My quest to promote Better Democrat Dr. Steve Blythe's race for FL-15, a Republican Open Seat with relatively low PVI of +4R, has led me to wonder if there were other possible opportunities being overlooked and underfunded?
Below is the list of districts with retiring Repubublican incumbents, ranked in PVI order.
Which other ones, if any should get some last minute extra support?
Districts with Retiring Republican Incumbents in PVI Order:
- New Jersey's 3rd congressional district: Jim Saxton: D+3: Chris Myers (R) vs. John Adler (D)
- New York's 25th congressional district: Jim Walsh D+3 Dale Sweetland (R) vs. Dan Maffei (D)
- New York's 13th congressional district: Vito Fossella: D+1 Bob Straniere (R) vs Mike McMahon (D)
- New Mexico's 1st congressional district: Heather Wilson: D+2 Darren White (R) vs. Martin Heinrich (D)
- Illinois's 11th congressional district: Jerry Weller: R+1 Martin Ozinga R(R) vs Debbie Halvorson (D)
- Minnesota's 3rd congressional district: Jim Ramstad R+1Erik Paulsen (R) vs Ashwin Madia (D)
- New Jersey's 7th congressional district: Mike Ferguson: R+1 Leonard Lance (D) Linda Stender (D)
- Ohio's 15th congressional district: Deborah Pryce R+1 Steve Stivers (R) vs. Mary Jo Kilroy (D)
- Virginia's 11th congressional district: Tom Davis R+1 Keith Fimian (R) vs. Gerry Connolly (D)
- Arizona's 1st congressional district: Rick Renzi: R+2 Sydney Hay (R) vs. Ann Kirkpatrick (D)
- New York's 26th congressional district: Tom Reynolds R+3 Chris J. Lee (R) vs. Alice Kryzan (D)
- Florida's 15th congressional district: Dave Weldon: R+4 Bill Posey vs. Steve Blythe (D)
- Ohio's 16th congressional district: Ralph Regula R+4 Kirk Schuring (R) vs. John Boccieri (D)
- New Mexico's 2nd congressional district: Steve Pearce: R+6 Ed Tinsley (R) vs Harry Teague (D)
- Ohio's 7th congressional district: Dave Hobson R+6 Steve Austria (R) vs. Sharen Neuhardt (D)
- Louisiana's 4th congressional district: Jim McCrery R+7 John Fleming (R) and Chris Gorman (R) Paul Carmouche and Willie Banks Jr. Due to the effects of Hurricane Gustav, the state has ruled that the primary runoff will be held on November 4 in place of the general election, with the general election moving to December 6.
- Missouri's 9th congressional district: Kenny Hulshof: R+7 Blaine Luetkemeyer (R) vs. Judy Baker (D)
- California's 52nd congressional district: Duncan Hunter: R+9 Duncan (son of) Hunter (R) vs. Mike Lumpkin (D)
- Illinois's 18th congressional district: Ray LaHood R+9 Aaron Schock (R) vs. Colleen Callahan (D)
- Colorado's 6th congressional district: Tom Tancredo: R+10 Mike Hoffman (R) vs. Hank Eng (D)
- Pennsylvania's 5th congressional district: John Peterson: R+10: Glenn "G.T." Thompson (R) vs. Mark B. McCracken (R)
- California's 4th congressional district: John Doolittle: R+11 Tom McClintock (R) vs. Charlie Brown (D)
- Alabama's 2nd congressional district: Terry Everett: R+13 Jay Love (R) vs Bobby Bright (D)
- Kentucky's 2nd congressional district: Ron Lewis R+13 Brett Guthrie (R) vs. David Boswell (D)
- Mississippi's 3rd congressional district: Chip Pickering R+13 Gregg Harper (R) vs. Joel Gill (D)
- Wyoming's At-large congressional district: Barbara Cubin R+19 Cynthia Lummis (R) vs. Gary Trauner (D)
Which other ones, if any should get some last minute extra support?
To recap Fl-15:
- Open Seat.
- PVI +4R.
- Registration trending Democrat.
- Obnoxious winger opponent.
- Good guy on our side running.
- Big change year national.
- Yet, pretty much being ignored by both Netroots and DCCC.
- Dismissed by standard argument that he could not raise much money on his own, therefore not viable.
- Counter-argument is that is a circular self-fullfilling prophecy, and leads to ignoring good candidates who not either rich or already connected to rich people or corporations; not a good way to get good indepdendent people. Here is his ActBlue page.