‘There is no district that is safe for Republican candidates’

May 14, 2008

The presidential primary in West Virginia was certainly a high-profile contest, but the eyes of the political world were largely focused further south, where a special election in Mississippi was poised to tell us a whole lot about the Republicans’ congressional strategy for 2008.

A few months ago, GOP congressional leaders came up with a sure-fire strategy for success. The Republican brand had fallen apart, but the party assumed it could persevere, especially in “red” districts, by nationalizing House races, calling Democratic candidates liberals, and connecting them to Barack Obama and Nancy Pelosi. What could possibly go wrong?

Republicans gave this a shot in March, in Illinois’ 14th. The GOP felt good about its chances — the district had been represented by former House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R), Bush won the district twice by double digits, and Republicans have held the seat for decades. But when voters headed to the polls, a Democrat won by six points.

They tried again in April, in Louisiana’s 6th. Once again, the GOP went into the race optimistic — Bush won the seat by 19 points in ’04, and Republicans have dominated the district for decades. This time, the Democrat won by three points.

Republicans were committed to doing whatever it took to prevent their strategy from failing three times in three months. So, when it came time for yesterday’s special election in Mississippi’s 1st, a very Republican district, the GOP pulled out all the stops to hold onto it — pumping money into the race, sending Dick Cheney down to campaign, running a bunch of ads featuring Jeremiah Wright, and using robo-calls from McCain, Bush, and the First Lady.

The Democrat won by eight points.

Democrats scored a remarkable upset victory on Tuesday in a special Congressional election in this conservative Southern district, sending a clear signal of national problems ahead for Republicans in the fall.

The Democrat, Travis Childers, a local courthouse official, pulled together a coalition of blacks, who turned out heavily, and old-line “yellow dog” Democrats, to beat his Republican opponent, Greg Davis, the mayor of Southaven, a Memphis suburb. With 99 percent of the precincts reporting, the vote was 54 percent for Mr. Childers to 46 percent for Mr. Davis.

The seat had been in Republican hands since 1995, and the district, largely rural and stretching across the northern top of Mississippi, had been considered one of the safest in the country for President Bush’s party, as he won here with 62 percent of the vote in 2004.

Given the results, it seems as if congressional Republicans are … what’s the word I’m looking for … screwed.

Merle Black, a Southern politics expert at Emory University, told the NYT that a Democratic victory in this district looks like “a huge upset, and an indication of a terrible year ahead for the Republicans.” He added, “In theory, this should be an easy win for them…. There are indications that the normal Republican turnout is just not there. If they can’t win up there, where are you going to win?”

Congressional Republicans are reportedly panicking behind the scenes, and honestly, I don’t blame them. Plan A was Boehner’s strategy about tying Dem candidates to Obama and Pelosi. This approach has gone 0-for-3 in three heavily Republican districts, the last of which the National Republican Congressional Committee spent nearly 20% of its entire bank account to keep. And here’s the kicker: there is no Plan B.

A GOP House leadership aide told the Politico last week that “if we don’t win in Mississippi, I think you are going to see a lot of people running around here looking for windows to jump out of.”

And with an eight-point margin, it wasn’t especially close.

NRCC Chairman Tom Cole (Okla.) was so dejected, he didn’t even try to spin his failure: “[T]he political environment is such that voters remain pessimistic about the direction of the country and the Republican Party in general…. I encourage all Republican candidates, whether incumbents or challengers, to take stock of their campaigns and position themselves for challenging campaigns this fall by building the financial resources and grassroots networks that offer them the opportunity and ability to communicate, energize and turn out voters this election.”

In other words, the man responsible for overseeing House Republican campaigns nationwide just told every GOP candidate, “Good luck; you’re on your own.”

DCCC Chairman Chris Van Hollen responded to the results this way: “There is no district that is safe for Republican candidates.”

At first blush, that may sound like hyperbole. It’s not. If Dems can compete and win in these three districts, they can compete and win anywhere in the country. Republicans are not only left bloodied and confused; they’re also left with no answers about how to prevent a wholesale disaster in November.

How do we get Dick Cheney to campaign for ALL of ’em?

  • I wonder if the toxicity of the Republican brand might lead more of them to jump ship to the Libertarian ranks? It’d be interesting to see if Barr could recruit some House incumbents to follow his lead out of the party. Maybe Paul could lead the way.

