Today brings big news about primary challenges to incumbent Democrats in at least three campaigns:
Arkansas Senate, Blanche Lincoln. A new Daily Kos / Research 2000 poll shows incumbent Conservadem Blanche Lincoln is highly vulnerable to a primary challenge from Lt. Governor Bill Halter. Lincoln leads Halter, 42%-26%, even though Halter has not even entered the campaign (yet) and has a name ID 28% lower than Lincoln. That makes this a very winnable campaign for Halter.
Now, Halter is not a hardcore left-winger. As such, even if he enters the campaign, I imagine that many in the netroots won't care to support him. However, I think that would be a real mistake. If we are ever going to get power, we have to demonstrate real consequences for Democrats who lie to us. If Halter runs, it would be an excellent opportunity to deliver that payback.
If we take a pass on delivering payback to Lincoln over her lies because Halter isn't progressive enough, then really no one will give a shit what we think. However, if we deliver that payback, it puts everyone on notice. We have to produce consequence when someone stabs us in the back.
Maryland 4th, Donna Edwards. Speaking of demonstrating consequences, Rahm Emanuel knows how to do that. Back in June, Representative Lynn Woolsey claimed that the White House threatened freshman Democrats who voted against Afghanistan war funding. Given his demeanor and reputation, it doesn't take a genius to figure out that Emanuel was likely doing the threatening.
Donna Edwards was one of the freshman who ended up voting against Afghan war funding. And now, she has a primary challenger from her right:
Prince George's County State's Attorney Glenn F. Ivey said Wednesday that he has decided not to run for county executive and is forming an exploratory committee to look at challenging Rep. Donna F. Edwards in the Democratic primary next year.(...)
"They represent different wings of the party. Edwards is much more liberal, and Ivey is much more moderate," Herrnson said.
Rumors are that Emanuel is encouraging this challenge. Certainly, rumors are far from proof, but it wouldn't be the first time the Emanuel has stepped into a primary, or threatened a progressive.
Georgia 12th, John Barrow. State Senator Regina Thomas is once again challenging Blue Dog John Barrow in this slightly lean-Democratic district. Thomas is looking to make an issue out of Barrow voting for the Stupak amendment, but against the health care reform package. Barrow laughably claims that, despite those votes, he is actually still pro-Obama, pro-choice, and pro-health care reform:
"Why won't he level with the people?" she asked. "The people in the 12th District deserve better."
Barrow spokeswoman Jane Brodsky rejected Thomas' contentions.
"(He) didn't vote against President Obama's health care plan," Brodsky said. "He voted against (House Speaker) Nancy Pelosi's. ..
"Just because he doesn't agree with a particular legislative package doesn't mean he's opposed to reform. He believes we need all the reform we can get, but he's ... for solutions that are actually going to work."
She said he voted for the abortion measure because it applies only to public funds.
"Private plans can still cover elective abortions," she said, "and women can still use their own money to buy such coverage if they choose to do so."
The district is 45% African-American, and the primary electorate is nearly 75% African-American. Barrow won the primary in 2008 due to a combination of Obama cutting an ad for him (the Obama ad was Barrow's entire campaign), and Thomas running a lackluster campaign.
Much will depend on whether Obama is willing to cut an ad for Barrow again. If he is not, then Thomas could unseat Barrow.
Primaries remain one of the few leverage points we have with Congress. I say we lean on the lever as often, and as hard, as possible.
Donna is going to give the keynote on Saturday. She also got on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee and the Science and Technology Committees. The Transportation committee is going to be significant next year because the highway bill is going through in 2009.
Here's Donna. Notice the Republicans cheering loudly when she talks about not having time to waste to deal with gas prices - they believe in pushing this drill drill drill message.
This is Adrienne Christian, her new chief of staff.
I spent much of the morning at meetings, and I ended up talking to a former corporate insider who told me how boards vote on decisions. All corporate power flows through a small group of people on Wall Street. Fascinating.
Donna Edwards gets elected today, and will be sworn in on Friday.
Moveon is running this ad, the pundits pan it.
Inflation is kicking up, officially. To put it another way, inflation is now so bad that the official numbers are showing it.
I was at an EMILY's list luncheon today at the Omni Shoreham hotel near Cleveland Park. The Omni Shoreham is one of those giant hotels that could be the hotel from the Shining - bad carpeting, hyper-cooled air conditioning, excessive ornamentation combined with 1970s porn interior - except it's a popular destination for DC conferences and luncheons. I'd have taken pictures, but my camera is finally dead (that fundraising is paying for a new camera, among other things). Every DC organization, and EMILY's List is nothing if not a very successful DC organization, has one of these annual luncheons where they present awards, laud each other's accomplishments, and talk about how important and critical they are to some set of values or pieces of policy decisions. It's not that it's untrue, it is very often the truth, but it's still very boring, a bit painful, and it takes a lot of time to set small injustices right. It's a lot like orthodontist work.
Roll Call reported today that House Speaker Dennis Hastert is, like all good retired Republican officials, becoming a lobbyist. He's joining a senior staffer in his office and Al Wynn at Dickstein Shapiro, one of the largest law firms in DC and one with over 100 of the Fortune 500 as clients.
Donna Edwards will be seated in Congress, and her special election in on June 17. She does have a Republican opponent, Peter James, and he has been endorsed by Ron Paul:
Peter James is our Republican candidate in Maryland's 4th Congressional District. Peter faces a special election on June 17, which provides a unique opportunity for us to pick up this seat. There will likely be low voter turn out, so it is absolutely essential that Republicans, and liberty-loving independents and Democrats, go out to vote for Peter. Time is short and this election is rapidly approaching, please do what you can to help Peter today.
James is a crazy man who passes out monopoly money and talks about an international banking cartel, hint hint. Still, Paul's rationale makes sense, low turnout elections are opportunities for a small dedicated group to make an impact. I guess we'll see what kind of impact Ron Paul's movement will have. I'm not expecting much, but if you're in Maryland's fourth district, make sure to vote for Donna on June 17.
Over the next week and a half, we're going to be holding a fundraiser and asking for contributions to help us expand with the general election. We're looking specifically for 400 donors, whcih is aggressive, but we think we can get there. If you see value in what we do, you can give here. Otherwise, read on.
Our costs are going up, but our product quality will go up as well. We will be traveling this summer to several conventions, including a Media Reform Convention in Minneapolis, Netroots Nation, and the Democratic National Convention. To make the site run smoother, we are hiring an administrator. And to make our commentary more effective, we are hiring a researcher (hopefully soon, several) to look more deeply into some of the themes Chris has come up with and hold influentials - Democrats, pundits, conservatives, surrogates - accountable for what they say. The total of these costs is around $14,000.
Here's why it's worth it to chip in your $35. Very few groups self-identify as 'left', and there are many reasons for that, including a residual fear of ideology and partisanship. What we on this blog believe, though, is that in reorganizing the country around progressive principles we can't pretend we don't have left-wing values. We can't pretend we aren't liberal. At the same time, this is not a game for 'lefty purists'. It isn't solely about winning every election, but winning elections is important. And we are working, smartly and without litmus tests, to promote liberal values in the political system.
The Bush Dog campaign, the No Residual Troop campaign, and the Responsible Plan concepts have all borne real fruit. Earlier this year, I embedded myself in the campaign of Donna Edwards in Maryland's fourth, the first movement candidate who beat an incumbent in a primary and who will be seated in Congress. So far, 60 Democratic candidates have signed on to the Responsible Plan to End the War in Iraq, whose signature messaging of 'no residual troops' came from Chris's series of posts comparing the different Presidential Iraq plans. What Chris did, and it sounds so simple, but no one else had done it, was to read each plan and compare them. And now there are 60 candidates running on that principle, several of whom are going to be in Congress next year (or even this year). That's a real shift in conversation around foreign policy.
Many progressive ideas come from the conversations started in the blogs or in activist circles. And all of us on this site - commenters and bloggers alike - have worked to start our fair share. Ultimately, if we want progressive media to work we have to pay for it. Traditional corporate media works by selling you - the audience - to the soap makers and defense contractors who pay to propagandize. We don't follow this model, either within the Democratic Party or within the culture at large. We have a different model, in which we work both with political institutions and for you. We make no bones about our affiliations and our agenda, and we work on campaigns that are directly in line with them.
