Republicans Not Even Campaigning For Independent Voters Anymore-- For Them, It's All About Their Crackpot Base Now

GOP base strategy works with hardcore Republican voters, but not with normal people

This morning when Trump tried bragging about his magnificence, the UN General Assembly burst out in sustained, audible laughter. No, Señor T, you're not in Kansas anymore. (Ironically, even Kansas may not be Kansas anymore.)

Ugly monkey: "In less than two years, my administration has accomplished more than almost any administration in the history of our country."

World Leaders: laughter.

Ugly monkey: "It's so true."

World Leaders: more laughter.

Ugly monkey: "I didn't expect that reaction, but that's okay," smirking as though waiting for someone to feed him a banana-- or hand him a submachine gun.

Republican Party strategists have come to realize that appealing to independent voters this year is a rabbit hole for their candidates and they are now doubling down on getting out their own base and virtually ceding the independents-- as much as a third of the vote in many places-- to the Democrats. Our election coverage here at DWT has centered on independents ability to decide the midterms. GOP strategy is to now run such vile negative advertising as to just discourage independents from voting, not to get them to vote for Republican candidates.

At Axios Monday morning, Caitlin Owens outlined a Republican strategy to save hardcore red districts and basically abandon all swing districts. "With the midterm elections fast approaching and Democrats riding a clear advantage on health care, many Republicans are nevertheless doubling down on largely unpopular ideas like repealing the Affordable Care Act and cutting Medicare," she wrote."This strategy may seem counterintuitive on its face. However, it likely reveals that the party has all but abandoned independent voters this year and instead is focused on turning out its base. Republican leaders have recently become more public about the likelihood of trying again on ACA repeal, whereas a few months ago it was largely a private assumption among the party.

• Vice President Mike Pence told reporters in Wisconsin that if the GOP candidate wins the Senate seat there, the effort will be revived, per The Hill. “We made an effort to fully repeal and replace ObamaCare and we'll continue, with Leah Vukmir in the Senate, we'll continue to go back to that," he said.
• “We need to win this election and then get more seats next year" before trying again, GOP Whip Steve Scalise told the AP.

Is that a good idea in Wisconsin, a state where independents decide elections? It may be a good strategy for Mississippi but there isn't a single poll-- including partisan Republican polls that no one takes seriously-- that shows Vukmir with a pathway to victory. FiveThirtyEight gives her a 1 in 40 chance to beat progressive Democratic incumbent Tammy Baldwin (in a state Trump won-- albeit narrowly and with Kremlin help-- in 2016.

As Owens explained, "ACA repeal only resonates well with one group of voters: registered Republicans. 'It’s all about the base, because as far as I can tell, they’ve lost the independents, there’s no one left to woo,' said conservative economist Doug Holtz-Eakin, a former campaign aide to John McCain. 'The Republicans face a very odd problem…when you ask actually registered voters what they want to do with the future of the ACA, no one wants to repeal and replace it except the Republicans, which the majority do,' said Robert Blendon of Harvard's School of Public Health. 'If you are looking at the aggregate, you can't imagine why you’d even mention it. But if you’re trying to encourage your own voters… then they're trying to say that we would come back and try to do something,' Blendon added."

Worse yet for the GOP's election hopes among normal voters, the Trump Regime is now talking about cuts to Social Security and Medicare again. Owens reminds us that Trumpanzee's top economic advisor, drug addict and crackpot TV personality Larry Kudlow, "recently said that the administration will probably look at entitlement cuts next year." She brought up 3 very vulnerable Republican incumbents-- in districts with huge numbers of independent voters-- who are going along with Kudlow and Trump are likely to lose their seats because of it. John Faso, for example, was keeping his seat in play. It is now starting to trend, ever so slightly, towards Anthony Delgado. Faso is making noises that will make independents (and seniors) see him as a threat to Social Security and Medicare. Fine for the GOP base-- but NY-19 is not some backward rural district in Oklahoma or Alabama. The PVI is supposedly a deceptive R+2 but Obama won it both times he ran and it was only Hillary's lousy campaign and flaws as a candidate that gave Trump his win there (50.8% to 44.0%).

Peter Roskam is another one the need to rein in spending on entitlement programs like Medicare and Social Security. That's a bad idea in Chicagoland. IL-06 gave Obama a win over McCain, Romney a win over Obama and Hillary a 7 point win over Trump (50.2% to 43.2%). The PVI is also a deceptive R+2. The Democratic candidate, Sean Casten, isn't especially strong but it's a neck-and-neck race that Roskam's to lose by talking about cutting Social Security and Medicare.

