Good News For Scott Kleeb (D-NE) And Jeff Merkley (D-OR)

Scott Kleeb-- with Darcy Burner and Charlie Brown behind him

Early yesterday someone told me that former Nebraska Governor Mike Johanns, who served as Bush's Agriculture Secretary, was finally so embarrassed by the bribe money he had taken from Alaska's crooked (and indicted) Senator Ted Stevens, that he felt compelled to return all the money from Stevens' Northern Lights PAC, a Republican Party money laundering operation that took in hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribery from corporations and then distributed it to incumbents and challengers. Johanns was one of the last recipients to agree to disgorge his share.

Then yesterday he announced-- again, only more loudly than the last time he announced it-- that he won't be going to the Republican Convention in St Paul. He's vying with progressive Democrat Scott Kleeb for the U.S. Senate seat being vacated by retiring Senator Chuck Hagel. Yesterday announced that he's made plans to be out of the country when his party tries for four more years of shame and destruction. Neighboring Kansas' Senator Pat Roberts, who's in a tight re-election battle, is also not all that eager to identify with a political party detested by most Americans and he won't be at the convention either. In fact, quite a few Republican senators hoping to be re-elected are staying away: Elizabeth Dole (R-NC), Ted Stevens (R-AK), whether he's in prison or not, Susan Collins (R-ME), Roger Wicker (R-MS), John Sununu (R-NH)... Then there's Larry Craig (R-ID), who has been asked to stay away since he was arrested in a St Paul men's room trying to fellate a handsome young police officer.

But the funniest Republican sad sack of them all is Gordon Smith. A few days ago he ran his second TV ad trying to glom on to Barack Obama and make believe he wasn't part of the catastrophic Republican agenda for the past 12 years. But he was and all he's managed to do is get Republicans angry and make everyone else laugh at him. He resigned as McCain's Oregon campaign chairman and he's refused to campaign with the right-wing extremists running for Congress on the GOP line. Today he released his third and most pathetic ad yet. I wonder what McCain thinks of this guy who said he wouldn't go to the Republican Convention, wouldn't work to elect McCain and is now giving free TV time to Obama! Watch this clown... and imagine what you would think if you were a Republican: