Blue America's operating plan for 2017-18 is based on 2 simple premises-- first that Trump will be the worst and most destructive and hated president in history, and second, that Ryan, McConnell and the Republican Congress will drastically overreach, cement themselves to him, and make themselves vulnerable to a massive backlash in the 2018 midterms.I spend a significant part of my days-- every day-- on the phone with pers
Let me start by saying it's not a conspiracy. It's just that all the Beltway types live in the same bubble. So when, for example, Cook does their House ratings, they don't look further than the districts the DCCC and NRCC have identified as battlegrounds. Media follows along happily and a kind of a prophecy starts becoming self-fulfilling.
When Doug Applegate came for his Blue America interview, he brought his campaign manager, Robert Dempsey, the guy who ran Bernie's very successful Minnesota campaign-- where Bernie beat Hillary 118,135 (61.6%) to 73,510 (38.4%), winning every single congressional district in the state.
Thursday night, after Senator Mark Kirk (R-IL), one of the first high-ranking Republicans to disavow Trump, flubbed his debate with Democratic challenger Tammy Duckworth-- and flubbed it spectacularly. Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Con-Man immediately tweeted some Schadenfreude his way.
Democrats have labored for years and years and years trying to get California Hispanics registered to vote in greater numbers. Want to know why? Simple-- there are 8 Republican-held congressional districts in the Golden State with immense numbers of unregistered Latinos-- over a third of the potential voters. Like these:
How do you know which congressional candidates-- often without records, or without easily accessible records-- you should vote for? Many people just base it on party ID. People who identify with the Democratic Party, for whatever reason, vote for Democratic candidates and people who identify with the Republican Party, vote for Republican candidates. I bet that accounts for upwards of 70% of the electorate.
The election is still 12 days away and the Republican Civil War over Trump is getting out of control. Fox News reported that the head of the ticket has now stopped doing fundraising events for the party.
In his Atlantic column on Sunday, David Frum dealt with the lesser-of-two-evils elections concept from a Republican perspective. "You don’t vote to send a message," he wrote. "You vote to choose a president... Look at how she’s coped with that maniac Trump on the debate stage. Couldn’t have been cooler. Despite yourself, you’ve been impressed.
