A text message from Birmingham Better Democrat Josh Segall.
Large turnout, we surpassed 04 turnout around 2pm.
Also, I talked to some high school students doing volunteer work. They were very political but not in the 'political nerd' sense. They were normal high school students, and they told me that politics is very much discussed around school. One of them said me today that there are random heated arguments in geometry class, and there's very little the teachers can (or want) to do when they break out. One girl had skipped six days of classes to ... register voters, and had registered over 300 of them after meeting up with other Obama volunteers through the Obama blog.
When I was in high school it wasn't uncool to talk about politics, because no one even thought about talking about it. This is a very different country. Get off my lawn!
Americans appear ready to sweep a lot of Democrats into office on November 4. Not only does Barack Obama maintain a solid lead in the popular vote and electoral vote estimates, several Senate races that appeared safe Republican holds a few months ago are now considered tossups.
Polling is harder to come by in House races, but here too there is scattered evidence of a coming Democratic tsunami. Having already lost three special Congressional elections in red districts this year, House Republicans are now scrambling to defend many entrenched incumbents.
In this diary, I hope to convince you of three things:
1. Some Republicans who never saw it coming are going to be out of a job in two weeks.
On a related note,
2. Even the smartest experts cannot always predict which seats offer the best pickup opportunities.
For that reason,
3. Activists should put resources behind many under-funded challengers now, instead of going all in for a handful of Democratic candidates.
Want to help defeat conservatism right in the heart of Red America? How about Alabama, Heart of Dixie, where 29 year old attorney Josh Segall is the latest addition to the DCCC's Red to Blue list. If elected, Segall won't be just another Blue Dog Democrat -- he's a true progressive, a better Democrat in a place where merely more Democrats would be welcome.
The Democratic party can and should take back Alabama's 3rd District this year. The seat was held by a Democrat from 1875 until the 1996 election when Glen Browder retired and (now governor) Bob Riley won election to Congress as a moderate Republican. It was an open seat in 2002, a terrible year for Southern Democrats. The DCCC pulled out of the race late and Joe Turnham was completely off the air for a full two weeks before election day. He lost by only 3800 votes. It's kind of poetic justice that the DCCC is stepping in to help Segall -- late, but not too late to make a critical difference in the race.
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Josh Segall