Thom Tillis Is Counting On Trump And Schumer To Keep Him In The Senate

Thom Tillis is betting that pledging fealty to Trump will help him keep his Senate seat. He needs to beat multimillionaire neo-fascist crackpot Garland Tucker in a primary in which Tucker is self-financing his campaign ($1,274,643 million so far, 74% of his campaign war chest) and painting Tillis "as an enemy of the Trump agenda."

Trump beat Hillary in North Carolina, a swing state, by 3 points in 2016-- 2,362,631 (49.83%) to 2,189,316 (46.17%). Since then, though, Trump's image has crashed and burned. He's popular among Republicans but has utterly lost independents-- in a state where independents determine the outcomes of every election. According to the most recent Trump Tracker polling, Trump's job approval has steadily decreased since he was inaugurated. Since then, he has lost 21 points and today his approval is minus 3%. In way of comparison, Trump's approval is in positive territory in both Kentucky (+11) and Louisiana (+12)-- where he just presided over the loss of two gubernatorial allies, Matt Bevin and Eddie Rispone. It's worth mentioning that an impeachment inquiry was favored, even before it started, by 48.8% to 41.0% of North Carolinians polled.





Burgess Everett took a look at Tillis' strategy for Politico, reminding readers that "Tillis began the Trump era by negotiating with Democrats on immigration and co-authoring legislation to protect special counsel Robert Mueller. He even briefly opposed President Donald Trump’s national emergency to build a border wall." That was then. "Now the North Carolina Republican's independent streak is fading. He’s deploying the president as a shield against a conservative primary challenger and he’s hugging Trump tightly... It’s a shrewd political strategy amid a well-funded primary challenge from Garland Tucker, a conservative businessman who paints Tillis as an enemy of the Trump agenda. But Tillis’ role as Trump’s new best friend threatens to undermine his profile as a diligent, unpredictable senator-- and could damage his general election chances."

Everett himself is a good example of how Tillis can avoid losing in November. Everett is the kind of Inside-the-Beltway shill for the party power-mongers so that his Politico pieces sound like they were written, in part, by the DSCC and the NRCC. Let me show you some typical Everett: Standing behind Tucker is potential Democratic opponent Cal Cunningham, an establishment-backed military veteran eager to cast Tillis as a lackey who 'married himself to Donald Trump.'" Straight from Chuck Schumer's press shop. Virtually all polling shows state Senator Erica Smith, a progressive African American woman, is preferred to Schumer's conservative what male candidate. The most recent polling (Oct 7) is by Meredith College and it shows Schumer's Cunningham losing to Tillis 33.3% to 32.6%... but the more independent-minded Erica Smith beating him 33.5% to 33.1%. Schumer's propaganda team manages to get lazy lunkheads and Beltway sheep-- Everett is just one of dozens-- to stick with the party line.

Everett is correct when he points out that Tillis' most immediate task is to win the primary. (Presumably he can hope Schumer is successful in sabotaging smith's campaign and handing him the easily beaten Cunningham as an opponent.)

“He probably has more of a challenge in a primary than he does in a general,” said Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC), a close ally of the president who has not endorsed Tillis.

Meadows added that Tillis’ support for the special counsel bill and his shifting stance on the national emergency declaration “created an opening in a race that would generally not have seen a credible primary challenger."

The wealthy Tucker is spending heavily on ads highlighting Tillis’ “flip-flop” on the border-- Tillis’ most infamous episode as a senator-- when he voted to uphold the national emergency after announcing his opposition in a Washington Post op-ed. Tillis boasts a 94 percent voting score with the president, but Tucker is pouring enough money into pointing out Tillis’ perceived dalliances away from Trump that the senator felt compelled to respond with an ad barrage of his own.

Tillis acknowledges his style isn’t necessarily built to appeal to his party’s hard-liners. At a North Carolina Federation of Republican Women event, he lamented that sometimes he gets “criticized because I don’t speak too fiery or talk too angry.”

“Some people, I think, perceive my style as being something that’s soft,” he said during a 25-minute interview at the state party headquarters. “But I’ve got a good conservative track record to run on. And we believe if people know it, they know where I stand on immigration, they know where I stand to the level where the president will endorse me? We’ll win.”

These are rare moments of self-reflection for Tillis, a confident bordering on cocky 59-year-old former state House speaker who helped rebuild the North Carolina GOP. He said Trump would campaign for him in the primary if necessary but dismisses Tucker: “I don’t believe the race is even close.”

Most Republicans still feel Tillis can ride Trump’s coattails to reelection, though he risks running behind the president in a state known for close elections. GOP alarm bells go off every few years in North Carolina, sometimes warranted and sometimes not: In 2016, GOP Sen. Richard Burr was easily reelected despite running a laid-back campaign, while the Republican governor was cast out.

This year, Tucker is essentially operating as a Democratic super PAC, draining Tillis of resources and allowing national Democrats to sit back and enjoy the show. It’s a situation that most other vulnerable incumbents have avoided, but Tillis’ plight is unique, having riled up parts of Trump’s base with his limited dissent.

...Facing attacks from the right and left, Tillis harbors few regrets. He’s dropped any notion of deal-making on immigration with Democrats, walking away from 2018 talks to help Dreamers and dismissing comprehensive immigration reform as something that could happen “maybe 20 years from now” after the border is fully secured.

He even argues that his bill protecting the special counsel from a Trump firing was all about defending the president.

“I had a concern and it actually proved to be wise: to let the special counsel play out its role. Because there was no collusion and no obstruction,” Tillis said. “Obviously, I support the president. I thought, like he did, that it was a witch hunt.”

