I realize everyone’s “Hey, Paul, Hey Paul, Hey Paul, let’s have a ball”, but the Senate and House are also important, and there were two important Senate primaries last night.
The good news is that WWF’s own Linda MacMahon beat moderate Chris Shays for the Connecticut Senate primary, which immediately made Rep Chris Murphy the odds-on favorite to win that seat. The bad news is that none of the teabaggers beat Tommy Thompson in Wisconsin, so Tammy Baldwin will have a tougher fight to win that open seat. Connie Mack won in Florida, which was expected, so Bill Nelson now has his challenger.
There were also some fights in House primaries in Florida, but as far as I can tell, they were in pretty safe Republican seats. The news of the night is that Cliff Stearns apparently lost to his teabagger challenger, a veterinarian who’s never held office.
Waynski
Nice Pixies reference, mistermix.
Steve
Pixies, fuck yeah. I sure see a lot of Linda McMahon ads on TV, here in the nation’s most expensive advertising market. But if her money couldn’t beat Dick Blumenthal (in a Republican wave year) then I don’t see why it should beat Chris Murphy either.
By the way, in a 2-way race isn’t “odds-on favorite” redundant?
Peregrinus
The Thompson thing worries me. For some reason I’d forgotten he was running for the seat (this was weeks ago; I remembered last week) and thought it might be an easy pick-up.
BruinKid
Very bad news, the Republican judge in Pennsylvania has refused to block their voter ID law. It will be appealed, but as Kay mentioned yesterday, it looks like it’s all going to come down to Castille now.
Punchy
A veterinarian can be a teabagger? I thought vets had to have empathy, feelings, and a sense of helping others who are too sick or animalish to speak for themselves. Sigh.
Brian R.
@Punchy:
He probably specializes in putting pets to sleep.
Linda Featheringill
By my calculation, the Dems need to flip 26 House seats from Republican to Democratic in order to gain a mere majority in the House. DCCC is targeting 40-some-odd of those seats and looking with interest at another dozen seats. I read that they have started a robocall campaign against 50 Republican reps, focusing on the proposed damages to Medicare in the Ryan budget [that said Republican voted for].
There are probably some folks scouring the countryside for more seats that Dems might capture.
These down-ticket contests really matter, especially since it looks like it’s possible to take back the House and hold the Senate.
gogol's wife
I’m sorry, but Linda Mac Mahon winning anything is not good news. She shouldn’t be able to win the race for dogcatcher.
Betty Cracker
@Brian R.: LMAO!
PaulW
Stearns LOST?! (EDIT: it seems to be a close finish with uncounted ballots left to go with Yoho holding a slight lead. Wait… he’s losing to a guy named Yoho?!?!)
I lived in Gainesville a few years back. I attended a public hearing he was holding to see if there was a chance I could ask a question about the Republicans’ failure to balance a budget they controlled from 2001 to then. It turned out the entire focus of his gathering was to rail against illegal immigration, complete with a poorly-designed PowerPoint presentation that kept looping in the background while he tried to keep the audience distracted with a rambling improvised speech. I left about ten minutes in, disgusted by the disorganized mess.
I would have assumed that Stearns was perfect for the Tea-Bagger base. I should know better to never assume…
There better be a Democrat running in that district.
beltane
@PaulW: No matter how crazy a Republican is there will always be another Republican who is crazier and further to the right.
Mike in NC
@Brian R.:
Yeah, our current state senator is also a GOP wingnut veterinarian with a horrible voting record. Figured he got bored castrating cats and dogs and wanted to move on to screwing over people.
gvg
There is a fanatic who hates Cliff Stearns in Waldo florida who has been urging Democrats to change party in order to primary Cliff Stearns. The Dems I know were not too interested but maybe he had an impact.
I do not know why he hated Stearns. Its the guy who for 20 or more years as been painting weekly signs that were mostly funny warning about the Waldo speed trap and posting them in his yard on the main street of Waldo. About 2 years ago he started painting really vicious signs about Stearns-so much so that I discounted them as being irrational.
I had not thought there was any chance a 20 year guy could lose the election and didn’t hear any polling that predicted this.
The accusations were about corruption, sellouts and too long in Washington.
Davis X. Machina
@BruinKid: They’ll delay the decision, hold the election with the new ID law in place, then find for plaintiffs.
This way you can hand the state to Romney. then announce that hey, sorry, justice has been done, but because the election’s come and gone, there is no comfortable remedy, because a do-over’s too expensive, and multiple elections calls into question the democratic process….
BruinKid
@PaulW: There is, J.R. Gaillot, a political consultant whose father was a Haitian diplomat.
