MyDD :: Open Thread and Round-Up

Open Thread and Round-Up

by Chris Bowers, Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 05:08:30 PM EST

I've abused Breaking Blue enough this afternoon. Here is an open thread with a round up of items I have noticed:

Democracy Corps conducts an adwatch of their own (PDF) using focus groups in key districts. The consensus seems to be that every ad made by everyone everywhere is really good.
My younger brother just got a temporary job working for Louise Slaughter (he lives in her district with his family). Need further proof that Slaughter is doing the right thing, day in and day out? Michelle Malkin hates her, and in typically, discourse-elevating Malkin style, she calls Slaughter Bilal Hussein's congresswoman. Don't conservatives ever get tired of casually lobbing around charges like that? How boring and one-note. I wonder if Malkin accuses her waiters of helping terrorists because her Filet Mignon was two minutes late. I wonder if she accuses local ministers of aiding the terrorists when they read the Bible. Probably. I know that our main fundraiser in on the netroots challengers page, but Louise Slaughter is on the Netroots Allies page.
So, a new poll in PA-06 shows Gerlach leading Murphy 7 among registered voters, and 3 among likely voters. Only problem is that if the partisan crosstabs of the poll are adjusted to either 2002 or 2004 turnout models, Murphy is narrowly ahead. So Gerlach is only ahead if he gets even better turnout than Republicans got in 2002 and 2004, both years when he won by 2%. Yeah, that's going to happen this year.
Sirota has a great new article up defending the blogosphere from the lame "you don't win many races" challenge. Memo to everyone: Democrats only flipped six Republican-held House seats in 2004, and two Republican held Senate seats. Of those eight flips, the blogosphere was heavily involved in three. Find me a progressive advocacy group with a win rate like that anywhere. When you only focus on challengers, you will always lose more than you will win. The blogosphere will always focus on challenging Republicans in their own turf--that is just the way we work.
Republican House Majority Boehner still believes Saddam was tied to 9/11 and had WMD's. Seriously. Crooks and Liars has the video. Also, the Stakeholder has the DCCC response. Every day, it is helpful to have a reminder as to why we want to take the House back.
When it comes to discussions of torture, no blog has been better than Orcinus.
The Nation has a detailed look at The Democracy Alliance, which is undoubtedly an emerging force within progressive politics.

This is an open thread. Chat away.

Tags: open threads (all tags)

Permalink :: 18 Comments :: Post a Comment

Re: Open Thread and Round-Up (none / 0)

Louise Slaughter is a great Congresswoman and a real asset to the House. I had the opportunity to work on her 1992 campaign (when she ran against Bill Polito) and the Clinton/Gore GOTV. It was a great experience, and coming from heavily Republican Wayne County, NY, it was a breath a fresh air to be around so many good progressive Dems. Hope your brother has an equally positive experience.

by CairoExPat on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 05:20:13 PM EST

Appalachia (none / 0)

The balance of the Senate lies deep in the heart of Appalachia.

by faithfull on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 05:20:25 PM EST

Re: Open Thread and Round-Up (none / 0)

Chris, I loved the point you made about the netroots exclusively flipping three seats of eight contested in 2004.

That being said, in baseball parlance, the netroots are hitting .375, which as any fan of the game knows, is all-time greatness.

Something tells me we'll hit for a high average again. Maybe we'll challenge Ted Williams, and that means we'll take the House.

by dpinzow on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 05:33:10 PM EST

Lamont victory is essential (none / 0)

"If Kos is the kingmaker, name the king."

Ned Lamont in the Senate for six long years--and Joe Lieberman glue-factory-bound--would wipe the sneer off lots of faces and make lots of senators more careful about casting bad votes.

Sirota's point is well-taken, but if the odds of beating incumbents haven't changed with the addition of the netroots to the mix, why should anybody care?

Lamont is important in its own right--because I don't trust Lieberman not to flip GOP or at the very least extract maximum concessions from the new leadership, if there is new leadership--and as a morale- and PR-booster for sites like this one.

I don't think everyone here has stopped to think clearly about what a huge, huge deal Sen. Ned Lamont, D-CT would be, whether the Dems win all or part of Congress or not. Conversely, a Lieberman win would be the source of a great deal of (somewhat deserved) ridicule.

by stevehigh on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 06:38:57 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Woodward turns on Bush (none / 0)

New book by Woodward. Says things are worse in Iraq than we know (duh!).

Interesting tidbit heard on radio: Woodward says Kissinger is a frequent visitor to the Whitehouse and says the only exit plan is victory. Oy Vey!

"Once in a while you get shown the light In the strangest of places if you look at it right"

by molly bloom on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 06:07:19 PM EST

PA-06 Turnout (none / 0)

If the turnout for the primaries are at all predictive of that for Nov 7th, then Gerlach (and Weldon) may not be seeing a lot of enthusiasm. Adapted from a comment of mine last spring:

The primary turnout this year for Weldon (PA-07) and Gerlach (PA-06) was about half that of 2004. The turnout for Sestak (PA-07) and Murphy plus Liebowitz (PA-06) was about the same, if not a bit more, as that for the Dems in 2004. This has to speak for the lack of enthusiasm on the part of Republicans.