Tillis concedes he could have “probably spent more time explaining” his queasiness with Trump’s national emergency to his constituents, but doesn't disavow what in North Carolina political circles is now simply called “the op-ed.”

It’s an example of the dissonance surrounding Tillis. He tells Republican supporters he’s been with Trump “every step of the way” on the border wall but also emphasizes his willingness to take criticism from his own party.

“If all you do is take the easy way out and be silent on things that you feel strongly about institutionally, then you’re not really doing your job as a U.S. senator,” Tillis said. “I’m not going to be that person.”

It’s a difficult argument for him to make, but it doesn’t surprise close friends. Tillis is a partisan Republican, but he bristles at the idea that he’s become a rubber stamp.

“There have been times where Tillis has stopped and truly deliberated,” said Carolyn Justice, a former GOP state lawmaker and longtime ally. “People confuse that with his support for Trump overall. And that’s a mistake.”

“We live in an environment where people are out to get you if you stray one inch,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who has told Trump directly that Tillis is a strong general election candidate.

Tucker says he’s put $1.5 million of his own money into the race and will put in still more, hoping to tap into what he describes as long-standing conservative dissatisfaction with Tillis.

“It wasn’t necessarily that [conservatives] were waiting for me to run, but they were waiting for someone,” Tucker said in an interview in North Raleigh, flanked by adviser Carter Wrenn, a former aide to the late firebrand conservative Sen. Jesse Helms.

As he chomped on a lit cigar, Wrenn insisted Tucker has narrowed the race to about 10 points. Tillis has put more than $2 million of his campaign money into ads attacking Tucker as someone who “lies like a dog,” and he scoffed when told of Wrenn’s account.

A recent Fox News poll showed Tillis with the support of 54 percent of primary voters, with Tucker garnering just 11 percent.

“This is Carter Wrenn’s retirement fund. That’s the only reason he’s got Garland running,” Burr said of the race.

Tillis said he’s spending early to introduce himself to the fast-growing state’s new voters who have arrived since his previous election in 2014. Public polling shows Tillis still has work to do. Public Policy Polling, Fox News and Morning Consult surveys show at least 25 percent of voters have no opinion of him, hampering his approval ratings.

“He is not really in control of how he’s defined,” said Geoff Garin, a Democratic pollster. “This double whammy of being seen as not different enough from Trump among suburbanites and not supportive enough among rural conservatives could end up being the kiss of death.”

Whether Tucker comes anywhere close to beating Tillis is irrelevant to Democrats. They are just happy that Tillis is moving further to the right and putting the 2.2 million unaffiliated voters here in play.

“Extraordinarily weak, extraordinarily vulnerable,” Cunningham said of Tillis during an interview in nearby Cary. “I’d rather be me than him right now.”

North Carolina could easily be the tipping point for the GOP’s 53-seat majority. After losing the 2010 Senate primary here, Cunningham again has a Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee endorsement and is credible enough that Senate Republicans acknowledge Tillis is a top concern.

But Cunningham also has hurdles to overcome before he can face Tillis. The Fox News poll showed him trailing state Sen. Erica Smith, with Cunningham coming in at 13 percent of the vote to Smith's 18 percent.

“Every poll that has been conducted since this race started has me as the frontrunner,” Smith said.

Still, a 20-to-1 financial edge over Smith and the DSCC endorsement could prove decisive for Cunningham.

Cunningham is taking a centrist posture, distancing himself from “Medicare for All” and the suspension of deportations, while Tillis ties Cunningham relentlessly to Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders. In gauging Cunningham’s chances, Tillis strikes a Trumpian note, dubbing him “Silent Cal” after tight-lipped President Calvin Coolidge.

The incumbent senator said he takes his primary “seriously” but considers Cunningham his opponent, not Tucker. Tucker retorted that since his entry in the race, Tillis is “Trump’s new best friend... he’s desperate to make the race about Trump.”

Tillis insisted he “never” directly asked Trump for his June endorsement, which followed Tucker’s campaign launch. But he’ll be damned if anyone is questioning his Trump credentials.

“We’ve got the full support of the president,” Tillis said. “You can’t start out a campaign on the premise of thinking that you’re going to support the president more” than me.

Erica Smith Is Out-Polling Cal Cunningham But Schumer Prefers A Conservative White Man To A Progressive Black Woman

Yesterday, the DSCC officially endorsed middle of the road loser, Cal Cunningham for the North Carolina U.S. Senate seat occupied by Trump ass-kisser Thom Tillis. Cunningham, however, is in a tight primary battle with popular state Senator Eric Smith, who currently leads him in the polls. Smith's campaign has had it with Chuck Schumer, who has been making these kinds of suicide plays all over the country-- starving progressive candidates like Betsy Sweet (Maine), Maggie Toulouse Oliver (NM)-- who ended her campaign this week-- and Andrew Romanoff (Colorado) of institutional Democratic support and funding. Even though these progressives are all far more union-oriented than their GOP-lite primary opponents, Schumer has been largely successful in preventing union financial support from flowing their way.

Friday, the Erica Smith campaign went on record with what she thinks of Schumer and his tactics. "Today’s endorsement by the DSCC," she wrote, "removes the false veil of neutrality and confirms their attempt to sway this US Senate election away from the voices and voters of North Carolina. I have been in and out of sessions, all day, doing the work of the people of North Carolina. I am responding during the sixth recess and adjournment of the day! This Halloween endorsement is a trick and not a treat for North Carolinians."

