising or directly involved in his campaign.

Stone - who has previously worked alongside several of Ferre's Democratic consultants - said the same thing: "I'm a Republican. I'm not switching sides." Stone said he backs Charlie Crist, even if it doesn't always seem that way. "Maurice Ferre is a very old friend of mine with whom I have strong regard. I urged him to start looking at this race before Charlie Crist was a canddiate...I have always believed that Democratic nomination could be worth having for a candidate for broad appeal."

"Stone is not advising or directly involved in his campaign." Okay. Indirectly, though? It would be irresponsible not to speculate....

But wait -- there's more. Ferre's campaign manager, Todd Wilder, had worked on Rod Smith's unsuccessful bid for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination in 2006, but after Jim Davis won the primary, Wilder switched over to support Charlie Crist through a 527 (in Florida, they're known as "ECOs, " or "electioneering communications organization") called the "Coalition for Bipartisan Progress" (CBP) However, not only did Wilder's group support the GOP candidate -- Crist -- in 2006, but subsequently they've been in bed with a lot of other right-wing groups with oxymoronic names like "Families for Conservative Values" and "People for Integrity in Government." So Wilder raised money for Charlie Crist and now he's managing Ferre's campaign for the Democratic Senate nomination ... where the GOP nominee is none other than Charlie Crist? Where there's smoke ....

Now I am not saying for sure that Ferre is up to no good, and he did in fact have a somewhat decent run as the mayor of Miami at one point. But that was way back in the 80s and this seems to be something totally out of the blue. What would make a person who couldn't even win the Miami mayor's office again as recently as 2004 think they are a viable candidate for the U.S. Senate. Who exactly is whispering in his ear?

I don't know the answer to these questions and I don't want to jump to any conclusions. But I will be checking Mr Ferre out very closely and see where he goes with his primary bid. If he looks to be anything but on the up and up you will definitely hear about it from me.

When will Claire McCaskill Apologize?

Here is what Democratic Senator Claire McCaskill had to say to Anderson Cooper about the incident where the woman with the Rosa Parks poster was escorted out forcefully by the police after a teabagger snatched it and tore it up.




Here is what actually happened along with a contrast in what happened to some white attendees who were holding their own signs.





I just want to know at what point will Senator McCaskill apologize to those women who were thrown out, to Representative Scott for calling him irresponsible and to all of us for the way she tried to dismiss the claims of racism so flippantly?

And if she doesn't, at what point do we start looking for a progressive alternative in a Democratic primary against her in a few years? She doesn't seem to understand that she is now representing a blue state anyway. It might be time to put a real Democrat from Missouri in office.

Arlen Better Get His Weight Up

Looks like Joe Sestak is coming for the crown.



And uhmm CNN next time give TPM the respect they are due, assholes.

Get Yo Popcorn Ready

Now that my Governor, Republican Charlie Crist, has announced his intention to run for the Senate next year its officially game time for the right wing base of the GOP. One of his primary contenders, uber "conservative" Marco Rubio, has already released an attack ad.




The truth is Charlie Crist is the Republicans' best hope for winning the Senate seat but because he isn't a wingnut its highly likely that the party will trash him in the primary and he won't end up being their choice for the general election. They have already started hitting him for endorsing the stimulus bill which was of course the right thing to do. I imagine it won't be long before they start spreading the rumors about Governor Crist's sexual orientation either. I am sure the Club for Growth will also ultimately be involved.

My advice for the Democratic Party is to just stand back and let them do all of the work for us. There is no need to get in between a really good street fight. And in end its highly likely that after the Republican primary is all said and done, whomever survives will be so beaten up that they will no longer be a viable candidate. I like Crist and I think he has been a decent governor but I really don't think the base of his party is going to allow him to represent them. While its good for us it definitely sucks for them because there is no doubt in my mind that Crist is the strongest candidate they could field.

Ridge Is Out

Looks like its going to be Pat Toomey as the Republican nominee in the general election in Pennsylvania.

An Admission Of Guilt

After Arlen Specter announced that he was switching over to the Democratic Party he said part of the reason why he was doing so was because of the radicalization of the Repubican Party in his home state of Pennsylvania. Basically because so many Republicans left the party last year, what was left of the party was the fringe uber conservative, uber religious right wingnuts. In his own words Specter said he wasn't willing to have that group judge his years of service. Because the republicans in Pennsylvania are now mostly wingnuts all of the polling shows former leader of the Club For Growth, Pat Toomey leading Specter by around 20 points in a Republican primary. And he went through and talked about how the Club For Growth has ruined the Republican party by running far right candidates in primaries and beating sitting GOP members of Congress only to have their far right candidate get destroyed in general elections. He ended up by saying that the Republican party should rise up against the Club For Growth if they ever wanted to change their minority status.

Now soon after Specter's announcement several high profile Republicans came out to slam the move and dispute his characterization of the party. According to them he was just running from the fight and Toomey was a mainstream candidate who could win not only the primary but also the general election. There was all kinds of fantasy based happy talk saying that Specter leaving the party was a great development for the GOP. This was supposedly the first step in the resurgence of the party they said.

Well it seems like since those proclamations some lightbulbs have come on with other people in the Republican party and they are starting to see the truth of Specter's words.

Still stunned by Arlen Specter's party switch, Republican senators are pessimistic about the chances for conservative GOP hopeful Pat Toomey in the Pennsylvania Senate race.

"I don't think there is anybody in the world who believes he can get elected senator there," said Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah, the vice chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

Asked if the NRSC would back Toomey, Hatch said, "I don't think so" and that the party should look for "someone who can win there."

Now think about what Hatch is saying here. He is saying that a guy who is up 20 pts over Specter in a Republican primary has absolutely no chance in hell of beating Specter in a general election. That is about as close to an admission that the party is now dominated by the fringe of not only the GOP but also the fringe of Pennsylvania in general as you will probably ever see. But that is the state of the Republican party today and as Olympia Snowe pointed out in her op-ed Pennsylvania is just a microcosm of what is going on in that party nationwide. And what makes it worse is that some leaders in the Republican party seem to think this is a good thing.