Blue America Was Successful Last Tuesday In Arkansas-- And I Don't Mean Symbolically; Our Candidate Won

Just about one year ago to the day, John, Digby, Jacquie and D-Day were scurrying to put together our Blanche Lincoln ad campaign. It was a very homemade affair, the first 3 ads being produced by Digby in John's kitchen. 862 donors contributed $33,753 and Blue America kicked in another $70,000. The average donation was just over $39.00. We ran those ads-- and a fourth one we made later-- all summer, fall and winter and stopped running them as soon as the big labor unions came in with their candidate-- and bankrolls. We didn't stop because we necessarily had anything against Lt. Gov. Bill Halter-- more about that below-- but because we felt our mission was accomplished. We had driven Blanche's approval ratings down drastically, especially in the 8 counties across from Memphis which are crucial for Democrats in statewide races. Our ads let the voters there know that although Blanche Lincoln called herself a Democrat, she was voting with the GOP for the corporate special interests and not in the interest of Arkansas' working families the way Democrats are supposed to. I know, I know; it's an old fashioned supposition (as Blanche started proving again, immediately after she was declared the winner of the runoff).

Anyway within moments of Bill Halter declaring his candidacy I did two things-- added him to the PAC's Send the Democrats A Message They Can Understand page (on which 161 donors contributed $4,673.75 directly to Halter For Senate); and I called his office to invite him to participate in a Blue America live blogging session at Crooks & Liars, which is how we introduce our candidates to our readers and donors. We invited him half a dozen times and got various excuses over the next couple of months. He never came on and never got in the phone either. We never had any idea if he fit any of the Blue America criteria for an endorsement. So we never endorsed him.

Did he believe in campaign finance reform? Was he solid on Choice? How would he stand when it came to corporate special interests vs working families? Afghanistan? Equality for gays? The environment? We never got any answers. Instead I got a call from an old and trusted friend, Lara Bergthold who had worked closely with Halter in the Wes Clark campaign. She told me that as bad as Lincoln is-- and she agreed that Blanche is a nightmare, Halter would be no improvement and, in fact, could be even worse. That gave me pause. Lara worked on a guest post on March 2. On June 7, she was interviewed along the same lines in the NY Times and made it clear that, from her perspective, Halter was no progressive.

Ms. Bergthold, who spent weeks in 2003 working with Mr. Halter on Gen. Wesley K. Clark’s presidential campaign, said Mr. Halter had been among the most conservative voices in the room, even pooh-poohing the importance of meeting with labor unions and other key segments of the Democratic base.

Now, Ms. Bergthold worries that the groups that have poured millions of dollars into his campaign might not know what they are getting. Compared with Mrs. Lincoln, a senator for 12 years, Mr. Halter is a political cipher, with no voting record and several chapters of his history unexamined.

“I don’t like to see him turned into a progressive darling on the national stage when I know him to be something different,” Ms. Bergthold said. “He’s a political opportunist.”

By then Blue America had long made a decision to "root" for Blanche to lose and leave it at that. Instead we saw a real opportunity for progressive governance and we jumped on it. Back when I was first looking for an alternative to Blanche-- and when Halter had personally assured me he would not be running-- virtually everyone I spoke with in the state told me the most progressive voice in state government was a Little Rock senator, Joyce Elliott, but that she would be unlikely to go up against Blanche and the Democratic Machine, something that would end a promising political career.

And then moderate Democrat Vic Snyder, the congressman who represented the 2nd CD, which includes all of Joyce's senatorial district, suddenly decided to retire. Every progressive in the state wanted to see her run, although there was almost immediately a crowded field-- of conservative-leaning white men. In January Blue Arkansas really introduced Joyce to outsiders like myself, calling her the "the one candidate that really thrills me":

Senator Elliott is an excellent representative and a great progressive, but there are reasons to question her ability to win this district, and we all know why-race and ideology. The second was President Obama’s best district in Arkansas, but he still lost it by nine points. There is of course deep seated racism and reluctance to vote for African American candidates in some segments of Arkansas, even among so called Democrats, and the Republicans have a top tier recruit in Tim Griffin. Then you have to factor in sourness towards Obama and national Democrats found heavily in Arkansas, a product of both the President’s indifference to connecting to voters here and of our Democratic establishment refusal to respect voters by talking to them like adults and their cowardly refusal to stand up to the teabaggers and the rest of the rabid right. It’s all plenty of reason to give any of us pause when considering such a promising progressive as Elliott.

