With all the excitement over Alexandria Ocasio's shot at beating Joe Crowley on Tuesday another crucial race that hasn't gotten the kind of traction it deserves is the contest in the Denver suburbs (CO-06), a district that wraps around the city on three sides, from Littleton in the south west, across through Centennial, up through Aurora in the east and then across Brighton in the north. The PVI is a swingy D+2. Obama beat McCain and Romney and Hillary beat Trump 50.2% to 41.3%. So why is a unaccomplished Republican, Mike Coffman, still in office? Have you ever heard of the DCCC, the GOP's most potent weapon?And the DCCC is at it again. They found a really worthless New Dem, Jason Crow, who they're trying to pass off as an attorney who fights for working families. Actually he fights for pay day lenders who are screwing working families. But what's a word or two difference. The tragedy here is that the DCCC, by blatantly backing the conservative hack in the race, has been blatantly undercutting the grassroots progressive, Levi Tillemann.After Hoyer's stunt, Blue America got in touch with Adgreetz, one of the most innovative digital ad agencies in the world, to see if we could help even-out the playing field a little. They haven't worked in the political world but among their current and past clients are Amazon, Google, BMW, Anheuser-Busch, Quaker, Pepsi, Kraft, Disney, HBO, the Wall Street Journal, Acura, NBC, Universal Pictures, ABC, Intel and Toyota.They specialize in very targeted, personalized communications. This one is a video they developed with Levi and have been getting out to likely Democratic primary voters in the district-- in this instance to "someone" named Eric.This similarly personalized GIF was sent via e-mail to all the likely Democratic primary voters in the district; again to "Eric."The company CEO, Eric Frankel, told the company's clients that "the Levi for Colorado personalized messages are a prime example of the positive ways in which data-driven technology can be used in our ever-changing world. This upcoming midterm election is a very important one for the country, and finding smart and innovative ways to cut through the noise of disinformation is paramount... The personalized messaging content was tailored to recipients by name, contribution history and location.Tillemann said that he has been "blown away by the power of the platform and how easy it was for us to build videos that were specifically targeted to each voter. We're looking forward to collaborating with them in the general election."On Wednesday the local Fox affiliate in Denver spotlighted the primary race, Crow, playing the identity politics game-- "I'm a veteran," focusing on me, me, me-- while Tillermann tried talking about what he hopes to achieve for the residents of the district: "I'm the only progressive running in the 6th congressional district."
Tillemann has positioned himself as the most progressive in the race vowing to impeach Trump and vote out Nancy Pelosi as Democratic Leader."I'm the only candidate who is fighting to impeach Donald Trump," Tillemann said.Crow for his part believes the Mueller probe into Trump should be protected but isn't ready to commit to an impeachment vote.Crow believes a challenger to Pelosi should emerge but wouldn't rule out voting for her."I would like to see healthy competition, I got to win my race first," Crow said.On the issues the candidates can appear similar but on health care Crow is for a federal public option to improve health care costs while Tillemann supports Medicare for all.
If you want a status quo, establishment candidate who uses words to hide meanings, Crow is your guy. On the other hand if you prefer a straight-talking agent of change who is addressing many of the same issues Bernie addressed in 2016, Tillemann is the candidate to vote for on Tuesday.
