Should Eric Cantor Get Another Free Pass From The DCCC?

We're been agitating for a courageous DCCC that takes on powerful Republican committee chairmen, especially the ones who are causing the country so much damage and who are electorally vulnerable. We've used Budget chair Paul Ryan (WI) and Buck McKeon (CA) of House Armed Services as the two best examples. They're not the only examples, of course; another good example is John Mica (FL), who-- because the NRCC knocked out Jim Oberstar (D-MN) in 2010-- heads the immensely powerful House Infrastructure and Transportation Committee. And he's been doing a terrible job-- unless you think spreading around pork at taxpayer expense indicates good job performance.

After scaring off everyone interested in challenging John Boehner, it's too late to go after that bumbling drunken old lecher-- he has no opponent this year, thanks to the DCCC-- but Eric Cantor is very much available. And he has a great opponent, Wayne Powell. (We have a special page devoted solely to defeating Cantor). But the DCCC doesn't want to take on Cantor... too hard, too costly... too many big donors who give both to Cantor and Steve Israel.

Powell has a remarkable-- even legendary-- Democratic strategist on his team, Dave "Mudcat" Saunders. He helped turn Virginia blue for both Mark Warner in the 2001 gubernatorial race and for Jim Webb's 2006 Senate race. He wrote the campaign classic Foxes in the Henhouse: How the Republicans Stole the South and the Heartland, and What the Democrats Must Do to Run 'em Out. And, unlike the idiots at the DCCC, he thinks Cantor is a great target and that it's a campaign worth waging. “We’re going national,” Saunders told the Daily Caller Wednesday. “And we’re going to be doing a lot of national shows.”

The campaign’s message against Cantor? “He screwed us, and us is pissed.”

“What he has done is sold out the 7th District and his country so that he could become majority leader and continue his march to the speakership,” Saunders said. “It’s all about Eric Cantor. It has nothing to with anything else.”

He added: “It’s a classic case of a guy going to Washington and buying his way to the top."

...“I wasn’t going to do a campaign this time,” the consultant said. “Had no intentions to do it. Then I met Wayne Powell. We have a good horse.”

Cantor has more than $5 million in his campaign war chest, but the hope is to gin up enough national interest in the race to raise enough money to put up a fight, Saunders said.

“We cannot win this campaign, cannot tell the story on Eric Cantor, if we don’t have bullets.”

“How are we going to raise the money? We’re going to tell the story,” he said.

And while toppling Cantor seems far-fetched, Saunders claims the district’s voters are open to someone else. “He’s not well-liked in his district. He doesn’t do town hall meetings, he shelters himself from the electorate.”

“This ain’t about red or blue,” he added. “This is about red, white and blue. This is about the health of the country. We got to stop this crap.”

And Wayne is on the Blue America ActBlue page, if you're of the mind to help take out Cantor.