Senate Dems Back Domestic Spying Nominee David Barron For A Judgeship

Shenna Bellows (D) and Rand Paul (R)-- a real bipartisan approach

Thank God, some of our candidates-- particularly Shenna Bellows (ME) and Jay Stamper (SC) for Senate and Ted Lieu (CA) and Alan Grayson (FL) for the House-- are taking a stand against unconstitutional domestic spying. And a few Democrats in the Senate, particularly Mark Udall (CO) and Ron Wyden (OR) are doing some actual fighting against Obama and his NSA. But, truth be told, a lot of the heavy lifting in this crucial battle is coming from libertarian Republicans Justin Amash (MI) in the House and Rand Paul (KY) in the Senate. A few Democrats-- particularly Bellows and Stamper-- have been advocating a transpartisan effort that will put the privacy interests of Americans first.

This week, in an OpEd for the Washington Post, Reining in the surveillance state, Katrina van den Heuvel gave Rand Paul his due on this critical issue. "Paul vowed," she wrote, "to filibuster the nomination to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 1st Circuit of former Justice Department official David Barron, who helped write memos supporting said argument." Wednesday afternoon the Senate shut down his filibuster, every Democrat but Manchin (WV) and Landrieu (LA) voting against him. In the end it was 52-43, all the Republicans ready, as always, to just filibuster everything and anything from the administration.

Paul’s strong libertarian principles have always differentiated him from many of his Republican colleagues. It is, therefore, not all that shocking for him to speak out against a president he dislikes on a policy he disdains. Yet his outspokenness has many liberals and leftists asking a legitimate question: Why aren’t there more Democratic voices opposing the surveillance state? Protecting civil liberties should be a critical piece of the progressive platform, but too many establishment Democrats and progressives have been silent on this issue simply because one of their own is in the White House.

Some Democrats in Congress have taken bold stands. Longtime civil-liberties champion (and former House Judiciary Committee chair) John Conyers has worked to limit the National Security Agency’s collection of bulk telephone data. Reps. Keith Ellison of Minnesota and Adam B. Schiff of California have probed the administration’s drone and surveillance programs. Rep. Zoe Lofgren of California is pushing to prevent the NSA from weakening online encryption. In the Senate, Judiciary Committee chair Patrick Leahy of Vermont has held oversight hearings questioning excessive surveillance. Even Dianne Feinstein of California, chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence and normally a committed defender of the intelligence community, finally spoke out after discovering that the CIA spied on Senate staffers. And last week, Sens.Mark Udall of Colorado and Ron Wyden of Oregon sent a letter to Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli Jr., strongly criticizing a “culture of misinformation” that has resulted in “misleading statements . . . about domestic surveillance.” And Sen. Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont, has proposed a bill limiting FBI and NSA spying.

Still, too many Democrats and even progressives are reluctant to challenge the Obama administration, either because they don’t want to criticize a besieged president or because they’re focused on other priorities. As they stay silent, a host of troubling policies, including the assassination of U.S. citizens without due process, the prosecution of record numbers of journalists and whistleblowers, the unaccountable growth of the surveillance state and the vast expansion of the drone program, are proliferating unchecked.

To combat the spread of these policies, we need not just outraged rhetoric but also serious, concrete actions to seek accountability. And we need more progressive elected officials who are willing to fight for change.

We need leaders such as Shenna Bellows, who is running for the U.S. Senate in Maine. In her eight years leading Maine’s American Civil Liberties Union, Bellows has consistently worked across the aisle, bringing together unlikely allies to pass marriage equality, to restore same-day voter registration in the state and to make Maine one of only two states to establish cellphone privacy protections in the wake of the recent NSA spying revelations.

Bellows is an eloquent, vocal champion of progressive values across the board. But she is particularly focused on what she calls “the surveillance industrial complex.” “I just disagree on the amount of intrusion that is acceptable in our private lives,” she recently told MSNBC. Bellows wants to repeal the USA Patriot Act and release the CIA’s 6,000-page report on torture practices after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks. She has expressed an interest in working with Paul and others on anti-surveillance legislation.

According to polls, Bellows has a tough race to unseat incumbent Susan Collins, a Republican. But she is leveraging her considerable organizing skills. And while Collins has vastly more money in her campaign coffers, Bellows-- who recently earned belated support from Emily’s List and the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee-- outraised Collins in the last quarter of 2013.

Bellows has been called “the woman who could be the future of progressive politics in America.” While this overstates the case, her unwavering commitment to civil liberties gives hope that progressives will soon have a champion who can help lead a transpartisan fight to rein in the national security state’s unconstitutional overreach.

You can contribute to Bellows' campaign-- and Stamper's-- here on our Senate ActBlue page.




UPDATE: Congress Authorizes More Unconstitutional Domestic Spying

Jim Sensenbrenner's Orwellian-named USA Freedom Act passed this morning, 303-121, most members of both parties eager to continue warrentless, unconstitutional bulk spying against American citizens. During the debate Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), who said, "regrettably, we have learned that if we leave any ambiguity in the law, the intelligence agencies run a truck right through that ambiguity," and Alan Grayson (D-FL) joined libertarians like Justin Amash in calling out Military-Intelligence Complex shills, Mike Rogers (R-MI) and Dutch Ruppersberger (D-MD) for their treachery against the American people and the Constitution. Amash: “This morning's bill maintains and codifies a large-scale, unconstitutional domestic spying program." 70 Democrats and 51 Republicans voted against the bill, a veritable declaration of war against the American people. Suggestion: fight back-- vote against all 179 Republicans and 124 Democrats who voted to violate our rights and the Constitution.

A bold-face lie:

The truth:

How About A Useful Select Committee In The Senate To Balance Out The Circus Routine In The House?

All the Blue America bloggers have been agitating for Pelosi to refuse to legitimize the Benghazi clown show and to instead appoint just one Democrat-- Alan Grayson, who is bound to make the Republicans wish they were not the party of sedition and obstruction. Yesterday, Grayson told Brett Logiurato at Business Insider that the Republicans are "scandalmongers without a scandal. They're trying to offer the American people bread and circuses-- without the bread" and that he could think of much better uses for a Select Committee that to plow over the ground Darrell Issa has already tried:

"I'll be asking why there's no select committee on income inequality. I'll be asking why there's no select committee on immigration reform. I'll be asking why there's no select committee on the minimum wage. I'll be asking why there's no select committee on anything that has anything to do with the lives of ordinary Americans."

Lindsey Graham, in desperate trouble with South Carolina voters, is demanding that Harry Reid establish the same kind of select committee in the Senate. Dianne Feinstein, the head of the Senate Intelligence Committee dubbed the idea "ridiculous" and "a hunting mission for a lynch mob." Although 37 seditious Republicans signed on, it was the brainchild of the 3 stooges, Graham, Kelly Ayotte and John McCain.