Very similar story in Texas' 7th district (Houston), where the Democrats nominated a weak candidate, Lizzie Fletcher, but where Hillary narrowly edged Trump (48.5% to 47.1%). Incumbent John Culberson is a poor campaigner. Fletcher has outraised him, $2,312,615 to $2,007,183 and he will be committing political suicide if he embraces-- as he appears to be doing-- an all base strategy. Fletcher isn't capable of winning this race; Culberson is very capable of losing it.

Again, Owens explained the risk to Republicans like Culberson: Although the bet is that the GOP base is concerned with deficits, "as soon as the other side switches to 'you're going to cut back Medicare and Social Security,' you're on the wrong side," Blendon said. "The highest turnout rates are among people above 60." Like clockwork, the DNC blasted out an email criticizing Kudlow's comments, saying that he "admitted that Republicans will try to cut vital programs relied upon by millions of working families."

Alienating The Base-- A Tale Of Two Primaries... Arizona And New Jersey

Many Arizona Republicans see Jeff Flake through this Alt-Fact lens

Arizona Senator Jeff Flake has a long history-- mostly in the House-- as a right-of-center conservative. His record is very conservative but, unlike so many of his colleagues, not unhinged or deranged. He's a Mormon and his very vocal opposition to Trump seems to have been based on the same sense of decency and deep-seated beliefs that most Mormon leaders expressed during the election. Trump did significantly worse in Mormon communities than other Republicans did. In 2004, George W Bush took 80% of the Mormon vote. In 2012 Romney took 78%. Trump won 61% of the Mormon vote nationally.

We have written before than Trump's political operatives are hoping to defeat Flake in his 2018 reelection bid, preferably with neo-fascist Trumpist Jeff DeWit, Arizona state Treasurer. Another extremist who would likely be fine with the Trump Regime is extremist former state Senator Kelli Ward, another neo-fascist crackpot. When she challenged John McCain last year, McCain pulverized her 302,532 (51.2%) to 235,988 (39.9%).

A Republican mid-November poll looked sketchy for Flake. Trump's favorable rating among Republicans then was 82% and Flake's was just 30%. Wade scored 19% and DeWit came in at 35%. Head-to-head match-ups showed Ward tying Flake 35-35% and DeWit beating him 42-33%. DeWit would have also won a 3-ways primary:

• DeWit- 38%
• Ward- 15%
• Flake- 30%

Over the weekend Ward released a new poll of likely Republican primary voters from Political Marketing International. It shows Ward pulling ahead of Flake in a head-to-head match-up, 30% to 23%. Ward didn't released any polling that included DeWit, but she did boast that she was the "most conservative member of the Arizona State Senate in 2015" and reminded whomever reads her stuff that Flake is "one of President Trump's biggest foes."

[Note: Political Marketing Strategies is not a well-regarded firm and is pretty much considered one of those companies that delivers whatever results they're paid to deliver. Ward paid them $5,000 for this poll. She is touting it in a press release claiming Flake is "in freefall."]

That said, Flake, a freshman, could be in trouble with Arizona Republican primary voters. He's been a tad too independent-minded for most knee-jerk Republicans and if Trump really decides to make an example of him, he could be toast, even though Trump doesn't have an impressive track record interfering in GOP primaries. A North Carolina incumbent he strongly backed, Renee Ellmers, was eviscerated, barely coming in third in a 3-way race (George Holding- 53.4%, Renee Ellmers- 23.6%, Greg Brannon- 23.0%, just 207 votes separating the latter two). And Thursday, Trump's candidate to replace Mike Pompeo in KS-04, Alan Cobb, was badly beaten by run-of-the-mill establishment Republican Ron Estes.

Across the country, if not quite across the political spectrum, one of the very worst and most corrupt far-right Democrats elected in November, worthless Blue Dog, Josh Gottheimer (NJ) is well aware he's going to attract major Republican opposition in 2018. NJ-05 sits on the entire northern border of New Jersey with New York, from the Hudson River in the east to just outside of Port Jervis in the west, and the entire northwestern border with Pennsylvania from Milford to beyond the Delaware Water Gap. It's an affluent R+4 district in blue New Jersey. Over 70% of the population is in northern Bergen County's suburbs and towns like Paramus, Hackensack, Teaneck, Mahwah and Lodi (the Soprano's Bada Bing club town). In 2012 Romney beat Obama there by 3 points and this year Hillary managed to have beaten Trump 48.8% to 47.7%.