The DSCC has been unofficially backing Cal Cunningham as their ‘heir apparent’ with personnel, resources, directed donations, infrastructure, and more since he entered the race in June. We have made multiple overtures to the DSCC about their under the table support for my primary opponent and they told us, unequivocally, that they were not, had not, did not intend to endorse in the Primary. In fact, I met one-on-one with the DSCC Executive Director in August and he assured us that the DSCC was not making any efforts in the North Carolina Primary. Our objective has always been to allow the voters-- and the voters only-- to be the decision makers in this primary election. The failure of the DSCC to disclose their ongoing support for Mr. Cunningham’s campaign puts their thumb on the scale of our democracy and mutes the voice of North Carolina Voters. This is unacceptable.

Enumerated evidence of DSCC support prior to formal endorsement:

•Devan Barber:

◦ Cal Cunningham’s campaign manager, was the Deputy Executive Director of the DSCC up until July 2019. Shortly thereafter, she suddenly becomes Cal’s campaign manager.
◦ Barber was also the political director at End Citizens United, who also endorsed Cal Cunningham over me despite Cal being in receipt of PAC money in 2011 while he worked with a major developer. Mr. Cunningham is, in fact, the only candidate in this campaign that has welcomed the support of Super PACs.

•Senator Chuck Schumer

He's also an idiot who gets it wrong most of the time

In the second fundraising quarter of this year, prior to any endorsement from the DSCC, Sen. Schumer directed 55 of his very wealthy donors to contribute the maximum allowed donation to my opponent’s campaign-- totaling $152,000. All these donors have prior giving history to Sen. Schumer and had never given to Mr. Cunningham. These New York-based donations constitute more than a third of the total money raised by the Cunningham campaign, at that time.

  •Unauthorized Email list sharing

There have been multiple reported instances of people being placed on Mr. Cunningham’s mailing list despite them never signing up to receive his fundraising emails. These same people reported recently signing up with either the North Carolina Democratic Party or the DSCC. This may run afoul of campaign finance law and the Cunningham campaign should immediately cease this practice or disclose how these lists were acquired in accordance with the law.

An Emerson poll in June showed me beating incumbent Thom Tillis by 7 points. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Cunningham was recruited by some who would consider themselves Democratic establishment to run for this statewide office. Three other polls conducted since June show that I remain in the lead! In the last independent statewide poll conducted by Meredith College, I am leading Thom Tillis, but Mr. Cunningham is trailing me and Tillis. This is after Cunningham has raised $1.7 million, and reported spending $47,000 on digital advertising. Having been outraised 12 to 1 by my opponent, I am still leading the field. That tells me that the voters support me over Cal. I am ahead of every candidate, including incumbent Senator Thom Tillis, in EVERY poll that has been conducted since this contest started and have yet to spend a dime on advertising.

This endorsement cuts to the integrity and ethics of this election. If the DSCC has been involved all along, then it should disclose the details of its prior involvement to the voters of North Carolina. Ultimately, the voters of North Carolina will decide who their next United States Senator will be-- NOT a handful of DC politicians making back room deals in windowless basements.

In the spirit of Shirley Chisholm, I am Unbought and Unbossed. I am One of US for ALL of US! The big tent party of inclusion is how the Democratic Party became the party of the people. Our diversity makes us strong-- our unity keeps us rising!  We remain the most qualified, progressive frontrunner in this race.  We continue working for US and for an America that works for US. We are “In It to Win It” and we’ll see you on the trail! 

Money Money Money Makes Chuck Schumer's World Go Round

Picture Chuck Schumer playing either Liza Minnelli or Joel Grey in this 1972 film, released while he was still in law school, earning a law degree he never used once, going straight into vacuuming up money from special interests to finance his grubby political career. And now, he's demanding that other Democrats do the same-- or else. In 2006 Schumer was a loyal Harry Reid henchman and ran the DSCC. One race I remember well was when he recruited a pointless party hack, John Morrison, a Wall Street puppet then serving as Montana state auditor. Progressives were all in on state Senate president Jon Tester who ran a populist campaign and cursed out Schumer, who proclaimed he was too liberal to win in Montana, daily. Despite all Schumer's efforts and sabotage-- including demanding all institutional money go to Morrison--Tester beat Morrison/Schumer overwhelmingly, 60.77% to 35.48%. Tester then went on to prove Schumer wrong in November by beating Republican incumbent Conrad Burns 199,845 (49.16%) to 196,283 (48.29%). Schumer was certain Tester would lose for two reasons:

1- Schumer hates progressives with all his being
2- Burns outspent Tester, $9,167,154 to $5,587,467

That easily describes Schumer's perspective in every Senate race since then. He recruits conservatives to and tells them the only thing that matters is money. He's often wrong, but being wrong has never stopped Chuck Schumer. Yesterday, writing for the National Review, Jack Crowe reported that Schumer has been up to his old tricks in North Carolina, working to make sure a conservative lackey gets the nomination in case an anti-Trump wave is big enough to take out Republican incumbent Thom Tillis. Ideas, character and values have no place in Schumerian electoral calculus-- just national trends and money for mass media. It's like he's still living in the era Cabaret won its 8 Oscars (Best Director, Best Actress, Best Supporting Actor, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Original Song, Best Art Direction and Best Sound. The Godfather won Best Picture, not a dishonorable loss. A leaked tape shows that Schumer, wrote Crowe, "has taken a heavy-handed, top-down approach to selecting Democrats to challenge vulnerable Senate Republicans this cycle, putting his thumb on the scale for candidates willing to shun grassroots outreach in favor of a smile-and-dial, fundraising-first approach."