Blue America doesn't endorse many candidates for Senate. We're more focussed on the House, but there are 3 extraordinary progressives running for Senate seats this year that we are trying to help. We asked each of them what they think would be a more useful select committee that another one seeking to slime Hillary Clinton with made up conspiracy theories about the tragedy in Benghazi. This morning Jay Stamper, who's running against Lindsey Graham in South Carolina told us that although Graham "was oddly silent when our embassies were attacked during the Bush administration, he's leading the Republican chorus calling for a Senate Select Committee on Benghazi. By frivolously blaming the Obama administration for an attack perpetrated by Libyan terrorists, Graham has demonstrated a willingness to oblige our enemies with a knee-jerk assignment of internal blame for an attack against us. Lindsey and politicians like him, who knowingly-- and without justification-- inflict damage on their own country's reputation, serve as force multipliers for any person or group who would do us harm."

Like Grayson, Jay had his own ideas about a more useful select committee. But he wants to shape them in a bipartisan way that both Democrats and Republicans can get behind on behalf of the American people. "Instead of constructing elaborate revisionist versions of historical events," he told us, "wouldn't Lindsey Graham’s time be better spent working on solutions to our country’s present and future challenges? We know that Graham won’t support raising the minimum wage or expanding the social safety net. But why not focus on at least one or two issues that actually help working and middle class families. Graham says he supports the troops; what about a Senate Select Committee on improving the lives of the thousands of veterans who are missing limbs or living with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as the result of two wars he voted to authorize? Graham supported billions of dollars in nationbuilding overseas; what about a Senate Select Committee on domestic Nationbuilding, to fix our crumbling infrastructure and create jobs here at home? Like everyone, Graham's life has been touched by cancer; what about a Senate Select Committee on Cancer? The possibilities are endless. For the sake of this country, I hope that Lindsey Graham can move on from Benghazi and find something productive to do with his time."

Similarly, Shenna Bellows, who's running for the Maine Senate seat currently occupied by domestic spying advocate Susan Collins, make a lot of sense with a message that resonates across partisan divides:

If the US Senate is going to spend its time putting together a select committee, I can think of a number of issues that better warrant their time and attention. Given the unprecedented infringement of our civil liberties by the National Security Agency, for example, the American people would be better served by the Senate's consideration of ways to overhaul the surveillance industrial complex and better ensure our privacy is protected.

The Blue America-endorsed Democrat running for the open seat in South Dakota, Rick Weiland, circled back in another direction-- the direction his campaign is founded on. You can tell he takes Franklin Roosevelt very seriously and that he took it to heart when Roosevelt said that "the liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism-- ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or any controlling private power." This is what Rick told us this morning:

Instead of playing “gotcha” politics with speculative future presidential candidates, the Senate should establish a Special Select Committee on Campaign Finance Reform in a Post Citizens United/McCutcheon world. Big Money has turned Abraham Lincoln’s  vision of government-- “of the people, by the people and for the people”-- into the punch line of a bad joke. And that joke is on everyday citizens, seniors, working families and veterans all across America. The U.S. Senate, more than any other deliberative body, needs to take concrete action in this regard. A bipartisan committee of committed leaders can restore American’s faith in America. It’s the single most important thing we could do right now.

 If any of these ideas appeal to you more than another Benghazi witch hunt in the Senate, please consider making a contribution to one of these grassroots candidates on our special Blue America Senate page. Or all three of them!

Is Lindsey Graham About To Lose His Senate Seat? Beltway Pundits Will Let You Know In November

Opposition is bipartisan… but not from Lindsey Graham

Although the Beltway pundits of conventional wisdom-- like the brain scientists at Cook-- rate Lindsey Graham as "safe," I wouldn't want to be forced to put any money on that. Nate Silver claims Lindsey has a 97% chance of being reelected, just 1% less than Tim Scott and 7% better than Al Franken's reelection odds. I have a feeling Nate-- not to meantion the stiffs at Cook-- don't watch Southern Charm and are unaware of Tom Ravenel's kamikaze jihad against Lindsey in the general election. Ravenel can't beat him, but can he drain off enough votes to throw the election to a Democrat? The odds against him are not 97%. In fact, they're looking more and more like 50/50 every day.

Charleston County, where Graham counts on a big turn-out to propel him back into office, just joined 8 other South Carolina counties in which the official Republican Party censured him. One of Graham's primary opponents, teabagger Lee Bright, won the Charleston County Republican Party straw poll last week. That kind of news just weighs on the minds of voters who still recall the Lindsey Graham campaign finance scandal, for which one of his biggest donors was found guilty of funneling foreign money into Lindsey's campaign after Lindsey funnel millions of dollars in taxpayer money into his business. After Mount Pleasant-based biotech company GenPhar CEO Jian-Yun “John” Dong and his wife had maxed out to the overly generous Graham, Dong illegally funneled money through friends and employees to Graham between 2006 and 2009.

Relentless. Liar. Schemer.

That’s how Jian-Yun “John” Dong was described this week in federal court by prosecutors and witnesses. They included his ex-wife and his former employees at GenPhar, the Mount Pleasant biotechnology company he still leads today.

Dong, 56, was found guilty of six of seven counts involving illegal campaign contributions to U.S. Sen. Lindsey Graham, lying to investigators and witness tampering.

Dong showed little emotion in the courtroom when a clerk of court read the verdicts. He was found guilty on counts involving the conspiracy and execution of illegal campaign contribution through proxies, except for one count involving a 2009 contribution.

…Prosecutors told the jury that Dong relentlessly tried to get Reinhard Hubner, a foreign national and an investor in GenPhar, to donate to Graham’s campaign. Hubner and others told Dong several times that it was illegal, according to testimony.

Hubner eventually gave Dong $32,000 for Dong to do as he pleased, according to testimony. Some of that money was contributed to Graham through proxies.

Dong also stole $3.6 million worth of federal grant money Graham helped him get (earmarks) that was intended for research on Ebola and Marburg vaccines, money he used to to bolster Graham's miserable career, for lobbying and to entertain a mistress in China. Graham and the South Carolina Republican Establishment are, of course, happy to make sure the Senate election is about anything but Graham's long-standing connections to criminal elements.

And the South Carolina Democratic Establishment isn't any better. They're as repulsive, careerist and self-serving as the Republicans. They are obsessed with defeating progressive Jay Stamper and inserting conservative Chamber of Commerce-friendly Brad Hutto. Currently they have their slimy operatives whispering that Stamper is a teabagger who supports Rand Paul. Blue America endorsed Stamper-- you can contribute to his campaign here-- and I reached out to him last night to explain the absurd charges to DWT readers. I didn't change a word:

The political landscape is now so poisoned that personality supersedes policy, those with whom we disagree are reduced to stereotypes, and ideas are judged not by their merits but instead by the company they keep.