Gottheimer beat the incumbent Republican, bizarre extremist Scott Garrett, 156,863 (50.5%) to 146,643 (47.2%). Garrett managed to win in Sussex, Warren and Passaic counties but Bergen County voters were sick and tired of him and gave Gottheimer the 18,000-plus vote cushion he needed. Gottheimer immediately joined the Blue Dogs and started voting with the Republicans. Gottheimer-- who got more money from the banksters than any other non-incumbent running for the House this year ($889,419), outraised Garrett $4,288,192 to 2,055,513. Ryan and the NRCC were happy to see Garrett lose and they shut off the party spigots. Pelosi and the DCCC wasted over $3.8 million boosting a corrupt reactionary will will almost never vote for any progressive legislation. His ProgressivePunch crucial vote score is one of the worst of any Democrat's in the House-- 20% which basically means he's voting with Paul Ryan and Kevin McCarthy on virtually every one of their agenda items, giving them the opportunity to call their destructive proposals "bipartisan." Gottheimer is already damaging the Democratic brand and alienating Democratic voters. Obviously, he hasn't been involved with any resistance to Trump at all. Bergen County activists already hate him and are unlikely to support his reelection bid-- one that the Observer speculates could be a huge national circus, featuring xenophobe and racist asshole 72 year old Lou Dobbs, a longtime New Jersey resident lives in Sussex County, on a 300-acre horse farm in Wantage. The Observer analysis of the 2018 race is interesting, except that it's based on entirely incorrect numbers. For example they claim Garrett won 125,861 to 101,859 but that was before absentee and mail in ballots were counted and he actually won 156,863 to 146,643. So I'm going to throw out their faulty numbers are just use the bits of the sloppy journalism they got right.

In 2016... more voters fell off from Trump to Garrett than Clinton to Gottheimer. One can reasonably conclude that Gottheimer will be hurt more by running without a presidential candidate atop the ticket than the Republican challenger will be.

Voter registration (as of 11/30/2016): Republicans 144,959; Democrats 142,717; Unaffiliated 222,193. So it’s a slight GOP edge, but off-year elections tend to favor Republicans, though not necessarily in the first off-year election of a Republican presidency, when voters may be looking to apply a “check” on the president’s power.

...Prior to Gottheimer, the last time a Democrat won the GOP-leaning 5th was in 1974, when Andy Maguire upset 11-term incumbent Bill Widnall in the Watergate year. Maguire held on until 1980, when Roukema washed him out in the Reagan tidal wave.

The biggest question here, of course, is whether the GOP can lure a marquee candidate like Dobbs to run. With a huge national profile and over a million Twitter followers, he’d start with a strong base of support. But a Congressional seat might not seem like an attractive prize to a guy who’s been hosting his own show on national television for decades and has a closet full of Emmy and Peabody Awards.

Republicans will then have to see if Garrett runs again. He’s never been popular among establishment Republicans-- he ran close primaries against Roukema in 1998 and 2000. Garrett lost because of his own quirks and oddities, not because of his party affiliation. His odd refusal to pay dues to the Party unless it disavowed support for gay candidates sent buckets of national money into the coffers of Gottheimer, which hurt all Republicans in the district, especially the more moderate Bergen GOPers.

Two conservative northwest NJ Senators live in the district: Mike Doherty, 53 (R-Oxford) and Steve Oroho, 58 (R-Franklin). Doherty was the first NJ GOP pol to endorse Donald Trump. He’s encouraged speculation of runs of his own for statewide office since 2008, but he never pulls the trigger. Others include Assemblyman Parker Space, 48 (R-Wantage) and former state Labor Commissioner Hal Wirths, 51 (R-Wantage).

Of strong interest will be whether Bergen can come up with a high-quality, consensus candidate-- with or without Garrett. The bench is a bit depleted up there, but strong choices might include Assemblywoman Holly Shepisi (R-River Vale), 45, seeking fourth term in the Assembly; Assemblyman Robert Auth (R-Old Tappan), 60, seeking third term in the Assembly; Republican State Chairman Samuel Raia, also the Mayor of Saddle River. Of these, Shepisi probably holds the strongest crossover appeal, while Raia has personal wealth.

Bergen lining up behind a consensus candidate might just be enough to ensure that person is the nominee. But at this writing, the BCRO might be in denial. Its website still shows Garrett as the Congressman.

Gottheimer deserves a primary opponent but I doubt if he has one it will be serious enough to deny him the renomination. There are local activists working to recruit someone to run against him. He deserves to be weakened enough so that he loses. He is inexorably dragging the congressional Democrats further right and further into Wall Street corruption. He could solve the Republicans' problem in NJ-05 by switching parties; it would make the most sense... and he wouldn't even have to change his voting habits.

