Sen. Mark Udall
Third Way is supposedly a Democratic organization. Conservative Democratic, to be sure, but not actually Republican. But Lee Fang dug into their records and found that
one of Third Way's fundraising consultants also does a whole lot of work for the Chamber of Commerce. The result:
While the Third Way op-ed made a point of claiming economic progressive economic policies wouldn’t play well with voters in Colorado, in 2008, their fundraisers’ client ran nasty attack ads against a Third Way leader in the state. In 2008, when Third Way co-chair Senator Mark Udall (D-CO) first ran for the Senate, the US Chamber sponsored an advertisement against him on energy policy, declaring, “Every time he’s blocked American energy production, he’s made the tyrants and sheiks happy. But we’ve paid the price.”
Last year, Third Way co-chair Senator Claire McCaskill (D-MO) faced a barrage of attacks from the Chamber. One ad during the election last year instructed viewers, “Call Claire McCaskill. Tell her Missouri doesn’t need government-run health care. Support the repeal. We need jobs!”
This is Third Way in a nutshell: The less-important client of one of the Chamber of Commerce's top lobbying firms. It's pathetic. It's also not a great argument for the media's "centrist Democrats" label for Third Way.