A Worse Democratic Candidate For President Than Biden? Let Me See-- Well, He's Not A Really Candidate, But There Is John Delaney

When I was on the air with David Feldman this week, he asked me if there are any candidates worse than Biden. I mentioned that there are a few on the right-fringe of the Democratic Party who have no traction and no chance to win but that certainly John Delaney would be almost as bad. Delaney, a slime ball multimillionaire, was one of the most virulently anti-progressive members of Congress, who sold his seat to an even richer dork, David Trone, the only member of Congress to have endorsed Delaney's hopeless presidential campaign. I don't even think I bothered doing a Worst Democraps Who Want To Be President piece on him because his bid is so pathetic and so under the radar. I did mention over a year ago, though, that he is functioning as someone making Biden look less reactionary by comparison.

In Congress, Delaney, a New Dem and devoted Wall Street ally, served their interests as a member of the House Financial Services Committee. He was always an outspoke anti-Bernie partisan and as soon as he bought himself a House seat he immediately became a fount of Republican ideas-- like forbidding the EPA from protecting clean drinking water in streams and lakes, raising the retirement age for the working poor and forcing chained CPI down the throats of Social Security recipients. Delaney has been the perfect Democrat for Fox News, always eager to blame progressives for everything, always eager to equate progressives with the extremists, Confederates and fascists that dominate the Republican Party. He's an advocate of the "both sides are equally wrong" simplemindedness. "Washington," he wrote in a Washington Post OpEd in 2015, "is paralyzed by extreme political rhetoric that creates powerful sound bites but poor policy... With Washington already broken, the last thing we need is a left-wing version of the tea party. But I am worried about where some of the loudest voices in the room could take the Democratic Party." Delaney is worried. Why doesn't he hop the fence and join the GOP officially? He continued, in a barely veiled critique of Elizabeth Warren, Bernie, Sherrod Brown and other progressive stalwarts that "some in our party continue to engage in time-consuming rhetoric attacking banks that has little chance of producing more financial reform and distracts from far more consequential areas of economic risk, such as climate change Climate Change..."

Oh, so he's interested in the climate crisis now? The anti-environmental fracking guy is concerned about climate Who knew? Is he talking about it in his fantasy campaign for president? Yes! Just yesterday he denounced the Green New Deal! Politico, desperate for "news" on a slow day, even covered it. On a hate-talk radio show hosted by Hugh Hewitt-- and sounding like he is auditioning for Fox News-- he denounced progressive policies, singling out the Green New Deal and Medicare-For-All. Hewitt goaded him by asking how he "planned to stand apart from those on the Democratic field's left flank on a debate stage."

"I'm just going to point out: Their policies are bad policies. Medicare for All-- in terms of the bill that’s been introduced in the Senate-- is fundamentally bad health care policy. Putting aside we have no way of paying for it, even if we were able to pay for it, it still would be bad policy... There’s a much better way to deal with climate change than the Green New Deal, which will in many ways crush working families... So I’m going to take them on hard on their policies, which I think are fundamentally flawed and are not going to move this country forward in the right direction and are going to hurt a lot of people. [If Democrats take on Trump with] "bad policy, we're not gonna win... The Democratic Party needs someone like myself who can actually go toe to toe with the president on the economy and where voters will believe with a Delaney administration that the economy’s not going to go off the rails by embracing some half-baked socialist policies."

Sounds like if he doesn't get the job at Fox, maybe a President Biden (God forbid) will give him a minor job for helping slander Biden's opponents in the primary.

By the way, Delaney wasn't the only right-of-center Democrat Politico showcased yesterday. Sarah Ferris highlighted the Velvet Hammer, Stephanie Murphy, head Blue Dog. I don't want to call anyone (other than Trump and everyone who enables him) a worthless piece of shit, but... Murphy is pretty worthless. She exists in Congress-- just as Delaney did-- to prevent the Democratic Party doing anything to help working families. As head of the Blue Dogs she can get them all 27 of then barking at the same time and get a little attention for the far right of the Democratic Party and their Republican perspective on issues. But that's it. She's never accomplished anything that helps her constituents-- and never will-- and is likely to lose her Orlando-area seat in 2022.

In a closed-door meeting about immigration policy recently, Pelosi chastised her for helping the GOP exploit fissures in the Democratic Party. She brags that she was able to stop a $15 minimum wage bill from going forward. I wonder if voters in her district know that; I hope so.

“She’s a low-key negotiator and power broker but don't mistake that for not having a lot of power,” said Rep. Ben McAdams, a Blue Dog Democrat from Utah. “As long as we’re organized and willing to say no to legislation that doesn’t advance good policy, legislation doesn't go forward without us being willing to support it.”

...McAdams, who won one of the closest contests last November, said he privately approached Murphy even before the Democratic whip team with his qualms about the caucus’s marquee campaign finance and anti-corruption bill, H.R. 1.

McAdams, like roughly a dozen other moderates DINOs, had issues with the idea of public financed campaigns, with taxpayer money going toward TV ads.

Within days, Murphy worked with the bill’s chief authors, Reps. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) and John Sarbanes (D-MD), to come up with a workaround so that all the money came from fees, not tax dollars. The tweak went almost unnoticed until a reporter noticed that a group of Blue Dogs had all become co-sponsors on the same day.

Back in the fall, Murphy withheld her vote for Pelosi as speaker until she and a band of moderates DINOs-- including some Republicans-- secured a promise from leadership to make it easier for bipartisan legislation to receive floor votes.