In the recording, taken during a September 26 talk at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, North Carolina state senator Jeff Jackson describes the experience of courting Schumer while he was considering running for the Democratic nomination to challenge the state’s incumbent Republican senator, Thom Tillis, in 2020.

Jackson had grand ambitions: When he flew to Washington to meet with Schumer earlier this year, he told the minority leader that he was going to do “100 town halls in 100 days” and talk to as many North Carolinians as possible to get a feel for the electorate’s priorities. But Schumer, who had previously dispatched his staff to meet with Jackson at his home, had other plans.

“Wrong answer,” Schumer said when confronted with Jackson’s grassroots strategy, according to the account of their conversation Jackson gave at UNC Charlotte. “We want you to spend the next 16 months in a windowless basement raising money and then we’re going to spend 80 percent of it on negative ads about Tillis.”

Jackson explained that, while he didn’t technically require Schumer’s support to run, the minority leader’s control over the funds disbursed by major donors and the Senate Democrats’ campaign arm, the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee (DSCC), made running without his support an impossibility.

  “So, did I need his permission to run for that race? No,” Jackson said during his address at UNC Charlotte. “But talking to my family and seeing the opportunity we have-- sort of the obligation we have to try and take the majority to end gerrymandering in 2020-- and realizing that I probably wasn’t going to have the support of this group, which is important financially because I ain’t rich... I mean, they kind of tipped the scales in favor of not running.”

And if the lack of funding wasn’t enough, Jackson said he was turned off by Schumer’s insistence on running an entirely negative campaign against the incumbent, Tillis-- a preference that Jackson attributed to “artistic differences” between himself and the minority leader during his UNC talk.

Instead of Jackson, Schumer and national Democrats are throwing their considerable support behind Cal Cunningham, a former state legislator and Army veteran who, in apparent accordance with Schumer’s wishes, has given just three interviews since announcing his candidacy in June. Reached for comment, Cunningham’s spokesman denied that the candidate has eschewed public appearances and grassroots activism in favor of fundraising.

...A copy of Cunningham’s campaign schedule obtained by National Review lists 18 appearances at various barbecues, galas, and church services from August 10 to September 29. During his remarks at UNC, Jackson dismissed these appearances as meaningless window-dressing compared to the town halls he’d planned for his own campaign.

“Yes,” Jackson said when asked if Cunningham has been in “a windowless basement” since announcing his candidacy. “He hasn’t held a public event. He didn’t have a kickoff. This is like month three. He goes to Democratic-party events if you follow him, right-- places where they’re going to say, ‘And everybody, Cal Cunningham is here!’ And he gets to be like, ‘Hey!’” (Jackson did not respond to a request for comment, but announced his endorsement of Cunningham hours after he was contacted and learned of the existence of the audio recording.)

...Cunningham’s chief primary rival, state senator Erica Smith, who announced her candidacy roughly five months before him, has already taken note of the national party’s intrusion in the race.

“The special interest groups and big, wealthy donors out of New York are trying to buy this Senate seat, and it’s just shameful and it is embarrassing,” she told Crabtree. “I just worry about the people I serve in North Carolina. We don’t have the same demographics as New York, and this Senate seat is not for sale.”

Reached by phone, Smith lashed out at Schumer and the DSCC for being dishonest about their support for Cunningham, telling National Review that Schumer’s public and private stances on candidates were “diametrically opposed.” She claimed that shortly before she learned Cunningham was fundraising off of the DSCC’s email list, Schumer had assured her that he had not endorsed any particular candidate and would remain agnostic for the time being.

Smith also pointed out that in addition to avoiding appearances, Cunningham appears to be avoiding public-policy commitments altogether. The only information or interactive features on his website concern donations.

“We can’t find his policy positions either,” Smith tweeted in August in response to a message one constituent wrote about the difficulty she’s had in identifying where Cunningham stands on any policy she cares about.

The same pattern, in which Democratic leadership handpicks a preferred candidate to run against a vulnerable Senate Republican, is also playing out in Maine and Iowa. [Jack Crowe appears to have forgotten Colorado, where Schumer has decided the Democratic nominee will be Frackenlooper and has demanded that unions directly their contributions to him and not to Andrew Romanoff, who many working people prefer by a very wide margin.]

In Maine, incumbent Republican senator Susan Collins is sure to face a tough reelection amid the liberal backlash to her support for Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh’s confirmation. Schumer and the DSCC have made clear that their preferred candidate is state House speaker Sarah Gideon. Like Cunningham, Gideon has carefully avoided the spotlight and policy commitments. And like Cunningham, she’s benefited from her deference to Washington: She raised more than $1 million in the first ten days after she announced her candidacy in June, and she’s reaped the high-profile endorsements that follow from being taken under Schumer’s wing.

Like Cunningham’s opponent, Smith, Gideon’s opponent, Betsy Sweet, has taken notice.

“An open letter to Democratic leadership,” reads an August fundraising email from Sweet’s campaign. “How many times. How many times are you going to interfere with primary races by picking an opponent before the people do?”

In Iowa, it’s Theresa Greenfield, a real-estate-development executive and first-time candidate, who has been chosen to follow the Schumer playbook. The DSCC endorsed Greenfield just three days after she announced her candidacy in June, shunning J. D. Scholten, who vaulted to national acclaim last year after nearly beating the racist Republican representative Steve King in the state’s fourth district.

“We don’t need a primary,” Schumer reportedly told Scholten on a phone call at the end of May.

