This morning Doug Kahn did a post at DownWithTyranny which offers a positive step towards making the House Democratic caucus more progressive. He's going to spend $100,000 to help defeat two Blue Dogs between now and election day. If you're not already aware of Doug, he is a former Democratic candidate for Congress, running twice against entrenched far right incumbent Carlos Moorhead in Glendale/Pasadena back in the early 1990s.
Since then he's given a great deal of money to the DCCC, state party organizations, and to DCCC-suggested candidates, a few really good ones (like Darcy Burner) but often to Democrats who have gone on to vote against progressive programs in committees and on the floor, like Heath Shuler (Blue Dog-NC), Jason Altmire (Blue Dog-PA), Melissa Bean (worse than a Blue Dog-IL), Harry Mitchell (Blue Dog-AZ), Zach Space (Blue Dog-OH), etc. He is also helping to run the Blue America Bad Dogs initiative, which is helping to replaced Blue Dogs with progressives-- working towards trading in anti-working family shills like Jane Harman and John Barrow for proven progressive leaders Marcy Winograd and Regina Thomas.
Doug makes the case that the DCCC is working to help elect so-called Democrats who vote with Republicans. Parker Griffith, a slimy Blue Dog from Alabama, is a good example; he recently jumped the fence and officially declared himself a Republican... after spending all of last year on the other side of the aisle voting with Boehner on almost everything contentious. (He voted with the Democrats on naming post offices.) Doug:
The problem is the DCCC, Chris Van Hollen, Patrick Murphy, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Rahm Emanuel. They help Blue Dogs get elected, defend them once they’re in office, and with the assistance of Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer, give these people the best committee assignments. Nobody ever gets thrown off a committee, so there’s only one solution. We have to throw a couple of Dogs out of the House, and scare the rest of them.
That’s the theory, here’s the reality. I spend money on politics. I’m going to personally spend $100,000 before election day 2010 in the districts of 2 Blue Dogs, telling Democratic voters just how badly they’re being represented. That’s a promise.
Just who these Lucky Dogs are going to be isn’t clear yet, but it won’t be a secret. We just have to wait and see who’s vulnerable after Labor Day. Some of the Blue Dogs are going to lose, and lose badly; polling will tell us who they are. There isn’t any point in piling on in these races, and making someone lose worse. We’ll be picking districts that are clearly in play, spending the money where we’ll be going up against the DCCC. Maybe Frank Kratovil (MD-1).
And it’s Blue Dogs only. Any Dog who wants to avoid the attention has options: publicly resign the Blue Dog Caucus by Labor Day, become a Republican, retire from the House, or be losing badly in September.
So which two Blue Dogs? Doug's going to make that call but I'm sure he'd like some advice from this community. He seems to be leaning strongly towards Frank Kratovil (Blue Dog-MD) as one. Kratovil went way beyond just voting against health care reform. This past year, when he was most needed by Democrats-- on substantive votes they either lost or that were very close-- he was with the GOP 75% of the time. He's one of the original Boehner Boys. And he's very vulnerable, having completely turned off and alienated progressives. But perhaps you have a better suggestion? Comments at Doug's story will all be read and I'm sure Doug will read the ones here too. And then there's the poll...