Jim Martin might be able to oust Saxy Chambliss from his disgracefully stolen Senate seat, and might also be a serious senatorial upgrade

by Ken

Here's a race that was off the charts till now, and is suddenly in play. It's the Georgia Senate race where the unspeakable Saxby Chambliss (aka, at least hereabouts, as Saxby Chamberpot) is seeking a second term. Only last week Howie described this race as "an uphill battle." (Back in march our Georgia-resident friend Valley Girl reported to DWT readers on "much-loved Georgia pol" Martin's inching toward making the Senate race.)

I admit to strong personal feelings here. Chambliss probably isn't the worst person in the Senate, where there's such tough competition for the title. But for me he is just about the vilest, simply because of the way he got there. In denouncing the McCranky presidential campaign, I've tried to be careful to include the distinction "national" in any estimate of its all-time vileness rankings. It's hard to believe that a campaign could be any more loathsome than the one Chambliss waged against Sen. Max Cleland, an authentic war hero, somehow turning his service record against him. And even then, the campaign apparently had to engage in some significant election fraud to put their, er, man over the top.

The good news is that the political convulsions of recent weeks have apparently put Chambliss's reelection bid in play.

Now, Georgia Democrats are not necessarily adornments to the nation's progress and well-being. The name of virtual Republican Rep. Jim Marshall comes up regularly on DWT, where he generally vies with North Carolina's Heath Shuler for recognition as the worst Democrat in the House. And of course no survey of Georgia "Democrats" (sorry, quotation marks required) would be complete without mention of the appalling Zell Miller.

In order to find out what kind of Democrat Jim Martin, Chambliss's opponent, is, our colleague Matt Stoller eked out some time from the candidate's busy campaign schedule for an informative interview on OpenLeft.

Martin assures Matt that he considers hiimself a progressive, and insists: "Progressives can win in the South because people are fed up with where we are as a country, and they are looking for real change." He's not even fazed by Matt's mention of the Z-name:

Simply put, I am not Zell Miller. I am a proud Democrat and a proud progressive and I would just ask you to look at my record. Over the course of my career, I have earned deep, bipartisan respect as a principled leader for progressive causes. That is who I am and what I will be as Georgia's next United States Senator.

Martin manages to work references to "the failed Bush-Chambliss economic policies" in nearly every sentence. He opposed the bailout, and explains why:

As I've said, I strongly believe that action must be taken to stabilize our economy in order for us to start reversing the failed Bush economic policies that have proven so disastrous for the middle class. But what I am not willing to do is to stick taxpayers with an enormous and costly bailout bill, rushed through in haste, which won't even solve the problem. Among other issues, the package failed to address the fundamental problems created by the deregulation of Wall Street. And it lacked consumer protections to stem the abusive lending practices that are at the root of this crisis - practices that I devoted hundreds of thousands of dollars in television ads to sound the alarm on two years ago, long before the mortgage crisis began.

For reasons that should be obvious from what I've written above, I award Martin points for the statement: "I am lucky enough to count Max Cleland as a friend and a strong supporter of my campaign. Everyone knows of his service to his country, but I am also inspired by his long service to the state of Georgia."

There's a lot to like in the interview, and the apparently realistic chance of Jim Martin capturing the seat from the most illegitimate member of the Senate.


AND MARTIN IS OUTRAISING CHAMBLISS!

According to the Associated Press:

Campaign finance reports show upstart Democratic Senate challenger Jim Martin has raised more money than Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss over the most recent three-month period.

In by far his best fundraising haul, Martin took in more than $1.3 million from July through the end of September.
Click here to find out more!

The silver lining for Chambliss is that Martin spent almost all of the money and had just $92,340 in the bank heading into the final month of the campaign.

Chambliss had about $1.2 million in his treasury after raising about $1.1 million for the third quarter.

The advantage shows that Martin has had an easier time convincing people to donate as the race has grown competitive. Chambliss once had some $4 million in the bank compared with just a few hundred thousand dollars for Martin, a former state legislator.

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