We think we've done good work, work that is worth expanding, work that will get this country out of Iraq a bit faster and set us onto a more sustainable course as a country. Throw a few bucks if you can, even if it's not much. Obviously, please don't give if it's a choice between this and gas money or rent money, but do recognize that there are lots of places to get media for free. But ultimately, as we've seen, if you are the product being sold to Honeywell and Monsanto so they can lie about our country, free is actually quite expensive.
So it looks like Maryland will hold a special election to seat the next Congresswoman for the fourth district. There was a lot of confusion around Wynn's retirement, but the Governor is making a change to the law to allow the 4th to skip a special primary and move straight to seating the next Congressperson. Donna might even be in office in time to be a superdelegate for Obama, though I'm not sure right now.
I was on a call this morning with George Soros organized by Steve Clemons of the New American Foundation. Soros is coming out with a new book called The New Paradigm for Financial Markets: The Credit Crisis of 2008 and What It Means discussing what he calls the deflation of the 'super-bubble'. In terms of political news, Soros made it clear he will not be spending as much money on the 2008 election. He believes, as do I, that 2004 was a special decision, and the consequences of 2008 are far less significant. He doesn't like partisan politics, and now seems focused on financial regulation and energy and climate problems.
The call was organized around Soros's ideas on the current financial crisis, which he thinks is the worst since the 1930s. There are many elements to what is going on, but the gist of the macro-economic shift is that the dollar is losing its status as the world reserve currency and the 'mortar' of the world economy will no longer be the American consumer. This crisis is different from previous busts, because the shift in global power constrains the ability of the Federal reserve to lower interest rates.
Soroes believes that the financial market's fall was acute, but is basically over. The problem now is the fall-out, which is going to cascade throughout the economy. People are going to feel it in a nasty recession and further drops in the price of housing, as the market overcorrects to the downside. The crisis was driven in the short-term by a failure of the regulators to exercise the powers they have, to allow a totally unregulated market in financial instruments to develop. The scariest market, he says, is the Credit Default Swaps market, which equals half the entire US household wealth and five times the national debt, and the biggest player there is JP Morgan.
In the past week, I have had the opportunity to ask both Paul Krugman and George Soros what the worst case scenario will look like. Krugman suggested a slightly less bad Argentine style collapse, followed by a pretty good resurgence of growth. In the end, everyone will just move 'one house to the left' as legal wrangling gets fierce. Soros believes that authorities are pretty qualified and won't let the financial system collapse, so he sees the problem as crushing the dreams of the poor and upwardly mobile African-American Latinos buying their first homes. He specifically cited Prince George's County, a wealthy African-American county hit harder by the foreclosure crisis than anywhere in the country. The county incidentally will soon be represented by Donna Edwards.
Soros was clear that this is not a natural cycle, it is an entirely man-made crisis, and it will ripple through the economy and slow down or reverse wealth creation because of a credit crunch. What we need to do, he believes, is establish a clearing house or exchange where all these trades needs to be registered and settled according to well-established rules, until that is cleared up there's uncertainty as to the value of the various unregulated instruments out there, which is why there is a credit squeeze. No one wants to lend because no one knows what anything is worth, and no one knows who the counterparties are on many of these transactions.
In terms of further prescriptions, he thinks we need to minimize the downturn by seeking to limit foreclosures in the short-term. In the longer term, he believes that the American consumer will no longer be acting as the key driver of the global economy (the 'mortar'). The next driver of demand, or the next 'mortar' of the global economy, should be infrastructure investments necessary to reduce and reverse global warming. There's trillions of legacy infrastructure that needs to be overhauled, and that's the only way we're going to find a new global equilibrium.
I believe this is what is called an 'inflection point'.
Governor Martin O'Malley says he's exploring the possibility of holding an election to replace Congressman Albert Wynn, who's stepping down in June.
To make that possible, O'Malley says he's considering trying to change state law before the General Assembly adjourns next week.
