Wednesday, August 27, 2014

Last Night's Primaries

>


Last night saw primary results come in for Florida, Vermont and Arizona and for primary-runoffs in Oklahoma. The only thing that interests me in Republican results is if the right-wing punters pick an extremist or criminal type who will be easier for a Democrat to beat. Otherwise, their races don't interest me. Let's look at Florida first: no surprises. The two districts Democrats have the best chance to win-- FL-27 (where Obama beat Romney 53-47%) and FL-13 (where Obama beat Romney 50-49%)-- don't have Democrats running. How is that possible? Easy-- Debbie Wasserman Schultz protects her corrupt buddy Ileana Ros-Lehtinen and threatens anyone who even thinks about running against her and… well Nancy Pelosi appointed the most incompetent boob to run the DCCC since 1868. So… Ileana and Dave Jolly get free rides back to Congress, thanks to Wasserman Schultz and Israel. Also waltzing to a new term with no opposition in November are Mario Diaz-Balart ®, Ted Deutch (D), Kathy Castor (D), Gus Bilirakis ®, and Ander Crenshaw ®.

Every other Florida incumbent, both parties, won their primary tonight-- and none were close. Former incumbent, David Rivera, came in 4th of 5 Republican candidates vying to face off against weak, conflicted New Dem Joe Garcia. Rivera, who Garcia beat in 2012, only took 8% of the vote yesterday-- just 2,198 votes. Garcia will face Miami-Dade school board member, Carlos Curbelo, the GOP Establishment candidate.

Alan Grayson won his primary against Nick Ruiz, who financed his campaign by telling donors he was running against conservative Republican John Mica. Grayson took 74%. What ever chance Republicans had to take advantage of identity politics, they blew by giving the nomination to Carol Platt, a real estate agent, instead of teabagger Jorge Bonilla who had been endorsed by right-wing celebrities Dana Loesch and Michelle Malkin. Team Grayson must be happy this morning, with the weakest of the 3 Republicans (a farm subsidy welfare queen) as his opponent in November. You can contribute to Grayson's campaign here.

Republican Charlie Crist will run for governor as a Democrat against criminal Rick Scott, who will run as a Republican. Neither man is worthy of getting any votes from anyone with half a brain. They're the worst of what our corrupt, dysfunctional political system regularly pukes up.

Blue America suffered a loss in OK-05 when conservative state Senator Al McAffrey beat progressive professor Tom Guild, 10,411 (54%) to 8,789 (46%). Although Tom carried Pottawatomie (56.3%) and Seminole County (57.5%), he lost the big enchilada (Oklahoma County 44.1%). His volunteer-based, grassroots campaign just couldn't overcome the negative effect of the last minute smear campaign by McAffrey--robo-calls and postcards claiming Tom was the conservative and McAffrey the real Democrat. McAffrey has no chance whatsoever to beat the GOP candidate, Steve Russell, in November.

The race we were watching in Arizona was for AZ-07, the deep blue central Phioenix district (D+16), where Obama beat Romney 101,028 (72%)- 37,353 (27%). Ed Pastor-- first elected in 1991-- is retiring. The top two contenders were Ruben Gallego, the progressive and Mary Rose Wilcox from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party, endorsed, predictably, by EMILY's List. He spent $486,502 and she spent $427,086. Several progressive PACs and good government reform groups spent another $246,001 bolstering Gallego. After their very costly twin disasters in Hawaii (conservatives Hanabusa and Kim) and their gigantic loss with Wendy Greuel in Los Angeles, EMILY's List didn't spend any of their own money on behalf of Wilcox. She conceded very early in the evening.
Ruben Gallego- 11,644 (48%)
Mary Rose Wilcox- 8,806 (37%)
Randy Camacho- 1,850 (8%)
Jarrett Maupin- 1,797 (7%)
Gallego is a firm ally of Raul Grijalva and can be expected to be a great addition to the Congressional Progressive Caucus. No doubt Wilcox would have joined the Wall Street-owned and operated New Dems. PCCC was one of the progressive groups helping Gallego fight off the threat from EMILY's List and other conservatives. Their co-founder, Adam Green, was jubilant:

"This is a huge victory for the populist Elizabeth Warren wing of American politics, and a big blow to the corporate wing. In addition to supporting economic populist ideas like expanding Social Security benefits and reducing student debt, Ruben Gallego is part of the growing movement to reform how campaigns are funded so that our government is accountable to everyday Americans instead of big-money donors. Ruben Gallego's victory is yet another reminder to national Democrats that the way to energize voters and win in 2014 is to campaign on a bold economic populist message-- fighting to increase the voice of regular people in our democracy."


And late last night we got word from DFA that they had committed $300,000 in Independent Expenditures on behalf of Shenna Bellows, the awesome candidate running for the Maine Senate seat occupied by Susan Collins. They'll be running two 60-second TV spots, that explain Collins real record in Washington. Today would be a good day to contribute to Shenna's campaign.

Labels: , , , , , ,

0 Comments:

Post a Comment

<< Home