Ned Lamont hasn't really won anything yet - except the right to hang around for another 13 weeks - but Tuesday's victory in Connecticut has left me feeling empowered and enthusiastic about the opportunities that November presents. Without detracting from the impeccable ground game and consistent messaging employed by the Lamont campaign, I feel strongly that Daily Kos - you and I - played a part, however small, in Ned's historical trouncing of Joe Liebe(R)man.
So I'm asking all of you to follow me through a hypothetical en route to winning the Senate this November. Because I think we have one more surprise left in us, don't you?
Let's pretend for a minute that the money, the polls and the momentum are all true - that five currently Republican Senate seats will be returned to their rightful owners, the Democrats. Let's pretend that
Rick Santorum has uttered his last man-on-dog reference, that
Conrad Burns has insulted his last firefighter, that
Mike DeWine's Buckeye State has purchased multiple tickets on the clue bus, that
Jim Talent has, well, none, and that
Lincoln Chaffee is as vulnerable as the numbers suggest. If all that were true, we'd be one Democrat shy of winning the Senate.
That makes us one Democratic Senator short of nirvana.
At my marketing firm, we often debate the merits of two distinct strategies: Spray-and Pray and Concentration of Force. Think of it this way: a 100-pound woman in high-heels will sink into the asphalt on a hot day, while a 250-pound man in wingtips will not. The heels create a concentration of force, despite the lesser weight on them.
The November Senate picture presents the same dilemma. Give our time, money and effort to the DSCC, and we've employed a "Spray and Pray" approach. Focus on a single candidate, as we did with Ned Lamont, and we have a true "Concentration of Force."
It seems to me that our sixth and decisive Senate seat could come from one of 4 places:
1. Nevada (Jack Carter)
2. Tennessee (Harold Ford, Jr.)
3. Virginia (Jim Webb)
4. Arizona (Jim Pedersen)
So here's the $64,000 question: which of these 4 potential deal-makers do we like enough to adopt - to throw our concentration of force behind, a la Lamont, and give us the best chance to win the Senate?
A few things come into play for me...
...polls and trends
...money
...each candidate's ground game and GOTV effort
...momentum
...composition of each state's electorate
...the likelihood of national (DSCC) dollars going to a given candidate
I'll give you a brief snapshot of each race. I'm hoping that many of you can add more insight and local nuance.
Then I want you to answer two questions: 1) do we put our trust in the DSCC or adopt our own concentration-of-force candidate, and 2) if the latter, which candidate?
Nevada:
Fellow Kossack dpinzow made a great case for Jack Carter in a diary last Friday. In four months, Carter has closed the gap on Ensign - starting at a 33-point deficit, and now trailing by only 7 (Rasmussen). Carter has the name, the netroots movement (thanks to Sarah Carter), and a growing, unpredictable electorate.
The drawback: he may not have the full attention of the DSCC.
Tennessee:
If you didn't see Time magazine's article this week (Why Harold Ford Has a Shot), it's worth your "time," so to speak. An excerpt:
Ford does indeed get people's attention. Selected one of PEOPLE magazine's "50 Most Beautiful People" in 2001, he has a charisma some Tennesseans say they haven't seen since Bill Clinton. Tennessee AFL-CIO Labor Council president Jerry Lee, who got his start in politics working for the Democrat in the 1960 presidential election, goes even further back: "Harold Ford Jr. is the most exciting candidate I've seen since John F. Kennedy." Clinton himself, who was in Nashville last week to raise $1 million for Ford and the state party, told a cheering crowd of 1,500 that he sees in Ford "the walking, living embodiment, in my opinion, of where America ought to go in the 21st century."
Ford trails Bob Corker in this race, to be sure, but Ford's "conservative Dem" messaging seems to be resonating with Tennesseans.
That may be his drawback. His views don't inspire the hardcore left. But if they inspire Tennessee, do we care?
Virginia:
There's a real-life David/Goliath story playing out between George Allen and Jim Webb. As Ambivalent Mumblings pointed out here 10 days ago, Webb is down by 16 points. Then again, so was Lamont not all that long ago.
Mt. Allen will tough to climb, but as lowkell pointed out earlier this week, Jim Webb has some friends in high places, notably the Roanoke Times, in this editorial comparison between Webb and Teddy Roosevelt:
So many similarities exist between Roosevelt and Webb that it's almost uncanny. Most obvious, both men served heroically in the military, T.R. as leader of the Rough Riders in the Spanish-American War and Webb as a decorated Marine in Vietnam.
After combat, Webb served as secretary of the Navy, T.R. as assistant secretary. And each chose to bolt from a Republican Party he felt had lost its bearing.
Roosevelt, a former two-term Republican president, denounced the GOP as corrupt, stormed out of the 1912 convention and ran for president as a Progressive.
Webb, after serving in the Reagan administration and supporting George W. Bush and George Allen in 2000, left the Republican Party after the invasion of Iraq because, he said, the party had "gone crazy."
Nationally, the Republicans will help Allen because a loss here would be embarrassing on the largest scale.
Arizona:
Jim Pedersen has not made the inroads that many expected against seemingly vulnerable incumbent (R) Jon Kyl. One of the infamous Schumer's 7, which I diaried about last New Year's Eve (loser, I know), Pedersen has been unable to close the 20-point of 8 months ago.
That's not to say that DSCC has completely abandoned the idea of splitting Arizona's Senate seats with John McCain. As one of the original "chosen few," Pedersen is still likely to get some national help.
But is it too late?
One of these four - Carter, Ford, Webb or Pedersen - can pound the deciding nail in the Republican coffin this November.
Make your case.
Cast your vote. Is 1000 votes too much to ask?
See the tip jar for my choice.
Let's pull off one more Kossack surprise.
P.S. Hey Markos - go on vacation already!