...And unlike many of her Democratic colleagues, Murphy has been happy to accept invitations to the White House. It has paid off: On one visit, she pitched Vice President Mike Pence to support loosening restrictions for federal funding on gun research, and she says that moment-- which came in the aftermath of the Parkland shooting in her home state-- helped get the provision ultimately signed into law.

Murphy has largely avoided direct clashes with the progressive firebrands who have dominated discussion of the new Congress, but she recently made something of an exception by publishing an op-ed condemning socialism that some on Capitol Hill saw as a rebuke to members of her own party.

I would pay real money to see Delaney and Murphy perform that lovely Garfunkel and Oates song up top together. And certainly either one of them would fit in perfectly in a modern day version of this scene from The History of The World in the Roman Senate:

Blue Dogs Still Whining About Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

Blue Dogs say they can work with this in a bipartisan way

It's silly to called Blue Dogs, the right-wing fringe of the Democratic Party (AKA, the Republican wing of the Democratic Party) "moderate." They're not moderate; they're conservative-- and more than anything else, they're corrupt, When Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said "I don't think people who are taking money from pharmaceutical companies should be drafting health care legislation," they short circuited and have been attacking her ever since. If the Blue Dogs were once motivated by right-of-center ideology, today they are just as motivated by the right-of-center gravy train, just as Republicans are. Ocasio-Cortez also said, "I don't think people who are taking money from Oil and Gas companies should be drafting climate legislation.

There are 17 Blue Dogs returning to the House in January-- not counting the 7 right-leaning freshmen they recruited. This list is the 17 incumbents with how much each has accepted in bribes, first from PhRMA and second from Oil and Gas. This kind of bribery ins't illegal-- since Congress gets to define its own criminal behavior as legal.

• Sanford Bishop (GA)- Appropriations Committee, next chair of the Subcommittee dealing with the Food and Drug Administration, $67,500, $82,930
• Jim Cooper (TN)- Oversight Committee's Subcommittee on Health Care, $134,400, $102,375
• Lou Correa (CA)- Veteran's Affairs Committee's Subcommittee on Health, $69,998, $53,500
• Jim Costa (CA)- Natural Resources Committee's subcommittee on Energy and Mineral Resources $35,500, $517,974
• Charlie Crist (FL)- Financial Services Committee, $101,250, $79,905
• Henry Cuellar (TX)- Appropriations Committee, $75,350, $708,127
• Vicente Gonzalez (TX)- Financial Services Committee's Subcommittee on Insurance $4,750, $47,250
• Josh Gottheimer (NJ)- Financial Services Committee, $103,990, $57,841
• Dan Lipinski (IL)- Science Committee's Subcommittee on Energy; Transportation Committee's Subcommittee on Pipelines, $17,000, $35,000
• Stephanie Murphy (FL)- Small Buisiness Committee's next chair of Subcommittee on Regulations, $62,081, $3,300
• Tom O'Halleran (AZ)- Agriculture Committee's Subcommittee on Energy $25,935, $475
• Collin Peterson (MN)- next chair of the Agriculture Committee- $44,000, $150,926
• Brad Schneider (IL)- Small Business Committee- next chair of Subcommittee on Energy and Trade, $268,491, $22,552
• Mike Thompson (CA)- Ways and Means-- next chair of Subcommittee on Health, $502,228, $90,260
• Filemon Vela (TX)- Agriculture Committee, $29,100, $98,300

As for calling the Blue Dogs, "centrists," they are certainly not anywhere near the center of the Democratic Party, although they are in the center of Congress, something right in between actual Democrats and Republicans (basically now a neo-fascist party). The Blue Dogs and New Dems are pretty much what's left of Eisenhower Republicans. In fact, severakof their members are "ex"-Republicans, like Charlie Crist, and Tom O'Halleran.

Over the weekend Washington Post columnist Josh Rogin, in a pull piece for the Blue Dogs, referred to the then as both moderates and centrists and never once mentioned their corruption. His headline is their p.r. message-- what a coincidence-- going into 2019, Blue Dog Democrats are poised to play a crucial role in the next Congress. He starts by reminding his readers that "The Democratic Party [the DCCC] spent enormous amounts of time and money recruiting and supporting moderate, centrist candidates as part of its strategy to take control of the House in last month’s midterm elections-- and it worked." Yes, it worked; there was a massive anti-red wave they swept even even wretched candidates like Jeff Van Drew, Max Rose and Abigail Spanberger into Congress. Rogin's next sentence is the message that the Blue Dems have repeated-- and have had their pet media hacks repeat-- year after year after year, no matter how many times it's proven to be completely incorrect: "Now, these very lawmakers are organizing to assert their influence. If they succeed, they might just keep their jobs and save the Democratic majority in the process."

Meet Rep. Van Drew, Josh Rogin's idea of the "moderate," "centrist" candidate-- it's not easy to get an A+ from the NRA, but Van Drew pulled it off... so moderate in suburban New Jersey!

The Blue Dog Coalition began in 1995 after Democrats lost power in the most stunning electoral defeat of that era. Originally made up of mostly older, white, Southern men, their name was inspired by the iconic yellow-eyed blue dog painted by artist George Rodrigue... The forming principle of the group was that fiscally conservative, national-security-minded Democrats needed to stick together-- and occasionally stick it to their own party’s leadership-- to survive and get stuff done. But the Blue Dog Coalition will look a lot different in 2019 than it did in 1995: It now includes Northerners, young people and veterans. It is led by an Asian American woman who served in the Pentagon and just won her first reelection in a purple Florida district that supports both gun control and gay rights.