  • Wonder what this is going to do now to the CORPORATE MEDIA’S generated ‘narrative’ about poor , white, uneducated workers not going to vote for Obama ? Yet another corporate narrative whose intent is to get their Corporate Boy McBush installed as president so that a government by and for the few, Greed, can be sustained ….

  • Tom Cole, as would be expected, missed the obvious point in his summation. He needed to say that Republicans need to quit acting like Republicans, voting like Republicans and pulling the crap that Republicans do. After their track record of losing why would anyone want to throw campaign money the Republican’s way?

    I bet if Republicans would make moves to impeach Bush, Cheney and other key members of this administration, a good many voters might just see some hope for their party’s future. Until then, they are just the Corrupt Bastards Club.

  • I wonder how an influx of pretty conservative Dems would play out. Would an Obama administration be able to carry out its agenda without bucking the sentiment of these freshmen congressmen?

  • I love all this discussion about the Republican “brand.” The longer that Republicans think they can sell themselves like soap, the longer it will take them to figure out that the problem isn’t their “brand.” The voters have figured out that Republicans suck, and no polishing of the Republican “brand” is going to save them.

    A campaign based on “We may be stinkers, but we’re better than the other guys” is pretty weak stuff when 80% of the country think that the Republican Party has led the country onto the wrong track.

  • I don’t have anything intelligent to add, but I sure do love this stuff.

    Maybe Plan B should be, “Do quit your day job. Pursue that big band career, or just harass the poor and the powerless for free.”

  • I wonder if any of the Republicans in the House and the Senate are going to start behaving responsibly, or whether they will insist on continuing to march over the cliff in rigid lock-step. I’m anticipating mostly the latter, but I’ll be looking for indications of changes in voting patterns and obstruction.

  • Dear Rep. Emmanuel:

    You really, really didn’t care for Chairman Dean’s 50-state strategy when it was first rolled out. Care to revise and extend?

  • I’m with petorado (#6) – we should try to persuade some of the Republicans that their only hope for avoiding electoral mass extinction is for them to start a drive to impeach Bush and Cheney for abuse of their offices, trashing the constitution, and so on and so forth. Now that would be fun.

  • What scott_m said. I am a loyal Democrat and proud liberal and Deniac too, and it warms my heart so to see fifty states in play.

  • My first suggestion for the Republicans in their efforts to rebrand the party from corporate shills and cronies to the party of the people would be to stop referring to themselves as a “brand”.

  • What I find so amusing is that the GOP plan was to simply try and smear the Democrats as “liberal,” try to drum up controversy by tying Wright around the necks of every Dem, and just generally use the “destroy-my-opponent” tactics that have worked for so long.

    Well, guess what?

    Those tactics don’t work any more.

    People are just sick and damn tired of it. They’ve had enough. They’ve seen what that brand of politics get us: a massive abortion of a war, an economy teetering on the edge of total collapse, an infrastructure that is crumbling all around us, and billions spent making us feel safe without actually, you know, making us safter.

    In other words, people want **gasp** policies that actually work. (Which is pretty stunning since the media never talks policy and is more interested in horserace horseshit news).

    Perhaps if the GOP spent some time developing ideas that have to do with actual governance, rather than spending time finding new and even more disgusting ways to attack a person’s character, they wouldn’t be on the verge of getting their collective asses handed to them in November. And no, gay marriage and flag burning don’t count since neither affects 98% of the population whatsoever.

    Don’t get me wrong — I don’t want them to actually do such a thing, nor do I think they will. But if they want to survive as a legitimate party, they better figure something out. And soon.

    In the mean time, I’ll be over here giggling at their failure.

  • A GOP House leadership aide told the Politico last week that “if we don’t win in Mississippi, I think you are going to see a lot of people running around here looking for windows to jump out of.”

    Nah, we don’t have to throw them out windows, we can just lock them back in the attic or down in the basement with the lights out, and feed them gruel and water once a day – give ’em a taste of what they’ve done to the country. They spent over $3million on this race including Freedom’s Watch, sent Pig Boy to scare the troops, threw everything including the kitchen sink, and look what they got – an 8 point loss!!!!!!!!