Michael Franken is the best of the Iowa senatorial candidates-- but not Schumer's favorite. So Schumer is trying to destroy his campaign by telling donors to not give him any money and by working hard to get a candidate nominated who is only known for her own corruption, a candidate who can't win. "Iowans," said Franken, "are first-on-deck in choosing Presidential nominees, so we should be more than capable of picking the best U.S. Senate candidate, as well. I didn’t ask a party chief’s permission to serve my country for many decades and I shouldn’t need to ask permission to continue that record of service in the US Senate."

New Mexico Secretary of State Maggie Toulouse Oliver, a candidate for the empty U.S. Senate seat in her state, made a reputation for herself as a successful corruption fighter. That's a major turn-off for Schumer, who is more afraid of reformers than Dracula is of garlic. This morning Maggie told us that "The Washington establishment wants to keep big money in politics and keep progressive leaders out. That's not how democracy works. Voters-- not Chuck Schumer, not special interests, not corporations--choose their elected leaders. All the money in the world isn't enough to buy establishment leaders the bold vision and core values that voters want. I'm not running on big money or poll-tested talking points. I'm running to make sure every American has health care; to finally address the climate crisis; and to get big money out of politics once and for all."

The three billboards above-- in Colorado, Maine and North Carolina-- appear to be the work of the NRSC, even if they really look like they were designed and played by Little Chucky Schmucky. My dream for 2022: Schumer vs AOC. I pledge to max out.

In the NC Senate race it appears that Democratic officialdom has once again unerringly managed to line itself up behind the worst candidate

With update: Charlotte Observer endorses Marshall

NC Democratic Senate contenders Cunningham, Lewis, and Marshall

"No one likes to be called a homophobe, yet some of these purported allies feel they need to closet their LGBT support in order to win/get by/soothe the outright homophobes to win an election. These creatures are the most onerous because they have no problem showing up at events to take gay money, but won't put positions on their web sites and usually dodge questions in non-LGBT settings. It never occurs to them that if they took an affirmative stand and simply called out, say, the HRC-rated 0% Richard Burr on his bigotry and hypocrisy -- a lot of people in NC know he has gay friends -- they'd do just fine. Does Burr privately feel they should be second-class citizens?"

-- a footnote explaining her use of the term "politically homophobic" in Pam Spaulding's Pam's House Blend post on her attempt to get a full position statement on LGBT rights from the campaign of NC Dem Senate contender Cal Cunningham

by Ken

I encourage everyone to read this incredibly convoluted post, which Pam begins by declaring she "really didn't want to have to write," on "campaign dealings that will curl your hair." The post, let me make clear, is "convoluted" not because of any deficiency in Pam's narrative skills but because she had to endure so much double talk and procrastination from the campaign of one of the three candidates contesting the Democratic nomination to face Sen. Richard "Bank Run" Burr, one of the lowlier and more pathetic toads inhabiting the Senate marshes.

Howie has been keeping tabs on this race (as recently as this past Tuesday), where it appears that once again, with two really good candidates to choose from, Secretary of State Elaine Marshall and lawyer Ken Lewis, the weight of Democratic officialdom is lining up behind the most solidly unprogressive, or should we say the most malleable to the interests of sociopolitical orthodoxy, lawyer Cal Cunningham.

There's a wrinkle, though. Even in North Carolina, it seems, in a Democratic primary it has become important for contenders to sort of pretend to be progressives, in recognition of the growing importance of the most energized and committed portion of the party's base. At the primary stage, then, it seems important at least to keep Democratic progressives at bay by providing sincere whispered assurances that deep in their hearts they bleed progressive blue. But the more worrying -- to "centrist" hearts and minds -- the issue, the more private those deeply held progressive views have to be kept. And what issues provide a better test than LGBT ones? This is where the "political homophobia" Pam writes about comes into play.

It says something that progressives are no longer simply blown off, as Pam reports happened in North Carolina as recently as the 2008 Senate campaign:

As I mentioned back when I started covering the NC U.S. Senate race this year, my goal was to avoid what happened in 2008 when candidate-now-Senator Kay Hagan blew off LGBT reporters when it came to giving any straight answers about her views on prospective votes on DADT, ENDA, etc. if she were to take office. Clearly some Beltway drones got to her and told her "you can't do that, you'll never get elected in NC."

This year, it turns out, Pam had no trouble getting answers from the Lewis and Marshall campaigns. In fact, "out of the blue, months ago (12/10/2009), Ken Lewis and his campaign reached out to do an interview with me for the Blend." The plan she devised, she explains, was live blogs with all three campaigns, and again, the Lewis and Marshall campaigns cooperated fully, and on their own incorporated positions articulated there into their websites. But "there was only silence from the Cunningham campaign."

So, then there was that "milk carton" post of mine on April 12, NC-Sen: Where's Cal Cunningham on LGBT issues? I put it up at BlueNC and Daily Kos as well, hoping someone on his campaign would finally get a clue that I thought it was important for him to get on the record.

What do you know, on April 12 I received a call from someone on the campaign, who said they would try to make something happen. That led to a call on the 13th from campaign manager Rick Fromberg, who said that the lack of contact wasn't a blow-off, but "a scheduling problem."

For the rest of the story, I direct you to Pam's full account, which reads like an action-adventure thriller. Eventually, under conditions drastically more favorable than the other campaigns received (including receiving all the questions ahead of time), the Cunningham campaign participated. [CORRECTION: This should have read "agreed to participate." See below.] And eventually, after much private assuring and hand-wringing, the Cunningham campaign added a really fine website section headed "Equality and Civil Rights."

But considering what it took to get this out of them, do we have any reason to believe any of it would figure in a Senator Cunningham's thinking and voting once in office?


