Who Are The Worst Members Of Congress-- The Best Electoral Targets?

Club For Growth (of corporate power)

There are endless ways to measure this and plenty of strategies to answer the question. Normally I consult members' voting records. It's an imperfect way to do this but, sprinkled with a little sense, it really is the best way to figure out the worst of the worst. At that link above, if you scroll down to the bottom of the list-- bottom of the barrel-- you'll find the worst of the worst. Problem is, most of these reactionary lunatics are in backward districts filled with people just like them. Many don't have any real opponents. One of those tied for worst, Steve King of Iowa, does have a great-- if longshot-- opponent this year, Rob Hubler. So do Mike Pence of Indiana, Thelma Drake of Virginia, John Kline of Minnesota, Tom Feeney of Florida, Henry Brown of South Carolina and Patrick McHenry of North Carolina.

But among those at the bottom of the barrel are five who actually look like they are facing defeat in 2 weeks:

Tim Walberg (R-MI)
Michele Bachmann (R-MN)
Mean Jean Schmidt (R-OH)
John Shadegg (R-AZ)
Scott Garrett (R-NJ)

Coincidentally, the most extremist of the Republican Party front groups, the neo-fascist Club for Growth, has endorsed three of these arch-reactionaries this week: Bachmann, Shadegg and Garrett. According to the National Journal's House Race Hotline, "when the Club, who normally likes to just play in GOP primaries, endorses an incumbent, you know GOPers are worried." The Club is a good contrary indicator and it's not a bad idea to put money behind the opponents of these incumbents. Among the best candidates running anywhere-- regardless of who they're running against-- are Mark Schauer (MI-07), Vic Wulsin (OH-02), and Dennis Shulman (NJ-05) all Blue America candidates and Bob Lord (who can be helped out here).

The new issue of Time Magazine has their startlingly superficial look at a dozen Hot Races, including Linda Stender's battle against right wing nutcase Leonard Lance (NJ-07), nominal Democrat Alice Kryzan's fight with rightist Chris Lee for the open NY-26 seat, Jim Gilmore's likely slaughter by moderate Democrat Mark Warner in the open Virginia Senate race, a reprise of the biased, pro-Reichert garbage hit piece by pseudo journalist Amy Sullivan on how the netroots is hurting front runner Darcy Burner (WA-08), Charlie Brown's homegrown campaign against lunatic fringe carpetbagger Tom McClintock (CA-04), Suzanne Kosmas' likely defeat of the corrupt Florida hack Tom Feeney (FL-24), the Mississippi race pitting two worthless reactionaries-- so-called Democrat Travis Childers and Republican Greg Davis-- against each other again (MS-01), the unlikely race between come from behind Becky Greenwald against GOP hack Tom Latham (IA-04), a spectacular race pitting one of this year's congressional superstars, Martin Heinrich against Bush's closest New Mexico ally, Darren White (NM-01), the laughable race between arch-conservative Democrat Mike McMahon and GOP hot dog vendor Bob Straniere in Staten Island (NY-13) to replace convicted GOP congressman Vito Fossella, Mary Jo Kilroy's march to victory over right-wing kook Steve Stivers in Columbus (OH-15), and the Senate race in Minnesota pitting moderate Democrat Al Franken against Bush rubber stamp Norm Coleman.

If Time wanted to be relevant, the race they should have covered is this one.

And this morning there are more CQPolitics congressional race ratings changes-- each one dire for the GOP. We all saw this coming: after unmasking herself on national TV, crazy right wing extremist Michele Bachmann's chances of winning re-election have dimmed in MN-06. Since Bachmann shot her mouth off, Blue Dog Elwyn Tinklenberg has been given over a million dollars by outraged Americans to help him get rid of Bachmann-- on top of which, the DCCC is running another million dollars of ads against her.

The best news of the day, though, came in Orlando, where top Blue America endorsee, Alan Grayson, is now seen as the clear winner against corrupt Bush rubber stamp Ric Keller. A victory for Grayson, which now appears likely, will mean there is another person in the House with a Paul Wellstone quality of fighting for American working families against the power of the deadly combination of Big Business + Big Government. In two weeks, the best news of the night could well come of FL-08.

Suzanne Kosmas is also now favored to beat another extremely corrupt Republican radical, Tom Feeney (R-Abramoff) in central Florida (the 24th CD). After trying to tough out the accusastions that he had been taking bribes from Abramoff, Feeney "took the unusual step of apologizing to his constituents in a paid ad this summer, labeling the trip a 'rookie mistake.' Yet the Orlando Sentinel’s editorial board noted the Abramoff flap in its recent endorsement of Kosmas.

There was even bad news for the crumbling Republican Party in Wyoming, where the at-large House seat being abandoned by crazed KKK advocate Barbara Cubin now looks like it will go to Democrat Gary Trauner instead of another GOP clone, Cynthia Lummis.

In an upstate New York district (NY-25), Dan Maffei is so far ahead of a listless Republican nonentity, Dale Sweetland, that the race is all but over. The district has been edging blue and Maffei has outraised Sweetland 4-1.

And, finally, in Oregon's one open seat, voters are completely rejecting a far right extremist loon, Mike Erickson, in favor of a moderate Democratic state Senator, Kurt Schrader. It has all been steeply downhill for Erickson, an anti-choice fanatic, when his Republican primary opponent accused him of gross hypocrisy for paying for at least one abortion for a girlfriend. He's not likely to break 40%. Schrader has nearly a quarter million dollars left to spend and Erickson has barely $40,000 on hand.

Meanwhile a new poll in Alaska is reporting that Congress' King of Pork, Don Young, is going to lose his
House seat-- by a lot. Ethan Berkowitz is up 51-43%!

Please help Alan Grayson put this new ad up on TV starting today:




UPDATE: REPUBLICAN PARTY IS WORRIED

Politico has a list of the ten incumbents the GOP is most worried about (based on their phone-banking operations). #1 is Robin Hayes (NC), who is now denying his denial about saying Democrats hate people who like God. The man has actually lost his mind. Others on the list:

Dave Reichert (R-WA)
Joe Knollenberg (R-MI)
Don Young (R-AK)
Scott Garrett (R-NJ)
Tom Feeney (R-FL)
Patrick McHenry (R-NC)
Jon Porter (R-NV)
Phil English (R-PA)
Randy Kuhl (R-NY)