New Dem is the opposite of progressiveThe word "progressive" has become fashionable and now anti-progressive politicians are using it. Joe Crowley, Wall Street's conduit to the House Democrats and the reactionary former head of the New Dems is hoping to follow Pelosi/Hoyer as the head of the House Dems. He's a truly disgusting, glad-handing corrupt crud.
The first video is the first TV ad for the Chicagoland district (IL-03) by progressive reformer Marie Newman, the Democrat working to unseat Blue Dog Dan Lipinski, one of the most pro-Trump Democrats in Congress. It's pretty self evident what Marie is doing to create a plausible narrative to replace Lipinski. Recent polling shows that if the messaging in the video gets out to voters in the district, Lipinski will be defeated.
The Illinois primaries are just around the corner-- March 20. In a safely blue Chicago districts like IL-03, where Hillary beat Trump 55.2% to 39.9%-- that's the day the next member of Congress is determined. It's a big deal this year on IL-03 because the extreme right incumbent Democrat, Dan Lipinski, has his first-ever primary challenge.
Last summer we met Jasper Ward and his dad, former Kentucky congressman Mike Ward. Since then Jasper and Mike have been helping progressive candidates around the country-- like Kendra Fershee in West Virginia and Dan Canon in Indiana-- with marijuana legalization messaging.
I don't go in for identity politics at all. Voting for someone because they were born a woman, gay, of any particular religion, Asian or black, for example, is not my cup pf tea. Nor is voting for someone who is a veteran, a scientist, a doctor or part of any age group. Take women. Women make up 51% of the population but just 22% of the Senate and 19% of the House. That's outrageous.
Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) has a great voting record-- pretty much as good as it comes. ProgressivePunch rates her record a strong "A" and she's one of only 6 members of Congress this cycle with 100% scores (along with people like Barbara Lee, Jim McGovern and Jamie Raskin). When it comes to politics, though...
Neither Will Hurd (R-TX) nor Pete Aguilar (New Dem-CA) are very popular in their districts and, frankly, neither deserves reelection. A Democrat is likely to beat Hurd, although the DCCC and the Castro Machine have its fingers on the scale for a worthless Blue Dog in South Texas. And it will take some time before a progressive is in position to primary Aguilar in the Inland Empire. They’re both useless back-benchers from overwhelmingly Hispanic districts and this week they co-sponsored a DACA compromise-- a “discussion draft” ahead of Trump’s January 19 deadline.
Wednesday afternoon the House defeated Texas Democrat Al Green's motion to begin impeachment proceedings against Señor Trumpanzee, 364-58 with 4 Democrats-- Joaquin Castro (TX), Terri Sewell (AL), Carol Shea-Porter (NH) and Marc Veasey (TX)-- voting "present."Generally speaking, it was the progressives who voted to start impeachment proceedings and conservative Democrats like Kyrsten Sinema
When Kirsten Gillibrand first ran for Congress, I used to talk with her frequently. She had me fooled that she was a progressive and Blue America helped her raise money and even got Rickie Lee Jones and the Squirrel Nut Zippers to help us make an ad for her campaign.
Incumbents always-- always-- circle the wagons around other incumbents of their own party who are challenged in primaries. Even when they know the incumbent being challenged is a corrupt bucket of slime bringing disrepute on the party and on Congress, incumbents will turn their backs on worthy challengers. Have any elected officials given Tim Canova a hand against Wasserman Schultz?