    Can you say “Veto-proof Congress???” I knew you could.

    I was watching the PBS American Experience show on the rise of Franklin D. Roosevelt Monday night you should catch the re-run if you missed it, it’s good), and I was thinking about the fact that the three greatest presidents in history – Washington, Lincoln, and Roosevelt – were all highly unlikely before they became President. Think about it: Washington seems inevitable, but he and the others had to go out and create a country for him to embody before he could do it. With Lincoln, the man had failed in politics (elected to the House in 1846, turned out in 1848 for his antiwar position), hadn’t achieved that much in the rest of his life, only became known in 1858 with the debates with Douglas, yet he went on to save the country. Roosevelt didn’t have all that much experience either, and he was a cripple on top odf it, yet he went on to create the modern United States. In fact if you look at it, these three are in their own ways the three most unlikely presidential candidates in our history. Hopefully you see where I am going here: we now have a fourth candidate who could be considered extremely unlikely as a canddate given our history, yet look what is going on. Put him in office with a filibuster-proof Senate and a veto-proof House, and we have opportunities for progress that haven’t existed since 1938.

    Now that should send a cold chill down the back of every Thug drooler, eh?

  • Like so many people who have commented, I am simply having a moment of extreme happy over this news. But could someone please, please tell me – how can the party who broke Washington ever be expected to fix it? 😉

  • Tom Cole, as would be expected, missed the obvious point in his summation. He needed to say that Republicans need to quit acting like Republicans, voting like Republicans and pulling the crap that Republicans do. After their track record of losing why would anyone want to throw campaign money the Republican’s way?

    Nonetheless, you end up with a Democrat who as a “conservative Democrat” which is, down here, basically a Republican. That is happening a lot here in the South. I fear the return of the Dixiecrats. Remember, it is a grand southern tradition to run locally as a Republican (the party of Lincoln [which is a bad thing]) and then switch to the Democratic Party (the party of not-Lincoln) when running a statewide or federal campaign.

    Given a choice between a Republican and a Republican, they will pick the Republican every time.

  • They had Bush and Cheney campaigning and the worst Democrats they can find are Obama and Pelosi? They’re really screwed.

  • I hate to spoil your fun, but I think Republicans or Democrats in charge, corporate America still runs your country. A change in the party? They simply used a different bottle for the same medicine.

    I hope I’m wrong.

  • I’m as happy as the rest of you about this.

    But, I am not ready to claim victory–yet. The Republicans are smart and savvy, and they have no scruples whatsoever. Make no mistake, they will regroup–if not this election, certainly the next.

    They will do whatever it takes to regain power, and with the corporatocracy and its media arm behind them, with their slimy tactics revealed during national elections (and their supporting companies who manufacture voting machines and who retain control of software codes and vote counting), and with their utter disdain for the democratic process and overall dishonesty in general, I am not for an instant going to believe that they will scuttle back under the rocks from whence they came never to return. We must remain vigilant.

  • The problem the GOP has is that it really, honestly does believe that government is the problem. That, and the fact they are elitist and think their manifest destiny is to rule because they were born with silver spoons.

  • The complete destruction of the republican brand is the fault of those who called themselves members. It will be another 5 years or so, I think, but it seems clearly to be going the way of the Whigs.

    But don’t you republicans jumping ship come crawling to the Libertarian party – you don’t deserve it. The way you treat other countries, other parties, and people in general is completely against the live and let live attitude at the core of Libertarianism. You should have supported us when we were as small and powerless as you are about to be.

    – A lifelong libertarian

  • Be careful of what you wish for, folks. While my instinct is to fantasize about an Obama presidency with an 80% Democratic majority in the House, history has shown that hegemony is just as bad for Democrats as it is for Republicans. In the absence of powerful opponents, the Democratic party is every bit as capable of engaging in flights of ideological fancy as the Republicans are.

    In the short term, that’s great. In the medium term, it will lead to voter backlash against the inevitable excesses that unchecked power lead to. Heck, Democratic politicians may be far more ethical and well-meaning than the Republicans, but they are still politicians, after all.

    So here’s hoping for a clear majority, but not such a majority that it prevents opposition to bad policy and investigation of — yes, it can happen to Democrats, too — corruption.

