Why Democrats Won't Win Back The House In 2014-- Don't Blame Hillary

This morning, everyone was talking about Maggie Haberman's new piece for Politico, Struggling Dems waiting for Hillary in 2014. While many progressives grappled with the idea that the Democratic Party seems wedded to a candidate who is another servant of Wall Street corporate interests, there are other unpleasant implications to be considered. Short version: the pathetic Beltway Democrats have turned off their base so badly that they can't get them to come out and vote without luring them with a celebrity. So… forget the midterms-- chances to take back the House nonexistant/Senate lost-- and wait for Hillary in 2016. (I guess the $102 million candidates, committees and outside groups spent on television advertising in federal and gubernatorial races since the beginning of the fourth quarter of last year, doesn't change much… except for the personal wealth of the consultants getting a cut of all that loot.)

Hillary hasn't been campaigning for Democratic candidates in the midterms while her husband has been raising money for the worst corporate friendly shills from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party-- like Chelsea's scandal-plagued mother-in-law in PA-13. But the 2 of them are who all the candidates want on the stump with them. It looks as though the GOP has won their battle to neutralize her:

Clinton’s approach has strategic logic: The sooner she campaigns, the easier it will be for Republicans to sully her as a partisan. Her popularity as a public figure peaked during her time at State; avoiding the political trenches could help prolong that goodwill. Clinton’s poll numbers over the years have tended to drop the more partisan she has been seen as being.

…Clinton’s no-politics-for-now stance comes as Clinton said this month that people should be focused on the midterms instead of speculating incessantly about 2016.

“We have an election coming up this year. … We ought to be paying attention to that, because that will set the parameters of what can or should be done,” Clinton said.

People involved in 2014 races were thrilled by the remark. They took it as a clear signal that Clinton recognizes the distraction that 2016 is for the party when it’s at risk of losing control of the Senate and additional seats in the House.

Officials with national committees and state parties who see President Barack Obama as an albatross for their candidates in November have begun-- if only gingerly-- to initiate conversations with associates of Clinton about getting on her calendar later this year. They don’t want to be seen as nudging or annoying her and aren’t expecting anything until after the summer, several people involved in the process said. The main point of contact is Huma Abedin, Clinton’s chief of staff.

“I said to [Hillary] that the second-- not the minute, but the second-- that she’s ready to engage, we’ll be excited,” Steve Israel, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee chairman and congressman from New York, said in an interview. He said that he spoke with Bill Clinton about a month ago but hadn’t settled on which races the former president will be involved in.

“There’s not a single battleground district in America which wouldn’t want her engagement,” Israel added. “Not one.”

Close your eyes and imagine that Pelosi had fired Israel as DCCC chairman after his catastrophic performance in the 2012 cycle. Would a competent chairman be sitting around holding his breath for Hillary Clinton to show up on a white horse? Or would he be cleaning out that nest of corrupt, self-serving incompetents at the DCCC and replacing them with men and women who understand how to win races? Would a competent DCCC chairman be wasting money trying to elect anti-Choice and gay-hating Blue Dogs in deep red districts while preventing races in vulnerable swing districts? Steve Israel is the worst DCCC chairman ever and no amount of Bill and Hillary Clinton appearances are going to win back the House as long as Israel is deciding which districts (like OH-06-- R+8-- and AR-04-- R+15) and targeted and which get ignored, like Fred Upton's MI-06 (R+1), Ileana Ros-Lehtinen's FL-27 (R+2), Sean Duffy's WI-07 (R+2), Erik Paulsen's MN-03 (R+2), Pat Meehan's PA-07 (R+2), John Kline's MN-02 (R+2), Charlie Dent's PA-15 (R+2), Mike Rogers' MI-08 (R+2), and Paul Ryan's WI-01 (R+3). Worse yet, not a week goes by when a top tier candidate doesn't tell me he or she isn't going to run while Israel is in charge of the DCCC and that they'll wait 'til the next cycle when he's moved on to the next position he'll be screwing up.