“The makeup of our coalition has changed,” Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-FL) told me. “It’s not your Southern Democratic Blue Dog Coalition anymore.”

Murphy and her co-chairs, Rep. J. Luis Correa (CA) and Rep. Tom O’Halleran (AZ), are growing their coalition by recruiting from the incoming freshman class.

[Note: Correa was known as the worst Democrat in the California legislature, corrupt beyond belief and voting more frequently with the Republicans than any other Democrat. There was general rejoicing when he left Sacramento. Tom O'Halleran also served in his state's legislature... as a Republican, which is still basically is, except with a "D" next to his name.]

It is no accident they’ve signed up Afghanistan war veteran Max Rose (NY), former CIA officer Abigail Spanberger (VA) and former Salt Lake County, Utah, mayor Ben McAdams. Their theory of the case is that competence, pragmatism and experience in public service are attributes voters crave in the age of President Trump.

Republicans have ceded huge territory in the center, Murphy said, by abandoning fiscal responsibility on debt and deficits while following Trump as he takes the GOP toward a nationalist trade and foreign policy.

“We have a unique opportunity,” she said. “It is a moment when the Blue Dogs have an opportunity to be a strong, reasonable voice. . .  In contrast to some of the reckless policies we are seeing.”

This is how the rules of the conservative game read: when Democrats are in power, no money is allowed to be spent except on the military. Money spent on making the country more equitable and more livable for working families is verboten. First priority must always be reducing the deficit that the conservatives ran up with their tax cuts for the rich and wasteful militarism. Then when voters get sick of the Scrooge-like posture, Republicans get back into power and the spigots open for further enriching the very rich-- and stealing from the public purse, another hallmark of conservative governance. When in comes to fiscal and economic policy, Blue Dogs are Republicans. And when it comes to attacking progressives, the Blue Dogs are better at it than Republicans. Rogan continued, sympathetically: "They know the progressive far-left Democrats entering Congress are getting the lion’s share of media attention. For example, Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (NY) has a district just miles from Rose’s but gets drastically more coverage, in part because of her willingness to oppose party leadership and advocate economic and foreign policy ideas that are outside the mainstream."

Laughable. It was Rose who threatened to not vote for Pelosi and who demanded she agree to rules that would enable the Republican minority. Ocasio-Cortez said she would vote for Pelosi. So where does the lie come from? The Blue Dog p.r. person or from the dishonest or really dumb-as-a-brick "journalist?" Why shouldn't Ocasio-Cortez get media coverage? She's already been setting the policy discussion while Rose sits around with one finger up his ass and the other in the wind trying to figure out what's the least dangerous things for him to say.

Sixty-four percent of the 42 seats Democrats flipped in the 2018 midterms will be held by members of the Blue Dogs or the moderate New Democratic Coalition; only 27 percent of those seats will be held by members of the Progressive Caucus. Of the 20 congressional districts now held by Democrats but that favored Trump in 2016, 11 are Blue Dog or New Dem members; only three are in the Progressive Caucus.

With a little sleight of hand, the Blue Dog p.r. team leaves out progressive freshmen like Ocasio-Cortez (NYC), Ilhan Omar (Minneapolis), Ayassa Pressley (Boston) and Rashida Tlaib (Detroit) since they represented seats that were already held by Democrats, while including a brainless conservative backbencher, the wealthy Vegas socialite and Mob-connected Susie Lee who was also elected in a district held by a Democrat, as were Steven Horsford, Jahanna Hayes and Chris Pappas. So is the use of "honesty" in the calculations too much to ask for?

Lets start with how many freshmen joined each caucus, keeping in mind that the most conservative freshmen joined both the Blue Dogs and the New Dems and that the actual centrists-- rather than the right wing Democrats-- joined the New Dems and the CPC (Congressional Progressive Caucus.) A brief tangent here. Many of the centrist Dems feel they need the political cover of being able to tell their constituents they are progressives, so they pay the $5,000 annual membership fee and and the CPC gives them that cover. They think they can avoid primaries from the left that way. That's fucked up!

OK, these are the new members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus: 25 members so far:

Only 7 freshmen were willing to admit to being Blue Dogs, all proven conservatives. Not one, for example, has signed onto the #GreenNewDeal:

• Jeff Van Drew (NJ)
• Mikie Sherrill (NJ)
• Xochitl Small (NM)
• Anthony Brindisi (NY)
• Max Rose (NY)
• Ben McAdams (UT)
• Abigail Spanberger (VA)

As for the New Dems, 30 joined... although 6 are also Blue Dogs and 5 are also members of the CPC. This in the whole list:

• Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ)
• Greg Stanton (AZ)
• Josh Harder (CA)
• Katie Hill (CA)
• Harley Rouda (CA)
• Jason Crow (CO)
• Debbie Powell (FL)
• Sean Casten (IL)
• Sharice Davids (KS)
• Elissa Slotkin (MI)
• Haley Stevens (MI)
• Angie Craig (MN)
• Sean Phillips (MN)
• Susie Lee (NV)
• Chris Pappas (NH)
• Tom Malinowski (NJ)
• Mikie Sherrill (NJ)
• Xochitl Small (NM)
• Max Rose (NY)
• Anthony Brindisi (NY)
• Chrissy Houlahan (PA)
• Susan Wild (PA)
• Lizzie Fletcher (TX)
• Veronica Escobar (TX)
• Colin Allred (TX)
• Ben McAdams (UT)
• Elaine Luria (VA)
• Abigail Spanberger (VA)
• Jennifer Wexton (VA)
• Kim Schrier (WA)

OK, now the excuse the conservative Democrats use for voting with the Republicans so frequently. Rogin points out that "Ocasio-Cortez won with 78 percent of the vote. Rose won with less than 53 percent. If Pelosi still wants to be speaker after two years, Democrats must convince constituents in districts such as Rose’s that their party represents them." Perhaps if Rose ran on the issues Ocasio-Cortez ran on-- Medicare-for-All, free state colleges, the GreenNewDeal-- he would have had 78% as well. Only 4 Democrats had worse voting records.