In the end Blue Arkansas endorsed her and fought hard for her. She won the first round of the 5-way primary, beating her closest opponent, arch conservative House Speaker Robbie Wills 39.6- 27.9%. Blue America endorsed her immediately, started raising funds for her and had her over to Crooks & Liars for a live session. Wills' campaign was basically to have his surrogates repeat over and over that an African-American could not win in November and that if she were nominated she would be beaten by the execrable Tim Griffin. The scare tactic didn't work and last Tuesday Joyce triumphed decisively, 53.8- 46.2%, over Wills.

If Joyce wins in November she'll be the first Africa American to win a federal election in Arkansas since the Union troops were withdrawn from the state after the Reconstruction period that followed the Civil War. She'll be facing Karl Rove protégé Tim Griffin, the disgraced ex-U.S. Attorney. Please consider contributing what you can towards her campaign.

Blue America's success with Joyce had a great deal to do with the spectacular GOTV operation in Pulaski County by the unions. Unfortunately many of the voters who they got out to vote were listening to Obama and Clinton who had urged them to vote for Blanche. But they voted for Joyce as well. And that success didn't change my opinion one bit that the unions and other Halter backers did the right thing for them-- showing conservative and corrupt corporate Democrats that there is accountability and a price to pay for their perfidy. I bet Ben Nelson got a very clear message from the horrific-- and expensive-- primary and run-off Blanche had to fight. Right after the votes rolled in AFL-CIO activist Amy Dean posted a worthwhile piece at Daily Kos Why Taking on Blanche Lincoln Was the Right Call + Building a Real Progressive Agenda.

Challenges within the primaries allow us to define what it means to be a real Democrat--to insist that the party truly puts the interests of working people first. That's what makes elections like Tuesday's run-off in Arkansas between Bill Halter and incumbent Senator Blanche Lincoln, the victor, so important. Labor and progressive movements got together to target Lincoln because she had opposed the Employee Free Choice Act, helped to block a robust public option in health care reform, and refused to back one of President Obama's key nominees to the National Labor Relations Board.

Conventional wisdom within the Democratic Party states that we need strong majorities in order to pass better public policies in Washington, DC. But the logic of "more" doesn't add up if those people we elect do not provide us with the votes we need. As long as our political strategies ask only that candidates have a "D" behind their names, we'll never get the type of majorities that will take hard stands to confront the power of big business and create real reform.

Going back to the Carter years in the 1970s, we had large Democratic majorities in Congress, yet we saw labor law weakened and the right to collective bargaining eroded. Under Clinton, Democratic majorities gave us NAFTA and more unfair trade. If we don't want history to repeat itself with the current administration, we cannot get wrapped up in the temporary excitement of a given electoral campaign. We need to have the memory, foresight, and strategy to craft something different. That's why we should hope that challenges within the primaries become more standard.

Doing politics differently means two things:

1) having a higher standard of accountability; and

2) judging our success in electoral contests based on a dual bottom line.

Accountability first means being clear about what our agenda is. Strong health care and labor law reforms are key structural changes needed in our economy if we are to rebuild the American middle class. We can't forget these in the next Congress and simply move on to new matters. Rather than waiting for the White House to lead and hoping that candidates follow, we must lead by putting our priorities forward. We don't need friends on issues that are foundational to working people, such as health care, living wages, and making collective bargaining the norm; we need champions.

There have been countless calls from labor and other progressive constituencies for accountability from politicians. Nobody disagrees that elected officials should be made to answer for their votes. But there is not much said about how to make this happen--about what the vehicle for ensuring accountability will be.

The answer is an organized base. None of the progressive lobbies in Washington, DC can hold any elected official accountable without strong, organized, permanent grassroots organization in the home states.