CORRECTION: THE CUNNINGHAM LIVE BLOG

HASN'T TAKEN PLACE YET

Obviously I got so caught up in the twists and turns of the story that I missed a crucial detail about the Cunningham live blog. As Pam herself kindly notes in a comment:

Cal Cunningham has not participated in a liveblog yet. His camp would only agree to a liveblog next Sunday, long after early voting began. I plan to make my endorsement on Monday, which I did tell Campaign Manager Rick Fromberg.

Thanks for correcting that, Pam!

#

UPDATE: In A Big Blow To Beltway Bossism.
Charlotte Observer Just Endorsed Elaine

Menendez and the DSCC Stalinists have been pulling out all stops for their patsy, but today's Charlotte Observer urged Democrats to do what's right for North Carolina, not the Inside-the-Beltway boys' club:

We believe Elaine Marshall best combines the experience, achievement, temperament and intellect to make a promising U.S. Senator.
Marshall's story is one of an underdog who has made good. Marshall became the first woman elected statewide to executive office in North Carolina in 1996, when she defeated NASCAR legend Richard Petty in a race for secretary of state. She has won re-election three times since and is the only one of this bunch to have won statewide. In 2008, she won more votes in a contested race than anyone but Attorney General Roy Cooper.

...Her 13-plus year performance as secretary of state has been impressive. She was instrumental in bringing about lobbying and ethics reforms. She brought organizational skills and technological upgrades that have vastly improved the performance of her department. She is recognized for her efforts to combat counterfeit goods and protect copyrights. And she has battled consumer fraud... She has taken on special interests and won.

Excitement in North Carolina

Noah's brother and sister-in-law live in northwest North Carolina's Piedmont area, the 5th CD, which manages to skirt cities and encompass the suburbs of Winston-Salem and the outer suburbs of Charlotte. The congressional district, which is overwhelmingly Republican (PVI is R +15 and McCain, while losing the state, won the 5th with a hefty 61% of the vote) and overwhelmingly white. It includes Mt. Airy, the model for Andy Griffith's Mayberry. When far right fanatic Richard Burr gave up his House seat to run for John Edwards' abandoned Senate seat, Virginia Foxx-- a kooky state Senator best known as the nut job who sponsored a constitutional amendment targeting gays and legislation to hurt women's Choice, Hispanic immigrants and public education-- stumbled into a close run-off victory with a fringe maniac billing himself as "the black Jesse Helms." In Congress Foxx has been one of the 3 or 4 most outspokenly anti-gay members and the ideological heir to Jesse Helms' backward bigotry across the board. She hasn't had a credible challenger since she was elected. Until now.

Yesterday Noah's sister-in-law told us about a progressive radio host on WATA-AM, Billy Kennedy, who has all but announced that he's taking on Foxx, widely viewed as an embarrassment to all but the hardest core rednecks and KKK boosters in the area. Billy's father was a beloved local minister-- old fashioned Christians who saw Jesus as a figure of love and acceptance rather than the current version that seems to have reinterpreted the Gospels along very different lines-- and the mayor of Black Mountain. Billy is a farmer and a carpenter and his sympathies lie with working people rather than with bankers and corporate managers. He recognizes that Washington-- a city crawling with lobbyists-- is completely out of touch with working peoples' lives and values. "Politicians," he explains, "will say anything to get elected. But once they're there, they spend their time taking money from lobbyists and handing out taxpayer money to corporate interests. Enough is enough! Everyday Americans need someone in Washington to put an end to the greed."

That someone is clearly not Virginia Foxx. As much as she has tried to curry favor with the teabaggers, they have run from her embrace and, in fact, a lifelong Republican teabagger, Brad Smith-- a self-proclaimed devotee of Glenn Beck's-- is running as a third party candidate. If he can draw 10% of the Republican faithful away from the controversial Foxx, Kennedy will probably win. Remember, polls are showing that 3-way races could prove deadly to Republican incumbents like Foxx. As I mentioned in November when I first heard that Smith was taking on the wild-eyed hellion, there is no list existent of the half dozen most lunatic fringe members of Congress that doesn't include this homophobic sociopath. I have literally been in strategy sessions where Democrats have said that her bizarre and extremist presence in Congress does them more good than harm and that there's no reason to run any candidates against her since she is probably the single least effect member of Congress and a warning signal to moderates across party lines that, at its core, the Republican Party offers nothing but extremism, fanaticism and a world turned upside down by ignorance, hatred and fear.

Talking about why voters in the 5th should replace Foxx, Kennedy is clear he has no intention of getting drawn into her wedge-issue style of campaigning.

Dishonest politicians try to divide us and pit us against each other in order to win an election on wedge issues. Politicians of both political parties emphasize wedge issues so they can distract us and avoid talking about the serious problems we face. It is a tactic used to confuse us in order to hide how they really vote about bread and butter issues.

More and better jobs, a commitment to Medicare and Social Security, real discussions about whether or not we should commit our young people and our nation to war, health care reform, and the failure of bailouts and subsidies to corporations are not wedge issues.

I will not run a wedge campaign. I want to focus on what all of us can do to improve our lives. I plan to listen to my constituents and hear what’s important to them because I respect other people’s points of view. I will not allow my opponent to play “gotcha” politics on these questions of individual liberty.

I want to make it clear. I support freedom and equal rights for all people. I will protect all individual constitutional rights, without allowing politicians to pick and choose which Amendments deserve to be taken seriously.

Even when a candidate or political party wins an election through the use of a wedge issue, once they arrive in Washington they do nothing to further its cause. That is when it becomes painfully clear that the candidate never had any real commitment to the issue itself. The candidate simply used the issue to try to fool the people and win the election at any cost.