The Blue Dogs disagree, of course. Rogin asked the "ex"-Republican Tom O'Halleran (who has an "F" rating from ProgressivePunch and who has voted about 60% of the time on crucial roll calls since he was elected with the Republicans.

“Our districts have a different look to them and a different face to them, and we have to recognize that and the caucus has to recognize that,” O’Halleran told me. I might ad that though he had a very week opponent, who spent half what he did, the DCCC threw $1,002,928 into the race and Pelosi's SuperPAC kicked in another $481,564. (Neither the NRCC nor Ryan's SuperPAC targeted the race; they spent zero.) And now to the main point they want to get to: if Democrats deliver on the progressive ideas that powered

The risk for Democrats is that the squeaky wheels will wind up getting the grease-- and the loudest voices will become the voice of the party.

“Pragmatism never has been and never will be a sexy message, but these members were elected in part because of their pragmatism,” said Democratic strategist Rodell Mollineau, a partner at ROKK Solutions, a Washington consultancy. “The priority is maintaining and expanding the majority. As a bloc, there’s a lot of strength in the Blue Dog Coalition.”

What bullshit! The 7 of them were elected because they were on the ballot in an anti-red year. Jeff Van Drew, for example, nearly lost his race, in a blue district and despite running against a vanity candidate with no support. Had he run as a progressive, he would have done much better. Any Democrat with the kind funding Sherrill had was going to win that seat. Same with Rose.



"The Blue Dogs’ challenge is not just about marketing. They are preaching moderation," he asserts, instead of calling it what it is: conservatism and a defense of the status quo. He extols "compromise and bipartisanship in an environment characterized by divided government, intense partisanship, the prospect of two years of investigations into the administration and potential impeachment proceedings." Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy reached out with that same message to the Blue Doggie freshmen last week, ironically on the exact same day that he refused to allow a vote on ending the U.S. participation in the tragic genocide in Yemen. That was a compromise bill passed with a bipartisan majority in the Senate. It would have passed by a bipartisan majority in the House as well, but McCarthy and Ryan refused to allow a vote. That's who Rogin and the Blue Dogs want to work with on compromise and bipartisanship? (You bet it is!)

And Rogin ends with another canard that the Blue Dogs, New Dems and Republicans love repeating endlessly when Democrats take over Congress: "Even if the Democratic leadership gives its centrist and moderate members the opportunities and cover they need to be independent and focus on their districts, greater forces may continue to push both parties to their extremes. Democrats must decide whether they want to assuage their angriest elements or govern from the middle and keep their power." Majorities of Americans-- not just Democrats, but also independent voters and in some cases Republican voters say they support the progressive platform. Almost no one supports the Blue Dog platform except Republicans, who don't vote for Blue Dogs anyway.

Another Sign A Wave Is About To Sweep Away Lots And Lots Of Trumpists-- Newspaper Endorsements

Newspaper editorial endorsements don't move elections-- but they can be a signal that a wave is coming. Yesterday we saw how conservative newspapers in Maine, Texas and Iowa had endorsed progressive Democrats, Jared Golden, Dayna Steele and J.D. Scholten, not despite their progressive policies, but because of them. The Houston Chronicle, in explaining why they had abandoned right-wing incumbent Brian Babin for Dayna, noted that they liked her New Deal appeal and that her main issue "is Medicare-for-all because too many people can’t afford the care they need, especially in the rural stretches and small towns of this district... She also wants a $15 per hour minimum wage, free community college and job training, expanded Internet availability for rural Texas and immigration laws that provide a path to citizenship. 'I believe government’s job is to make people’s lives better. Everything goes back to health care-- you can’t do anything if you’re not healthy,' she told us."

And then came the Orlando Sentinel which endorsed both Andrew Gillum and Bill Nelson Thursday. "It's time," they wrote in bold print, "to elect Andrew Gillum, an exciting young candidate poised to disrupt the GOP stranglehold on state policy and become an agent of compromise." Again, the reasons are not in the "despite of his platform" category but because of them.

Gillum, the Democratic mayor of Tallahassee, comes from a modest background. Mom was a bus driver. Dad was a construction worker.

Not surprising, then, that his platform is geared toward the middle class instead of catering to the wealthy. Increasing the minimum wage. Paying teachers a salary that better reflects their contributions to society. Ensuring that people aren’t denied health insurance because they have a pre-existing condition, like cancer.

He wants to expand Medicaid so more people can get access to health care. And he understands that immigrants are important contributors to Florida’s economy, not an invading force.

...The GOP’s “too radical” campaign against Gillum would more accurately apply to his Republican opponent, Ron DeSantis.

The most distinguishable feature of DeSantis’ five years in Congress was his servile devotion to the GOP’s far-right impulses.

He’s a reliable Trump vote, going along with the president 94 percent of the time, according to tracking by the website FiveThirtyEight.com. The website Govtrack.us, lists DeSantis as one of the most partisan members of the Florida delegation, keeping company with the fringy likes of Matt Gaetz.