For those reasons, it’s difficult for many progressive Democrats to accept the fact that they agree with someone like Rand Paul on anything. After all, this is a man who is worshiped by people who wrap themselves (literally) in the American flag and loiter on freeway overpasses wearing revolutionary war era garb. Many of these people’s common motivation seems to be a hatred for President Obama based on the color of his skin.

It’s tempting to mock or deride such people; I’ve been guilty of it myself. Actually, I did it today.

But that doesn’t mean that I don’t agree with Rand Paul on certain issues. For instance, I oppose an interventionist foreign policy that has helped bring our country to the edge of bankruptcy; and the costly and failed drug war that has filled our penitentiaries with over one million non-violent offenders-- most of them people of color; and I’m outraged by the NSA’s warrant-less surveillance of American citizens, the extra-judicial killing of American citizens and the secret federal courts that operate with limited transparency and accountability.

The majority of Democrats agree with me on these issues. The fact is: the left-right continuum model for political ideology is actually more like a circle, which is why civil libertarians like me and libertarians like Rand Paul sometimes find ourselves in agreement; an uncomfortable realization for many of us. But that discomfort shouldn’t weaken our resolve to fight for these same issues. Rand Paul doesn’t own these issues-- no person or party does. If elected, I’m going to reach across the aisle and find areas of agreement with senators like Rand Paul. Yes, politics makes strange bedfellows. But in the end, we all benefit if we can put aside our mutual preconceptions and suspicions and work together.

Of course, on most other issues-- from marriage equality to raising the minimum wage to expanding the social safety net-- I disagree with Rand Paul. I’m a progressive Democrat. But I have no plans to live in an ideological echo chamber. We miss out on something when we isolate ourselves from people with whom we disagree; it’s not a very stimulating environment. It contributes to a certain laziness. And I like to remind fellow liberals that nothing is more illiberal than a closed mind.

The South Carolina Democratic Party is pathetic. They threw away the state as a Democratic bastion, in part, because of their unwillingness and inability to stay in touch with the needs of South Carolinians. They've been shut out of power and all they can do is snipe at progressives. The Maine Democratic Party has embraced Shenna Bellows for taking the exact same stand as Jay Stamper. Jaime Harrison and his crew could learn a lot by pulling their heads out of their the sand. The kind of bipartisanship Jay and Shenna are talking about is what the American people crave, not the kind of pseudo bipartisanship that sees Democrats surrendering their values and accomplishments to right-wing fanatics. We don't raise money for Republicans like Lindsey Graham and Rand Paul or for conservative Democrats like Brad Hutto, but you can contribute to dedicated civil libertarians Shenna Bellows and Jay Stamper here.

How Does An Actual Progressive Campaign In A Red State?

Ex-Republican/BRAVO TV star Tom Ravenel announced he is running as an independent against Lindsey Graham in the general election. If he manages to pull just 10% of the anti-Graham votes, the Democrat will win the U.S. Senate seat. Last year, when no one wanted to Democratic nomination, Blue America endorsed progressive outsider Jay Stamper but when Ravenel made it public he was going to run the Democratic state Party Establishment got behind hopeless conservative, Chamber of Commerce state Senator Brad Hutto who is hoping that Ravenel can deliver the Senate seat to him.

In the video above, which Jay posted this morning, he is very clear that the last thing South Carolina Democrats should be doing is "abandoning our principles and throwing middle class and working families under the bus because we think it will help get us elected." He's obliquely referring to Hutto, a prime example of a terrible fake Democrat from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party. Jay eloquently makes the case for giving voters a real choice, not a pale echo of the Republican Party. "I’m running," he starts, "because with all the challenges and opportunities ahead, and with the President looking to the future, Republicans in Congress are stuck in the past and holding us all back."

Stamper doesn't have to campaign on the Affordable Care Act; he wasn't in Congress to vote for it. But he's talks about-- even calls it Obamacare-- at every stop, touting the benefits for working people and thumbing his nose at the Koch brothers and the predatory Republicans who want nothing more than to deny health insurance to poor people and continue to strip benefits from the middle class. Jay understands something that many southern Democrats don't want to understand. Voters may not like Obamacare but they like everything about it. In today's Washington Post Greg Sargent pointed out that polling shows that most voters in 4 red states-- Arkansas, North Carolina, Louisiana and Kentucky-- support the basic goal of government action to expand coverage to those who need it-- and support expanding Medicaid. Although South Carolina wasn't polled, there's no reason to believe results there would diverge from the results in the 4 other red states.

"When people," he wrote, "are given a range of choices about the proper role for government in health care, one in keeping with what Obamacare actually does, the picture changes. Large majorities support either government giving people without workplace insurance financial assistance to buy private insurance, or government providing coverage as it does for seniors and the poor. Only small minorities say government should not be involved and that getting coverage is people’s own responsibility. The total who envision one of those two government roles, versus those who see no role at all, breaks down as follows: Arkansas (55-36); Kentucky (63-29); Louisisana (58-35); and North Carolina (61-32)."

Hutto stood with the South Carolina extreme right Republican Party and the NRA to allow guns in bars and he's proud of his 100% rating from the crackpot and very partisan Chamber of Commerce. Jay:

Unfortunately, there are still people in our own state party establishment who think you have to act like a Republican to be elected as a Democrat; that we should be dictating women’s reproductive choices, telling people who they can and can’t marry, even siding with the NRA. They think that to win, we need to distance ourselves from President Obama, his positions and his accomplishments.

I couldn’t disagree more. I’m proud to be a Democrat. I’m proud of President Obama and what he’s accomplished. And I’m not gonna spend a second of this campaign apologizing for it.

This President has done an incredible job for all of us, even in the face of Republicans in Congress who just want to see him fail. Now, he needs our help to keep the US Senate from falling into Republican hands. We need to get out the vote, beat Lindsey Graham and give President Obama the votes in the Senate he needs…

To raise the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour.

To fight for equal pay for women.

And to defend the Affordable Care Act.

I’m not gonna to run away from Obamacare when there’s so much to be proud of.

Now is not the time to back down. It’s time to hold Republicans accountable.

Let’s hold them accountable when they cut benefits for seniors, veterans and the disabled in the name of fiscal conservatism-- and then spend over a trillion dollars on wars and nation-building.

We’re 43rd in education, 46th in health care, 45th in personal income. We need nationbuilding right here in South Carolina.

If you'd like to help Jay accomplish a really incredible feat in South Carolina-- replacing Lindsey Graham with a fighting progressive true to the values of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt-- you can contribute to his campaign here. It's a feisty, grassroots campaign and he can really use some help!

Is South Carolina Ready For A Democratic Party Take-Over?

We've been talking about convicted cocaine dealer/ex-Treasurer of South Carolina Tom Ravenel ® and how he is hoping to pivot from ex-con and BRAVO sit com/reality show star to anti-Lindsey Graham general election Senate candidate in November. If he does, he's likely to throw the election to the Democratic candidate. You don't think so? Progressive outsider Jay Stamper has had the Democratic nomination all to himself until Ravenel made it public he was going to run. At that point, the Democratic state Party Establishment got behind hopeless conservative state Senator Brad Hutto who is hoping that Ravenel can deliver the Senate seat to him.