There Are Three Main Classes in America. Two Are Represented by Political Parties

Working class voters, from the accounting office to the construction site, of all races and genders, are forgotten once they leave the polling place. Land of the free, or of something else? (Tom Pennington/Getty; source)

by Gaius Publius

Something to think about as we return to our post-celebratory American Independence world. About 10% of the country is represented by a political party. The rest is not.

The writing below was taken from something published by Devin Reynolds at Medium. It perfectly expresses what Thomas Frank, chief among others, has also said. Here's one of Reynolds main points:

Let’s be honest, Bernie and Hillary don’t represent the same class.

We traditionally think of the Republican/Democrat divide in terms of the “ruling class” and the “working class,” or “the 1% v. the 99%.” Democrats are thought to faithfully represent the interests of the working class. The Republicans, carrying the torch for the richest of the rich, manage to stay competitive by dubiously securing votes from the working class. They do this by exploiting the economic ignorance and racial prejudices of low information working class voters. While there is a significant amount of truth to this model’s description of Republicans, there is a wrinkle to the makeup of the Democratic Party that this model neglects to mention.

This wrinkle is the fact that the “99%” actually has multiple classes within it. The main division is between the “upper middle” class and various “lower” classes. At about 10–15% of the population, the upper middle class is made up of doctors, lawyers, university professors, various skilled professionals, and owners of successful local businesses around the country. These people don’t need universal hearth care, they just need their excellent employer provided health care to have its cost increases managed and they need to not be dropped from health care rolls for preexisting conditions. Their kids don’t need tuition free college, they just need manageable interest rates for their financial aid. They get generous amounts of paid vacation, they don’t need it provided on a mandatory basis. The Democratic Party, in all its incrementalism, tweaking the status quo with modest policy adjustments, represents this class.

Then there are the lower classes. Making up 85–90% percent of the population, this group is the true “working class.” This is the most diverse group in the country, it ranges from “middle class” semi-skilled office workers to truly “lower class” day laborers. While some members live more comfortably than others, this group, by and large, exchanges its labor for just enough money to get by. Their jobs have few, if any, benefits. These people would greatly benefit from policies like universal health care, tuition free public college, mandatory paid time off, and many of the other worker-empowering policies, funded by progressive tax rates, that are standard procedure for most of the developed world outside of the United States. This class has no political party.

The divide between the top 1% and the top 10% makes our political system look competitive, and there are legitimate diverging interests between those two classes. That said, in practice, our two political parties split the vote for the working class, then both ignore it in favor of their primary constituencies. The simple reality of this dynamic is that the majority of the population’s interests go unrepresented. While Republican members of the working class are exploited by their low-information status into voting for policies that benefit the top 1%, the Democratic members of this group allow themselves to be browbeaten into supporting policies that largely benefit the top 10% based on the dubious supposition that those policies are “better than Republican policies.” With one half of the working class deceived into voting Republican and the other half treated like it has no choice but to vote Democrat, 90% of the population has its interests treated like an afterthought. Bernie’s entire campaign was an attempt to change that.

I would have made this the title of my own piece, if it weren't so long. It's perfect, though, as a way to capture what Frank captured in an entire book:

in practice, our two political parties split the vote for the working class, then both ignore it in favor of their primary constituencies.

This is impressively tight, clear and cogent, as is the rest of the article. For example:

The working classes had their jobs shipped overseas in the dead of night from the 1980s-2000s. No one really noticed that an economic genocide was being perpetrated on the working class until it was too late. Those people have been suffering for a generation.

And immediately following:

The upper middle class suffered some recent setbacks when the 2007 financial crisis precipitated a downturn in the global economy. The owners of successful local businesses have seen their fortunes shrink and skilled professionals have seen their retirements take a hit. It was only once this creeping crisis started affecting the upper middle class that it became actual news. There was no “crisis” when the working class was being removed from the middle class over the course of 30 years. Once people with money started to take hits, the economic situation demanded bi-partisan action.

And:

Of course the action that was taken in the face of the crisis also reflected the class interests that the government represented. Financial institutions that held the upper middle and ruling class’s money were bailed out while working class homeowners simply lost everything.

Not new information exactly, but clear in expression. "Economic genocide" indeed. And yes, distressed working class homeowners did "lose everything." Including their life expectancy (see also here). Props to the author for writing this. I encourage you to read the rest, if you have a few minutes to spare.

This is not a "what you should do" piece. Just something to ponder as we ponder having celebrated our freedom.