Andy Dinniman's substantial win for State Senate in the special election also bodes well for Lois Murphy - especially if he works on her behalf in Nov - as that was mostly conducted in Chester County, Gerlach's stronghold. Turnout for Gerlach in Chester County was lots more than that for Murphy plus Liebowitz, but cutting into that with Dinniman's help would be devastating.

by accumbens on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 06:23:09 PM EST

Question on PA-06 poll (none / 0)

I'm told only 15% of the reponses were from Montgomery county with Berks and Chester splitting the difference. Is that a fair distribution?

by accumbens on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 06:30:29 PM EST

Re: Question on PA-06 poll (none / 0)

Yeah, I think so. MontCo was split up among 6 different CDs in 2002. I think the lion's share of MontCo is the 13th (Schwartz). I'm guessing the 6th may be the second largest chunk, but parts of MontCo are also in the 8th, the 15th, 2nd (Fattah) and I'm not sure of the other CD. The majority of the 6th is Berks (Reading) and ChesCo.

Maybe Chris will be kind enough to give us the actual partisan breakdown. :)

by phillydem on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 07:22:10 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Map (none / 0)

Here's the current map of the 6th:

javascript:newWin("../printable/images/p review/congdist/PA06_109.gif",750,452);

by phillydem on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 07:36:07 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Map - corrected (none / 0)

Corrected link:

http://nationalatlas.gov/printable/image s/pdf/congdist/PA06_109.pdf

by phillydem on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 07:37:36 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Map - corrected (none / 0)

Thanks. It's hard to see what's where, but I'm thinking that the part in Montgomery is quite populated. It includes Lower Merion and Ardmore. Berks has Reading, of course, but Chester?

by accumbens on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 09:44:13 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Map - corrected (none / 0)

Looking at the map, my guesstimate is that the 6th
has around 25-30% of MontCo area, but clearly ChesCo and Berks are the large majority of the district. Murphy ran very strongly last time in MontCo where she beat Gerlach and they ran about even in Berks, but it wasn't enough to offset Gerlach in ChesCo.

by phillydem on Fri Sep 29, 2006 at 05:17:11 AM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Question on PA-06 poll (none / 0)

Based on the current PA DoS voter registration, the partisan breakdown is below.

For the 3 counties, there are approx 910k Rs and Ds. Rs = 55%, Ds = 45%. There are 1.074k total RVs in the 3 counties, Rs = 47%, Ds = 38%, Other = 15%.

Unfortunately, the DoS website does not give the registration breakdown by CD.

The true partisan breakdown may actually be what the Keystone Poll used because a lot of the Dem parts of MontCo are in the 13th and ChesCo is the last real GOP stronghold in the burbs, meaning you have to be registered as a Republican to have any meaningful say in local county politics. It should be noted that this district has its fair share of Rs who vote like Ds.

by phillydem on Fri Sep 29, 2006 at 12:51:19 PM EST
[ Parent ]

Re: Open Thread and Round-Up (3.00 / 0)

The blogosphere will always focus on challenging Republicans in their own turf--that is just the way we work.

The liberal blogoshere also needs to challenge more entrenched bad Democrats on their own turf in primaries. The Lieberman challenge was a good first step, but more than one rotten Dem must be dealt with per election cycle if institutional change is ever to occur.

With Democrats Lieberman goes for the jugular. With Republicans he goes for the lips.

by Sitkah on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 06:34:02 PM EST

Tradesports and Iowa (none / 0)

I love the positive vibe here... but if things are so certain, whats the deal with Tradesports and Iowa?

Tradesports has GOP retaining house at 58%; retaining Senate at 80%.

Iowa Electronic Markets has similar.

What gives?

by lokiloki on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 08:33:47 PM EST

Re: Open Thread and Round-Up (none / 0)

I just heard (on the radio) a replay of Bush explaining that releasing NIEs because they've been leaked is a bad habit to get into, as he releases part of the terrorism NIE because it was leaked. Has anyone held him to account for this? Did he release the information because it was politically expedient? I thought he didn't do that? Does he undertake bad habits whimsically? Maybe it's a bad habit to invade other countries on false pretenses, but if you only do it once in awhile it's not really a habit?

by jujube on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 08:33:54 PM EST

Re: Open Thread and Round-Up (none / 0)

How could the Dem's let this vote happen today? Why didn't they march out too the street and start yelling about this? We are now a torture state. What the hell!

by Lisa B on Thu Sep 28, 2006 at 10:15:08 PM EST

Re: New Poll in PA-07 (none / 0)

Gar Joseph of the Phila Daily News was on PCN's Journalist Roundtable last night. The PDN is evidently commissioning Keystone Polls in the 3 hot SE Pa suburban CDs. The poll for the 6th was released yesterday and Joseph said today they'll be reporting the Keystone Poll on the 7th which he said will show a very tight race. He also said they'll be doing a poll on the 8th next week.

On PA-04, Chris Potts, Pgh City Paper, reported on the same show that he's confirmed the existence of a recent Hart internal campaign poll that shows her not very far ahead of Jason Altmire, thus confirming what his internal poll showed. Hart's camp is refusing to release the results of their poll.

by phillydem on Fri Sep 29, 2006 at 05:22:47 AM EST

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