House and Senate Race Roundup

MN-Sen: Garrison Keillor, native Minnesotan and witness to the Republican convention, unloads on Norm Coleman for his enabling of massive contract fraud during the Iraq War.

The Republican, Norm Coleman, has scored points by whooping up a couple of tiny scandalettes - some old jokes that, like a lot of old jokes, aren't so funny, and a tax snafu by some bookkeeper with dandruff on his shoulders - against Democrat Al Franken, which may yet succeed in distracting voters from Mr. Coleman's important role as whistle-plugger in the $23 billion Iraq scandal.

From 2003 to 2006, Mr. Coleman was chairman of the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI), which is responsible for investigating, among other things, "fraud, waste and abuse in government contracting," and on his watch, the subcommittee held no hearings on the disappearance of billions of tax dollars into "reconstruction projects" in Iraq that didn't seem to reconstruct anything whatsoever. Bundles of newly minted $100 bills on pallets in Baghdad that simply vanished. No-bid contracts lavished on people with connections. What may be the biggest case of war profiteering in the history of buzzardry.

His closing graf is even harsher:

The simple truth is that while more than 4,000 Americans gave their lives in the war in Iraq, the war was an enormous financial opportunity for neocons and their friends, and Senator Coleman was a passive observer of one of the biggest heists in history. The cynicism is staggering to the normal person. He was the cop who busted the hot dog vendor for obstructing the sidewalk while the McGurks were cleaning out the bank. This is no joke. A crook is walking around looking for votes. And the truth is marching on.

Is it selling? Check SUSA's approval polling for Coleman:

Approve 44 (48)
Disapprove 51 (46)

Heckuva trend, Normie. In fact, these are Norm's worst numbers ever. I guess accountability for Iraq is important after all.

MT-Sen: GOP candidates like U.S. Senate nominee Bob Kelleher, squaring off against Democratic incumbent Max Baucus, almost make me feel sorry for the Republicans.

Almost.

Kelleher's latest: "I can beat Baucus! Really!"

So far, Kelleher says he's spent about $20,000 on such things as travel to parades and county fairs, a couple of billboards, campaign literature and is making plans to air a few radio ads in the state's biggest cities.

Over the years, the 85-year-old has run for most every office under Democratic and Green party labels, including a failed 1976 presidential run.

This time he thinks he advanced in the primary because voters are ready for a change to a parliamentary government.

Someone should ask the McCain and Obama camps how well "constitutional disaster in switching to parliamentary government" is polling.

NH-Sen: Jeanne Shaheen's latest ad (following up on her excellent "Dig" ad) is another winner:

KY-Sen: The trouble with spending 24 years and four Senate campaigns lying to voters is that eventually, your lies catch up with you. And so it is with Mitch McConnell.

Witness Bruce Lunsford's new ad:

House Races

MN-03: Democrat Ashwin Madia's new ad is dynamite. It's airing on TV, but you'd think it was a Web ad for its focus on new means of communication:

CA-50: Turnabout is fair play, Republicans.

The new TV ad from Democrat Nick Leibham in California's 50th compares Republican Rep. Brian Bilbray to everyone's favorite heiress and political punching bag, Paris Hilton.

Why? Because they both do nothing.

NM-01: Republican Darren White doesn't seem to know what a lobbyist is. From FBIHOP, quoting Steny Hoyer on his recent visit to NM-01 and the Sandia Labs, a nuclear research facility in Albuquerque:

Hoyer also said it was telling that Heinrich chose the location for his event with the House Majority Leader.

...

Of course, the Darren White campaign used the opportunity to pounce on Hoyer (and by extension Heinrich) for the location because of a vote by Hoyer that could have negatively affected New Mexico's national labs.

"Only a slick lobbyist like Martin Heinrich would be cynical enough to use Sandia Labs as a political prop for an event with an ultra-partisan politician who voted to cut $400 million from our national labs and attempted to kill over 3,000 New Mexico jobs," said Communications Director Stephen E. Schatz in a release from the campaign.

So far as we can tell, Martin Heinrich is not a lobbyist.

MO-09: A SurveyUSA poll shows Democrat Judy Baker trailing Republican Blaine Luetkemeyer by 12 points:

SUSA. 9/1-2. Likely voters. MoE 4%

Luetkemeyer (R) 50
Baker (D) 38

Democratic internals recently showed Baker leading, 41% to 39%. Swing State Project's James L. notes one oddity in this poll: McCain appears to be outperforming Bush in the district.

IL-10: ProgressIllinois' Josh Kalven notes that women are not pleased with Mark Kirk's effusive, even sycophantic, praise of Sarah Palin. Excerpted from a letter to Kirk's office signed by 75 women of IL-10:  

We are writing to you to express our disappointment with your effusive praise of Republican Vice Presidential Nominee Sarah Palin. Just one month after you cast a vote against equal pay for equal work, your strong support for Palin demonstrates your lack of interest in standing up for the values of the 10th District.

Soon after John McCain announced that he had chosen Palin to be his vice presidential nominee, you praised her candidacy, saying that you were "encouraged" by her candidacy and that she is a "reformer." To the women of the 10th District, there is nothing encouraging about Palin's extreme political views, including her opposition to  a woman's right to choose even in the cases of incest and rape, equal pay for equal work, and gun control. Nor is her support for abstinence-only sex education, teaching creationism in our schools, and banning books from our public libraries.

Just as we are dismayed by her extreme positions on the issues, we are also offended by the patronizing and cynical view that because she is a woman, she will automatically earn our support. While some of us supported Hillary Clinton's candidacy for President and believed that her election would be a victory for women across the country, Sarah Palin's slim qualifications and radical right-wing views would only set back the causes we hold dear.

As mentioned in the letter, Mark Kirk's record is one of opposing pay equity for women, and his support of a far-right candidate such as Palin is not likely to help.

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