Florida voters have another reason to vote for Gillum. A recent Florida Supreme Court ruling makes it increasingly likely that the next governor, not current Gov. Rick Scott, will appoint three justices to the court when their terms end. Gillum is the better choice for that task, especially considering he’ll choose from a list of names submitted by a nominating committee packed with conservative Scott appointees.

Given those circumstances, Florida is far more likely to end up with centrist judges under a Gillum administration.

Our state has operated under the GOP’s singular rule long enough. We’ve watched governors and legislators gut environmental and growth-management laws, turn the state into a petri dish for loopy gun laws, ignore the affordable-housing crisis and let the middle class struggle.

Time’s up. We recommend voting for Andrew Gillum, for a change.

There's not much good you can say about sleepy old Senator Bill Nelson in an endorsement. But there's a lot you can say about his crackpot right-wing opponent:

Behold, Floridians! Step right up and see the Sunshine State’s amazing, shape-shifting governor.

One moment Rick Scott is the mortal enemy of environmental regulation. Eight years later, he’s a champion of the environment.

One moment he’s the epitome of fiscal conservatism. Eight years later, the state’s budget is $89 billion, an increase of nearly 30 percent from when he took office.

One moment he’s signing bills making it illegal for pediatricians to ask patients if guns at home were locked safely away. The next he’s signing a sensible gun-safety law he could have backed-- but didn’t-- years before so many kids were massacred in Parkland.

One moment he’s besties with Donald Trump in the 2016 Republican presidential primary, choosing a New York real-estate tycoon over Florida sons-- and better candidates-- Jeb Bush or Marco Rubio. The next he’s edging away from the mercurial president to help his chances at getting elected to the Senate.

This isn’t principle at work; it’s political calculation. Scott did what he needed to do to get elected as a Republican in the 2010 tea party wave. It worked. Now he’s creeping toward the center. Not because he’s a centrist, but because that’s his best bet against incumbent Democrat Bill Nelson.

...No, Nelson doesn’t make headlines. He’s not the go-to senator for the Sunday morning news shows.

Neither is he shady. Nor unethical. Nor opportunistic. Nor tribal.

He’s a decent person who has served Florida and his country well, both in the military and in politics.

Bill Nelson has earned another term in the U.S. Senate.

Much of their endorsement of worthless Blue Dog pile of crap, Stephanie Murphy, wouldn't have to change all that much for it to be a ritual DWT denunciation of her. "[S]he’s the most conservative Democrat in Florida’s congressional delegation... She votes with President Trump 50 percent of the time, demonstrating her capacity for bucking the party when necessary. Only six other Democrats in the House have voted with the president more often." Republicans are worse... right? Right?

Why The Cult Of Republican-Lite Doesn't Work-- Case Studies In Florida

Republicans are campaigning too-- and with the DCCC as an opponent, you'd think the odds would be stacked in their favor. Problem for the GOP, though is that the NRCC is almost as inept and incompetent as the DCCC. Almost. The letter below didn't come from the NRCC, it came from the campaign of Scott Sturgill, the lead dog among the 4 Republicans who would like to take on wretched freshman Blue Dog Stephanie Murphy in the suburbs north of Orlando. It includes the Orlando Executive Aiirport and Orlando International, Winter Park, Altamonte Springs, Sanford on the south shore of Lake Monroe, Oviedo, all of Lake Jesup, Osceola and Lake Harney in the East and Orlando east of Orange Avenue and the 4 Freeway. Previously the PVI was R+4 but it was bumped up to a perfectly even district now, making it much easier for a Democrat to win. Obama, albeit narrowly, lost both times but in 2016 Hillary won the district 51.4% to 44.1%. The medium income is $52,197, about $5,000 more than the state average. The district is 66% white, 19% Latino and almost 10% black.

The NRCC, desperate for candidates nationally, has included Sturgill in their Young Guns program, one off only 3 in Florida, freezing out state Rep. Mike Miller (who's raised nearly as much money as Sturgill) as well as Vennia Francois and Judson Sapp. As on the FEC December 31 reporting deadline Democrat Stephanie Murphy had raised $1,342,343, while Stroll had brought in $308,456 and Miller $213,011. In his kick-off statement, Miller, generally considered a far right loon, said "This district should no longer be represented by someone whose vote is controlled by Nancy Pelosi and the ultra-left." Odd thing to say about one of the most conservative Blue Dog Dems in Congress? Not at all... if you live in Republican fantasy-land.

In fact, yesterday, I got the same kind of malarky from Sturgill's campaign:

Hey, Howard--

I appreciate you taking a minute to read my email. I wanted to ask you… do you know Scott Sturgill?



Scott’s a true conservative champion running for Congress in Florida, and he could really use your help.

His opponent, Stephanie Murphy, is about as liberal as it gets: she supports Obamacare, sanctuary cities, and-- this is the worst part for me-- abortion after the unborn child is more than twenty (20) weeks old and can feel pain.



 The good news is that even with her liberal pal Hillary Clinton on the ballot driving up Democrat turnout in Florida, Murphy was only able to eek out a win with 51.5% of the vote. This year, if conservatives like you and me stand up and make our voices heard, we can send her packing and put a true conservative like Scott in that seat.



 Click here to let me know if I can count on you to help Scott defeat liberal Stephanie Murphy and secure our Republican majority in the House of Representatives.

I’m proud to call Scott Sturgill a friend, and I know he’ll make a fantastic congressman. Unlike Stephanie Murphy, he takes a strong stand against wasteful spending and demands that politicians must adhere to the same rules as everyone else. He’s not a career politician, and he’s only going to Congress because he’s sick and tired of feeling sick and tired-- and at some point you’ve got to stand up and fix it yourself.