  • Plan B? The GOP have never had a plan B. They’ve never needed one before. Now they think they can change that around by sloganeering. Good luck with that. The truth is, the American public has woken up to the reality that the GOP is not so grand, and the plans they have are only for the elite, not the rank and file. Not to mention the GOP has helmed the destruction of our country in nearly every regard.

    Even here in Utah, change is in the air. Hip, hip hooray!

  • #14…if the goopers started impeachment proceedings, reversed the shredding of our Constitution and other sundry things to turn around the abuse of our government, *I* would vote gooper. (And that is quite the statement, I assure y ou.)

    I have no worries, though. Their corruption is far and wide and about as deep as possible.

    Good riddance to horribly bad rubbish!

    Did you know that several people in the Bush Administration have been charged with war crimes?

    THIS is why goopers are done for – and hopefully forever!

  • Did Childers really deny knowing Barack Obama, or was he referencing someone else?

  • The best part is that this sets up Howard Dean’s 50 state strategy to really pay dividends.. I remember my Repub-supporting friends mocking me about Dean and his new strategy at the time it was laid out…

    It’s almost a perfect storm raining on the GOP

  • Over at Political Wire there is a great quote:

    In addition, Allen says House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-OH) “also has to watch his back” since House conservatives are “especially restive.”

    If anyone in the Republican party, much less the leadership, buys the argument that R’s are losing because they aren’t right-wing enough they deserve the extinction that will follow. Damn those folks is dumb.

  • You speak my mind, jhm: “I wonder how an influx of pretty conservative Dems would play out. Would an Obama administration be able to carry out its agenda without bucking the sentiment of these freshmen congressmen?”

    It lightens my heart to see Republicans losing, but how much real good does it do if we get Republicans in Democrats’ clothing?

  • Time passes for all things, and now we’ve finally reached the beginning of a new era where the Republicans are in a downward spiral. As their brand fades, perhaps the GOP will become known as “Grampa’s Old Party!”
    I feel change in the air!

  • Their bluff has been called. Ended up holding deuces, but there is a plan “B”.

    Its called “the change you deserve”. Pretty pathetic. Sounds like they’re trying to sell toothpaste or something.

    One bright side for the Republicans. The Democratic party will be adding one more member in discord with libr’l ideology on some (if not most) policy matters. As in the past 1 1/2 years the party has had its problem governing with this coalition of left and right.

  • PJ@36: It does lots of good. The problem with the Republicans is not their policy differences, it is their level of corruption, cynicism, dishonesty, and perfidy.

    To the extent that we have good faith intra-party debates about policy, that is a good thing. Uniformity of opinion is not the goal, just maturity of debate and a genuine effort to balance competing priorities. If we get some conservative Democrats who see fiscal responsibility as a higher priority than, say, a robust social safety net, I think that’s a good thing.

    The goal is not to ram through policy. The goal is to improve the country, and if the Republican party really does go through its richly-deserved collapse, it will do the Democrats good to have internal debate.

  • Perhaps all hotel rooms above the 10th floor should be reserved for Rethugs taking a dive – not the kind they usually do, the one that would actually do the country the most good.

    Not wanting to be a boring cynic because I love watching the thugocracy self-destruct, but Bush still tells them how to vote and they still DO IT. McSame makes it plain that he intends a third Bush term, and about half the country still BUYS IT. There must be something in the water.

    Someone, somewhere, the neocons probably, see the handwriting even if those corrupt little greedheads representing the hinterlands of the homeland don’t. They can’t win on policy issues. That’s becoming quite clear. So they have to change the subject. But to what? Fear? Race? Patriotism? Child molesters? Aliens? How about Iranians, North Koreans and Russians?

    I doubt the end of 2008 will look as rosy for the Dems as it appears now, but I can still hope (a little).

  • So much for Rove’s permanent majority. I’d be more giddy, but I keep reading comments on liberal blogs where Hillary’s supporters vow to vote for McSame, if Hillary doesn’t win the nomination. Where the flock is party loyalty? Would these people really swing an election to a clone of the boy king? Man, thats got me worried.

  • Joe @41, don’t worry. Those comments are made by people who never really intended to vote Democratic for the most part. They just thought that we are as stupid as non-rich Republican voters, and are “stirring the pot.”

