“No way any of us can excuse what the president did yesterday… a week after Jim Foley was beheaded"- Peter KingRoland and I have been traveling all over the world for decades. He'd eat grasshoppers, snakes, monkeys and, in Beijing, dog. So when I wondered if I knew anyone who watched the video of Jim Foley's beheading, I asked Roland. "Are you kidding," he declared in disgust. "I'd never watch the savage garbage." OK, so I don't know any friends or family who did. I asked a few congressmembers too and they all said no. I couldn't get an answer from Peter King's office but I bet he did watch it. He's that kind of guy. He's also the kind of guy who gets a free ride to reelection every year. His neighbor and crony, Steve Israel, refuses to allow the DCCC to recruit a candidate against him and when the local Democrats nominate someone, Israel threatens institutional donors and big contributors and does everything he can to undermine the Democrat trying to take on King, despite the fact that redistricting moved King out of most of his Nassau County comfort zone and into Democratic territory in Suffolk County. President Obama won the R+1 district with 51% in 2008 and with 52% in 2012. It's a far better shot for a Democratic pickup than deep red districts in Arkansas Israel is wasting DCCC money on.But the two Long Island crooked pols are both connected to the Mob and both take plenty of cash from the same filthy sources. They have each others' backs. So when King regularly makes a monkey out of himself, there is no one to help local Democrats capitalize on it. Thursday King shot off his trap again: "There’s no way any of us can excuse what the president did yesterday. When you have the world watching… a week, two weeks of anticipation of what the United States is gonna do. For him to walk out-- I’m not trying to be trivial here-- in a light suit, light tan suit, saying that first he wants to talk about what most Americans care about the revision of second quarter numbers on the economy. This is a week after Jim Foley was beheaded and he’s trying to act like real Americans care about the economy, not about ISIS and not about terrorism. And then he goes on to say he has no strategy."King may have not been trying to be trivial, but Peter King is trivial-- and Long Island voters deserve better. But Steve Israel would prefer to FedEx weekly packages of bagels and cream cheese to multimillionaire Sean Eldridge than actually replace a heinous and vulnerable Republican like Peter King, who he brought with him to the schule he ripped off.Pelosi has consistently refused to fire Israel, even after his disastrous defeats in 2012 which resulted in another catastrophic Republican House-- and the last chance for Pelosi to reclaim the Speaker's gavel. Israel has no strategy to win, just a string of light-weight, failed tactics that he tried before and lost with. Steve Israel doesn't have the mental capacity to do anything but take bribes. If he's the chairman of the DCCC for 10,000 years, the Republicans will win the House for 10,000 years.Even Peter King is entitled to a bad fashion decision every now and thenAt least the local Long Island Democrats nominated a candidate, Pat Maher, even if she's being undermined by Israel. There are plenty of incumbents, around 80 of 'em, who are running without major party opponents in November. There are a few states, like California, Louisiana and Washington, where jungle primaries result in two Democrats or two Republicans facing off in November-- like Republicans Clint Didier and Dan Newhouse (WA-04), Republicans Tom McClintock and Art Moore (CA-04), Republicans Steve Knight and Tony Strickland (CA-25), Democrats Mike Honda and Ro Khanna (CA-17), Democrats Zoe Lofgren and Robert Murray (CA-19), Democrats Christina Gagnier and Norma Torres (CA-35), etc-- and then there are districts where incumbents aren't being challenged by the other major party. This is a list, along with each district's PVI:
• Mike Thompson (CA-05)- D+19• Sam Farr (CA-20)- D+21• Adam Schiff (CA-28)- D+20• Janice Hahn (CA-44)- D+32• Juan Vargas (CA-51)- D+16• Ruben Gallego (AZ-07)- D+16• Trent Franks (AZ-08)- R+15• Jim Bridenstine (OK-01)- R+18• Sam Johnson (TX-03)- R+17• John Ratcliffe (TX-04)- R+25• Jeb Hensarling (TX-05)- R+17• Kevin Brady (TX-08)- R+29• Al Green (TX-09)- D+25• Mike Conway (TX-11)- R+31• Joaquin Castro (TX-20)- D+6• Lamar Smith (TX-21)- D+12• Henry Cuellar (TX-28)- D+7• Gene Green (TX-29)- D+12• Eddie Bernice Johnson (TX-30)- D+27• Mark Veasey (TX-33)- D+18• Cedric Richmond (LA-02)- D+23• Charles Boustany (LA-03)- R+19• Steve Womack (AR-03)- R+19• Phil Roe (TN-01)- R+25• Robert Aderholt (AL-04)- R+28• Mo Brooks (AL-05)- R+17• Terri Sewell (AL-07)- D+20• Bennie Thompson (MS-02)- D+13• Ander Crenshaw (FL-04)- R+19• Gus Bilirakis (FL-12)- R+7• David Jolly (FL-13)- R+1• Kathy Castor (FL-14)- D+13• Ted Deutsch (FL-21)- D+10• Mario Diaz-Balart (FL-25)- R+5• Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL-27)- R+2• Lynn Westmoreland (GA-03)- R+19• Hank Johnson (GA-04)- D+21• John Lewis (GA-05)- D+32• Austin Scott (GA-08)- R+15• Barry Loudermilk (GA-11)- R+19• David Scott (GA-13)- D+16• Tom Graves (GA-14)- R+26• Mark Sanford (SC-01)- R+11• Trey Gowdy (SC-04)- R+15• Robert Pittinger (NC-09)- R+8• Bobby Scott (VA-03)- D+27• Bob Goodlatte (VA-06)- R+12• Morgan Griffith (VA-09)- R+15• Bob Gibbs (OH-07)- R+6• Mike Doyle (PA-14)- D+15• Charlie Dent (PA-15)- R+2• Tim Murphy (PA-18)- R+10• Gregory Meeks (NY-05)- D+35• Grace Meng (NY-06)- D+13• Hakeem Jeffries (NY-08)- D+35• Yvette Clarke (NY-09)- D+32• Jerry Nadler (NY-10)- D+23• Charlie Rangel (NY-13)- D+42• Joe Crowley (NY-14)- D+26• Jose Serrano (NY-15)- D+43• Eliot Engel (NY-16)- D+21• Richard Hanna (NY-22)- R+3• Richard Neal (MA-01)- D+13• Jim McGovern (MA-02)- D+8• Joe Kennedy (MA-04)- D+6• Katherine Clark (MA-05)- D+14• Mike Capuano (MA-07)- D+31• Stephen Lynch (MA-08)- D+6
I can understand why a Republican doesn't run against Jose Serrano in the Bronx.The last time the Republicans ran a candidate he got 4,427 votes (3%) to Serrano's 152,661 (97%). Obama also beat Romney with 97% in the district. The PVI is D+43. Similarly, it makes sense that Democrats don't relish running against Mike Conaway in his sprawling, superstitious West Texas district where no Democratic congressional candidates have even gotten to 20% of the vote since Conaway, a pathetic backbencher with zero accomplishments, was first elected in 2004. In 2012 Romney beat Obama there 182,438 (79%) to 45,083 (20%). But if the DCCC can't at least put up a good fight against vulnerable incumbents like Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, Charlie Dent, David Jolly, Richard Hanna and, most of all, Peter King, what are they even doing collecting money from grassroots donors… aside from feathering their own nests?