 This election is winnable-- but we can’t do it alone. We need your help, Howard. Add your name and let Scott & I know we can count on your support when it counts.



Thanks so much for everything. I hope you’re doing well.



-- Ian

These are some very conventional Republican talking points that they send to their moron followers everywhere in the country. And they underscores something that many establishment Democrats simply do not understand. The GOP will unleash their trip against any Democrat no matter how they actually vote. They’re going to say the same things about you, regardless. Stephanie Murphy, like I said, is about as right-wing as a Democrat can be. ProgressivePunch rates her a solid "F," not even close. Her lifetime crucial vote score is an abysmal 41.38, the worst of any Florida Democrat. In fact, the only Democrats who vote against progressive proposals more frequently than her are Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Henry Cuellar (TX) and Collin Peterson (MN). When Ryan and McCarthy want to call one of their horrifying bills "bipartisan," they go right to Stephanie Murphy. That's not going to help her with the Koch brothers-financed attack machine goes into action. It may help her-- and eventually it will for sure-- turning off base Democratic voters, once they figure out how she votes. (She's far worse than Lipinski, for example, who is bering primaried right now, and has a lifetime crucial vote score of 57.43.

Another clueless Blue Dog from the area, former Congresswoman Suzanne Kosmas, represented chunks of what is now district. She fretted over every vote, trying not to give the Republicans anything that they could use against her, and then they ran $2 million of ads against her for destroying Medicare. She never saw it coming. And she lost her seat to crackpot teabagger Sandy Adams. Republicans though she was a Pelosi-clone liberal and were willing to vote for the crazy teabagger instead of the conservative Democrat. And progressives in the 2010 midterm election just stayed away from the polls, saying too themselves, "why should I vote for this drunken Republican-lite turd?" (Yeah, she was all that). And she lost-- in a 60-40% landslide-- to a silly extremist, who held the seat for one term, just as Kosmas had.

The DCCC wastes its time recruiting these Blue Dogs and New Dems from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party and they waste their money supporting them. They kill momentum for the kind of legislation that would make the Democratic Party popular (instead of--barely-- the lesser of two evils) and if they're in swing districts they lose anyway, once voters figure out how terrible they are.

Its So Rare That Local Media Exposes Democrats Who Enable Trump, That When They Do, They Should Be Celebrated-- Florida

But they don't look like bigots-- Stephanie Murphy and Val Demings

For the better part of the last decade, we've spent a lot of time exposing the Republican wing of the Democratic Party for what it is-- primarily reactionaries, corporate shills and self-serving corrupt careerists. This would basically include just about all the Blue Dogs and New Dems in Congress-- and then some. To over-compensate for once-- a million years ago before anyone still alive was born-- having been an activist and committed progressive, Pelosi allowed the rest of House Democratic leadership to turn into the exact opposite. And now we're stuck with absolute garbage members as likely next generation heads of the party, particularly greasy, corrupt Wall Street whore and former New Dem chairman Joe Crowley, who is in position to take over after the he Ancien Régime of Pelosi, Hoyer and Clyburn dodders off to wherever they're going. But the problem isn't just at the top, but-- thanks to the conservatives at the top controlling DCCC recruitment-- throughout the party.

Rarely do local papers cover this. Lo-info voters from coast to coast imagine when someone has a "D" next to their name, even raging conservatives who vote with the Republicans and enable Ryan's agenda-- like Josh Gottheimer (NJ), Kyrsten Sinema (AZ), Tom O'Halleran (AZ), Ami Bera (CA), Cheri Bustos (IL), Collin Peterson (MN). Sean Patrick Maloney (NY), Lou Correa (CA), Jim Costa (CA), Henry Cuellar (TX), and Jacky Rosen (NV)-- share their core progressive values. They don't.

After a couple dozen of the worst of the Republican wing of the Democratic Party voted with the actual Republicans on the xenophobic Kate's Law legislation Ryan had rammed through the House, we went over it here at DWT, even encouraging Dan Lipinksi's primary opponent, Marie Newman to use it in his campaign. (She was ahead of me and had already sent out a press release about Lipinski's vote with Ryan and the GOP against immigrants.)

But what I didn't expect was to find any coverage in local media anywhere and, as usual, media has lived up to its reputation, much happier covering Trump's rude tweets than reporting on how congressmembers actually vote. So wasn't I surprised-- pleasantly so-- when the Orlando Weekly called out two garbage members of the Florida Democratic delegation for voting with all the Florida Republicans for this toxic piece of the Trump-Ryan agenda. Their headline last Friday: Stephanie Murphy and Val Demings just voted for an incredibly terrible anti-immigration bill. Nice! How I'd love to see the Arizona Republic run a similar story exposing Sinema and O'Halleran or the Tampa Bay Times letting their readers know the despite claiming to have switched to the Democratic Party, Charlie Crist is and will always be nothing but a Republican. And isn't it time for The Tennessean--not to mention La Campana and the Nashville Pride-- to let Nashville Democrats-- who voted overwhelmingly for Obama and for Hillary-- know that Jim Cooper is a right-wing bigot and doesn't deserve to be elected as a Democrat?