GP

Sanders Surge Continues in Iowa & NH; Taking the Fight to Clinton

The Sanders surge is about Sanders, not Clinton. Click to enlarge.

by Gaius Publius

We know that Sanders is gaining in many polls, and that some are attributing his rise to a growing "anyone but Clinton" mood among Democrats. Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight.com disagrees.

Data first, via Silver:

In Iowa, Sanders’s favorability rating has grown from about 35 percent at the start of the year to 60 percent now. And in New Hampshire, it has improved from around 45 percent to 65 percent. Some of that is from improved name recognition, but Sanders’s unfavorable ratings haven’t increased even as he’s become better known, remaining at about 10 percent in each state.

From 35% to 60% in Iowa, from 45% to 65% in New Hampshire, both since February. These are excellent numbers. Now the cause, as Silver sees it. The article begins with the idea he wants to debunk:

“The recent rise of Bernie Sanders,” wrote Vox’s Jonathan Allen last week, “points as much to [Hillary] Clinton’s vulnerability as Sanders’s strength.” Allen went on to argue that Joe Biden should run for president. “The Sanders surge shows that Democratic activists want an alternative to Clinton,” he explained.

We’ve seen this idea before. For at least a year, journalists have been urging, sometimes almost begging, Biden to enter the race. The more elaborate versions of the idea liken the 2016 campaign to 1968, a year in which the incumbent president, Lyndon B. Johnson, withdrew after the liberal, anti-war candidate Eugene McCarthy finished a close second in the New Hampshire primary. The nomination was eventually won by Johnson’s vice president, Hubert Humphrey, after Robert F. Kennedy (who had entered the race after New Hampshire) was assassinated. In the 2016 narrative, Clinton is Johnson, Sanders is McCarthy and Biden is some composite of Kennedy and Humphrey.

But these comparisons suffer from a fatal flaw. Unlike LBJ, who (mostly because of the Vietnam War) had approval ratings only in the mid-50s or low 60s among Democrats during the 1968 campaign, Hillary Clinton is beloved by voters in her party. In national polls, her favorability ratings among Democrats usually exceed 80 percent.

Thus:

The Bernie Sanders surge, in other words, has a lot more to do with Bernie Sanders than with Hillary Clinton. More specifically, it has to do with his left-populist politics. We’re going to break some news here: It turns out that some Democrats are really liberal, and they like a really liberal candidate like Sanders. Right now, Sanders is winning about half the support of white liberal Democrats, but little support from other groups within the party. That works out to around 25 or 30 percent of the vote in Iowa and New Hampshire but more like 15 percent among Democrats nationally.

But Silver's news for Sanders is not all good.

The Dark Side of Silver's Silver Lining

Silver is concerned (on Sanders' behalf) that this result — potential wins in Iowa and New Hampshire, each with a rich lode of white liberal Democrats — may be as good as it gets for him. In other words, that Sanders may win in Iowa and New Hampshire and lose everywhere else.

Here's what that "white liberal Democrat" population looks like, state by state:

Click to enlarge.

From a different FiveThirtyEight piece (the one containing the graphic above), Silver writes this:

Sanders, who has sometimes described himself as a socialist, isn’t likely to do so well with moderate Democrats, of course. That’s a problem for him, since a thin majority of Democrats still identify as moderate or conservative rather than liberal. But Sanders has a few things working in his favor. The share of liberal Democrats is increasing — pretty rapidly, in fact — and those Democrats who turn out to vote in the primaries tend to be more liberal than Democrats overall.

What’s received less attention is that Sanders has so far made very little traction with non-white Democrats. The most recent CNN poll found his support at just 9 percent among non-white Democrats, while the latest Fox News poll had him at only 5 percent among African-American Democrats. (Fox News did not provide crosstabs for Hispanics or other minority groups.)

So Sanders (and Warren) seem to be creating new "liberals" — meaning the Warren kind, not the Obama kind —pretty rapidly. That's good news. But without minority support, he's going to have some trouble. And that's fixable. I've heard from a number of sources that the Sanders camp is aware of this. More as it develops.

In the meantime...

Sanders Takes It to Clinton

This is one way to use the advantage you have — draw clear lines. Two reports, each from The Hill, around the same event, an impromptu Sanders press conference. First (my emphasis):

Sanders uses Clinton visit to draw contrast

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Tuesday tried to highlight the differences between himself and fellow presidential candidate Hillary Clinton after she spoke with Senate Democrats during a weekly party lunch.

