Category Archives: Politics: US: 2006 Election

It looks as if the party that wins two out of three of Missouri, Virginia and Tennessee might have a majority in the Senate.¹

Democrats have a tiny, uncertain, lead in Tennessee. Virginia looks leaning GOP, despite everything revealed about the incumbent. So that means the pressure is on in Missouri. Here's one of the hardest-hitting ads I've seen in a long time, starring Michael J. Fox, for Claire McCaskill, running against incumbent Jim Talent.

¹ To get a majority the Democrats must pick up six seats. The assumption is that Democrats retain New Jersey & Connecticut (in some form or other), gain in Rhode Island, Ohio, Montana, and Pennsylvania. Of these, Montana and New Jersey seem the least safe bets.

Matt Stoller, Debate Train to Crazy Town has the scoop on what’s happening in Connecticut. Basically, Lamont’s campaign made errors after he won the primary. They coasted, rested, recharged, lost the initiative. Lieberman surged, taking some Democratic votes and all the Republican ones.

But all of a sudden, thanks to the first three-way debate, and to the second five-way debate, both marked by an inspired no-holds-barred performance from the Republican candidate, it’s a horse race again, as the GOP voters have a reason to come home; and if they do that means squeezing Lieberman. So anyone could win.

You know you’re in an incredible political environment when you’re at an event where egomaniac Ralph Nader is wandering around, and not only is no one paying attention to him, but Ralph Nader himself doesn’t even expect anyone to pay attention to him. That was the scene earlier today in Hartford, CT, where five candidates went at each other, or mostly at Joe Lieberman, for the Senate nomination in a debate. I wasn’t feeling so good about this race a few weeks ago; it had stagnated, and the polling reflected that and will still reflect that for a week or so. Today, I think there was a decisive shift both in the dynamic of the race and in the tone of the political environment.

It’s not that Lamont has overperformed, or that Joe has melted down, it’s that Connecticut Election 2006 has gone off the deep end. It’s not your normal white picket fence suburban election, with attack ad facing attack ad. No, this is more like a white picket fence election that suddenly gets bored with life and decides to live in the forest, take a bunch of LSD, trout-fish naked, and taunt a bear cub before ending its life suddenly and with total and inexplicable resolution on November 7. Well not really, but there’s no analogy that I can think of summarizing what’s going on. What has happened is that Joe Lieberman competed in a Democratic primary, lost, and is now competing in a Republican primary, and is losing again. Meanwhile, Lamont is finally picking up renewed steam and getting back on track as a candidate. There’s energy here, real energy.

There’s lots more where that came from. Including this bit, which echoes what I’d suddenly started worrying about:

All in all, it was an impressive, serious debate, and I don’t think you could look at it as anything but a clear victory for Ned Lamont and Alan Schlesinger. Alan Schlesinger says he’s getting in money now, and he’s going to go on TV. I actually think Alan’s Perot-style message is quite resonant, and that in a totally freakshow moment he could pull enough votes from Lieberman and Lamont to eke out a weird 37% victory. That’s not likely, but it’s in the realm of the possible. …

… I think it’s pretty clear that the anti-establishment wave that’s collapsing Republicans all over the country is beginning to crumple Lieberman, just in time. Alan Schlesinger is the first candidate I’ve seen who is genuinely tapping into the frustration grassroots conservatives feel with their party, because he’s very clearly not supported by the establishment or even President Bush. As a result, Lieberman has to now make the electability argument to conservative voters, and that’s never an easy place to be since it makes your message more complicated.

Daily Kos lets Eli Pariser explain MoveOn’s Call For Change:

Basically, it allows people to log onto www.callforchange.org from their home computers and then phone target voters in the 30 top House and Senate races around the nation. Our goal is to make 5 million phone calls to inconsistent voters who lean Democratic – we recently passed 1.5 million.

Our members chipped in millions to allow MoveOn to buy the most up-to-date lists, acquire consumer data, and use micro-targeting to ensure that every call is maximized. We used the Busby and Lamont campaigns to test our program and make it a good user experience. After Busby, a Yale study compared our phone program to others and found that it boosted turnout the most.

Part of the reason we designed the program the way we did was to make it work for parents and others who’ve want to chip in but only have 20 or 30 minutes free to volunteer at the end of a long work day – not just the super-activists. Also, folks in areas without competitive races or who live in rural areas far from campaign offices no longer have to be excluded from GOTV.

Canvass without leaving home!

What’s the Matter With Kansas? is the title of a book by Thomas Frank which argues that working-class voters in the American heartland have been duped into voting against their own financial interests by a clever and tactical appeal to so-called “values” issues.

Well, here’s a straw in the wind, one that suggests the winds have changed. Via Daily Kos, a look at an editorial by Steve Rose in the Johnson County Sun in Overland Park, Kansas:

As we prepare ourselves to make political endorsements in subsequent issues, I can tell you unequivocally that this newspaper has never endorsed so many Democrats. Not even close.

…

But I could not help but put in perspective a more global phenomenon that has led us to re-evaluate our traditional support for Republicans….

The Republican Party has changed, and it has changed monumentally.

You almost cannot be a victorious traditional Republican candidate with mainstream values in Johnson County or in Kansas anymore, because these candidates never get on the ballot in the general election. They lose in low turnout primaries, where the far right shows up to vote in disproportionate numbers.

To win a Republican primary, the candidate must move to the right.

What does to-the-right mean?

It means anti-public education, though claiming to support it.

It means weak support of our universities, while praising them.

It means anti-stem cell research.

It means ridiculing global warming.

It means gay bashing. Not so much gay marriage, but just bashing gays.

It means immigrant bashing. I’m talking about the viciousness.

It means putting religion in public schools. Not just prayer.

It means mocking evolution and claiming it is not science.

It means denigrating even abstinence-based sex education….

But everything else adds up to priorities that have nothing to do with the Republican Party I once knew.

Abraham Lincoln was right?