There's a similar dynamic-- minus the cocaine bust-- playing out in the South Carolina gubernatorial race in which ex-Blue Dog-turned Republican Tom Ervin has withdrawn from the GOP primary and is running as an independent against incumbent Gov, Nikki Haley and Establishment Democrat Vince Sheheen. He can probably draw enough votes away from Haley, who is widely disliked by South Carolina voters, to deliver the race to Sheheen, a conservative. Haley's approval rating was only 42%-- with a 49% unfavorable and when voters were asked if the election were held now, only 44% said they would vote to reelect her, as opposed to 46% who would vote to elect Sheheen. With Ervin in the mix, she's cooked.

Tom Ervin, a former Greenville lawmaker and judge, said Friday that he has withdrawn from the Republican primary for governor and will run as a petition candidate in the November election.

Tom Ervin, a former Greenville lawmaker and judge, said Friday that he has withdrawn from the Republican primary for governor and will run as a petition candidate in the November election.

Ervin, a 62-year-old attorney and radio station owner, said he needs more time to share his message and could not accomplish that in the short span before the primary.

“I believe South Carolina is ready for fresh new leadership and ready for a governor who cares about our people and not selfish political ambition,” he said. “Both (Republican Gov.) Nikki Haley and (Democratic challenger) Vince Sheheen are career politicians. I’m a small business owner who will serve as governor and then return home to run my business.”

He said he started gathering signatures of registered voters to have his name added to the November ballot as a “Republican petition candidate.”

"I look forward to offering my vision for South Carolina as a Republican in the general election," he said.

When he joined the race late last month, political experts gave Ervin little shot of unseating Haley, whose popularity has grown in the party since her 2010 election. The governor has $4.3 million to spend.

Ervin has loaned his campaign $420,181, according to state records. He had $271,172 on hand after spending money on a consultant and automated robocalls.

He started a six-figure radio ad campaign this week introducing himself to voters.

Ervin was a Democrat before switching to the Republican Party for a unsuccessful run in the 2005 special election to succeed House Speaker David Wilkins, who had been named the U.S. ambassador to Canada. Ervin has said he became a Republican because he’s pro-life and a born-again Christian.

He has donated to GOP candidates in recent years, but his wife, attorney Kathryn Williams, has contributed to candidates in both parties-- including $4,500 to Sheheen’s 2010 gubernatorial campaign and $50,000 to the S.C. Democratic Party that same year, according to state records.

Ervin said Friday that he believes his being a “fiscal and social conservative with an independent streak” could sway voters.

“I’m running to reform state government and to restore executive competence, honesty and accountability – especially as it relates to protecting our most vulnerable children in harm’s way,” Ervin said.

Ervin gave a good clue to the kind of campaign he'll be running against Haley in his announcement statement Friday: "Four years ago, Nikki Haley promised us transparency and accountability when she became governor. Sadly, Governor Haley has broken those promises. Instead, Haley has delivered four years of missteps, mistakes, scandals and cover-ups – none more disturbing than the ongoing investigation of Governor Haley's cabinet appointee and their gross negligence in failing to protect the children under their watch at DSS. The Bible says we will be judged by how we treat the least of those among us. That means doing everything within our power to right the wrongs being done to our children at risk. Under her watch, Nikki Haley has turned a blind eye to the plight of our children at greatest risk. It is time for Governor Haley to relieve her appointee at DSS for gross incompetence and mismanagement."

Can you imagine the GOP losing both the Senate and gubernatorial races in November? Here's his new radio ad, which is absolutely saturating the airwaves now:

Wall Street Democrats vs Real Democrats-- In South Carolina?

Hutto with deranged teabagger Lee Bright-- 2 ineffectual Lindsey Graham opponents

South Carolina state Senator Brad Hutto announced yesterday-- just before the filing deadline-- that he is a candidate for the Democratic nomination to oppose Lindsey Graham. A conservative, Big Business-friendly Democrat, he will be up against Jay Stamper who has been endorsed by Blue America but is not a favorite of the party Establishment. Last year, Hutto was rated 100% by the Chamber of Commerce, one of only two Democrats in the state legislature willing too suck up to Big Business to that extent.

Unlike Stamper, who has chosen to draw a clear line of distinction between himself and the conservative Graham, Hutto takes pains to paint himself as the kind of Republican-lite candidate that depresses Democratic turnout.

Hutto, 56, said he thinks he can woo Republicans dissatisfied with Graham with a pitch "that I’m a practical middle-of-the-road guy."

“I have no aversions to working with Republicans,” Hutto said.

Hutto said South Carolinians liked having U.S. senators from different parties, Republican Strom Thurmond and Democrat Fritz Hollings, for nearly 40 years. “They’d say, ‘We always had somebody to go to,’ ” he said. “Sometimes having people on both sides helps.”

The only way a Democrat is going to win this seat is by offering a real alternative to the slick conservative claptrap Graham has used his entire career to win every election he's run in since 1992. Last night, a reporter on MSNBC explained how Graham had taken a $15,000 campaign "contribution" from mobster casino billionaire and Chinese government agent Sheldon Adelson just before introducing legislation to ban internet gambling, Adelson's #1 domestic agenda item. Stamper will be far better equipped to capitalize on that kind of behavior than the tepid Hutto. But Hutto is hardly the only Wall Street Democrat blurring the lines between what it means to be a Republican and what it means to be a Democrat. In an essay yesterday, Richard Eskow talked about the struggle inside the Democratic party that pits those who serve the interests of ordinary families and those who serve Wall Street and are generally considered the Republican wing of the Democratic Party. "If progressive and populist ideas resonate with most voters, some people have asked, why isn’t the Democratic Party doing better in the polls? Here’s one reason: Some of the party’s most prominent leaders are still pushing Wall Street’s unpopular and discredited economic platform." And he wasn't just talking about little known corporate shills like Brad Hutto.

Recent speeches by former President Bill Clinton and House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer showed that Wall Street continues to hold considerable sway in their party, despite the fact that its austerity agenda has failed. Its “deficits over growth” ideology has wounded both Europe and the United States. To hear Clinton and Hoyer speak, you’d think we’d learned nothing from the economic experience of the last five years.

…It’s rather stunning: A former president addresses members of a generation that has been saddled with record student debt and which faces the worst job market for graduates in modern history, and he talks, not of jobs or debt or decent wages, but about deficit reduction.

What’s more, this generation’s woes were caused in large part by the Clinton Administration’s eager collaboration with Republicans and Wall Street executives on deregulation. That collaboration also led to the accumulation of enormous wealth by a number of former administration officials. (Mr. Clinton did pretty well himself.)

