YES, ANOTHER ONE! TOM REYNOLDS RETIRING FROM CONGRESS

Tom Reynolds was at the pinnacle of the House GOP hierarchy in 2005. He was their Rahm Emanuel. He was even able to persuade Mark Foley (R-FL) not to resign, even though they both knew it was just a matter of time before it all came out that Foley was molesting young boys. Reynolds told him he had to hang in there for the good of the party. Oops! It was for the good of the other party! And that kind of sealed Reynolds' fate. Even against a self-financing vanity candidate, Jack Davis, he barely managed 52% of the vote-- in a district where Bush had taken 55% two years earlier. This year, facing an energetic, accomplished and charismatic young Iraq War vet, Jon Powers, Reynolds realized he didn't have a chance.

His rubber stamp voting record might play well in parts of suburban Texas or Tennessee, but not suburban New York. Take Iraq, for example. Reynolds participated in 61 roll call votes involving the war. Starting with the 4 bills authorizing the use of force, Reynolds has never once seen fit to question the Bush-Cheney agenda. There aren't that may rubber stamps as pure as Tom Reynolds. He's 61 for 61, the most disgraceful record of abdication of responsibility of any congressman in the Northeast United States! And across the board you simply can't find an issue where his record is in synch with the moderate nature of his western New York district.

If the Foley scandal didn't get him in 2006, the systematic theft of around a million dollars from the NRCC-- which he headed-- probably wasn't going to help in November. Fiscal responsibility begins at home.

Let me recommend you read the live blog session with Jon Powers at FDL last July. I think you'll get a better idea why Tom Reynolds hoisted the white flag and ran for his life than you will from the official press statement he makes. And if you'd like to help Jon out against whichever hack the GOP decides to start fresh with, the Blue America page is open.

And this little clip of Queen's classic song is the Tom Reynolds edition:




UPDATE: REYNOLDS' STORY IS THE STORY OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY

Today's Washington Post recounts the sad public career of an ambitious rubber stamp who dreamed he would be the next Speaker after Hastert.

Reynolds' impending departure means that five of the six elected Republican leaders from the start of the 109th Congress are now gone or going -- Hastert, DeLay, Reynolds and retiring Reps. Deborah Pryce (Ohio) and John Doolittle (Calif.). Only Blunt is still around, and all five of those seats have either flipped or are in danger of doing so; DeLay's seat went Democratic in 2006, Democrats captured Hastert's seat in a special election earlier this month and Reynolds' and Pryce's districts are high on Democratic target lists. Doolittle's seat looks relatively safe for the GOP, but only because the scandal-tarred incumbent is retiring.

So given the circumstances in both Washington and New York, Reynolds' announcement today is not surprising. Republicans have a long road ahead before they can hope to regain power, and even many of the most senior and previously powerful members of the party are no longer interested in going along for the ride.

UPDATE: GOP BETTER OFF WITHOUT REYNOLDS?

According to Larry Sabato, Reynolds isn't "the strongest Republican for that district. They may be able to hold that district better with him gone, oddly enough." Reynolds, during his retirement announcement yesterday, says he is certain he could win if he wanted to.

He said that as a politician, he expected opponents to throw “a little bric and brac” about scandals “versus talking about the issues,” but added that he didn’t think those controversies would have affected his re-election campaign.

“Even in the worst political environment in a generation, the voters of this community returned me to office for a fifth term,” said Reynolds of his 2006 campaign, “which leaves me no doubt that had I broken with tradition and sought another term, I would have succeeded.” The tradition to which 57-year-old Reynolds referred was his own track record of never staying in an office for more than 10 years during a career that began in 1974 with his election to the Concord town council and later took him to the Erie County legislature, the state Assembly and Congress.

...The vagaries of the newly open-seat race raise the importance of candidate recruiting efforts by Republican officials. State Sen. George Maziarz was widely mentioned Thursday as a top contender for the Republican nomination, but it is not certain at this early point that he will run.

...The Democrats, meanwhile, face a likely primary that party officials expect to produce a nominee well-suited to make a run at capturing the seat. Iraq war veteran Jon Powers, a substitute teacher, has entered the race and sewn up the endorsement of five of the seven county Democratic committees. Also definitely running is Buffalo lawyer [Republican-lite] Alice Kryzan.

Former nominee [vanity candidate] Davis also is mulling this race and has promised to use $3 million of his own money-- if he decides to run.

Davis’ losses to Reynolds in 2004 and 2006 have caused some Democrats to question whether he should step aside to let a new candidate try the race. In a recent interview, Davis said he knew some people opposed his candidacy. “There’s people who think that somebody who’s a 75-year-old guy is too old to do it, but I don’t. I have a passion in my belly for the working-class people and I think I can represent them better than a young guy like Powers,” he said.

When asked whether his ability to self-fund his campaign created an uneven playing field for the Democratic primary, Davis responded: “Let’s see, it’s unfair to work hard and make money and to spend it for a good cause? ... If [Powers] worked hard like I did, then he would have money. He’s never had a real job.”

Powers struck back against that characterization. “I’ll challenge anyone that thinks that our soldiers don’t have real jobs. ... If you don’t think that teaching and being a soldier is a real job, then I think we’ve got some concerns."