He says current law requires him to order that a special primary take place before a special general election. By the time that process unfolded, O'Malley says whoever won would only have about three months in office.
The governor says that's why he's looking at the possibility of holding a special general election -- without an additional primary.
If a law like this gets passed and signed, it will save a lot of money for the state and it could put Donna in office in around 36-46 days or so from the date the law takes effect. If Wynn can be encouraged to step down earlier, Donna could be an Obama superdelegate at the convention.
Roll Call just reported that Al Wynn resigned his seat to join a DC law firm. I'm trying to find out more about what this means in terms of a special election.
... Here's Donna's statement.
First and foremost, I salute Congressman Wynn for his many years of public service on behalf of the people of Prince George's County and in the United States Congress representing the people of the 4th Congressional District," said Donna Edwards. "In the spirit of a dedicated public servant, Congressman Wynn is looking out for the interests of his constituents and I commend him for that. I wish Congressman Wynn all the best in his upcoming endeavors, and I deeply appreciate his willingness to work together to ensure a seamless, smooth transition of representation and constituency services for Maryland's 4th District."
Tonight, we at Blue Majority are asking our readers on Daily Kos, Open Left, and Swing State Project a simple question: should we endorse in the Democratic presidential nomination campaign tomorrow, or should we wait until the nominee is certain?
There are two reasons we ask this question. First, we have always valued your insight and suggestions for which Democrats to place on the page. For an endorsement of this magnitude, a super majority of you, the supporters who make Blue Majority work, must approve. In order for us to place a presidential candidate on the page while the outcome of nomination campaign is still in doubt, two-thirds support from the community will be required.
Second, while we were always going to place the presumptive Democratic nominee on the Blue Majority page as soon as s/he emerged, over the next month several new candidates will be placed on the Blue Majority page in anticipation of the March 31st fundraising deadline. With the overwhelming majority of progressive, grassroots, electoral energy current focused on the presidential nomination campaign, we believe that the newly added candidates will receive vastly more support if there is a presidential candidate on the Blue Majority page. And yes, you know which candidate we are talking about.
So far in 2008, Barack Obama is on pave to surpass all electoral records in terms of progressive grassroots support, even the high marks set by John Kerry four years ago after he became the presumptive nominee. If the energies of people-powered congressional candidates and that of the movement behind Barack Obama's presidential campaign were to combine, it could create a powerful symbiosis that can build the sort of governing majority we need to pass strong legislation in 2009. For example, in the Democratic primary for Maryland's 4th congressional district, the Donna Edwards campaign was able to convert the new wave of Obama voters into a decisive victory. We want to help translate that energy into even more big victories like the one we saw in MD-04.
Now, many in the community are ambivalent about the Democratic nomination campaign. Also, there are still many Hillary Clinton supporters within the community. Further, even many Barack Obama supporters have reservations about him, and I am sympathetic to those reservations. Here on Open Left, for example, I recently expressed my displeasure with the way Obama distanced himself from the term "liberal," Matt blasted Obama for his Harry and Louise mailers, and Mike blasted the Obama campaign for using Bush Dog Jim Cooper, who played a major role in sinking health care reform back in 1993-1994, as a spokesperson for health care. In fact, Matt and I even once appeared in a commercial attacking both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama for their plans to leave residual American military forces in Iraq. There are good, progressive reasons to be wary of Barack Obama, of which these are only a few.
So, we have decided to leave the decision to you. If two-thirds of the community approves, we will add Barack Obama to the Blue Majority page tomorrow, and roll out several new congressional candidates over the next couple weeks. If there is not two-thirds support for making an endorsement now, we will roll out the new congressional candidates anyway, and wait until there is a presumptive Democratic nominee before adding a presidential candidate to the page. And whether or not we add Barack Obama now, we will add Hillary Clinton to the page if and when she becomes the presumptive nominee.
So please, take the poll in the extended entry. Would you like Blue Majority to endorse now, or to wait until the nominee is certain? The deadline to vote is 6 p.m. eastern tomorrow, and the decision will be made based on the cumulative result across all three blogs. Take the poll.
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