And people wonder why Gallup reports that millennials are at or near record levels of alienation from both political parties? When leaders of both parties emphasize deficits over jobs, their disaffection becomes easier to understand… It’s impossible to look into the soul of another person. But it feels breathtakingly cynical for President Clinton to speak to a student crowd about deficit reduction when they, and the rest of the nation, desperately need government programs for jobs and growth-- programs that have been strangled by Washington’s wrongheaded fixation on deficit reduction.

As for Hoyer: Austerity-lite advocates have offered a shifting set of rationales for their deficit fixation, using everything from disproven inflation fears to discredited economic spreadsheets. But Hoyer’s come up with a new one: Cutting the deficit, he says, is the best way for “America to get its swagger back.”

The minority whip was addressing the discredited Wall Street front group that calls itself “Third Way.” While he, too, was careful not to mention his support for Social Security cuts, Hoyer expressed disappointment that the Simpson-Bowles plan was never enacted. That’s saying the same thing.

Hoyer also called for a “big and balanced” budget agreement. “Big and balanced” is a euphemism for the kind of deal that hurts the middle class through Social Security and Medicare cuts, but which also includes tax hikes that Republicans have historically opposed. Fortunately for Wall Street, the increases promoted by Peterson funded groups go easy on the millionaire and billionaire crowd.

In fact, Simpson-Bowles and similar proposals actually offer tax decreases for the highest earners, coupled with reductions in “tax expenditures”-- a phrase often used to describe tax breaks the middle class relies upon, like the home mortgage interest deduction and the employer health insurance deduction.

For years the deficit crowd has tried to create a false sense of panic about government debt. So it was especially ironic to hear Hoyer say that “it’s at this moment, when we don’t have a crisis breathing down our necks, that we have the best chance to lay the groundwork for the hard decisions we will need to make.”

There’s a struggle underway over the future of the Democratic Party. The populist movement has scored some significant recent wins, including the electoral victories of Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren and New York Mayor Bill de Blasio. Its ideas resonate with the public, and are in sync with mainstream economic thought.

But the remarks from Clinton and Hoyer demonstrate that the party’s Wall Street wing is still riding tall in the saddle, despite its discredited ideas and unpopular proposals.

There’s one sure-fire way to give a person, or a country, its “swagger” back: a good job at good wages will do it every time. Too bad these Wall Street Democrats aren’t talking about that.

Jay Stamper has made it clear that he's part of the populist wing of the party. The South Carolina Establishment-- both the political and the media establishment-- can't relate to it. They are much more comfortable with an advocate of the failed Austerity agenda like Brad Hutto.

Can Pot Save The Democrats?

Last night I interviewed Lee Rogers on KPFK, the Los Angeles Pacifica station. The show will run tomorrow evening. As you probably know, unless this is the first time you've ever read DWT, Rogers is a progressive Democrat running for Congress in the northwest corner of L.A. County-- Santa Clarita, the Antelope Valley and Simi Valley. After nearly losing to Rogers last cycle-- followed by some come-to-Jesus-moment polling-- arch-conservative incumbent Buck McKeon recently announced he would be retiring from elective politics.

CA-25 has come a long way but still leans a little red, especially in regard to turning out Democratic voters in midterm elections. The rearview mirror oriented Cook Report rates the PVI an R+3. Obama beat McCain under the new boundaries 124,377 to 123,454 but lost to Romney 4 years later 125,258 to 120,701. Rogers is engaged in a tough three-way jungle primary with two Republicans, Tony Strickland and Steve Knight, each trying to prove he's more of a right-wing, bigoted extremist than the other. Republican voters can sort that out among themselves, but Lee Rogers still needs a way to get Democrats to the polls June 3.

Rogers is an internationally prominent surgeon who strongly and articulately backs medical marijuana legalization. Why? Neither one of us uses it. But Rogers has been a big advocate for ending prohibition way beyond what California allows today. It isn't one of his big issues-- he's campaigning on jobs, healthcare, raising the minimum wage, protecting and expanding Social Security and comprehensive immigration reform. But, ironically, marijuana legalization could be of paramount importance in his race, where turnout in the June 3 primary is crucial. Consider this from Alex Seitz-Wald:

A new poll, conducted by a Democratic and Republican polling firm in partnership with George Washington University, suggests voters would be overwhelmingly more likely to go to the polls if they could vote on a ballot measure to legalize marijuana, something Democrats may want to keep in mind as they work to boost turnout.

Facing a tough map and perennial low turnout in midterms, Democrats are hoping to minimize losses in this year's elections by enticing their voters to the polls in any way possible, which in some states includes marijuana liberalization. At least six states are expected to have marijuana questions on the ballot this year.

Colorado and Washington, which each had referenda to legalize the drug on the ballot in 2012, saw the youth share of the vote jump between 5 and 12 percentage points that year over 2008, even as it increased only marginally nationwide.

The GW Battleground Poll of likely voters, conducted by the Tarrance Group and Lake Research Partners, asked voters how much more or less likely they would be to go to the polls "if there was a proposal on the ballot to legalize the use of marijuana."

The top response: "Much more likely," an option selected by 39 percent of respondents. The next most popular choice was "somewhat more likely," which garnered 30 percent of responses. Just 13 percent said they'd be somewhat or much less likely to vote, and 16 percent said it would make no difference.

Together, when rounded, that suggests that 68 percent of likely voters would be more likely to go to the polls if they could vote on a measure to legalize pot.

A breakdown of the numbers provided to National Journal shows liberals are more enthusiastic than moderates or conservatives, with 76 percent saying they would be more likely to vote if marijuana legalization were on the ballot, compared with 64 percent of conservatives and 61 percent of moderates.

"These numbers provide even more evidence that marijuana reform is a mainstream issue and that smart politicians would do well to start treating it as such," says Tom Angell, the founder of the pro-legalization group Marijuana Majority. "More politicians might want to find reasons to start saying good things about this issue."

Of course, Rogers isn't the only progressive Democrat running who wants to end prohibition. “Politicians, and I know a lot of them, tend not to seek out controversy,” said Daylin Leach, a state senator in Pennsylvania who is running for an open congressional seat in suburban Philadelphia and who has made legalization a central plank of his campaign. “You know the Wayne Gretzky line, ‘I don’t skate to where the puck is, I skate to where it will be.’ Well, most politicians want to skate where the puck already was.”

Leach introduced a bill in the Pennsylvania Senate this year that would have legalized marijuana. Passage remains unlikely, but if there were a secret ballot, he said, “it would pass overwhelmingly.” A conservative lawmaker who was publicly opposed to the bill, Leach said, told him privately, “I hope it passes so I can stop smoking pot in my living room and start on my front porch.”