I've sensed a lot of progressives are downheartened the Halter lost. I understand it, but I don't really share the feelings. I would have liked to have seen Blanche lose-- as she probably will in November-- and it probably would have been better to have her lose to a Democrat than to a Republican corporate hack like John Boozman. He'll also oppose healthcare reform; he'll also oppose Employee Free Choice; he'll also oppose fair taxation and push to abolish the Estate Tax; he'll also serve the interests of the 100 wealthiest families and the biggest corporations in America. Meanwhile, if we're lucky, we'll have a proven progressive leader in Joyce Elliott beginning a long fruitful House career.

Perhaps on that same day Tarryl Clark will replace Michele Bachmann, and perhaps Billy Kennedy will replace Virginia Foxx, Ken Calvert could be ousted by Bill Hedrick. And we'll be working to pull off what the DCCC won't even dare to approach-- replacing John Boehner with Justin Coussoule. We have our work cut out for us and we're not going to get anywhere without your support. Last cycle Blue America scored better than any PAC in the nation in terms of bringing home winners-- better than the unions, the environmental groups, the women's groups, etc. And "viability" is far, far from the top of our list of candidate qualifiers. Principles, values and character are what we're looking for. I hope you are too.



Digby Takes It To The Next Level

In a post this afternoon Digby charged down the field-- and scored:

If you don't try, don't support progressive candidates, challenge the establishment, work hard over a long time horizon to help build progressive infrastructure it will never happen. And like all progress it happens in fits and starts, two steps forward, one step back.

It's easy to lose heart and figure there's no point, especially when you try something as big as the Halter campaign, with all the money and institutional clout, and lose. But it seems clear from all historical examples that it takes a while to build a movement, especially one based upon a value system, worldview and set of principles rather than a single issue. It obviously requires long term dedication to education, rhetorical refinement, infrastructure building and patience. Solidarity-- the single most important aspect of movement building, in my opinion-- takes time. I don't think there are any shortcuts. And like most things in life, I would guess that it's important to acknowledge the smaller victories and build upon them.

Joyce Elliott is facing one of the most disreputable GOP dirty tricksters in the business, Tim Griffin a truly malevolent piece of work who made his bones manufacturing lies about Al Gore in the 2000 election and went on to be the poster boy for Karl Rove's despoiling of the US Attorneys office during the Bush administration. There is no person more unworthy of being in the United States congress. And at least partly because of a netroots and union push in the state, we have a very accomplished progressive running against him in the most progressive district in Arkansas. And he can be beaten.

So, despite the fact that the Halter campaign didn't go the distance, never think it wasn't worth it. If Joyce Elliott becomes the next congressional representative from the 2nd district, every penny will have been well spent, no matter what the petulant complainers from the White House said. She could very well be the one that ends up succeeding Blanche Lincoln a few years from now. That's what playing the long game is all about.

You can donate to Joyce's campaign here.

Say, Bill Clinton, is there anything that embarrasses a "centrist" Democrat?

Bill 'n' Blanche: You mean being a 

corporate whore is, like, a bad thing?

by Ken

Over the weekend I found myself in extended conversation of the sort I usually try to avoid -- with a fellow citizen of strongly held opinions backed by broad but in many areas exceedingly sketchy knowledge. It was a social occasion, and for once I didn't want to appear antisocial, or at least not excessively antisocial, and the citizen was the husband of someone whose feelings I truly didn't want to bruise. And of course once I got into it, the old need . . . well, not to be right, but not to be steamrolled by blatant sophistry, kicked in.

The citizen wasn't so much conservative as contrarian, although it struck me as interesting that his contrariness rarely seemed to apply to areas of the conventional wisdom that I find most deserving of contradicting. And so, for example, he offered up the Obama administration's difficulty in closing the prison at Guantanamo as a demonstration of its awakening to the reality that governing is more difficult than the campaign's attacks on the Bush administration suggested.

Now of course as a DWT reader you probably know that my response was, "What attacks?" And I pointed out what a wasted opportunity both the campaign and the administration-to-date had been in the matter of frontally attacking the criminally misguided ideology and policies of the Right. In the matter of Guantanamo, I agreed that yes, closing the prison involves difficulties, but difficulties are what you surmount if you want to get something done, and in this administration's case, on a whole range of Bush regime policies it's hard to find much trace of a wish to seriously change course. It's not only difficult but pretty much impossible to, say, shut down the Guantanamo internment camp if you're not really trying.

