It's the final round of Forward Together PAC's
Map Changers competition! After the first two rounds of public balloting, only 10 worthies remain. One of them is going to get a fundraiser with Mark Warner. Rather than give another pitch for my candidate (though I'll address that in comments), I'm going to lay out a few relatively objective criteria I think everyone ought to think about when choosing. They are these: The candidate should be participating in a race with National Impact, should be aiming at a Worthy Target, should be fighting on Favorable Terrain, should be Lacking Funds (keep in mind the grand prize is a fundraiser), and, in keeping with the name of the contest, should be in a position to fundamentally change the map if elected.
These are the guys and gals in question:
Jerry McNerney - CA-11
Bill Winter - CO-06
Diane Farrell - CT-04
John Laesch - IL-14
Nancy Skinner - MI-09
Jon Tester - MT-Sen
Stephanie Studebaker - OH-03
Patrick Murphy - PA-08
John Courage - TX-21
Chris Bell - TX-Gov
National Impact
This, to me, is a sine qua non. A Congressman or Senator's authority does not end at the boundary of their district. A governor's does. In my opinion, this gives us all both more of a stake and more of a right to influence federal than state elections. For that reason, I disqualify Chris Bell outright. It's not that I don't want him to win - just that I don't have a stake in the outcome, and neither do most of you.
Worthy Target
If we can only give support to one challenger here, it should be one who is challenging a powerful, entrenched, and thoroughly repugnant member of the Republican elite. Fortunately, we have a number of chances to do that.
McNerney (v Richard Pombo) -Yes. Richard Pombo is a slimeball. He's corrupt to the core, and bar none the worst environmental offender of them all. Which, of course, is why the GOP gave him control of the Natural Resources committee. He'll be taking over agriculture in 2008.
Winter (v Tom Tancredo) - Yes. The immigrant-buster. Let's face it - Tom just hates brown people. Every day he's in congress, his rhetoric becomes a little more "mainstream." Let's stop that.
Farrell (v Chris Shays) - No. Would I like to beat Shays? Sure. Is he that bad in the grand scheme of things? No.
Laesch (v Dennis Hastert) - Yes. He's the bleeping Speaker of the House. `Nuff said.
Skinner (v Joe Knollenberg) - No. A congressional waste of space. He votes the wrong way, but he won't be leading any charges any time soon. He's old and soon to retire anyway.
Tester (v Conrad Burns) - Yes. Abramoff's BFF. Leaving him in the Senate is an affront to the dignity of the chamber, or what's left of it.
Studebaker (v Mike Turner) - Who the hell is Mike Turner?
Murphy (v Michael Fitzpatrick) - He authored that cockamamie anti-MySpace bill, but truth be told I think he actually is trying to protect kids with it. He's got no seniority, and isn't much of a threat.
Courage (v Lamar Smith) - Yes. Lamar Smith is one of those second-tier leaders with more power than you realize. He chairs the Internet and Intellectual Property subcommittee of Judiciary. A real bad guy to have there when you're trying to get Net Neutrality through, which he of course opposes.
Favorable Terrain
The are races that will take the Grace of God to win, and some that we mere mortals can take. Basically, we should be putting our resources into a race where our guy has some sort of natural advantage - a wounded incumbent, national fundraising appeal, or a heavily Democratic district, for example.
McNerney - Yes. Pombo's Abramoff ties are coming out, and the voting public is pissed. McNerney's up 46-42 in the latest head-to-head.
Winter - No. Tancredo won by 20% and has never won by less than 15%. And as repugnant as Tancredo's anti-immigrant rhetoric is, it's probably an advantage in the district.
Farrell - Yes. Shays is one of the last of a dying breed - the New England Republican. He barely pulled his nuts out of the fire last year, and very well might not this time around, especially considering a possible turnout-boosting 3-way senate race.
Laesch - No. This district is within striking distance, but Hastert is still popular and scandal-free.
Skinner - No. The nice thing about being a nobody (Knollenberg) is that nobody has a reason to vote against you.
Tester - Yes. Burns is suffering from severe Abramoff-taint, and Tester is catching up in the polls. When coupled with Tester's fit to the state, this is what Sun Tzu would call fatal ground - a place where you can only go forward, not back.
