Steve Israel Gives Up On Even More Of His Lousy Recruits-- He Still Wants A Leadership Position Though

The DCCC is withdrawing from more races. It was inevitable; they recruited the wrong candidates and, in many cases, the wrong districts. All the money in the world— the DCCC had scheduled 56 million in ads for their candidates— and all the ads in the world will not elect Steve Israel’s wretched Blue Dogs and New Dems. Non-Beltway, grassroots Democrats just do not want to vote for garbage candidates like Israel’s prized OH-06 recruit Jennifer Garrison, in a district moderate state Senator Lou Gentile— who Israel forced out of the race— could have begun the 2-cycle effort it will take to win back.

As we’ve been warning for over a month, Israel-recruited candidates who have counted on the DCCC to help their election and made their plans around DCCC pledges and promises, are up shit’s creek without a paddle. Those who followed Israel’s strategies— strategies that are proven losers— are stuck now with nothing. All that mystery meat bullshit crashed and burned, along with all the weak, pusillanimous candidates who followed it. This week, in explaining why the DCCC is failing so abysmally, the New York Daily News went right to the DWT explanation— which is 100% ignored by the Beltway trade press p.r. shills— namely that “the GOP’s prospects are fueled by national trends and boosted by lackluster recruiting and faltering campaigns by Democrats.”

The Beltway trade papers broke the news about more campaigns Israel is sinking. “The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is scaling back on planned commercial airtime in 11 Republican-held districts, the group said Monday.” The excuse is a hodgepodge of “better” challengers (like Nebraska conservative Brad Ashford, who Israel thinks has a chance of beating Republican incumbent Lee Terry) and endangered Democratic incumbents, all of whom were already getting huge sums of money with the exception of Wall Street darling Sean Patrick Maloney, who does his fund-raising calls from the offices of a friendly hedge fund. He’s already brought it $2,799,282 and has $1,787,449 cash-on-hand to his opponent’s $1,077,638 cash on hand. The latest public polling— by GOP firm Gravis Marketing a couple of weeks ago— shows Maloney ahead 46-40%. If the DCCC is panicking, they must have some private polling that shows Hayworth catching up.

The candidates whose final plans included the ad buys the DCCC promised them but who have now been left high and dry include a growing list including:

• Manan Trivedi (PA-06)
• Kevin Strouse (PA-08)
• Amanda Renteria (CA-21)
• Michael Eggman (CA-10)
• Ann Callis (IL-13)
• Martha Robertson (NY-23)
• Jim Mowrer (IA-04)
• Aaron Woolf (NY-23)
• Pam Byrnes (MI-07)
• Bobby McKenzie (MI-11)
• Eric Schertzing (MI-08)

A contact inside the moribund campaign of former Guantánamo gulag commandante Jerry Cannon told me this morning that Cannon, bitter and angry, has given up completely— practically ending phone calls and chopping firewood instead, cursing Steve Israel with every swing of the axe. His drinking buddy, Michigan Democratic chair, Lon Johnson, who didn’t give a hoot when he saw Israel flush Pam Byrnes, Eric Schertzing, or Bobby McKenzie down the toilet, carries on incoherently about the anti-Choice, socially conservative Cannon. Michigan, which held so much promise is just cooked. One bitter campaign manager told me yesterday that his candidate “did everything the DCCC asked us to do and… then there’s no guarantee.” Their campaign strategy is wrecked. At this point, Michigan’s only strong, vibrant campaign is in the southwestern part of the state, MI-06, which has been completely ignored by Israel. Paul Clements crafted a campaign that wouldn’t be dependent on DCCC money or messaging or anything else. His campaign has a path to victory that doesn’t include the DCCC. The other Michigan campaigns are sunk, along with everything else Israel has touched this cycle.

Please consider never giving the DCCC another nickel to waste-- and contributing to Paul Clements' campaign instead. Remember this spot from then-abandoned Congressman Steve Dreihaus? "Send a message to the DCCC," he suggested.