The DCCC has long looked the Republicans for congressional recruits. Rahm Emanuel, Chris Van Hollen and Steve Israel are all guilty of recruiting conservative Republicans to run as Democrats-- almost all of whom joined the Blue Dogs or New Dems and subsequently lost their seats. They lost their seats when Democratic voters realized they'd be sold a bill of goods by the DCCC and then refused to go out too the polls and vote fourths phonies. That they lost their seats-- and drove the Democratic Party into the minority in the House, a minority that could last decades, hasn't slowed the conservaDems down one bit. Steve Israel seems to have persuaded the naive new DCCC chairman, Ben Ray Luján, that this is how Beltway grown-ups are supposed to behave.Right now Chuck Schumer is waging the ugliest and most vicious Senate campaign of the cycle in Florida-- but not against Republicans... against progressive icon Alan Grayson on behalf of "ex"-Republican/New Dem Patrick Murphy, the Wall Street candidate. And, unless you know otherwise, it's almost getting safe to assume that DCCC recruits-- like IA-01 GOPer-turned conservaDem Monica Vernon-- is a DINO. Yesterday Roll Call reported a story in Missouri that's even more complicated and with more twists and turns that most. This time a Republican the DCCC recruited, Eric Greitens, is back to running as a right-wing Republican, which is what he was all along anyway, regardless of the DCCC calling him a Democrat.
Depending on how things shake out, Missouri voters could face a bizarro world next fall: A former Democrat running as the Republican nominee for governor against a Democrat who used to be a Republican.Eric Greitens is part of a crowded and growing field of Republican candidates who will face off next August. As he launched a statewide tour earlier this month, the former Democrat attempted to turn what could be a weakness in the crowded Republican primary into a strength.“I am a conservative Republican, but I didn’t start out that way,” Greitens wrote in a Fox News editorial in mid-July.Greitens, an ex-Navy SEAL turned New York Times best-selling author who has led the veterans advocacy group The Mission Continues, said that Democrats tried to recruit him “several years ago” to run for a federal office.An official at the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee told CQ Roll Call that ahead of the 2010 elections, Greitens met with the committee about running against Rep. Blaine Luetkemeyer, a Republican from mid-Missouri.Ultimately, Greitens told the DCCC no. As he put it, “There was one rather large problem: As I got older, I no longer believed in their ideas.”The flirtation was not Greitens’ first with Democratic politics. Two years earlier, he got in the car with the state’s former Democratic governor, Bob Holden, and drove from St. Louis to Denver to see then-Sen. Barack Obama accept the nomination for president at the Democratic National Convention, Holden said.“He was still just kind of getting his feet on the ground with The Mission Continues and all of that,” Holden told CQ Roll Call, who mentioned that Greitens actually finished one of his books at his cabin near Jefferson City. “Eric has said he leaned toward the Democratic Party. I wish he still did.”
Like many Beltway Democrats from the Establishment, Greitents had nothing but contempt for a progressive vision and for liberals. "I had concluded that liberals aren’t just wrong," he wrote. "All too often they are world-class hypocrites. They talk a great game about helping the most vulnerable, with ideas that feel good and fashionable. The problem is their ideas don’t work, and often hurt the exact people they claim to help... [G]ood intentions are easy. Even easier when you’re spending other people’s money. But they’re not enough. To actually achieve meaningful results, you have to have good ideas, discipline and accountability to go along with it. The problem is that most Democrats seem to think more money and bigger government are the solutions to virtually every single problem. They’re wrong. It’s easy to give people food stamps; harder to get people into good-paying jobs. It’s easy to encourage dependency; harder to help people into a life of purpose and dignity. The worst are politicians who smugly talk about caring for the little guy, and then abandon the poorest, most vulnerable of our children to schools that give them little chance to succeed. That’s not just hypocrisy. It’s a tragedy. I became a conservative because I believe that caring for people means more than just spending taxpayer money; it means delivering results. It means respecting and challenging our citizens, telling them what they need to hear, not simply what they want to hear."That's what the DCCC thought would be a good idea to recruit-- just like so-called "ex"-Republicans Monica Vernon (IA) and Mike Derrick (NY) this cycle. Dozens of former congressional Democrats-- Blue Dogs primarily-- have become Republicans. Steve Israel seems completely comfortable with that. No Republicans or Blue Dogs on this Blue America list, just well-vetted progressive candidates.