I will not be distracted from what is most important to voters!

And if Smith falters and North Carolina voters can get past partisan labels-- and Fox propaganda-- they may well find Kennedy's populist message far more attractive than what the Republicans have been offering. For him, serving in Congress means serving his community, not serving himself and not serving the special interests.

Ever since 9th Grade civics, we’ve all known the way Washington is supposed to work. We elect representatives who go to Congress to pass laws for the good of the citizens. But as adults, we’ve all learned why things have gone terribly wrong and aren’t working.

Partisan bickering, Wall Street bailouts, and the people who were elected to do the people’s business are spending their time, instead, hobnobbing with wealthy CEOs and paid lobbyists while trading our futures for campaign contributions. The same people who give politicians millions of dollars in "campaign contributions" are the very folks Congress is supposed to be
keeping an eye on so they don’t continue to steal the country blind!

Washington isn’t working because people there are greedy. They’ve forgotten what real Americans learn every day of our working lives that we expect real value for the money we pay. So we’re paying taxes, and not getting value back for our dollar. Instead of working on real reform in banking or health care or farm policy, Congress wastes time debating toothless laws, written by lobbyists, for the very industries the laws are meant to regulate.

I believe we must replace the culture of corruption in Washington with a renewed culture of service. That’s why my campaign will tithe 10 percent of our volunteer hours directly to local charities.

I’ve worked all my life. I haven’t spent time rubbing elbows with celebrities and paid lobbyists, and I don’t intend to start now. This country has real problems that affect my family and my neighbors’ families, and I want to go to Washington to work on real solutions.

That's the kind of populism that should be sweeping across America rather than the right-wing version built on fear, racism and hatred. He worries that Obama's stimulus bill last year might not have been big enough to rescue the country from 8 years of corporate-dominated GOP rule we saw under Bush. And he points out that Foxx was a loud no vote. "She is more concerned about her reelection than helping people. She actively discourages any government attempt to stimulate development. This may explain why only three of 12 counties in the 5th District are targeted for new broadband infrastructure and access funding. We need a representative in Washington who helps bring jobs back home, not someone who actively discourages that! ... [Foxx] cheer leads a business culture where the rich and well-connected get richer while employees, shareholders and customers get left in the dirt."

If you'd like to help Billy Kennedy get his message out to Piedmont voters, you can donate to his campaign directly through ActBlue. Needless to say, the DCCC hasn't recognized this race and probably won't until Kennedy has the word "Congressman-elect" in front of his name.

Meanwhile, the big race in North Carolina this year is for Burr's Senate seat. Widely-- and correctly-- viewed as one of the Senate's worst corporate hacks, Burr is not popular and his poll numbers show him vulnerable, especially if he's up against popular-- and populist-- Secretary of State Elaine Marshall. But the Democratic Party Insiders in DC-- in the form of the DSCC-- feel one woman senator from North Carolina is all the state can handle and they're trying to push her out of the race in favor of corporate shill Cal Cunningham. Corporate shill? Who says? Glad you asked.

Last week Burr, held a fundraiser with Karl Rove. And over the weekend Cunningham sent a fundraising email attacking Burr for his event with "the Washington insiders and corporate elites." That sounds nice and populist, right?
 
Problem is, it’s pretty hypocritical, not to mention cynical, of Cunningham since the day before Burr’s event, Cunningham’s hands were in those very same pockets at a fundraiser he held at a high-powered Washington lobbying firm.  His campaign is spinning it as a "meet and greet" but we all know what that means (same as this one).  

The "meet & greet" was at the offices of sleazy corporate lobbyists Mehlman, Vogel, & Castagnetti, and hosted by Kelly Bingel & Jonathon Jones. The firm’s client roster reads like a who’s who of the groups that have fought to kill healthcare reform: AHIP, Pharma, Humana, and major pharmaceutical companies.
 
Host Kelly Bingel is a partner at the firm, and previously was Blanche Lincoln’s Chief of Staff. The other host, Jonathon Jones, touts his work on, among other things, the Bankruptcy Reform Bill and the Medicare Part D gift to Big Pharma. To cap it off, Jones “worked on a daily basis with the Democratic Leadership Council” and helped create Third Way.
 
These guys see a natural ally in Cunningham, but the last thing we need in the Senate are more Lincolns, Liebermen and Bayhs. We need people who will fight Big Business, not work to water down bills for their corporate benefactors. Elaine Marshall has been a strong supporter of healthcare reform and looks like a true populist, not a pretender. She’s taking on Wall Street banks that defrauded North Carolina retirees and toughened lobbying laws in Raleigh.
 
Elaine is currently crushing Cal Cunningham in the polls, but the DC elite will do whatever it takes to get their man in office. Please consider helping out her campaign by spreading the word about this important primary election.

What Makes The DSCC Click? Who Knows-- But Let's Look At North Carolina's Senate Race

Leaving David "Diapers" Vitter (R-LA) and his hypocrisy and ethical lapses aside for a moment-- in a state that seems to pride itself in ignoring hypocrisy and ethical lapses in its political elite-- there is one incumbent Republican senator up for re-election next year who could conceivably be replaced by a Democrat: Richard Burr, a die-hard obstructionist buffoon from North Carolina. (I know I said we should leave Vitter aside for a moment, but I do want to point out one more thing about the race in Louisiana before moving on to North Carolina. Vitter's opponent is a mangy old worthless Blue Dog, Charlie Melancon, who consistently votes more frequently with the GOP-- on substantive issues-- than with the Democrats. He voted against the healthcare reform bill, though not before voting for the Stupak amendment, and last night was one of the 28 Dems crossing the aisle to oppose a jobs creation bill. The rest of this post will not mention Louisiana, Melancon or Vitter again.)