The state senator is in a crowded field, but if he wins, he will join a small cadre of members of Congress who are backing full legalization. A bill introduced this year to decriminalize marijuana and turn regulatory power over to the states has 10 Democratic co-sponsors, and Republican Steve Stockman, who announced Monday that he was running for the Texas Senate seat now held by Republican John Cornyn, supports a bill mandating that the federal government respect state marijuana laws.

“We shouldn’t put people in the criminal justice system for smoking a plant which makes them feel giddy,” Leach said. “We are now requiring everyone, including our kids, to buy pot from behind the local bowling alley from someone they have never met before, instead of going into a state store in a strip mall, as you would to buy a bottle of vodka.”

The 2014 candidates’ pro-pot stance appears mostly to be a way for them to distinguish themselves in primaries where the candidates largely share the same views, particularly on social issues. In Maryland, for example, the candidate pushing legalization, Heather Mizeur, also is vying to be first openly gay governor of the state and is running a campaign designed to appeal to liberals and young people. Mizeur rejects “old paradigm assumptions about conventional wisdom and what is and isn’t safe to do in politics,” she said. “I am a candidate who never plays it safe. I always stand up for what I believe in. In the past, politics has been about catching up to where people are.”

This is, in part, a guest post Bellows did for DWT just over a month ago:

A few years ago, as executive director of the ACLU of Maine, I was discussing marijuana policy with a prosecutor. As we debated, he started reminiscing about his days as a pot smoker. At that point, I had to tell him that I’d never smoked pot due to my severe asthma. He thought this was funny, but I was troubled by the hypocrisy. When the prosecutor who is locking people up for marijuana laughs about his own use, something is terribly wrong. And when our last three U.S. Presidents have acknowledged marijuana use at the same time that poor kids-- particularly young males of color-- are getting thrown in jail for the same activity, we need change.

As a Democratic candidate for the United States Senate, I support marijuana legalization. We need to end the war on drugs and reform our criminal justice system, and we cannot afford to wait. The United States incarcerates more people in total and more people per capita than any other country in the world, and the racial disparities are alarming. Even in my home state of Maine, which is the whitest state in the union, blacks are 2.1 times more likely than whites to be arrested for marijuana possession. Government spends billions of dollars each year enforcing counterproductive drug laws, which are truly the New Jim Crow. The economic and human rights costs are enormous.

Our limited public resources would be much better spent investing in drug treatment facilities and community education in a regulated system that promotes community health and safety. Instead of spending billions on a prison industrial complex, we could invest those funds in education, prevention and rehabilitation.

We should treat drug use as a public health issue rather than a criminal one. Mainers have been using medical marijuana safely now for over a decade. I met a senior citizen recently whose wife just died of lung cancer. He told me that marijuana was a necessary part of her palliative care. His daughter risked arrest time and time again to bring them marijuana in her mother’s last months. Medical marijuana patients all across the country have similar heart-rending stories.

Maine is already a leader on marijuana policy. Maine voters overwhelmingly approved medical marijuana, first in 1999 and then again in 2009. Portland citizens just voted in a landslide to approve the recreational use of marijuana in small amounts for adults over 21. Now is the time for federal reform. We need a commonsense approach to drug policy based on science and liberty; we need to end prohibition. With your help, I will be a voice in the United States Senate for sensible drug policy.

Another Democratic Senate candidate, Jay Stamper, has a great deal of appeal to principled libertarians in South Carolina who detest Lindsay Graham's Big Brother/NSA-backing stands. Republican elected officials in the state are notorious drunkards and coke-heads… and hypocrites. This morning, Jay took it right to them: "I think it's time for politicians to put down their scotch and sodas and vote to legalize marijuana. Prohibition of marijuana, like alcohol before it, serves only to enrich and empower violent criminal cartels that turn our cities into war zones and corrupt our public institutions."

If you'd like to help Shenna Bellow's and Jay Stamper's campaigns, you can do it here. And Heather Mizeur's is here. Lee Rogers and Daylin Leach can both be found on this page.

Could Lindsey Graham Lose to a Democrat?

The South Caolina Senate race may be more of a tossup than anyone realizes. With Patty Murray, the architect of the DSCC's stunning series of victories in 2012, having turned over the reins of the committee to one of the Senate's weakest, lamest and least capable members, Michael Bennet, there are ominous signs ominously pointing to the possibility that Democrats will narrowly lose the Senate this year. The hackish executive director, Guy Cecil, who totally controls Bennet has vetoed DSCC involvement on behalf of grassroots progressives in races in South Dakota and Maine and Senate Democrats are in panic mode, scrambling to defend numerous vulnerable seats and counting on a surprise win in Kentucky or Georgia just to hang on to a slim majority.

There has been no shortage of bad news recently, including the loss of a purported bellwether House race in Florida and Republican recruiting successes in Colorado and New Hampshire.

But there is also a glimmer of good news for Democrats coming from the unlikeliest of states: South Carolina. There, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham is fighting the toughest campaign of his career against six Tea Party challengers in a bitter contest for the GOP nomination. Although Graham is expected to win his primary, he will emerge from it bruised, battered, and with a much reduced war-chest. One of his Republican opponents is already publicly gay-baiting the closeted Graham, which local media has picked up on in a big way. Dave Feliciano of Spartanburg: "It's about time that South Carolina (says) hey, We're tired of the ambiguously gay senator from South Carolina. We're ready for a new leader to merge the Republican Party. We're done with this. This is what it's about, all of us coming together and saying, one way or the other, one of us is going to be on that ballot in November."

All of this is of course positive for Jay Stamper, Graham’s Democratic challenger and the candidate endorsed by Blue America. But, what’s really getting national Democrats’ attention is the likely independent candidacy of former State Treasurer Thomas Ravenel. Ravenel is a right wing conservative who plans to run to Graham’s right as an independent in the general election. He also plans to fund his campaign using his considerable fortune, reminiscent of his 2004 campaign for U.S. Senate in which he spent $2.7 million of his own money.

In other words, Ravenel is the perfect spoiler. His campaign could easily siphon 20% of the vote from Graham in the general election. Thanks to a loyal base, Democratic candidates running statewide in South Carolina typically receive approximately 40% of the vote simply by being on the ballot with a ‘D’ next to their name. So, Jay Stamper should receive at least 40% of the vote (Graham’s last Democratic opponent received 42.25% of the vote after spending a total of just $15,000 in both the primary and general election). That leaves 40% of the vote for Graham, which makes the race a tossup.

But a potential Ravenel candidacy, though a Godsend, is only one of many reasons that a Jay Stamper win is beginning to look possible. Other compelling reasons include the down-ballot lift generated by the gubernatorial candidacy of Democrat Vincent Sheheen, who lost narrowly to Republican governor Nikki Haley in 2010. Sheheen is back for a rematch, with millions of dollars being pored into his campaign by state and national groups. The state party’s $3.5 million GOTV campaign is meant to bolster Sheheen but will help every Democrat on the ballot.

