It's well known around these parts that the past few years have seen me change form a frequent critic of the DCCC to one of its biggest supporters. Chris Van Hollen has proven himself to be an aggressive chairman and he is not satisfied to sit back and defend the majority we already have and is working to expand it. They have raised a lot of money and recuited strong candidates all over the country, even ib some of the more Republican parts of South Florida. The only problem is that Red-to-Blue Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz continues to undercut challengers to three right wing Republicans, epsecially Ileana Ros-Lehtinen.
Wasserman Schultz, the sorry chairperson of the DCCC's very compromised Red to Blue program, virtually endorsed 3 extreme right South Florida Republican incumbents-- Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Lincoln Diaz-Balart and Mario Diaz-Balart-- with the clear intention of sabotaging the campaigns of the three Democrats running against them-- Annette Taddeo, Raul Martinez, and Joe Garcia-- and making it impossible for them to get serious institutional money in Florida. She angered enough people, who pressured the DCCC, so that she finally made nice with Raul Martinez and Joe Garcia. She is still doing everything in her power to undercut Annette Taddeo, the challenger in the least Republican-leaning of the 3 districts.
And today we hear that Wasserman Schultz, whose extremely shady PAC, DWS: Democrats Win Seat, has handed out around a quarter million dollars so far this cycle, donated $2,500 to Martinez. I had to laugh. I mean Emanuel, Hoyer and Wasserman Shultz, three of the most corrupt in the Democratic leadership-- all destined to remind people that Tom DeLay, Bob Ney and Duke Cunningham were just typical politicians, not just corrupt Republicans-- all found a political soul mate in South Florida-- not the progressive Taddeo or Garcia, but the former mayor of Hialeah, Martinez. Why Martinez? He was indicted on 7 counts of extortion and 8 counts of racketeering while he was mayor.
She has to go. No, it's not too late to replace her. There are plenty of aggressive Democrats like Charlie Rangle who have deep pockets and even deeper connections. Connections that don't include corrupt Cuban exiles funnling cash through Debbie Dubya's "anti-Castro" PAC. Wasserman Schultz represents what I consider the worst elements of the Democratic Party that took control in the late 1990's and continues to cling to what power it has left. I only shudder to imagine the damage she might do if she ever makes it to the Senate. Short of her ouster, the best we can do is support Taddeo as best we can and demonstrate how foolish it was to ever consider shorting her.