  • Joe # 41, in fairness the WV exit polls showed just as many Obama supporters unwilling to vote for Clinton in November, and over 15% saying they would vote McSame. The lack of party loyalty is not unique to Clinton supporters.

  • Everything is falling for the Dems. I trust Obama to lead wisely and ethically. I however sense that the effects of greed and power will eventually kick in but I don’t see that happening to Obama. All of the anger I have felt over the years at President Bush (electing Czars over the credit industry and the FDA who were the very people who had benefited so much from the corruption). All of this anger is now being directed in my working with the Obama Campaign to get him and all Dems elected in the fall.

  • Conservatives we can usually accomodate in the Democratic Party. The bigots, racists and un-reconstructed segregationists (that is a plurality of the Southern Republicans) might want to stay with the Republican knuckle draggers, they will not be comfortable in the Democratic Party, and the party will not be comfortable with them.

  • Joe said:
    So much for Rove’s permanent majority

    Permanent majority, thousand year Reich, both lasted about as long;>

  • I encourage all Republican candidates, [to] position themselves for challenging campaigns this fall by building the financial resources and grassroots networks

    I can just picture the puzzled looks on the faces around the room…

    “What is these “grass roots” you speak of? How do I buy some?”

  • The main reason that the Republicans have tied up the legislative process is party loyalty. If southern conservatives with a (D) after their names are elected, then popular progressive legislation may come to a vote. The southern conservative Democrats may still vote against the bill, but they won’t be as likely to pull the parliamentary tricks that the Republicans have been using to stall legislation.

  • I wonder…would the phrase “chickens coming home to roost” be acceptable here?

  • Finally some news both Clinton and Obama supporters can rejoice in together!

    Power -> Corruption -> Loss of Power -> Renewal -> Power -> … these 8 years will be a short and intense run of the first 3 steps of this cycle.

  • @39 & 48

    exactly right. if liberals fear conservative debate, they shouldn’t be governing anyway. however, if we simply want a functioning government that attempts to pass legislation for the public good, then the democratic party should welcome the conservative dems with open arms, debate them, and when they have made a good point, concede it, and work together on a compromise. the biggest problem with republicans is they simply are interested in power, and not governing. they will refuse to pass things, hold up legislation, and fillibuster for the sake of not allowing dems to get credit for anything. nothing in my mind is more craven than the flag-burning constitutional amendment which failed with 66 votes – one vote shy. “On Monday, June 26, 2006, the Senate began debate on the proposed amendment. The following day, the amendment, sponsored by Senator Orrin Hatch, fell one vote short in the Senate, with 66 in support and 34 opposed. The Republican Nea votes were from Bob Bennett (UT), Lincoln Chafee (RI), and Mitch McConnell (KY).” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_Desecration_Amendment Okay, i get chafee, but mcconnell and bennett? they didn’t want it to pass so they could campaign on liberals refusing to pass it! (since it would fail in the states anyway) you simply cannot work to get anything done with people like that.

    if conservative dems force compromises that make legislation more palatable to all americans, isn’t that the entire point of a deliberative body?

  • I also take comfort in the fact that, although DNCC outspent RNCC in Miss. 01, we could afford it, easily, and they cannot. The million that RNCC spent there was close to an eigth of the entire purse they were holding while the million and a half we spent didn’t make anywhere near as much of a dent. Both DNCC and DNSC have done much better than their Republican counterparts in fundraising. The only place where they have an advantage over us is the DNC (Dean’s bailiwick) but I think even there we’ll start catching up once we have a firm nominee, cleanly selected. The financial advantage will be even more telling in districts which are far less “red-meat” than this one had been; they’ll have no money (and less hope) for those…

  • I personally won’t mind seeing a resurgence of moderate Dems. It would mean the return of an actual “center” to Washington. The far right-wing Repubs overran and ignored the moderate Repubs. It meant nothing to be a moderate Repub because they voted party line on everything that mattered because party discipline meant more to them than principle. They never as a block threw their weight around and sided with the Dems. The far right could safely ignore them. As a result, moderate Repubs are becoming an endagered species.
    Moderate Dems have a history of hanging together as a block and actually making their views count. It’s a fundamentally healthy phenomenon for the country. I look forward seeing a veto-proof Democratic Congress that forced by the Blue Dogs to balance the budget.

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