Finally, South Carolina is simply not as red as the popular perception would suggest. The 2012 Presidential election results demonstrated that South Carolina is only the 19th most Republican state in country and, with only three exceptions, Democrats have held state-wide elected office in South Carolina every single year since 1886! South Carolina has a strong Democratic tradition, a loyal voting base and even had a Democratic U.S. Senator until 2005.

The bottom line is that South Carolina may be a much more promising state for Democrats in 2014 than either Kentucky or Georgia, races that are rated as ‘Likely R’ and ‘Leans R’ respectively. Yet, despite having a plausible path to victory, Stamper’s campaign has yet to receive even a fraction of the funds being donated to Allison Lundergran Grimes (D-KY) or Michelle Nunn (D-GA).

If Democrats are going to hold onto the Senate this year, we need to recognize overlooked opportunities and go on the offensive to put at least one more state into play. That state may very well be South Carolina. You can contribute to Stamper's campaign here.

Will BRAVO Spawn A Monster This November… In Charleston?

No one knows if South Carolina Republican-turned-Libertarian Thomas Ravenel is floating trial balloons about running for Senate this year-- against his nemesis Lindsey Graham-- as a publicity stunt for his new BRAVO TV show, Southern Charm or if his participation in the shocking TV show is a publicity stunt for his Senate run. But this week the Post and Courier broke the story-- for those who didn't watch the first episode of the bizarre Charleston-based reality-sit-com-- that Ravenel may take on Lindsey Graham as an independent candidate.

For those who haven't been following the Ravenel saga, let's sum it up in a paragraph. His father, Arthur, a vicious racist Dixiecrat and self-styled "aristocrat," who switched to the GOP in the '60s was the congressman from Charleston from 1987-1995-- and he's the Ravenel the iconic Cooper River bridge is named for. His son Tom ran for the U.S. Senate in 2004, spent almost $3 million and came in third in the GOP primary. Two years later he was elected state Treasurer and served for 6 months before being busted for selling coke. He went to a fancy "rehab" center for wealthy Republican drug addicts and was given much reduced charges-- the 500 grams he was arrested with suddenly and very conveniently became "less than 100 grams" and after he ratted out some of his suppliers-- and he was sentenced to 10 months in a Club Fed-- where he played bocci-- instead of the 20 years he should have gotten. If you watch the BRAVO show, you have already come to see what a charming and utterly despicable sociopath he is. Since being released, he's been arrested in the Hamptons for driving "drunk" (i.e.- high on coke).

Stephanie Barna, writing for the Cahrleston City Paper echoed the fears of many in her city as Southern Charm was about to launch this week offering that, for many Charlestonians, it "represents all that is base and vile in the world. Charleston will become the laughingstock of the country-- as if South Carolina isn't already a laughingstock for things much worse than man sluts. You know, things like institutionalized racism and homophobia, high rates of illiteracy, poverty, teenage pregnancy, AIDS, etc."

Now, for those like me, seeing Thomas Ravenel in his natural habitat is fascinating stuff. This is a guy who truly is from the local elite-- a French Huguenot with a family name that dates back centuries. The big bridge is named for his dad Arthur Ravenel for god sakes. And about his dad. I kind of miss old Cousin Arthur, a former politician who served in Congress, ran for governor, and took a seat on the county school board at age 79. He gave the City Paper plenty of fodder for years. We dedicated entire issues to his Cuzway, the bridge's nickname during the project stage. We called him out when he famously referred to the NAACP as the National Association for Retarded People during the Confederate flag flap.

And because he is the son of Cousin Arthur, we shouldn't be surprised that T-Rav is an attention whore who loves stirring up controversy and saying shit like he did in last week's City Paper. Father and son share a mischievous twinkle in their eyes. They like to challenge and charm people. They like attention, which is why we caught a glimpse of the senior Ravenel in the preview episode. That's right. Cousin Arthur makes an appearance in Southern Charm, and for that, I will watch. I mean, you could put these two guys in a sitcom, they are such characters.

Ravenel, who, as a Libertarian is now pro-gay equality, harbors a lot of antipathy for the closeted Lindsey Graham and told the press that if Graham wins the 5-way primary in June, he'll run against him as an independent, possibly siphoning off enough anti-Graham Republican votes in November to throw the race to progressive Democrat Jay Stamper. "If Lindsey wins the nomination, I will probably throw my hat into the ring," he said on Tuesday.

South Carolina political scientists were quick to downplay Ravenel's odds of success, given his federal cocaine charge and guilty plea that drove him from office in 2007.

"I don't think he has a chance in hell," said College of Charleston political scientist Kendra Stewart.

Stewart said some voters can be forgiving, citing how coastal 1st Congressional District Republicans responded to now-U.S. Rep. Mark Sanford's marital affair and Appalachian Trail hike story while governor.

The difference, she said, was that Sanford asked for forgiveness and was contrite-- helping him win his former seat in Congress last year.

In Ravenel's case, she said, he hasn't been as repentant. He also was pushed from office for drug use.

"I think a drug scandal is a lot harder to overcome than a marital scandal," Stewart said. "Especially in other areas of the state."

Much of Southern Charm, seen on the Bravo network, claims to show the lives of rich young men and women living in Charleston. Parts of Monday's broadcast focused on Ravenel's efforts to mix his playboy persona and efforts to rehabilitate his image toward a political campaign.

"It's just television; it's entertainment," Ravenel said of the first hour of the series that was shown Monday. He added that he felt he was portrayed accurately.

He also let on Tuesday that other Charleston residents earlier had dropped out of the project, and that his siblings had pressured him to get out as well.

"(The network) said they wouldn't have a show without me; I was the only Charlestonian in it," he said of his decision to honor his commitment to the project and stay on.

Ravenel said he would self-finance his campaign if it does materialize, and would seek donations. His conviction does not prohibit seeking federal office.

Before exploring Thomas' lovely Charleston pied-à-terre, please consider contributing Jay Stamper's grassroots Senate campaign… just in case.

Will A Growing And Unrestrained American Surveillance State Become A Real Issue In The Midterms?

Yesterday's Politico featured a post by Manu Raju explaining how both Democratic and Republican candidates are running against the NSA's Cheney-conceived domestic spying agenda-- the NSA's Cheney-conceived domestic spying agenda that Obama has largely kept intact. Raju's top example: Maine progressive Shenna Bellows, who has talked with us about this last October and again in November.

Maine Senator Susan Collins has been a lockstep captive of the Military Industrial Complex and an unwavering supporter of the very unpopular Surveillance State and of all the abusive NSA excesses. Maine libertarians hate her. And Bellows, a former executive director of Maine's ACLU, has been going up and down the state explaining why Democrats should be as concerned as libertarians on this one. Collins has infuriated constitutionalists in Maine with her awkward statements about Ed Snowden. She harps on him being responsible for one of the most “serious national security breaches” in modern history. “He’s no hero,” she insists. “He’s no whistleblower.” Bellows, like critics on the right and left do see Snowden as a whistle bower, a position most Americans agree with. “I think she was wrong to vote time and time again to renew the PATRIOT Act without meaningful checks and balances, … she was wrong to vote in November 2013 to legalize the NSA program in the wake of these revelations of abuse,” said Bellows about Collins.