Sanders, who, like Clinton, is seeking the 2016 Democratic nomination, spoke with reporters at a stakeout normally reserved for leadership from both parties. He used the impromptu press conference to underscore differences the two have on a wide range of issues, including trade, the war on Iraq, climate change and national security.

Pointing to his vote against the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), Sanders said that he believes the trade deal has "been disastrous for American workers. ...Secretary of State Clinton I believe has a different view on that issue."

He also cited his vote against authorizing the war against Iraq. Clinton, who was a senator at the time, has faced criticism for her vote supporting the war, and she told reporters earlier this year that she "made a mistake."

On climate change, he touted his opposition to the Keystone pipeline adding that "I think Secretary Clinton has not been clear on her views on that issue."

The Hill used that last remark — on Keystone and climate change — for a second piece about that press conference:

Sanders challenges Clinton on Keystone

Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders challenged his rival Hillary Clinton Tuesday to take a stand against the Keystone XL oil pipeline.

Speaking with reporters in the Capitol, Sanders he took a leadership role in Democrats’ fight against the proposed Canada-to-Texas pipeline, while Clinton has been silent on the project.

“I have helped lead the opposition against the Keystone pipeline,” the Vermont senator said. “I think Secretary Clinton has not been clear on her views on that issue.”

In a later statement, Sanders added that he opposes Keystone “because of concerns about climate change.”...

Clinton’s silence on Keystone has been one of the top sticking points for environmentalists, who have mostly avoided endorsing her.

As secretary of state from 2009 to 2013, Clinton was one of the most senior Obama administration officials responsible for its review of TransCanada Corp.’s application to build the pipeline, a process that has stretched on for more than six years.

In 2010, she said the administration was “inclined” to approve the project. But she has been silent since then.

Sanders, meanwhile, has been actively courting environmentalists, and was ranked by the super PAC Climate Hawks Vote as the best senator on climate in the 2013-2014 session of Congress.

Climate Hawks Vote ranks members of Congress relative to climates issues (visit the page to find out how your senator ranks). More information here.

Bottom Line — There's Plenty of Time

If the Sanders surge lasts through February, when the Iowa caucus and New Hampshire primary are held, he's viable through the start of next year at least. That's a full six months to present the Sanders case to the rest of the Democratic base. So far, so good, though I would think it would be good to start making that case soon.

GP

Why Could Democratic Base Voters Possibly Be Discouraged And Unenthusiastic About November?

Boehner could never do as much to harm the Democratic Party as these 2 clowns have

In 2010, the DCCC flipped the House by losing a net of 63 seats. Nancy Pelosi had to surrender the Speaker's gavel to corrupt drunken philanderer John Boehner. It took years of abysmal strategy, that went back to Rahm Emanuel's time as DCCC chair from 2005-2009 to devastate the caucus so thoroughly. Steve Israel, following an identical base-depressing strategy, is likely to have similar results in November. The majority of Democrats who were defeated in 2010 were worthless Blue Dogs and New Dems-- i.e., the core of the Republican Wing of the Democratic Party that had been so carefully nurtured and cultivated by Wall Street corporate whore Steny Hoyer and Rahm.

The debacle began with an inordinate number of retirements of ConservaDems who preferred to throw in the towel rather that be humiliated by certain defeat: Marion Berry and Vic Snyder in Arkansas, Dennis Moore in Kansas, anti-Choice fanatic Bart Stupak in Michigan, Bart Gordon and John Tanner in Tennessee, and Brian Baird in Washington. The GOP took all 7 of those seats. 2 slimy Blue Dogs trying for Senate seats-- Brad Ellsworth (IN), and Charlie Melancon (LA)-- lost and their seats wound up in Republican hands as well… as did seats voluntarily given up by 3 normal Democrats, Dave Obey (D-WI), Joe Sestak (D-PA), and Paul Hodes (D-NH). One ConservaDem, Alan Mollohan (D-WV) defeated by an even more reactionary bucket of slime, Mike Oliverio in a brutal primary, saw his seat switch to the GOP. 13 seats down and that was just the beginning.

