The next addition to the Blue Majority page is a candidate returning from 2006: Eric Massa, who is running against Shotgun Randy Kuhl in the NY-29.. Please, give to Eric Massa today.

Eric is a true netroots favorite, evidenced by the tags NY-29 and Eric Massa being the most common tags for a congressional race and congressional candidate respectively, on MyDD. Eric is extremely energetic and hard working, as I have seen upclose in my visits to the district on several occasions. His energy rubs off on his grassroots supporters, who were able to close off a corporate Democratic primary challenger this past summer through relentless blog pressure, securing the support of virtually every local precinct captain in the district (including two family members of mine who joined the silent revolution in Update New York), and lots of small-donor, in-district fundraising. Now, he is set to take on Randy Kuhl who, separate occasions, has threatened both his ex-wife and his constituents with firearms, even though he claims he was just joking about the later. But he seriously doesn't like his constituents:

That is, he doesn't like his constituents unless they are Republican donors trying to build new bowling alleys in the district.

This is the "reddest" district in New York, which Bush won with about 56% of the vote in 2004. However, is it turning blue, like the rest of New York state. But Eric Massa is not your typical red-district Democrat who will let you down. As a progressive, he will fight for you, pledging to oppose FISA and watered-down withdrawal from Iraq, something few Democrats from a district this "red" have done. After losing by only 4% in 2006 despite no help from national committees, Massa is well poised to take the seat in 2008.

Support Eric Massa for Congress on Blue Majority. He is another example of more and better Democrats.

Crossposted from dKos

Friends,

It has been an absolute whirlwind week for our campaign over the last 10 days and there are a number of things I'd like to touch on today. In the last 10 days, our momentum has grown exponentially. Today, I'd like to take the time to review four major developments in our race.

YearlyKos

First - I want to thank all of you for another wonderful experience at the Yearly Kos convention last week in Chicago. I apologize for not posting last Sunday as I usually do, however I was on an airplane flying back to Western NY at the time. During the convention I was scheduled to speak at the Future Leaders panel with a number of netroots candidates. However on Saturday morning at 7 am I received an urgent call from one of my staffers. Apparently Arianna Huffington had just broken her ankle and as such was unable to make it to the "Left behind by the Right" panel (If you're reading this, I hope you're feeling better Arianna). As such, I was asked to step in since I too am a former Republican.

Crossposted from DKos

Last week, we saw a new low from the Bush White House. It no longer matters if you risk our national security for political purposes so long as you've played enough golf with the President (by the way my opponent was rated as the Most Improved Golfer in Congress in 2005 and can brag about having the same handicap as Rick Santorum and Tom DeLay). Of course, I am speaking of the Presidential commutation of I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby's 30 month prison sentence for lying to the FBI. This is wrong on so many levels I hardly know where to begin, but first let me say this - Our nation was founded on the principle that NOBODY is above the law... especially in cases where National Security is at risk. Had history been written a little differently, could ever you imagine President Washington commuting a sentence for Benedict Arnold?

Early last month, I announced my New Bill of Rights. This Declaration is my way of expanding upon the Rights listed in FDR's 1944 State of the Union message to Congress, which I have touched upon in some of my more recent DailyKos Diaries. I know that the way forward for the Democratic Party is to stand with the people against President Bush and the Rubberstamp Republicans, who taken the side of Corporatists rather than the American family. Together, I know we can make this world a better place.

This is the sixth in a ten part series where we will discuss some of the most important issues facing the American people today. I want to hear your opinions and thoughts on each and every one of these topics. Our campaign has had over 40 house parties over the last month which has made it difficult for me to be available every Sunday for liveblogging, but I am very happy to be back with you today from 3-6 pm eastern time.

Crossposted from dKos

This past week, the story on the presses has been that the Republicans won and the Democrats lost the Iraq timetable battle. I want to let you know how deeply committed I was to forcing veto from the White House.

Today I am going to break from the schedule. Rather than publishing the fourth edition from my New Bill of Rights, I thought that I should just go from the gut.  There is a whole lot of heart in what I am about to write and some of it is not entirely political advisable from the point of view of a junior candidate.

