Brian Schatz-- Abercrombie Makes The Best Possible Appointment To The Senate

A new progressive U.S. senator

When Daniel Inouye died last week, anyone would have predicted New Dem Colleen Hanabusa would have been appointed by Hawaii Governor Neil Abercrombie to succeed him. It's what Inouye is reported to have wanted. When we looked at the situation here at DWT a week ago, Lt. Governor Brian Schatz seemed like too good of an idea to even give serious consideration. It looked to me that it would be the only way to keep reactionary corporate whore Ed Case-- who was gearing up to run for Hanabusa's seat-- out of Congress.

But I didn't give Governor Abercrombie enough credit. He gave Schatz the appointment the day after Chrtistmas. The state Democratic Party had given Abercrombie 3 names to pick from: Schatz, himself a former chairman of the state party; Hanabusa; and Esther Kiaaina, the deputy director of the state's Department of Land and Natural Resources. He made the right decision, though not everyone in the Establishment thinks so.

"Senator Inouye conveyed his final wish to Governor Abercrombie," said Jennifer Sabas, Inouye's chief of staff. "While we are very disappointed that it was not honored, it was the Governor's decision to make."

Abercrombie said Inouye's views and wishes weighed on his decision-making process, but "no one and nothing is preordained." He said the possibility of a special election to fill Hanabusa's seat weighed on him in choosing Inouye's successor.

"Sometimes you have to set aside personal considerations in order to look for the good of the whole," the governor, a former congressman, said at a press conference.

Schatz said he would board a flight to Washington sometime this evening, with hopes of being sworn into office sometime on Thursday afternoon. The Senate reconvenes on Thursday to take up the urdent business of reaching a deal to avoid the fiscal cliff on Jan. 1.

Just as important as keeping Case out of Congress is the fact that Schatz, who at 40 will be the youngest member of the Senate until Chris Murphy (D-CT) is sworn in in January, is also a progressive and a reformer with a great record on environmental issues. Hawaii's Senate delegation, Schatz and Mazie Hirono, is likely to turn out to be the best in the whole country.

UPDATE: New Dem Hanabusa May Retaliate With A Run For Governor

Rep. Colleen Hanabusa, who had already, at least figuratively, measured the drapes in Daniel Inouye's office, is telling friends she may get even with Neil Abercrombie by running against him in the 2014 primary. She claims Inouye staffers are encouraging her, unable to comprehend that in death Inouye couldn't name his own successor, the pro-corporate Hanabusa and that Abercrombie was able to appoint a progressive. The other aggrieved party in this is the even worse corporate whore, perennial candidate-- and arch reactionary-- Ed Case. He's likely to run against either Abercrombie or Schatz in 2014 and against Schatz again in 2016.

Hawaii Looking For Senatorial Seniority... Fast

Hanabusa beat Case in the 2010 House special election

Politicians from Hawaii understand how congressional seniority works and the state plays up to it. When Daniel Inouye died last week he was the President Pro Tempore of the Senate and the longest serving member of the Senate, first elected in 1963. Before that he was a Congressman since Hawaii achieved statehood (1959). At the time of his death his seniority had landed him the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, a post that served Hawaii very , very well. It's likely that Gov. Neil Abercrombie will be eager to choose a replacement even before the new class is sworn in so that the next senator from Hawaii has seniority over all of them.

Reportedly, Inouye's last request of Abercrombie was that he pick his close friend, Rep. Colleen Hanabusa. Hanabusa is a right-of-center New Dem whose loyalties have been more with business interests than with working families. Abercrombie is a solid progressive but he may be stuck with her since the two other top contenders are much worse. The worst of all is Ed Case-- Hawaii's version of Harold Ford. He runs for every open seat and will stop at nothing to get back into government. He's already told friends he expects Abercrombie to pick Hanabusa and that he'll run in the House special election to replace her.

Case is more a right-wing Republican, at least on economic issues, than a Democrat but the state is too blue for a wily character like him to join the GOP. He's become very unpopular with the state's Democratic base and keeps losing primaries. He was also considered the laziest Member of Congress when he served. But the elites like him-- especially in DC-- and he's got a ton of dirty money behind him.

Case's backers in Hawaii try to portray him as recently socially moderate, rather than the reactionary extremist he was when he was in the House. But he's never explained to the women of Hawaii why he voted against funding for Planned Parenthood.The guy has a clearly Republican voting record and it would be nothing short of catastrophic to reward his perfidy with another shot in either house of Congress. He's been completely consistent in his support for Republican and corporate initiatives like job-killing trade legislation and to special interests legislation like abolishing the estate tax for the super-rich, making it easier for banksters to rip off consumers, screwing over working families on pensions and the never-ending Republican proposals to shift the tax burden to the middle class. He generally voted with the most reactionary Democrats when they joined the GOP to stifle reform and, we tried to make the point that anyone who likes Chamber of Commerce pawns and Patriot Act-type Dems such as Dan Boren (Blue Dog-OK) and Joe Donnelly (Blue Dog-IN) would be perfectly happy with Ed Case-- especially if xenophobia and war-mongering and making sure that victims of big corporations have no recourse to the courts are on the menu.