We see it all over the place, as Obama's people wage even more relentless campaigns against immigrants and whistle-blowers and any other would-be disturbers of the conventional right-wing order. (As many commentators have pointed out, the president's famous desire to look forward rather than backward applies only to the organized-crime wave that was the Bush regime.

Just the other day, for example, Glenn Greenwald, who's been doing a bang-up job tracking the continuity between Bush and Obama administration policies, in writing about the shocking and fundamentally un-American proviso that popped out of the Defense Department budget bill opening lawyers who defend terror detainees to possible recriminations just for doing their job, noted:

This is yet another example of repellent, fear-based policies that could not be (or at least were not) enacted during the Bush years yet are finding new life under Democratic Party rule.  Recall that Bush Pentagon official Cully Stimson was actually forced to apologize for suggesting that lawyers who represented Guantanamo detainees were engaged in disloyal and improper acts.  Yet with the Democrats in control of Washington, a provision grounded in exactly that rotted premise has now been unanimously reported out of a major House Committee.

When you can get the attention of someone in the administration or the congressional leadership to address such points, what you usually get, mixed in with fibbing about the facts, is excuses -- we don't have the votes, we have to be careful, the country isn't with us, etc. Rarely do they have the honesty to say, Well, we just don't wanna.

It is, of course, the standard excuse for all those Republican-style candidates the Democratic leaders in both houses of Congress have been trying so hard to stuff their caucuses with. For a while you can accept the excuse that they need people who are "electable" in those districts and states. But as Howie has had such frequent occasion to point out, their right-wing "centrists" aren't necessarily more electable than authentic Democrats they routinely muscle out of the nominating process, candidates who might actually give troubled voters something to vote for.

In this election cycle even the pretense of an "electability" factor has more and more been dropped, as the official party organs increasingly find themselves stumping for candidates who (probably fortunately) couldn't beat any candidate unencumbered by a sex scandal. It becomes increasingly clear that the party hacks support right-wing "Democrats" because they're the people they're most comfortable with -- people who will fit right into the Beltway's kabuki politics, where "order" requires giving highest consideration to the people who pay for it.

Which brings me to Bill Clinton. Now I don't imagine there are many progressives who still nurture illusions about our Bill's politics, though I think there are still a lot of people who haven't yet figured out that Hillary isn't much more progressive. But it's Bill who's suddenly in the news, and you have to wonder if he has the sense to be embarrassed.

I still say that, as a matter of law, the story of what inducement the White House may have offered Joe Sestak to clear Arlen Specter's path to reelection is a nonstory. It was a legitimate political issue in the Democratic primary, because Pennsylvania Democratic voters have a right to know and consider how their elected officials are attempting to manipulate the selection of candidates. But there's no issue of a crime here; that's just a demented fabrication of right-wing doodybrains who haven't told their day's quotient of lies.

If this were the worst thing that had been done by the Nixon, Reagan, Bush I, or Bush II administrations, that would represent an ethical standard about a trillion times higher than reality. In American politics, and I suspect everybody else's, finding a nice job for somebody you want out of the way of your preferred candidate is a more or less daily occurrence.

As an issue of governance, however, it is an issue. And by gosh, now that the actual story has come out, there's Bill Clinton "carrying the water" (as Fat Rush would say) for none other than his old attack dog Master Rahm Emanuel.

Meanwhile where was our Bill today? In Arkansas, addressing the question, "Can Bill Clinton Save Blanche Lincoln?" I'm assuming he said something like: "Now a lot of people are saying our Blanche is just a corporate whore. But they say it like that's a bad thing."

Say good night, Bill.


SPEAKING OF THE GREAT PA. SENATE "SCANDAL"

Digby had a great post, "The Scandal Monster's Deadly Toxin," taking off from the earnest proffers from hither and yon as to what Joe Sestak and the White House may have to do "in order to put a stop to this non-scandal once and for all." She acknowledges that "they may be right" --

But here's the thing. None of that will do any good. There is no winning with these noise machine pseudo-scandals. They have an alternate media structure that is designed to stoke scandal fever . . .

There's a wonderfully Digbyesque description of the process of issuing outraged demands that can't ever be met, leading to the next set of outraged demands, and the next.

