So do republicans (0.00 / 0)

Republicans like to run for higher office, too.  Last year nine Republican House members ran for higher office (Mark Green, Mark Kennedy, Katherine Harris, Jim Nussle, Ernest Istook, Tom Osborne, Bob Beauprez, Jim Gibbons, and Butch Otter).  We claimed seats from Green, Nussle, and Beauprez and probably won the actual vote count in FL-13 as well.  Only Butch Otter and Jim Gibbons were elected out of that group.

So far this year, we already have one Republican House member giving up a marginal House seat (she won by 862 votes) to run for the Senate (Heather Wilson, AP story of 10/6).  It seems likely that at least one and possibly as many as three GOPers may give up a Virginia House seat to run for John Warner's open seat (Tom Davis, Eric Cantor and Bob Goodlatte were all suggested by John Warner).  Tom Latham is being pursued to run against Tom Harkin in Iowa.  Candice Miller has been rumored to run for the Senate in Michigan.

So vacancies seem to open up spots on the food chain.

Last year, btw, we made a number of other pick ups on Democrats running for higher office besides the two mentioned.  Ed Case being replaced by Mazie Hirono was a big gain.  Jim Davis (FL-11) being replaced by Kathy Castor was a smaller gain.  Bernie Sanders replacing Jim Jeffords was a half seat gain; we retained Sanders-style voting in the House with Peter Welch.

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by: David Kowalski @ Tue Oct 09, 2007 at 11:15:00 AM CDT

Castor seems very progressive (0.00 / 0)

She hasn't joined any caucuses, but she has voted well. In fact, she has even voted against the Democratic House majority at least once because she thought a bill wasn't progressive enough (S-Chip). But Davis wasn't too bad, so you are right, it is a small gain.

Lots more open seats for Republicans this year, too, though mainly due to death and retirement rather than running for higher office.

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by: Chris Bowers @ Tue Oct 09, 2007 at 11:42:32 AM CDT

[ Parent ]

Davis wasn't too bad? (0.00 / 0)

He only voted with Democrats 46% of the time on key votes.  That's 5th worst of all the Bush Dogs.

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by: vibinc @ Tue Oct 09, 2007 at 12:04:43 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Different Davis (0.00 / 0)

I meant Jim Davis. Lincoln Davis is really bad. I think there are two more Davises in Congress, too.

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by: Chris Bowers @ Tue Oct 09, 2007 at 12:10:25 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Davises (0.00 / 0)

There were two Republican Davises from Virginia, Jo Ann (who died this week) and Tom.  Artur is a Democrat from Alabama.  Geoff is a Republican from Kentucky.

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by: David Kowalski @ Tue Oct 09, 2007 at 12:22:00 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Republican Open Seats (2007) (0.00 / 0)

So far we have had six in the Senate and thirteen in the House.  They break down as follows:

Senate:  Death (1), retirement (5), other office (0)

House:  Death (3), retirement (7 or 8), higher office (1 or 2)

The numbers depend on how you classify Duncan Hunter's run/rtirement in favor of his son.  I don't take him seriously so I'd classify it as a retirement.

So far four House members have died (Paul Gilmor, Charlie Norwood, and Jo Ann Davis from the Republicans and Juanita Millender-McDonald from the Democrats).  This pace is about equal to the nine from the 1930 House of Representatives who died.  In that casr, IIRC, that was enough to switch the House from barely Republican (218 votes) to barely Democratic conttrol.  In some strange way it seems to reflect the widespread popular dissatisfaction with Congress, particularly with Republican obstructionism.

I still have 16 House GOPers on my watch list and I would not be surprised to see a majority of them decide to either move on or move out.  In the past week, two names have been crossed off my watch list (Davis and Heather Wilson).  I also expect to see some other names who decide to call it quits.

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by: David Kowalski @ Tue Oct 09, 2007 at 12:14:59 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Wrong (0.00 / 0)

Castor released a statement saying that she voted against S-CHIP because of the tobacco taxes. She also had the effrontery in the statement I saw (can't find it now) to claim that despite this she wasn't a pawn of Big Tobacco.

http://www.tboblogs....

All this is not to say that she's generally bad, merely that her objections to the bill stemmed from fear of big business, not high principles.

Forgotten Countries - a foreign policy-focused blog

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by: Englishlefty @ Tue Oct 09, 2007 at 12:20:36 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Little tobacco? (0.00 / 0)

Castor sold out to the cigar makers in Tampa, closer to little tobacco than big tobacco.  Not only has tobacco faded but the influence of the Cuban community in Tampa has also faded.  This is the original group, the ones that came over around the 1890s or very early 1900s not the Castro refugees like in Miami.  Think Lou Piniella.

The taxes on high end cigars were pretty stiff.  But restaurants are probably more important to Ybor City than cigars.

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by: David Kowalski @ Tue Oct 09, 2007 at 12:34:24 PM CDT

[ Parent ]

Here are some more resources (0.00 / 0)

Nashville blogger Sean Braisted has audio of the interview.

Here's GoldenI's take.

And finally, some number crunching and general pontification from yours truly.

The audio is about 4 min. and very interesting, as is Braisted's analysis.

Also, before you guys get all happy, there's still 3 years before that election, and Davis is going to run for the House again in '08.

Enjoy

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by: vibinc @ Tue Oct 09, 2007 at 12:00:52 PM CDT