The Staten Island Advance is a lot like Staten Island-- and far more conservative and parochial than NY-11 as a whole, which also includes some relatively enlightened parts of Brooklyn (as well as some equally backward Mafia-oriented neighborhoods, particularly in Bay Ridge). And the district as a whole has been changing demographically as more immigrants move in. In 2008 McCain beat Obama in NY-11, 51-48%.
In the final week of the midterm election cycle, House Republicans are on the offensive and an abysmally-led DCCC is retreating almost everywhere.
everything that's wrong with American politics in one little pictureSteve Israel, Chairman of the DCCC, had managed to keep Fred Upton's blue-leaning district off the radar for years. Even after Obama won the district 184,186 (53%) to 156,835 (45%), Israel stepped in to make sure Upton would have an easy rise to reelection.
Top DCCC recruits who vanished without a trace: Suzanne Patrick, Joe Bock, Jennifer Garrison... so much wasted moneyWith Wall Street banksters flooding GOP campaign coffers with immense amounts of money for last minute TV blitzes in key races, a new NBC/WSJ poll shows a Republican advantage in the midterms.
If Comstock wins in November, Sean Hannity and Steve Israel deserve the creditLast week the NRCC put $605,144 into ads against John Foust, the Democrat running in the open northern Virginia seat from which mainstream conservative Frank Wolf is retiring. The Republican candidate to replace Foust is anything but a mainstream anything.
Last night we took a look at some of the poor schlubbs Steve Israel had recruited to run for Congress and has now abandoned, tainted by his losing strategies and unable to gain any traction on their own.
Starting today, Blue America has a new contributor, Gaius Publius. You may already be familiar with him from his work at AMERICAblog, Counterpunch, Naked Capitalism, Smirking Chimp, and Truthout. He tends to write a lot about the Climate crisis, strategies for progressives in a neoliberal-dominated world, Deep State and wealth capture of the political process. He's welcome to write about any topics he wants here at DWT.
The DCCC is withdrawing from more races. It was inevitable; they recruited the wrong candidates and, in many cases, the wrong districts.
Looks like Sykes won't endorse Rick Scott after all, but he did switch partiesSouthern Democrats are trying desperately to figure out how to balance the electoral need to keep up enthusiasm from African-American voters while distancing themselves from President Obama who is extremely unpopular among instinctively racist Southern whites.
If politics was rational Roll Call's list of the 10 most vulnerable House Members might look very different and possibly include other congressional sociopaths besides Staten Island Mafia thug Michael "Mikey Suits" Grimm. Almost everyone but Grimm on the list-- Carol Shea-Porter excepted-- is just some dull 3rd rate hack backbencher.