"Yesterday," wrote Colin Wolf for the Orlando Weekly "Florida congresswomen Stephanie Murphy and Val Demings were among 24 Democrats who voted for an extremely controversial bill that only boosts Donald Trump's anti-immigration crackdown. On Thursday, June 29, HR 3004, also known as Kate's Law, passed the House with a margin of 257-167. The GOP-backed bill is named after Kathryn Steinle, who was murdered in 2015 by an undocumented immigrant in San Fransisco. 'The legislation before us today is one born of a preventable tragedy,' said Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick, who co-sponsored the bill. 'Let this bill be her legacy. Let this bill result in Kate saving the lives of others.' It's a nice sentiment aimed at a pointless tragedy, but the only problem is there's absolutely zero evidence that undocumented immigrants commit more crimes. A study conducted by the University of California found that sanctuary cities are actually safer than non-sanctuary cities, and do not see a surge in crime."

Essentially, Kate's Law dramatically affects people who are attempting to flee unsafe conditions in their home countries, as well as those looking to reunite with their families.

But more importantly, Kate's Law bolsters penalties for undocumented immigrants who want to re-enter the United States even if they have no criminal history, which includes people who are seeking to apply for asylum and even those who have permission to re-enter the country.

The bill has been highly criticized by the ACLU and House Democrats, like Rep. Steny Hoyer, who said Kate's Law "appeals to the most right-wing, anti-immigrant base of the Republican party that supports exclusion and opposes one of the founding principles of our nation."

Rep. Lou Correa [an ultra-corrupt, right-wing fanatic on everything but immigration issues] also criticized the law, stating that the bill does not make the distinction between criminals and legal immigrants. "Do not brand millions of immigrants as criminals when their only crime is searching for the American dream," said Correa.

he ACLU has gone as far as stating that Kate's Law, as well as the No Sanctuary for Criminals Act, which also passed yesterday, are unconstitutional... Kate's Law also unnecessarily imposes harsh penalties for petty misdemeanors like loitering or driving a car without a license, which can now lead up to a possible 10-year prison sentence for immigrants.

But arguably the worst part of this bill is that it blocks immigrants’ ability to challenge prior removal orders, which is a clear violation of the constitutional right to due process, says the ACLU.

During Thursday's vote, 233 Republicans and 24 Democrats voted for Kate's Law, while 166 Democrats and 1 Republican  voted against it... Since the vote, Francesca Menes, policy director of Florida Immigrant Coalition has publicly called out the Democrats who voted in favor of this bill, including Demings and Murphy:

"Enforcement-only legislation has time and again proven itself a failure in tackling the complexities of the immigration debate in this country. The Florida Immigrant Coalition is disappointed in the members of the Florida Congressional delegation, including Representatives Charlie Crist, Stephanie Murphy and Val Demings who voted for H.R. 3004. We have entrusted these representatives to stand and protect our communities, yet yesterday, they voted to criminalize immigrants, separate our families and dismantle the public trust with local law enforcement.

At a time where Congress attempts to legitimize Trump’s hateful rhetoric which seeks to demonize and target immigrant families, we need leaders, who will focus on enacting comprehensive immigration reform. Mass detention and deportation programs not only undermine our basic human rights but have only exacerbated problems regarding immigration in this country while providing no long-term solutions.

The Senate now has an opportunity to stop legislation which erodes public safety and undermines our constitution. We call on Senators from both political parties to reject these draconian bills, and we send a notice to all those who voted in favor that we are watching intently and will hold them accountable."

Murphy is a representative of Florida's District 7, which covers all of Seminole County and much of northern Orange County, including downtown Orlando, Maitland, Winter Park and the University of Central Florida.

Val Demings is a representative for Florida's District 10, which covers parts of Orlando, Apopka, Eatonville, Ocoee, Winter Garden and Windermere.

Murphy, a rabid, virulent Blue Dog, was already rated an "F" by ProgressivePunch, with the third worst voting record of any Democratic freshman (26.09), just barely ahead of "ex"-Republican Tom O'Halleran (Blue Dog-AZ) and Josh Gottheimer (Blue Dog-NJ), each tied with a 25.00 score. Demings is a worthless New Dem-- who was relentless pushed by Pelosi, the DCCC and, of course, EMILY's List-- also with an "F" rating, voting like a Republican in a strong Democratic district. Hillary beat Trump soundly in both their districts-- 51.4% to 44.1% in Murphy's district and 61.8% to 34.9% in Demings' district. Neither has any political excuse for voting with the GOP. This is just who they are. When Ryan, McCarthy and Trump call one of their ghastly bills "bipartisan," they're usually talking about garbage Democrats like Stephanie Murphy and Val Demings.

Sometimes House Democrats Are So Bad That It Doesn't Pay To Waste Resources Trying To Save Them-- Orlando Blue Dog Stephanie Murphy

Would you defend a really bad Democratic incumbent against an even worse Republican challenger? How much energy and resources is it worth devoting to? Personally, I wouldn't even vote for Orlando area Blue Dog Stephanie Murphy, let alone defend her or contribute to her campaign. Her "F" grade from ProgressivePunch barely even scratches the surface about how she-- and other reactionaries like her in Congress-- are destroying the Democratic Party brand. Her crucial vote score is 26.09. Only 2 Democrats-- both Blue Dogs like her-- have worse scores, Josh Gottheimer (NJ) and Tom O'Halleran (AZ), each with 25.0. Conservative, libertarian-leaning Republicans Justin Amash (MI) and Thomas Massie (KY) vote more frequently for progressive proposals than Murphy does! In in the current session of Congress, North Carolina Republican Walter Jones also votes with progressives more than Murphy. Across a broad range of issues, she's as bad as they come for a Democrat. If issues are what motivates you politically, Stephanie Murphy is a bad fit-- unless you're a Republican-leaning Democrat like her.

