Guess who the DCCC has another free pass for this yearThe DCCC which is positively loathed by the California Democratic Parry county committees is bringing their circus to town-- or at least to Orange County, where the DCCC had been dormant for so long no one knows much about how horrible they are. The DCCC is a completely backward and backward-looking operation. They're continually losing because they continually prepare to fight last cycle's war. Last cycle Hillary won-- or, more descriptive of what actually happened, Trump lost-- every district in Orange County, many for the first time in anyone's memory. But because the DCCC was busy fighting some other cycle's battle, they weren't prepared-- like didn't have any candidates-- and couldn't take advantage of the Trump debacle. In 2012 Romney had beaten Obama countywide 541,592 (53%) to 457,077 (45%). Last year Trump flipped the numbers and turned the county blue. Hillary beat him 556,544 (51.0%) to 472,669 (43.3%).These are the districts either entirely or significantly in Orange County, along with Hillary's winning percentage over Trump:
• CA-39 (Republican Ed Royce)- 51.5- 42.9%• CA-45 (Republican Mimi Walters)- 49.8- 44.4%• CA-46 (Democrat Lou Correa)- 66.3- 27.9%• CA-47 (Democrat Alan Lowenthal)- 62.6- 31.05• CA-48- (Republican Dana Rohrabacher)- 47.9- 46.2%• CA-49- (Republican Darrell Issa)- 50.7- 43.2%
All the Republican congressional districts sent a Republican back to Congress and all the Democratic districts sent Democrats back to Congress. The only close call-- Issa's seat, which is mostly in San Diego County-- would have been won by Doug Applegate had the DCCC jumped in in a timely fashion instead of waiting for Applegate to practically tie it up-- and then start spending large sums in the ineffective ways they always spend-- commissionable TV ads that do nothing but make DCCC cronies rich.Issa spent $6,275,754 for 155,888 votes (50.3%) and Applegate spent $2,041,091 for 154,267 votes (49.7%). The DCCC came in late with 2,501,786 misspent dollars which was added to by Pelosi's House Leadership PAC to the tune of another $991,187, money that would have put Applegate over the finishing line if it was competently spent, especially early on in the cycle when Applegate was struggling financially and the DCCC was laughing at his efforts instead of helping.The DCCC didn't field or back candidates against Royce, Walters or Rohrabacher each of whom, along with Issa, is supposedly a top target in 2018. Royce has no opponent yet although pressure is mounting on Jay Chen who still remembers how the DCCC screwed him when he ran against Royce in 2012. Walters has already drawn 4 opponents, Katie Porter, Kia Hamadanchy, Ron Varasteh, the guy who ran last time, and Dave Min, some crony of Schumer's always the sign of guaranteed disaster in House races. eager beaver conservaDem staffer, Kyle Layman, recruited a typical DCCC "ex"-Republican to run against Rohrabacher, Harley Rouda. A slight looney district-shopper named Boyd Roberts is also running. Layman has had to back away from his "ex"-Republican when his bosses slapped him across the snout with a rolled up OC Register and told him they already have a "surprise" super-star candidate waiting in the wings, stem cell scientist Hans Keirstead.And then Applegate vs Issa, right? Well, normal people would think so. And Applegate is all fired up and ready to go-- Blue America has endorsed him again and you can contribute to his grassroots campaign here-- but then up pops, tired old Ira Lechner. one of Pelosi's sleazy multimillionaire donor buddies asking her to stab Applegate in the back to make room for one of his friends, Mike Levin, a Hillary Clinton bundler. Pelosi said leave it to her. Apparently saner minds at the DCCC have prevailed on her to back off, at least for now. Even Layman is claiming he had nothing to do with Levin (which isn't true).So the DCCC will hobble into the 4 Orange County races, try again in 2 Central Valley races in blue districts (Denham and Valadao) that they always manage to get completely wrong and again in the blue CA-25 district they also are becoming expert in screwing up, with terrible recruitment and stumbling ineffectual follow-up. That's what the L.A. Times was celebrating? A forward-looking DCCC wouldn't just be trying to turn back the clock to 2016 in Hillary districts; they'd also be cultivating candidates to run against Tom McClintock, Paul Cook, Kevin McCarthy, Ken Calvert, Duncan Hunter and the best target of all-- Devin Nunes-- who the DCCC may not be aware represents a California district that could be won with a 2-cycle concerted effort. But they're not-- because Hillary didn't beat Trump in those districts in 2016. They are so fucking lame. The DCCC, wrote Javier Panzar, "will send staffers in charge of overseeing House races in California, Nevada, Oregon and Washington to work out of an Irvine office in an effort to make inroads in Republican strongholds that have traditionally been sure bets for the GOP." The incoherent fool chairing the committee, Ben Ray Luján told the Times the move was made to "be as close to the voters and the campaigns as possible." I wonder if that means they'll lose even worse than usual.So why isn't it completely hopeless? Congressmembers from the West Coast recently elected a non-corpse, Ted Lieu, as DCCC regional vice-chair. If anyone can turn this clown care around, it's Ted.