The other possibility Abercrombie is said to be considering is also worse than Hanabusa, though probably not as reactionary as Case-- but more corrupt. Former Honolulu Mayor Mufi Hannemann, has, like Case, lost multiple congressional elections. Let's hope Abercrombie digs deeper than the obvious and comes up with someone who will represent Hawaii's working families, rather than big money interests the way Hanabusa, Case and Hannemann would.

Congressional Status A Big Negative Among This Year's Gubernatorial Candidates

There are two states with primaries coming up this month: Georgia and Oklahoma. DWT readers know that this coming Tuesday Blue America-backed Regina Thomas goes up against reactionary Blue Dog John Barrow in the 12th CD and the following Tuesday (July 27), late entrant Jim Wilson takes on even worse Blue Dog Dan Boren in eastern Oklahoma's 2nd CD. What we haven't discussed, however is that both states have gubernatorial primaries as well. Taylor Dolven has pointed out in The Hill that members of Congress aspiring to governor's mansions-- as is this case in both Georgia and Oklahoma-- are finding their congressional experience an albatross. These are the members of Congress-- two of whom, Nathan Deal and Neil Abercrombie, have recently resigned from that body-- who decided to leave Capitol Hill for a shot at running the show in their own state's capitals:

Nathan Deal (R)- GA
Mary Fallin (R)- OK
Artur Davis (D)- AL
Gresham Barrett (R)- SC
Pete Hoesksta (R)- MI
Zach Wamp (R)- TN
Neil Abercrombie (D)- HI

Fallin, better known for her times at Lt. Governor than for her short stint as a congressional, backbencher, is considered a lock and so is Abercrombie. The rest have either already lost-- Davis and Barrett-- or look like they will lose.

Once Davis, who represents one of the most overwhelmingly Democratic districts in the South (Obama have thrashed McCain 72-27%) decided to run statewide, his moderate voting record turned sharply right, ignoring his own constituents to make a play for... the KKK? His vote against the healthcare reform legislation was widely seen as the last straw for his cowardly and craven pandering-- and the death knell for an idiotic campaign. He lost to Ron Sparks. He lost 10 of the 12 counties in his own congressional district and only managed 37.6% statewide. Why should Democrats vote for someone who votes with the GOP in their own primary when they have a plausible alternative?

Gresham Barrett didn't change a thing to run. But the South Carolina GOP changed. No one can deny that Barrett has a long career as an ultra-conservative corporate hack, long the ticket to higher office in one of the most historically reactionary states-- going right back to colonial days-- in the U.S. But Barrett, like virtually the whole House Republican hierarchy, including teabagger hero Joe Wilson, I might add, followed the lead of John Boehner and Paul Ryan-- as well as party standard bearers George Bush and John McCain-- to support Bush's 2008 no-strings-attached Wall Street Bail-Out. The same deranged, demented teabaggers in South Carolina who were ready to erect statues of Joe Wilson in their town squares after he screeched "You Lie" at President Obama at the State of the Union, were unwilling to accept Barrett's abject daily apologies for voting the same way as Wilson. No doubt if Barrett would have campaigned on a "platform" of Obama being an Indonesian, Mexican or Kenyan-born Muslim terrorist, he would have won the GOP primary. But he didn't-- and he lost.

Congressional experience has been a boon in the past for lawmakers running in gubernatorial races, according to Jennifer Duffy, an analyst with the Cook Political Report.

“Now that experience is a liability because of Congress’s poor image,” she said.
Georgia Republican Nathan Deal will be the next former lawmaker to test voters’ anti-Washington mood.

A recent Mason-Dixon poll showed Deal, who left the House in March after casting his vote against healthcare reform, locked in a three-way battle for the GOP gubernatorial nomination with state Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine and former Secretary of State Karen Handel. 

Deal this week joined Oxendine in attacking Handel, who is seen as the front-runner after securing the backing of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. Observers say he may not make the expected runoff between the top two finishers in next Tuesday’s vote. 

His third-place position in the race comes despite leaving Congress in the hopes of improving his chances in the primary. 

“It was important that he devote 100 percent of his time to the election,” said Brian Robinson, a Deal spokesman.

Being out of Congress also eliminates the chance a candidate will have to make a controversial vote. This cycle, members from both parties who ran for governor were forced to defend tough votes. 

Wamp's membership in the radical right C Street Cult probably isn't hurting him in his primary bid, but just the fact that he's a congressman is. He's trailing the multimillionaire mayor of Knoxville, Bill Haslem. There are so many Republicans running in Michigan-- with no clear front-runner-- that the party nod is completely up for grabs. Aside from the bumbling and lackluster but well-known Hoekstra, Attorney General Mike Cox and Ann Arbor businessman Rick Snyder are contenders, with Oakland County Sheriff Mike Bouchard and state Senator Tom George lagging.