Burr, who used to represent the good folks who now elect Virginia Foxx to the House bi-annually, is a former lawnmower salesman and a clueless and bought-out shill for Wall Street (which has ponied up $2,730,319 towards his political career) and the Medical-Industrial Complex (which has heaped on another $2,350,726). That's over $5 million from the two most special of the special interests with business pending before Congress, business which is always-- 100%-- supported by Burr, regardless of how disastrously it impacts working families back in North Carolina.

Last year North Carolina took a decidedly blue turn. Obama won the state and Burr's senior colleague, Liddy Dole was trounced, winding up with a mere 44% of the vote. Republicans forfeited yet another House seat-- their second in two cycles-- and the Democrats now control the House delegation 8-5. So what are the Democrats doing to exploit the shift and to exploit Burr's weaknesses? Glad you asked!

Virtually every person I know in North Carolina has been complaining this week about the ham-fisted nature of the interference of the DSCC there. Pam Spaulding, North Carolina's most respected blogger was fuming a few days ago in a private e-mail: "My question-- why does the DSCC keep meddling in our (NC) races like this? It really looks bad this time around with a woman and a black man getting the brush-off for another candidate the Beltway thinks is 'more like NC.' ...Let the flipping people decide. It's good to have all three hats in the ring."

Another dedicated progressive blogger sent me a note that was even angrier:

The DSCC has made clear their intent to decide our Senate primary for us. The have chosen a one term [former] state senator with close ties to some of the more conservative (and ethically challenged) in our political establishment. 

In doing so the DSCC spits in the face of the two announced candidates:

• Kenneth Lewis - A Durham lawyer who has fought predatory lending for over 10 years

• Elaine Marshall - Our veteran Sec of State who has campaigned and won statewide as a progressive. Also the first woman to win statewide office in NC.

Unfortunately, neither of these two progressive candidates are a white man willing to fake a Southern drawl.

Since the DSCC's pick is virtually unknown in North Carolina, they intend spend money attacking progressive Democrats in order to secure their desired election result... 

The DSCC should not be involved in primary races. Democrats have held virtually uninterrupted control of North Carolina state government for over hundred years. In the past 25 years, this has been in large part because the NCDP remains neutral in primary elections, whereas the NCGOP leadership has kept their party divided through ill advised interference in primaries.

Funny, just when John Cornyn is cringing that the NRSC has come into devastating conflict with the Republican grassroots by endorsing establishment figures like Charlie Crist (FL), Mark Kirk (IL), Rob Portman (OH), Kelly Ayotte (NH), and Mike Castle (DE)-- and when the NRCC chair himself is being forced into a potentially damaging race against an angry teabagger because of NRCC behavior in the same vein-- Inside the Beltway Democrats are re-implementing the same failed strategy.

I wondered if any of this had to do with ideology. Certainly all three candidates are campaigning as progressives, even though no one seems to think the DSCC is doing anything more than placating and pandering to a base he will abandon the moment he has the nomination. Pam Spaulding's interview this week with Kenneth Lewis goes a long way towards explaining where he is on the issues. He's from what Howard Dean once mentioned as the "Democratic wing of the Democratic Party." And so is Elaine Marshall.

She hasn't been shy about being an early and aggressive advocate of healthcare reform, some Burr is hysterically opposed to and something that the DSCC candidate is still trying to figure out how to position himself on politically. This is from the October 4 issue of the Asheville Citizens-Times:

"On health care, [Cunningham] said he wasn't ready to make a statement about the public option, but said costs needed to be reduced and insurance providers should not be able to turn people down for pre-existing conditions."

AP has already picked up on the difference between how Cunningham and Burr on the one hand, who are supporting escalation of the war in Afghanistan, and Elaine Marshall and Kenneth Lewis, who aren't.

"As a former small business owner and attorney in domestic cases," Secretary of State Marshall explained to North Carolina voters, "I’ve seen, firsthand, the hardship visited on our families during tough economic times: families disintegrate when there are no jobs, no hope, and no future.

"Therefore I agree with President Obama that the nation I’m most interested in rebuilding is our own. Our commitment in Afghanistan though has become a deadly distraction of attention and resources from the real suffering that is going on here among the American people.  

"I acknowledge that there are no easy answers in Afghanistan and I respect the time and consideration that President took in making his decision. However, I disagree that now is the time to commit 30,000 additional men and women into harm’s way to prop up a corrupt government that has shown no real effort to reform itself. The mission that we are about to undertake has too much to do with building a nation that has not had a stable or responsible government in decades and too little to do with keeping us safe at home. 

"Our goal should be to stop terrorists who threaten our country wherever they are. Right now, the greatest threat to the United States and the rest of the world is Pakistan. I heard too little about political cooperation from Pakistan and the threat it poses. Pakistan harbors the most dangerous mix of terrorists and nuclear weapons in the world. Our efforts should be there, using political and diplomatic pressure on the their government to root out Al Qaeda elements.
 
"Failed states provide havens and training grounds for terrorists. However, at no time in history, have these states been “fixed” by the foreign powers. They have only been made stable by long-term occupations that, eventually, fail. That is not the route we should take in Afghanistan."

Or maybe it's not ideological. Maybe the DSCC just really thinks one woman senator for North Carolina is enough and that it's time for someone who will pass for a good ole boy. One thing is clear though-- the DSCC isn't evaluating candidates based on who has a track-record of winning statewide races and it isn't evaluating candidates most likely to support Democratic initiatives in the Senate.