So the story on Representative Randy Kuhl (R, NY-29) bragging about moving Federal help to a private bowling alley in his district gets a little more involved.  It turns out that the owner of the bowling alley, Jack Moran, aside from being a donor to the National Republican Congressional Committee the year Kuhl was elected, was an officer and a board member of the Bowling Proprietor's Organization.  And this bowling league has a very GOP-leaning PAC, giving $55,000 to Republican House candidates in 2006 (and none to Democrats).  On the Senate side, this group gave $39,500 to Republicans and $3000 to Democrats (Ben Nelson, and there's more detail about the PAC here).

The loan guarantee came through the US Department of Agriculture's Rural Development Program.  Today, the Washington Post has a long and interesting piece on that little known program.  In short, the USDA's Rural Development Program a large, secretive, and sprawling money pot that sends money anywhere and everywhere based on political considerations.

The USDA's regulations determining eligible rural communities vary from program to program and are often influenced by Congress. There are 40 separate programs under Rural Development. They include low-interest housing loans, USDA-backed loans for businesses, and grants for communities and nonprofit groups...

Did Kuhl pay back a GOP money cog?  It's hard to tell.  And the USDA isn't making it easier.

As the program has expanded, it has become more complicated, bureaucratic and secretive. The USDA instructed its employees not to answer questions from a Post reporter, steering all queries to Washington. Some documents obtained under the Freedom of Information Act were heavily redacted, so reporters could not determine the amounts of loans or locations of businesses. New Jersey officials blotted out names and figures in one of their own news releases.

So what exactly is going on with Roseland Bowl?  Is the GOP machine, which needs vast quantities of money, pumping cash through pots in the executive branch to areas of vulnerability?  We know Kuhl is one of Rove's vulnerables in 2008.  And we know that a nice GOP friend just got loan guarantees from the Federal government worth $10,000 a month in Kuhl's district.

The Fighting 29th tips us off that Randy Kuhl, the Republican Congressman from New York's 29th district, has procured $2.5 million in Federal loans for a bowling alley in Canandaigua called Roseland Bowl.  Normally this would be a sort of standard local politician move, helping out a small business owner.  Now, I'm a good liberal, so I'll point out that right near the bowling alley is a VA facility that just closed its acute psychiatric care facility, apparently due to funding cuts.  But that's not what's interesting here.

Kuhl voted against the supplemental and called it full of pork.  He's also quite pleased with himself with getting the money to the owner of the bowling alley, Jack Moran.

"Roseland Bowl is a great business and a fixture in the Canandaigua community," said Rep. Kuhl.  "This guaranteed loan will help Roseland Bowl by allowing the owners to restructure their debt to help improve the business and, importantly, save the 36 jobs there.  I thank Rural Development for their vital assistance."

Here's what's weird.  It's worth noting that Roseland Bowl's loan is coming from the Department of Agriculture, which is part of the executive branch and run by Bush partisan Mike Johanns.  That's useful to know because one of the main ways that the Republicans maintained power in Congress was through Congressional earmarks to vulnerable districts.  When the power to put Bridges to Nowhere disappeared with the Democratic takeover, it seems that in order for this political machine to work the executive branch would have to pick up the slack and push cash to critical districts.  And lo and behold Randy Kuhl is on Karl Rove's watch list as a vulnerable seat, which we know from a presentation given to personnel in the non-partisan General Services Administration.

Still, there's a good case to be made that getting a low-interest Federal lean to a private bowling alley is a good use of public funds, but funding our troops with the equipment in the supplemental that Bush will veto and Kuhl voted against is not.  After all, there's this.

Crossposted from dKos

Last week in a diary titled Building a Majority Party: Reforging Democratic Identity I suggested that we go back to a 1944 speech by FDR to reforge Democratic identity and build a lasting majority party.  Here is the list of rights I quoted from the speech:

   *   the right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries, or shops or farms or mines of the Nation;
    *  the right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
    *  the right of every farmer to raise and sell his produce at return which will give him and his family a decent living;
    *  the right of every businessman, large or small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair completion and domination by monopolies at home and abroad;
    *  the right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
    *  the right to adequate protection form the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
    *  the right to a good education.