The Democratic candidate didn’t think much about running for Senate against the popular GOP Sen. Susan Collins — until the aftermath of the Snowden revelations prompted tougher restrictions on warrantless surveillance on the state level that she now wants to replicate in Washington. Bellows wants an end to the NSA’s bulk data collection program, along with the PATRIOT Act. She argues the country needs stronger whistleblower protections. She even believes Snowden deserves clemency.

“Constitutional freedoms is how I win the race,” said the 38-year-old Bellows, who headed the American Civil Liberties Union of Maine for eight years and now faces a very steep climb to catch Collins. “I think the erosion of constitutional freedoms exemplifies how Washington has become out of touch with some of the values that we share as communities.”

Candidates across the country are using a similar playbook as they run against an unpopular Washington. Primary candidates running against incumbent GOP Sens. Lindsey Graham in South Carolina and John Cornyn of Texas have seized on this controversy, hoping to woo Ron Paul-minded libertarian voters worried about government overreach. The main GOP and Democratic candidates in Montana are both bashing the agency as they jostle for an upper hand on the issue.

And Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), a likely 2016 presidential candidate who has led the charge against the NSA in Congress, is reviewing candidates’ positions on surveillance as a condition of offering his endorsement to upstart challengers.

…Also in the West, Sen. Mark Udall-- the Colorado Democrat and early critic of the NSA-- is quick to point out the alarms he sounded even before the Snowden revelations. That, he said, will be a big selling point to voters as he faces what could be a tough reelection battle. “I think it will be one of the reasons I’ll ask to be rehired-- I want to protect Coloradans’ privacy,” Udall said. “They know I will, they know I have. They know I was on this cause before it was popular, before anybody paid any attention.”

The divisions are far starker in the GOP, with competing libertarian and national security wings battling for the future direction of the Republican Party. In a sign that the GOP is heading in a more libertarian direction, the Republican National Committee called on Friday to investigate the NSA for what it called the “invasion into the personal lives” of American citizens and their constitutional rights.

Paul said in a brief interview that the issue of privacy is “a popular one” that “appeals to people who aren’t traditionally in one camp or the other.” Asked if he would base his endorsement of 2014 Senate candidates partially on their views on the NSA program, Paul said simply, "Yes."

In North Carolina’s contested GOP Senate primary, Paul has endorsed physician Greg Brannon, who called Obama’s latest proposals “nothing more than slight modifications to an unconstitutional program.”

But the issue is becoming a bigger flash point in South Carolina, where Graham-- a longtime national security hawk-- has previously said he was “glad” the government was collecting the phone records of Verizon customers.

"I don’t mind Verizon turning over records to the government if the government is going to make sure that they try to match up a known terrorist phone with somebody in the United States," Graham said last year.

Those comments have made it difficult for Graham to appeal to libertarian-leaning conservatives, who could be a critical bloc in this year’s primary, according to one of his GOP opponents, state Sen. Lee Bright.

"That crowd and Lindsey Graham will never get along,” Bright said last week, adding that the senator’s Verizon comment “pretty much finished off any hope he had for the folks who were really concerned about the Fourth Amendment."

Fortunately, voters in South Carolina have an alternative to voting for an extremist anti-Choice, antigay, anti-environmental, anti-working family lunatic like Bright, if they want to oppose Graham's support of the Surveillance State and NSA domestic spying. Like Bellows, Blue America has endorsed progressive Democrat Jay Stamper. Although Politico is ignoring his campaign, he told us last night that "[t]here is no U.S. Senator more hostile to the Bill of Rights than Lindsey Graham. As his likely opponent in the 2014 general election, I will continue to draw attention to his attacks on our constitutional civil liberties, including his enthusiastic support for the NSA's warrant-less surveillance programs.

"Lindsey Graham says he doesn't mind if the NSA tracks his phone calls. This year, voters across the political spectrum in South Carolina have the opportunity to send a message at the polls that we do mind.

"Sen. Graham can always be counted on to support new wars and the escalation of existing conflicts overseas. He says we need to fight for our freedom. I would remind Senator Graham that protecting freedom starts with standing up for our civil liberties here at home."

And, of course, it isn't just Senate candidates who are talking with voters about these issues. Later today we'll be meeting the Oklahoma Democrat running against Tom Cole, Tae Si, and hearing in some depth how he differs from Cole-- and President Obama-- on the NSA domestic spying. It's a winning issue in Oklahoma and the Blue America-endorsed candidate in the 5th district (Oklahoma City), Tom Guild, has come out strongly in favor of the Constitution and against unwarranted intrusion on Americas' privacy rights. "As the venerated Fourth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution says, 'The right of the people to be secure…against unreasonable searches and seizures shall not be violated…except upon probable cause…particularly describing the place to be searched, and the person or things to be seized.' Unrestricted and unrestrained power concentrated in the government to the seize personal information of Americans, who have not been reasonably suspected of any crime, leads inevitably to a system where government overreach, abuse and mischief are invited and encouraged. We are a government of laws and not of men. Legal restraints should be placed on the NSA program to ensure that the privacy of ordinary Americans is not violated without sufficient and reasonable legal restraints. We need to restore the constitutional balance between national security and the cherished right to privacy enshrined in our Constitution."

Rob Zerban, who is running against NSA-backed Paul Ryan in southeastern Wisconsin agrees with Guild that warrantless wiretaps go beyond the intentions of the Founding Fathers when they put together the Constitution. "Everybody," he told us, "should be concerned when their government is collecting random personal data. With the 2014 midterm elections quickly approaching the electorate needs to educate themselves on where the candidates stand on such an important issue. I personally am adamantly opposed to such spying on American citizens. National security is critical to protecting our country and our freedoms, but must we give up those freedoms in order to protect them? I can not find a justification for the program and the way it has been used. Anybody that has supported such efforts needs to be voted out of office as it is a complete breach of trust and a violation of the constitution and our right to privacy."

Pennsylvania's Liberal Lion, state Senator Daylin Leach, the leading candidate for the open PA-13 House seat, is another advocate of a closer adherence to the Constitution. "I've been a member of the ACLU since I was 18 years old," he told us last night. "I taught and practiced Constitutional Law and named my daughter Brennan after my favorite Supreme Court Justice. Civil Liberties mean a great deal to me. I have seen no evidence that the results of the NSA spying program in any way justify the intrusion inherent in such a program. Our Constitution guarantees individualized suspicion that we have done something wrong before we are investigated. The NSA data collection program flies in the face of that basic right. It's time we rebalance our approach to place more emphasis on respecting basic liberties."