Although a dozen normal Democrats were dragged under by the wave, almost 40 Blue Dogs, New Dems and other garbage from the Republican wing of the party went down to defeat-- almost entirely due to the refusal of Democratic base voters to turn out and back worthless candidates who they wisely judged to be as bad, or nearly as bad, as Republicans. The garbage losers with asterisks indicate they were recruited by Hoyer and Emanuel in 2006 or 2008:

•Bobby Bright (AL) *
• Ann Kirkpatrick (AZ) *
• Harry Mitchell (AZ) *
• John Salazar (CO)
• Betsy Markey (CO) *
• Allen Boyd (FL)
• Suzanne Kosmas (FL) *
• Jim Marshall (GA)
• Walt Minnick (ID) *
• Melissa Bean (IL)
• Debbie Halvorson (IL) *
• Bill Foster (IL) *
• Baron Hill (IN)
• Frank Kratovil (MD) *
• Travis Childers (MS) *
• Gene Taylor (MS)
• Ike Skelton (MO)
• John Adler (NJ) *
• Harry Teague (NM) *
• Michael MacMahon (NY) *
• Scott Murphy (NY) *
• Mike Arcuri (NY) *
• Dan Maffei (NY) *
• Bob Etheridge (NC)
• Earl Pomeroy (ND)
• Steve Dreihaus (OH) *
• Charlie Wilson (OH) *
• John Boccieri (OH) *
• Zack Space (OH) *
• Kathy Dahlkemper (PA) *
• Patrick Murphy (PA) *
• Chris Carney (PA) *
• Paul Kanjorski (PA)
• John Spratt (SC)
• Stephanie Herseth Sandlin (SD)
• Lincoln Davis (TN)
• Glenn Nye (VA) *
• Rick Boucher (VA)

The disaster was compounded because, in the face of this kind of horrifying sweep, Democrats only took 3 Republican seats (all in deep blue districts), electing 3 miserable careerist New Dems who have nothing worthwhile to offer anyone: Colleen Hanabusa (HI), Cedric Richmond (LA) and John Carney (DE).

This morning both Mike Dorning at Bloomberg and Aaron Blake at the Washington Post touched on different aspects of the building wave likely to sweep House Democrats deeper into the toilet. Neither mentioned the incompetence or venality of Steve Israel and his less-than-worthless DCCC. Dorning warned that Democratic voters are pissed off with the results of the corporate Democratic policy agenda that has made economic inequality as bad as under Republicans. "The sluggish improvement in living standards among Democrats’ core voters," he asserts, "threatens to hurt the party’s candidates in this year’s congressional elections. Median household income among all Americans is still lower than before the recession, which ended five years ago, according to economic consultant Sentier Research. Key Democratic constituents-- blacks, Hispanics, single women and young people-- have been especially hard-hit, and analysts say that could make them less energized about going to the polls."

Stanley Greenberg, a Democratic pollster who advised former President Bill Clinton, said Democrats can still motivate voters by focusing on their economic concerns.

The White House and congressional Democrats have done that this year by calling for an increase in the minimum wage, legislation on pay equity for women and measures to improve college affordability, he said.

“Those are the central things that people want to address,” Greenberg said. “It’s recognizing that this economy is deflating for voters, but there are things that we can do.”

Blake doesn't get into why, just that Democratic base voters will likely be staying home on Election Day this year. He reports that "A new poll from Democratic pollster Democracy Corps finds that just 68 percent of African Americans, Latinos, young people and unmarried women who voted in 2012 and are 'likely' to vote in 2014-- the four key parts of Obama's coalition-- say they are 'almost certain' to vote in the upcoming midterm elections." There's a 17 point enthusiasm deficit for key members of the Obama coalition (68% who say they are almost certain to vote) versus other voters (85%)-- and it's gotten worse in the last few months.

And wait 'til base voters start figuring out just how bad Steve Israel's DCCC recruits are. Of the 39 candidates currently part of his severely tarnished Red-to-Blue program, a majorty are barely identifiable as Democrats. There are anti-Choice fanatics, anti-LGBT bigots, pro-NRA lunatics and, more than anything else, the worst kind of corporate shills Democratic voters detest but that Steve Israel and his coterie adore. Going through his whole pathetic list of 39, there are only 6 I would vote for with any sense of enthusiasm or urgency: Michael Eggman (CA-10), Pat Murphy (IA-01), Erin Bilbray (NV-03), Martha Robertson (NY-23), Mike Obermueller (MN-02), and Michael Wager (OH-14). Although Blue America is still vetting a few of them, we have endorsed exactly two so far: Michael Wager and Mike Obermueller. The poster child for Steve Israel's 2014 recruitment is Jennifer Garrison (OH-06), who is more anti-Choice than any Republican I ever spoke with personally, the most anti-gay person I've ever encountered in politics and wrong on nearly ever issue Congress will deal with. She makes her living tricking her neighbors into leasing their property to tracking companies. And Israel chased a decent, moderate state Senator, Lou Gentile, out of the race to deliver the nomination to Garrison, a Steve Israel Democrat, who will lead the party into abject defeat in November.

