Let me save Pennsylvania for the end, since that's the one with Democrats. Georgia and Kentucky are Republican affairs, although who the GOP voters pick in each state may influence the outcome of the November elections-- and the control of the U.S. Senate. We'll start with Georgia's 7 dwarves running for the open red Senate seat that conservative Democrat, Sam Nunn's daughter, thinks she has a chance to win.
It isn't likely, but New Dem vice chair and EMILY's List fave, Allyson Schwartz, could still win the May 20, Pennsylvania gubernatorial primary-- and equally conservative corporate shill Marjorie Margolies Mezvinsky could win her congressional primary the same day. But that's also unlikely. Both women from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party were dubbed prohibitive frontrunners by the brain-dead Beltway punditry from the outset.
I'm no fan of conservative-leaning New Dem Allyson Schwartz. Earlier today, I mentioned in passing how she was one of the bought-out Wall Street shills who voted with the GOP for Bush's anti-family bankruptcy bill. But there is one area where no one can deny Schwartz's heroic stature and that's when it comes to women's issues. She has been staunchy pro-Choice and a leader in the fight for women's health issues, no small matter.
Disaster in the making?Three weeks from Tuesday is election day in PA-13. Yes, it's the primary for the seat Allyson Schwartz is giving up to run for governor. But the district is such a healthy deep blue-- PVI- D+13; Obama won against Romney with 66%-- that no one doubts that the winner of the primary will be the next Member of Congress from northeast Philly/Montgomery County.
Pennsylvania state Seantor Daylin Leach was one of the first congressional candidates Blue America endorsed this election cycle. He's right up our alley: thoroughly progressive-- and aggressively so-- compassionate, smart, persuasive… and with a record of accomplishment in the legislature that goes beyond promises. So far this cycle 943 Blue America members have contributed $22,462.68 to Daylin's grassroots campaign-- an average of $23.72.
I hate the money game that American electoral politics has devolved into, drowning out ideas and, in too many cases, all agendas and even visions other than those of the donor class. But it's how the Beltway pundits and the mass media view momentum and electability. And, normally, the candidate with the most money wins-- not always, but most frequently.
The biggest wedge issue in the Democratic primary for the blue-blue PA-13 seat Allyson Schwartz is abandoning to run for governor is Social Security. As we explained Monday, Marjorie Margolies has an anti-Social Security record going way back to when she was a crooked, mediocre, one-term ConservaDem a couple decades ago-- and she's still singing the same old Republican austerity song today.
This morning, Vermont Independent Senator Bernie Sanders endorsed a Democrat running for a House seat in Pennsylvania. Senators don't often endorse in House races and almost never endorse in primaries in other states.
In the new ad above, the DCCC-connected SuperPAC, House Majority PAC, quotes AARP about the dangers seniors face if conservatives ever get their way in regard to privatizing Social Security. And they point out that the Republican candidate in the FL-13 special election, for the remainder of Bill Young's term, David Jolly, was a lobbyist who worked to privatize Social Security and who still favors that approach. All true.
Today two more important progressive groups, MoveOn and the Philadelphia Chapter of DFA (Philly for Change), joined Blue America and the PCCC in backing state Senator Daylin Leach in his bid for the open congressional seat (PA-13). In the May 20th primary Daylin will face a crowded field of garden variety Democrats, endorsed by Big Money interests.