With every impossible requirement that isn't met, the press will become more convinced that the person must be hiding something, is too hot to handle and will eventually agree that he has to step down or quit the race because "the scandal" is devouring him.

Although eventually "an article or a book will be written explaining that there was never anything to the charges, that the whole thing turned into a feeding frenzy," it will still be the pol's fault for not getting "out front," or simply "for failing to be a stronger, better politician." It takes the impenetrable hide of a Bill Clinton, Digby suggests, "to recognize that they are not going to leave you alone, give yourself up to it and greet each day with the knowledge that this is going to dominate until it either passes or kills you."

#

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.

Will Democratic Voters Dump Conservative Hacks Blanche And Arlen Tomorrow?

Tomorrow's primary election day in a 4 states: Arkansas, Kentucky, Oregon, and Pennsylvania. If you haven't made up your mind yet, allow us to make some suggestions in the 3 Democratic Senate primaries pitting conservatives against... more progressive alternatives. We urge you to vote for:

* Bill Halter in Arkansas
* Jack Conway in Kentucky
* Joe Sestak in Pennsylvania

Barney Frank once said he never agreed with anyone running for office on 100% of the issues until he ran himself. "And after a few years," he quipped, "I didn't even agree with myself 100% of the time!" Now, it isn't easy for an insurgent to beat an incumbent of his or her own party in a primary. A few weeks ago I was at an event with Barney Frank who told the assembled progressives that the way to turn Congress around and make it more responsive to ordinary Americans-- as opposed to special interests-- would be to support primaries against shady Members of Congress. He refused to comment on my question about Blue Dog John Barrow... although I could swear I saw a twinkle in his eyes. John Barrow has his moment of truth before Georgia voters on July 20 and, like most incumbents, he done enough special favors for special interests to have a very special campaign war chest. Likewise, the 3 conservatives running in tomorrow's primaries are all loaded with special interests corporate cash.

By the way, as far as I know, the only one of these races Barney has endorsed in is the one in Pennsylvania and I'm guessing that having served along side Joe Sestak and having gotten to know him over the last few years, he felt comfortable endorsing him against a sitting Democratic incumbent, something that is, alas, rarer than snow on the 4th of July on Penn's Landing. Sestak was also the easiest of the 3 for us to endorse-- and, like in Barney's case, primarily because we know him best. We don't agree with Joe Sestak on every single issue-- and in one case, disengaging from Afghanistan, its a serious disagreement-- but we trust Joe's integrity and goodwill. I couldn't say the same for Arlen Specter, who will change positions based on political tides and special interests donations. Joe is a straight-shooter with America's best interests first and foremost in his mind. Arlen is a sleazy, corrupt hack with Arlen Specter first and foremost in his mind... always and forever. Voting out a worthless shill like Specter and replacing him with an earnest, honest, hardworking public servant like Joe Sestak is exactly what primaries are all about. Disgust with incumbents in general and today's trendlines are Joe's friends going into tomorrow.

On a personal note, I want to say one other thing about Joe Sestak. Blue America endorsed him in 2006 and he turned out to be exactly how he campaigned, a mainstream leader with a decided progressive bent, willing to go out on a limb the way he has on ending DADT. But what marks Joe as unique among members of Congress is that when we've disagreed with a vote he's taken he never once-- not one time since being elected-- shirked from coming forward to publicly explain his position and listen to our criticism. This is almost as rare as that 4th of July snow on Penn's Landing.

When I first met Kentucky Attorney General Jack Conway, I admit, I didn't have high hopes. I knew how reactionary and steeped in corruption Dan Mongiardo was-- and I was certainly aware how he had campaigned against women's choice and against equality for gay people-- but I assumed Conway would better the best of two evils. Scratch the "two evils" meme. If he wins tomorrow-- and, like the two other races, this is polling neck-and-neck-- he is likely to be a solid advocate for working families in Kentucky. I don't expect to agree with every single vote he makes over the next six years but, having gotten to know him, I expect he will approach each vote with the best interests of ordinary American families in mind, not personal political ambitions and not corporate special interests. Jack has displayed good sense and political courageousness in his career. Mongiardo should be running as a Republican since he agrees with virtually their entire conservative agenda. Senator Wendell Ford's endorsement of Conway shocked everyone; he had never endorsed anyone in a primary before. This one, however, is crystal clear.

