In the 2010 cycle Blue America backed Sheila Dow-Ford against reactionary Pennsylvania Blue Dog Tim Holden. 2010 was a conservative year and Holden won. Since then, he has voted (on crucial roll calls) with the Democrats 31.96% of the time. That's right-- Holden has backed the right-wing agenda espoused by Cantor and Boehner 68% of the time. But something else has happened since 2010-- PA-17 was redrawn and is now a solidly blue district, with voters who back the kinds of progressive solutions to the problems conservatives like Holden have created in this country.
Holden was happy to get a bluer district, but the result, predictably, is a primary challenge from a real Democrat who stands for progressive values and principles. This year that candidate is Matt Cartwright, and Tuesday he announced his candidacy. Yesterday I spoke with Sheila-- who went to the University of Pennsylvania Law School with Matt-- and she is enthusiastic to see someone of his caliber challenge Holden... and on exactly the same issues she went to bat for two years ago. Tuesday, Matt's son Jack, a college freshman, made the case for his dad here at DWT. I had already spoken with Matt a few weeks earlier because of his opposition to SOPA. Holden was one of the more corrupt of the right-wing Blue Dogs who co-sponsored the Internet-stifling legislation. At the time Matt took off from his single-minded campaign theme of "jobs, jobs, jobs," to talk to me about SOPA:
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