Many Happy Returns-- Last Night's Primary Results

I tweeted away the night yesterday, starting in Kentucky, where the Blue America candidate, Jack Conway, won a great victory over three conservatives:

*Jack Conway (D)- 226,773 (44.1%)
*Dan Mongiardo (D)- 221,269 (43.0%)
*Rand Paul (R)- 206,159 (58.8%)
*Trey Grayson (R)- 124,238 (35.4%)

The big loser, of course, was Mitch McConnell, who drove poor, old senile Jim Bunning out of the race so he could get his colorless protégé, Trey Grayson into the Senate. With the populist masses of both the right and the left rebelling against the hated Inside-the-Beltway party establishments, McConnell's embrace of Grayson was the kiss of death. Nor did it help that Cheney and especially not John Cornyn also endorsed Grayson. It was an anti-Establishment slaughter from the first Republican precincts counted. Jim DeMint could offer McConnell a formidable challenge to the Senate Republican leadership, especially as the increasingly radicalized Republican grassroots is reminded that what Boehner and Ryan and Cantor did for Wall Street in October 2008-- in terms of forcing Republicans to vote for Bush's no-strings-attached bailout-- McConnell did in the Senate.

And on the Democratic side... well, it was one of those crystal clear choices between a real working family-oriented Democrat (Conway) versus a conservative, anti-Choice, anti-gay, anti-healthcare, corporate-oriented shill (Mongiardo). Although low-information voters in rural counties turned out for Mongiardo, Conway won in traditional Democratic constituencies. In Jefferson County (Louisville) for example, Conway racked up gigantic majorities (50,906, as opposed to Mongiardo's 21,203; Rand Paul won 30,005).

And although the DSCC stayed neutral in Kentucky, they spent tons of money and energy trying to bolster two hopeless incumbents in Pennsylvania and Arkansas. Sestak beat Specter convincingly, 559,131 (53.9%) to 478,245 (46.1%) and the areas where Specter did best-- basically Philly-- are the very areas most likely to swing most easily to Sestak in November. Sestak won every single county in the state with the exceptions of Philadelphia, Lackawanna and Dauphin. Specter immediately congratulated him and vowed to work for his election against Toomey in November. My favorite tweet of the evening was from Greg Sargent:


Early in the evening I predicted an anti-choice, anti-gay, anti-healthcare corrupt conservative will win in the PA-12 special election to replace Jack Murtha. I couldn't have lost that bet since both the guy in the blue jersey and the guy in the red jersey both fit that description. The one in the blue jersey won and DCCC nitwit Debbie Wasserman Schultz was all puffed up with pride:


The House race I was most interested in though, was in Arkansas, specifically AR-02, the Little Rock-centered district that moderate Vic Snyder is retiring from. Five candidates vied for the seat and June 8th will see a run-off between the most progressive of the lot, state Senator Joyce Elliott (39.6%) and the most conservative of the lot, House Speaker Robbie Wills (27.9%). The winner of that runoff will face Karl Rove protégé Tim Griffin.

Bill Halter's goal was to hold Blanche Lincoln below 50% and force her into a run-off, which is bound to be an even lower turn-out election, something that will probably help Halter and his energized base against the low-info Blanche supporters. There'll be no run-off in Republicanville where pro-bailout wingnut John Boozman took 52.9% of the vote, despite being hated by the teabaggers. Halter and Lincoln have been see-sawing for the bragging rights to having the plurality but they are clearly going to a June 8 runoff.

So... the Blue America May Primaries page is still open and functioning. At this point Jack Conway and Joe Sestak will need help beating their extreme right Republican opponents, Rand Paul and Pat Toomey, and Bill Halter and Elaine Marshall will both battle it out against the DSCC and their corporate-friendly opponents, Blanche Lincoln and Cal Cunningham. Please do what you can to help.



UPDATE: Sane Republicans In Kentucky Won't Support Teabagger Candidate GOP Nominated

Republicans may be crazy but they're not that crazy. And 43% of Trey Grayson supporters say they won't be voting for far right sociopath Rand Paul in November.

The likely Rand Paul victory in the Kentucky Republican primary today should give Democrats a very good chance of winning in the fall because supporters of Trey Grayson, Paul's main opponent, really don't like him.

Some primaries play out in such a way that party loyalists view several of the candidates favorably and just choose the one they like best. That was very much the case with the recent Democratic contest in North Carolina. But in Kentucky we find that Paul's supporters hate Grayson, and that even more Grayson's supporters hate Paul.

53% of likely Grayson voters for today have an unfavorable opinion of Paul to only 23% with a positive opinion of him. More importantly though just 40% of Grayson voters say they'll support Paul in the general election if he wins the Republican nomination with 43% explicitly saying they will not.