Anyone a Democratic candidate would care to be endorsed by in Kentucky politics has come out for Conway. Here are some of the more prominent endorsements:

Senator Wendell Ford: "Jack Conway is the best candidate for Kentucky, and that's why I'm supporting him."

State Auditor Crit Luallen: "I know that Jack Conway is a man of character and a man of integrity. He represents all that is best about a new generation of leadership for Kentucky."

House Speaker Greg Stumbo: "Jack has spent a career working on behalf of Kentucky's families and will be a champion for them in the Senate."

Congressman Ben Chandler: "Jack Conway will work tirelessly to bring economic opportunity to all parts of Kentucky."

Congressman John Yarmuth: "…I can't mention one person I can think of in this great Commonwealth who could serve us better than Jack Conway will in the United States Senate…"

Louisville Mayor Jerry Abramson: "We need somebody that brings this Commonwealth together, that reflects our values, that speaks on behalf of the citizens he has an opportunity to represent and that candidate is Jack Conway."

The Arkansas race is the most difficult for us. We know-- better than most-- how awful Blanche Lincoln has been, first as a conservative House member and then as a conservative senator. She's a posterchild for congressional corruption and if selling your vote was a serious crime, as it should be, she'd be serving life without parole. OK, but what do we know about Bill Halter? He's taken some popular populist positions but he's the only candidate in the history of Blue America who we were unable to get to come on and talk with us. We know he's busy-- and we know he's going to be better than Blanche Lincoln. Last week the Arkansas Leader endorsed Halter, with similar reservations:

Halter is a harder choice because we don’t care for his single achievement as a public official in Arkansas, the state lottery.

The lieutenant governor does not have a chance to do great deeds, but Halter went out of his way to do harm when he engineered a ballot position and a resounding vote for the lottery in 2008.

How differently he will perform as a senator from Lincoln we cannot be sure, but he indicated that he would have voted the opposite on all those initiatives of the Bush administration that turned federal budget surpluses into the mammoth deficits and converted the most buoyant economy in the nation’s history into the worst in 70 years. Neither do we believe that he will be at the service of people of great wealth and the petroleum and coal industries, which have pumped fortunes into the campaign of Lincoln.

Arkansas' top political columnist John Brummett informed his readers-- you might say apologetically-- he had already voted... for Halter. He's impressed by Halter "who is smarter, supremely competent, superbly qualified by academic and work experience and perhaps more progressive" but is completely repulsed by Blanche. How could anyone not be?

Outside of the three big Senate primaries, there are a number of other races worth looking at. Underdog Manan Trivedi seems on the verge of catching up with Doug Pike, the establishment fave for Jim Gerlach's shaky seat northwest of Philly. Due north of there, in a district I was lived in, Corey O'Brien doesn't seem to have closed the deal with Democratic voters to replace corrupt relic Paul Kanjorski. A bolder and more progressive Democrat would have been able to have done in with ease. In the conservative-trending 12th CD on the other end of the state, there's a special election between two conservatives, Democrat Mark Critz and some cookie-cutter GOP asshat, vying for Jack Murtha's old seat. Both are anti-choice, homophobic and completely corporate-centric. There's nothing under any circumstances that would ever get me to vote for either. Interestingly, though, at the same time Democrats may hold their noses and vote for Critz, just to keep the seat ostensibly blue, they can oppose him in the simultaneous primary by voting for Ryan Bucchianeri.

Sheila Dow Ford, a progressive, is opposing Blue Dog Tim Holden in the 17th CD, which stretches out from Harrisburg through Pennsylvania Dutch Country almost to Reading and north to Pottsville. Sheila is by far the better candidate in a race that hasn't been polled. If she wins it will probably because Democratic voters there are sick of Holden's conservatism and angry at his vote against healthcare reform.