Studebaker - No. See comments on Skinner.
Murphy - Yes. The Philadelphia suburbs are as swing as districts come. This used to be liberal Republican Jim Greenwood's district, so we don't need to worry about being killed on ideology here. A good Democrat in a Democratic year ought to win.
Courage - No. This is a hardcore Republican district, and it would take a Hackett-like performance to oust Smith.
Financial Need
Picking great candidates is job one, but there's no point in allocating scarce resources to people who already have enough (Hillary Clinton syndrome). We ought to pick races where the candidate can win with our support, but likely can't without it. The financial numbers I have here are from May and thus out of date, but pretty much tell the tale of each candidate's situation.
McNerney ($225k raised/$61k on hand]- Yes. McNerney has raked in some additional money following his DFA endorsement, but Pombo is a prolific fundraiser, and we can't count on the DCCC - they backed McNerney's primary opponent.
Winter ($165k/$90k)- Yes. Same thing, minus the DFA endorsement. Winter needs cash, fast.
Farrell ($1200k/$840k)- No. Farrell has a fundraising network in place from her last race in is in close proximity to New York funders. She's currently matching Shays in fundraising.
Laesch ($47k/$2k)- Yes. Did you see those numbers? Homie's got no cash, bro.
Skinner ($100k/$95k)- Yes. Given her network from her previous Illinois Senate run, one might actually expect Skinner to be raising more. But she's not, and it looks like she could use a hand.
Tester ($850k/$190k) - Tester did just get through a bruising primary, and you do expect a Senate race to cost more than a house race. Consider, though, that Montana is a helluva cheap media market, and the DSCC will be active here hardcore. On top of that, Tester's going to rake in the small-donor checks whether we endorse him here or not.
Studebaker ($35k/$15k) - Yes. See comments on John Laesch.
Murphy ($530k/$315k) - No. Philadelphia's an expensive media market, but it's also a rich donor source, as shown by Murphy's prolific fundraising so far.
Courage ($115k/$65k) - Yes. A Dem in Texas is always going to be outspent, especially running against an industry shill like Smith. The question is, by how much?
Map Changing
This is a time to think big and strike deep. We want to elect Democrats in the heart of Red country. We want candidates who will drive up the whole ticket. The end goal is a Blue America, and we want candidates who change the whole strategic picture, above and beyond just winning this race.
McNerney - No. McNerney's fighting an entrenched Republican, but this is a district that really should be ours. It's partly rural and red by registration, but 7 of the 9 districts surrounding it are represented by Democrats, and leader Pelosi resides about 20 miles away in the 8th.
Winter - Yes. A Blue Colorado influencing the whole Rocky Mountain region is one of our top strategic objectives. To do that, we're going to have to drive out the wingnuts.
Farrell - No. Again, this is a district that should be ours. A wholly blue New England would be a change in the map, but clean-up operations just don't seem worthy of our spearhead.
Laesch - No. The upper Midwest has been hotly contested for decades. Nothing new here.
Skinner - No. Ditto.
Tester - Yes. Jon Tester gives us an opportunity to prove a template for winning races with real Democrats all through the Mountain West. It's hard to pass up.
Studebaker - No. Like Laesch and Skinner, there's just nothing interesting about her race. Note, however, that turnout efforts here could aid Sherrod Brown in his Senate raced.
Murphy - No. I'm all for the effort to take back the Philadelphia suburbs in the PA 6th, 7th, and 8th. We might take all three this year. But they're just more suburbs. We already know we can win there.
Courage - Yes. A blue district in the heart of Bush country would be huge. We've been on the defensive in Texas for years. A successful counterattack would be cause for wholesale GOP panic.
Totals
With those four categories considered, we're left with the following scorecard.
McNerney - 3/4
Winter - 3/4
Tester - 3/4
Courage - 3/4
Laesch - 2/4
Murphy - 1/4
Studebaker - 1/4
Skinner - 1/4
Farrell - 1/4
It looks to me, then, like the finalists are Jerry McNerney, Bill Winter, Jon Tester, and John Courage. We can debate the relative strengths of the candidates, but these four look to me like our best chance to make a difference. And that's what we're all about, right?
Remember to comment and vote!
Update: The latest McNerney-Pombo poll is 46-42, not 48-44. My bad.