So when I read Thursday that brainless right-wing oaf, Mike Miller, virtually a neo-Nazi from Winter Park disguised as a "mainstream" Republican, had decided to run against her... I yawned. He's anti-Choice and virulently homophobic but on actual bread and butter issues most likely to come before Congress, he's hardly worse than she is. Let's say Miller would, like fellow Floridians Brian Mast, Francis Rooney, John Rutherford and Neal Dunn wind up with a ZERO ProgressivePunch score-- or, like Dennis Ross, a 2.48 or Dan Webster's 3.38 or Gus Bilirakis' 3.91 or Tom Rooney's 4.09 or Matt Gaetz's 4.17 or even Ron DeSantis' 5.13. The difference between the number of anti-family votes these radical-right sociopaths and Murphy is hardly worth the trouble. There are 190 "better" Democrats running for reelection and dozens and dozens of better Democrats-- even great Democrats-- running in races to beat Republican incumbents pretty much as bad as Stephanie Murphy. The real tragedy in her Orlando district is less that she could lose the seat and more that there is no progressive-- or even moderate-- primarying her.

Meanwhile, Miller is a worthless imbecile whose immediate attack was exactly what you might expect from an imbecile, especially one who doesn't care about facts or even his own credibility: "This district should no longer be represented by someone whose vote is controlled by Nancy Pelosi and the ultra-left." An even worse Republican moron, David Simmons of Altamonte Springs, is probably going to run as well. An irony in the race between Miller and Murphy is that Miller, the Republican, has been a strong advocate against fracking and has actually been making more of an effort to appeal on a few progressive issues than Murphy has. She spends all her time trying to appeal to conservatives, using GOP talking points with which Hate Talk Radio has brainwashed so many Americans. Only a massive anti-Trump/anti-Ryan tsunami will save her hide in this blue-trending district where Obama and Romney were tied and where Hillary beat Trumpanzee 51.4% to 44.1%. Murphy managed to oust listless GOP hack, John Mica, a laughable relic, 182,039 (51.5%) to 171,583 (48.5%) largely because Democrats didn't know how horrible she would be in Congress. Now they know. The DCCC spent $3,629,376 and Pelosi's SuperPAC threw in another $1,054,149 on her behalf. The NRCC ignored the race until it was too late and only spent a total of $1,670,865 to help Mica. This year they are expected to spend as much as $4 or 5 million to defeat Murphy. And the DCCC will be forced to match their spending to defend someone who votes for Ryan's agenda very consistently.

Another Blue Dog Slipped Into Congress Disguised As A Florida Democrat

Yes, we got rid of Patrick Murphy, but...

Although the DCCC listed 11 Democrats on their Front Line list of vulnerable incumbents, heading into Tuesday's election only 3 were thought be be seriously vulnerable: Ami Bera (New Dem-CA), Rick Nolan (MN) and Brad Ashford (Blue Dog-NE). Bera, who is narrowly leading, is one of only two incumbents nationally whose race still hasn't been called. The DCCC spent $2,459,123 on his campaign and Pelosi's House Majority PAC kicked down another $699,724. Nolan won his race, but the DCCC and House Majority PAC put in $7.7 million. The only Democratic incumbent to lose was Brad Ashford, a former Republican who switched to being a Blue Dog. He has the single worst voting record of any Democrat in the House, worse than several Republicans, in fact! The DCCC and House Majority PAC wasted around $3.4 million on trying to save him. If there was a silver-ling to the cloud that wrecked the DCCC's hopes Tuesday it was their failure to resuscitate the Blue Dogs in the House.

Nolan was the only progressive on the Front Line list. The rest are a pack of worthless New Dems, Blue Dogs and conservaDems.

• Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (Blue Dog-AZ)
• Rep. Ami Bera (New Dem-CA)
• Rep. Julia Brownley (CA)
• Rep. Pete Aguilar (New Dem-CA)
• Rep. Raul Ruiz (CA)
• Rep. Scott Peters (New Dem-CA)
• Rep. Cheri Bustos (Blue Dog-IL)
• Rep. Rick Nolan (MN)
• Rep. Brad Ashford (Blue Dog-NE)
• Rep. Annie Kuster (New Dem-NH)
• Rep. Sean Patrick Maloney (New Dem-NY)

Most of the New Dems and Blue Dogs that the DCCC recruited this cycle were defeated Tuesday... very expensively. But, Stephanie Murphy, one who didn't lose, didn't tell voters she is a Blue Dog before the election. She defeated long-time GOP powerhouse, John Mica in the northern Orlando Metro (FL-07). She bested him by around 10,000 votes-- 51.5-48.5%.

This was Mica's first competitive re-election in decades. After the state Supreme Court redrew Florida's congressional lines, his 7th District became more Democratic. And for the first time in years, Democrats succeeded in fielding a strong candidate against the 12-term incumbent.

Republicans fretted this fall that Mica wasn't expending the time or resources to introduce himself to new voters in his redrawn district. He only recently aired his first TV spot, trailing Murphy and other Democratic groups that had been on the air earlier.

...Murphy, the member-elect, was six months old when her parents fled with her and her brother from communist Vietnam to a refugee camp in Malaysia and then moved on to settle in the United States.

Her resume includes an executive position at SunGate Capital, an investment firm, and a stint at the Defense Department where she worked as a foreign affairs specialist on a range of issues, including military relations and national security.

She teaches business and social entrepreneurship at Rollins College in Winter Park, Florida.

A fiscal conservative with plans to join the Blue Dog Coalition, Murphy supports policies including withholding lawmakers’ salaries if they don’t pass a budget on time and adding a constitutional amendment to balance the budget.