In Arkansas crooked Blue Dog Mike Ross has no primary challenger but there are lively races for the seats of two retiring less conservative Democratic congressmen, Marion Berry in the first and Vic Snyder in the second. The last time any Democratic presidential nominee broke 50% in any of Arkansas' congressional districts was in 2000 when Gore eked out a narrow victory over Bush, 50-48% in the first CD. It's been all downhill, statewide, since then. Obama's best showing was in the second (Little Rock) where he managed to get 44% against McCain's 54%. Pretty dismal. The race for the Democratic nomination to take Snyder's seat pits four moderates against one conservative-- and the conservative, former House Speaker Robbie Wills, is well-known and well-financed. Willis is an anti-healthcare type of candidate who will, no doubt, join the Blue Dog caucus and vote with the Republicans on substantive issues. The best way of beating him is by voting for state Senator Joyce Elliott, the most progressive among the others.

There are 6 Democrats running to replace Berry in the eastern part of the state-- state Senator Steve Bryles, conservative former Berry chief of staff Chad Causey (who has been endorsed by Berry), moderate state Rep. David Cook, orthopedic surgeon Terry Green, businessman Ben Ponder, and very conservative former state Senator Tim Wooldridge. The big money seems to be mostly flowing to the two conservatives, Causey ($356,024) and Woolridge $315,780), with Bryles having brought in $131,380, Cook $54,173, and Green and Ponder just over $25,000 each. In all likelihood there will be a June 8th runoff between the two worst candidates, Causely and Woolridge, neither of whom will be worth supporting.

You Say You Want A Revolution? Conservatives Haven't Changed Since Colonial Days

Blanche Lincoln & Samuel Seabury, conservatives with ideas antithetical to American values

When reviewing-- at great length and over the course of several months-- Mike Lux's spectacular book, The Progressive Revolution: How The Best In America Came To Be, we often pointed out how conservatives were inevitably on the wrong side of history, starting with their opposition to the Declaration of Independence, to the American Revolution itself-- and did they ever hate the tea partiers-- and, of course, to the Constitution which granted suffrage to non-landowners and to "common" people. At the time of the American Revolution, almost half a million conservatives remained loyal to the British crown and many fought on the side of the Brits against the founding of a new independent republic. That was about 20% of the population at the time. After the war, over 60,000 white conservatives-- including many of the wealthiest landowners like the DeLancy, DePester Walton and Cruger families of the Hudson Valley and the Penn, Allen, Chew, and Shippen families of Pennsylvania-- left America for Britain or other British territories, like Canada and the Bahamas. Many of the richest southern conservatives took their slaves and fled to the West Indies. In his spectacular book, Conservatism in Early American History, Leonard Woods Larabee identified the traits that predicted anti-American attitudes among conservatives. It's still worth looking at those traits today when examining anti-American attitudes among today's conservatives. Needless to say, the top traits were greed and selfishness, the root motivators among most conservatives down through the ages.

In his book Threshold Thom Hartmann emphasizes that "[d]uring the Revolutionary War, virtually every person of great wealth left the United States... As the Constitution was being framed, one of the biggest issues was the debate over the best ways to keep in check the power of wealth." Unfortunately, corporate shills like Alexander Hamilton (think of him as the representative of Wall Street, a kind of combination of John McCain, Chuck Schumer and Joe Lieberman), Tench Coxe and Samuel Seabury and reactionary southerners-- yep; back then too-- worked hard, and effectively, to thwart that strain of revolutionary thought. Which is why, for example, we wound up with a Senate (modeled on the House of Lords), with slavery, with no voting rights for women and no guarantees of the individual liberties that were later addressed-- also to the hysterical opposition of conservatives-- by the Bill of Rights.

Today this same strain of conservatism completely dominates one political party, the Republicans, and had immense power inside the Democratic party (though the corporately-financed DLC and Blue Dog Caucus). Yesterday Bill Halter debated one of the most conservative-- and, as though it were a corollary, corrupt-- members of the Senate, Blanche Lincoln. He argued for giving the middle class a hand. She advocated for low estate tax rates for the few dozen families in Arkansas-- all her political contributors-- with estates worth over $10,000,000.

Tuesday Arkansas voters will decide between the middle class-oriented Halter and the sleazy corporate shill Lincoln. It should surprise no one that the Democratic Party Establishment, stinking in nearly as much corruption as the Republiucan Party Establishment, backs Lincoln. Wherever there's a contested primary Tuesday, the DCCC, the DSCC and the Democratic insider establishment is backing the more conservative candidate and the one most likely to suck up to Big Money corporate interests. In the U.K. last week, voters gave no party a mandate. The "winners," The Conservatives, walked off with an unimpressive 36% of the vote. 64% of the electorate rejected them. But the Labour Party, like the U.S. Democratic Party, has, in many cases, become too putrid and too beholden to corporate interests to bother with.