Valdivia
@BruinKid:
do we know when the Court will release their opinion? Do they get to argue the case again?
bemused
@Punchy:
Never take your pet to a tea party veterinarian. We have a local husband and wife team, Baptist, evidently very conservative Baptist because they don’t believe in evolution and think the earth is 3,000 years old. After all that sciencey schooling too, go figure.
True story: A client came into their waiting room and saw a dog lying on a blanket and she thought it was a little odd they would have a sedated dog coming out of anesthesia there instead of in a kennel in the back. She learned it wasn’t a sedated dog but a dead dog. They hadn’t had time to move the dog but weren’t a bit concerned about it being there in the waiting room in the first place or the impression it would make on pet owners.
Schlemizel
What scares me about some of the teabaggin whackos is that one or two will most likely sneak through. In Congress they may only be a minor annoyance and provide cover for the less insane (but still completely crazy) bits of the GOP that pretend to be moderate. If any of these get to the Senate however they can really gum up the works with holds and all the other perks 1/100th of some states nutbag hold.
Even if the Dems take back the House & gain in the Senate (probably more so if they do) these cockroaches will see a need to destroy the country in order to save it.
S. Holland
@gogol’s wife: Couldn’t agree more..she’s a real piece of work! I live in CT and she is running ads day & night! Spending a fortune…and it’s too bad about Shays..he wasn’t bad.
maurinsky
An acquaintance of mine who is not really politically aware liked Linda McMahon’s facebook page, which showed up in my news feed. The bad news for Linda McMahon is that the comments on the posting were almost entirely negative. Last time she ran, we Connecticutians were buried in mailers, and there is media focus on how much she’s spending to be elected – she’s up to spending $62 million dollars.
Her ads are infuriating, btw, because there are several about how she used welfare and state aid at various points in her life, while she’s a member of the party that wants to prevent other people from having access to that same aid. Galling.
Quincy
Thompson winning Wisconsin is a problem. Baldwin’s really good, after Warren she’s the senate candidate I’m pulling for hardest. Hanging on to the senate is much harder if we don’t keep Kohl’s seat. We can’t afford to have 2 Republican senators in states like WI. The Walker recall folks need to get out the vote something huge in November
Gus
State lege votes are important too. A moderate Republican in Mpls exurbs (by today’s standards) who didn’t support right to work and same sex marriage amendments was ousted in his primary by a tea bagger. Not sure what that portends for that district, though I suspect that anyone with an R after her name will win. Minnesota, home of moderate Republicans like Harold Stassen and Dave Durenberger is polarizing big time.
Steve
@gogol’s wife: Anyone can win a Republican primary these days with enough money and a right-wing agenda. Is Linda McMahon really a more ridiculous candidate than Christine O’Donnell?
To think that New England Republicans were once considered moderates.
BGK
Cornelius MacGillicuddy IV (Connie Mack) is like a fscking cancer on my district. I was afflicted with his father for many years as a representative, then as a senator. After an only comparatively sane interregnum of Port-hole “[s]omebody sends me a blue dress and some DNA, I’ll have an investigation” Goss (also too his son was running in the primary for Mack’s seat), we got the wastrel son. He’s most notable for not having a residence in the district and spending most of his time snogging Sonny Bono’s widow.
A truly moronic teatard won the Republican primary for Mack’s now-vacant seat. His Democratic opponent, Jim Roach, is a truly decent and qualified man who would, in a just world, win in a blowout. With a little outside dough he could do wonders. No doubt the DCCC will ignore him as not serious enough.
CT Resident
Anyone who has not undergone a Linda McMahon campaign cannot understand the sheer volume of media noise she produces on the daily basis. I get a mailer from her at least four times a week, and she’s on the TV at every commercial break. Having to listen to her nasal twang say “I’m Linda McMahon and I approve this message” six or seven times an hour is maddening.
maurinsky
McMahon is actually pretty moderate for a Republican – she includes that she is pro-choice in her mailing information. But who cares? If you are a Republican seeking national office, you have to bow down to the crazies once you get there if you want to have any power. The only answer is to not vote for Republicans, ever/
Water balloon
You forgot to mention Alan Grayson engineered a weak Republican opponent in Florida’s ninth district. Some very effective Dem ratfvcking there.
Gus
@maurinsky: Yeah, I was thinking the same about Tommy Thompson. I figure he’ll win, but at least he’s an old-style Republican. I can’t believe I’m feeling almost nostalgic about a guy who served in the Bush administration. And of course he’ll toe the party line as soon as he’s elected.
Calouste
@Steve:
The combined odds always add up to a number lower than one (the difference is the bookie’s profit). So in a close race you can have one candidate at evens and the other at 5/6 or so.