Building a team for real change starting in 2019- Jenny Marshall with Randy BryceOn Tuesday, Marie Newman gave Blue Dog Dan Lipinski a run for his money. With over 92,000 votes cast, just 2,000 separated them. In the end, Lipinski won the primary, 51.2% to 48.8%, although losing the suburban parts of the district where the Cook County Machine was unable to tamper with results.
As you may know, Blue America has been working with the Greenwave PAC to help candidates campaigning on marijuana legalization with ads like the one above-- and the one below. Progressive candidates campaigning on legalization can be found-- and supported-- by clicking on the Blue America Green Wave thermometer on the right. NORML is also working hard for candidates including legalization in their platforms.
Remember a couple weeks ago there was an amazing legislative seat flip in Kentucky? Democrat Linda Belcher beat Rebecca Johnson for the open state House seat (49th district). On February 20th, Belcher won 68.4% to 31.6% in a district Trump had won 72% to 23% (and which Romney had won 66-33%). That's a really red district and Belcher's 45-point improvement on Hillary’s performance was engineered by a legendary Kentucky political figure, Mike Ward. Ward was Belcher's campaign manager.
Dan Canon is a brilliant, albeit modest and self-effacing guy. He's one of the very best candidates for Congress I've met in years. And, as you may have read here back in December, he's running on a platform that includes marijuana legalization-- in a district that Trump won 61.1-34.2% (albeit a district where Bernie crush Hillary).
Ever notice that corrupt conservatives always seem to support payday lender schemes while progressives fight against them? As soon as Trump appointed Mick Mulvaney acting head of the CFPB-- the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau-- one of his first moves was to stop protecting consumers from predators in the payday lending world.
"How many sats are the Democrats going to pick up in November," one of the savviest campaign managers I know asked me. I don't know, I told him. Between 60 and 70, something like that. "Why are you losing faith?" he asked. "Last time I asked, you said 75." Oh, it could be 75... or 60 or 70 but you're gonna win for sure. He's worried. They're always worried. Good. They need to be.
Last cycle I begged the Congressional Progressive Caucus to not throw south Texas progressive Sonny Palacios under the bus by endorsing hard-core conservative crook Vicente Gonzalez.
On Friday, while the Senate was trying too figure out how to not shut down the government, the House voted to table-- like in kill-- another impeachment resolution. Just so we're all on the same page here, a vote to impeach Trumpanzee is not the same as removing him from office. It just begins the process with hearings and an investigation by the House Judiciary Committee. Why would anyone deny that is warranted.
Bernie, responding to Jeff Sessions push to drag the country backwards on marijuana legalization: "No, Attorney General Sessions. Marijuana is not the same as heroin. No one who has seriously studied the issue believes that marijuana should be classified as a Schedule 1 drug beside killer drugs like heroin. Quite the contrary.