Aside from Arkansas, there are a number of crucial races pitting conservatives against non-conservatives. Pennsylvania Democrats will decide between a Republican calling himself a Democrat for convenience sake, Arlen Specter, and an actual Democrat, Joe Sestak. And in Kentucky, Democrats get to choose between Dan Mongiardo, an anti-Choice, anti-gay, anti-healthcare conservative tool, and Attorney General Jack Conway, who, like Halter, stands for solidly middle class values and aspirations. All three races are too close to call, although momentum is clearly against the three conservatives. You know which ones Blue America is backing, right?

More On The Blue America Senate Primaries Contest

Yesterday we saw every single Republican-- including supposed moderates Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins and Scott Brown-- vote against allowing a debate on Wall Street reform to even begin. And the most reactionary Democrat in the Senate, Ben Nelson of Nebraska, crossed the aisle to vote for Wall Street and against the American people. It's another sign that there's an effective conservative coalition in control of the American government.

In 2008 Americans went to the polls and overwhelmingly voted for change and for hope, two of the things most anathemas to conservatives. Conventional wisdom is that after the fast-approaching November midterms, Congress will be even less likely to vote for change and hope. Conventional wisdom has convinced itself that the 30% of Americans who are die-hard right-wing Republicans, who relate positively to teabaggery, who embrace racism and hatred and bigotry and who think Rush Limbaugh and Glenn Beck, not Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, wrote the Constitution, will replace Nancy Pelosi with John Boehner and Harry Reid with Mitch McConnell.

Yesterday was also the first day of a Blue America effort to combat that conventional wisdom with an assertion that-- corporate media and corporate pundits be damned-- we can force change and hope through the system. As April drifts into May, we have to make it clear to our friends and families that if we wait for November it will be too late to prevent a conservative resurgence. May has five crucial Democratic primaries pitting more progressive candidates against more conservative ones: Jennifer Brunner vs. Lee Fisher in Ohio, Jack Conway vs. Daniel Mongiardo (pictured above with his friend John McCain) in Kentucky, Bill Halter vs. Blanche Lincoln in Arkansas, Elaine Marshall vs. Cal Cunningham in North Carolina, and Joe Sestak vs. Arlen Specter in Pennsylvania.

Blue America contends that because the more progressive Democrats are eager to draw sharp contrasts between conservative Republican positions and progressive Democratic positions, only Brunner, Conway, Halter, Marshall and Sestak can turn or keep these seats blue. Why, for example, would voters in Kentucky bother voting for a homophobic reactionary who opposed healthcare reform and mouths GOP talking points whenever he opens his mouth, Mongiardo, against Trey Grayson or Rand Paul? Because they like their officeholders in blue jerseys instead of red ones? I don't think so. Conservatives are happy voting for Republicans, and the Democratic base is as likely to stay home for Mongiardo (or Fisher or Lincoln or Cunningham or Specter) as they did for fatally flawed candidates like Creigh Deeds in Virginia and Martha Coakley in Massachusetts.

What we're doing over at Blue America is running a May Senate Primaries contest, inspired by the Barenaked Ladies song "If I Had A Million Dollars." In fact, we wish we could give the winning campaign a check for a million dollars. Well, we can, but it would bounce. Instead we're going to give the campaign that gets the most votes in our contest something you can't buy, not even for a million dollars: an RIAA-certified Barenaked Ladies multi-platinum-record award for their album Stunt. The winning campaign can auction it, or give it away to a donor, or do whatever they like with it. (This particular plaque is extremely rare and collectible. Fewer than ten were made because album sales spiked immediately after it was ordered and the more common award was made for 4 million albums instead of 3 million, like the one we're giving away.)

So how do you help your favorite campaign win it? Well, you vote-- by donating on the ActBlue page, where $1 counts as a vote and so does $1,000. That's right, each counts as one vote. As I'm writing this, Jennifer Brunner is out front and Bill Halter is coming up fast. But $1 contributions from ten people could change the ball game completely. You can vote here