The dKos 8 are federal candidates for which the Daily Kos community will help raise money and visibility. Some of these will be in battleground districts, others will be seek to boost marginal candidates, and others will seek to "spread the playing field" and force Republicans to defend seemingly safe seats.
But all of these candidates are proud Democrats, willing to take the battle to the Republicans who have made a mess of our country.
The goal is to gather 1,000 contributions for each of the six targeted House races, and 1,500 contributions for the two targeted Senate races. The amount is not important. What's important is that we all take a role in taking back the country from the Republicans.
Rounding out the endorsement list, the final slot goes to
Jim Newberry running in Missouri's 7th Congressional District.
(Click on image to enlarge.)
This is the home of tourist trap Branson and Springfield. It is the most conservative part of the state. Bush won the district by 27 points. It's like South Dakota. Democrats never win in districts like that. Right?
The district is represented by DeLay's chief lieutenant, Roy Blunt. He has $1.8 million cash on hand, and spends his time raising money for other Republicans. Some examples:
Gerlach, Jim (R-PA) $5,000 (Murphy's opponent)
Diedrich, Larry William (R-SD) $5,000 (Herseth's opponent)
Kerr, Alice Forgy (R-KY) $10,000 (Chandler's opponent)
Musgrave, Marilyn (R-CO) $2,000 (Matsunaka's opponent)
The rest of the list is a virtual who's who of the most endangered Republicans -- like Renzi in AZ, Heather Wilson in NM, Phil Crane in IL, Chocola in IN, Beauprez in CO, etc. $65,000 to Texas Republicans fighting to reap the benefits of redistricting. Throw in a Katherine Harris for good measure, and it's clear we need to pin this guy down. He can still do a lot of damage this cycle.
Blunt is your typical Republican, doing things as inserting provisions helping Phillip Morris into the Department of Homeland Security Bill. Typical Republican corruption, ethical lapses, blah blah blah. I think we've established around these parts that Republicans are bad.
Then there's the issue of Missouri. It's clearly a swing state at the presidential level, but it also has important races for Senate and Governor (where the GOP candidate is Blunt's son). When looking for races were our dollars could have maximum impact, this one really lept out. We're already giving Nancy Farmer help in her Senate run, so let's create a force multiplier -- we'll have two candidates in the state working hard to get Dems to the polls, helping themselves, each other, and John Kerry. I love it.
There's also something invigorating about going after their leadership. The DC Democrats can pore over their little list of "20 targeted races". I want to hit Republicans in the rear lines. And if we hit them in enough places, with ferocious intensity, eventually we're going to bag our own version of Rostenkowski or Foley. Newberry's internal polling indicates the district's voters are in a "throw the bums out" mood.
We're going to bag ourselves a Blunt or a DeLay. I can just feel it...
Finally, the Newberry campaign is everything I hope political campaigns become in the next coming cycles -- a strong commitment to the netroots, aggressive, and responsive to both constituents and activists nationwide looking to help a kindred cause.
Many of you know about Newberry's David and Goliath battle through the, er, somehow-related Stirling Newberry. Stirling has told us why to support his guy (here also). He's solicited advice for text on the campaign's Blogads. He took the $4,000 the campaign raised via Blogads and quickly tripled or quadrupled it by leveraging this new support for additional PAC support. In other words, a model netroots effort managed by a true netroots pioneer.
I love Jim Stork and Lois Murphy and every other Democrat in the top-tier battleground districts, but I live for the hopeless causes. If we take back the House, it is because we will overperform in Republican districts while pinning down the party's chief fundraisers (and I got three of the most effective on our target list -- Blunt, Seemann's opponent Ralph Regula and Tom DeLay).
Thanks to Stirling, we will continue to have a front-row seat to this race. While we have adopted all eight of these candidates, Newberry and Seemann are family. Perhaps that says we are suckers for hopeless causes, but to me, there can be no higher cause than to stick up for family. And there's nothing more gratifying than to see those "hopeless causes" blossom into contenders.
Swing state. Prolific fundraising Republican incumbent in his party's leadership. Great netroots-based campaign run by one of our highest-profile community members. This is truly taking the fight to the enemy.
(Don't forget to add the penny.)