You want good Democrats to support? Congress will be a much better place if these men and women are elected in November. So far, Israel isn't helping any of them-- and all of them can use some help. Just sayin'.

Turning Out The Base-- Or Turning Off The Base

The DCCC's Steve Israel doesn't give base voters a reason to turn out; he gives them reason to stay home on election day

Wednesday, Markos wrote an exceptionally well-thought-out post on Kos, Democrats' Biggest Challenge Is Getting Their Base Voters To Vote. He worries that historically the party's strongest-performing base groups-- African Americans, Latinos, Asians, young voters, and single women-- don't show up for midterms. "[T]he problem with our base turnout," he explains, "isn't necessarily in presidential years, but in the off years in between. That means not just the midterm elections, but all sorts of local and special elections scattered in between those four-year big ones... The holy grail of Democratic electoral performance is to have all those groups match white turnout in mid-term elections. African Americans are the closest to that goal, but still lag, giving Republicans a demographic advantage every election outside of presidential ones... If our people turn out, Democrats win. There are simply more of us than them, and that number is growing by the day. The problem is, our people are the least likely to turn out, and their track record in mid-term elections is woeful. That's why Republican disenfranchisement efforts are so successful-- our core groups are already predisposed to skip out on voting, it doesn't take that much of an extra push to guarantee their non-participation." You can see all the conclusive stats at the link above.

Echoing Markos, no less than Nevada's Republican Assembly Minority Leader Pat Hickey, who told Hate Talk Radio host Dan Mason: "We have some real opportunities in 2014. This is a great year in an off-presidential election. Seemingly no Democrat on the top of the ticket against Sandoval. No Harry Reid. Probably where we had a million voters turn out in 2012, we'll have like 700,000. A lot of minorities, a lot of younger people will not turn out in a non-presidential. It's a great year for Republicans."

The other night I was at a public forum in Hacienda Heights given by three outstanding progressive congresswomen from L.A., Lucille Royball-Allard. Judy Chu and Janice Hahn. I think I shocked them when I told them about Steve Israel's latest recruit for the DCCC, Ohio's Sarah Palin, Jennifer Garrison. Jennifer Garrison-- not to mention Israel and his strategies-- is the poster child for why so many base voters don't turn out. Israel chased a popular moderate state Senator out of the race, Lou Gentile, so he could deliver the nomination to the corrupt Garrison. He immediately put her on the DCCC Jumpstart list, signaling to big Democratic donors that she's a top priority.

But the signal to base voters is what will keep them away from the polls. Garrison is a shrill homophobic asshole who was elected to the state legislature by gay-baiting the only Republican who had voted against the anti-gay Ohio Defense of Marriage Act. Garrison sent out mailings that read, “If you believe marriage is between one man and one woman, there’s something you should know about Nancy Hollister.” The other side of the card said, “DOMA was enacted precisely to protect Ohioans from having to accept ‘marriages’ or ‘unions’ entered into in other states. Despite the value of DOMA, Nancy Hollister voted against it. Jennifer Garrison believes marriage is between one man and one woman and will fight to protect our values.” She told the Parkersburg (W.Va.) newspapers that "the big difference between Nancy and I is the gay marriage issue. I am against it. She is for it."

In 2006, as a member of Ohio's House Education Committee, Garrison helped to kill an amendment that would have required Ohio schools to protect students from bullying for their sexual orientation or gender identity.

OK, so the LGBT community isn't likely to come out and vote for her next year. What about women, the biggest component of the Democratic base? Garrison is adamantly anti-Choice and when she tried to run for Secretary of State NARAL warned its members and supporters that they had rated her a 0%.

Rep. Garrison showed just how extreme her anti-choice position is when she filled out the 2008 candidate questionnaire for Ohio Right to Life, saying she would:

• support legislation in Ohio to outlaw abortion (with only an exception to save a woman’s life),
• support legislation that would allow pharmacists to refuse to dispense emergency contraception, and
• support state funding for so-called "crisis pregnancy centers" that lie to women about the risks of abortion and never refer patients for abortion or birth control services.

Representative Garrison does not share our values.

Maybe Israel thinks they forgot? Garrison is also an NRA fave, voted against the minimum wage and is an anti-environment fanatic who counts on Big Coal to fund her political aspirations. So what part of the base is going to turn out for her? Steve Israel's part of the base: the Wall Street banksters. Not sure how many of those there are in Marietta, Cambridge, Steubenville, Jackson and the Ohio suburbs of Wheeling and Parkersburg. And do they vote in Democratic primaries? When is Nancy Pelosi going to wake up and show this clown the door?