Posts Tagged ‘Congressional District’

CA-11: “Liberal Hunter” Goehring blames YOU!

A little follow-up to a story that just makes you want to smack your head against a wall. Last week, Brad Goehring, a Republican challenging Democratic Congressman Jerry McNerney in California's 11th Congressional District, made what could be described in the best of terms as an unfortunate metaphor:

“If I could issue hunting permits, I would officially declare today opening day for liberals. The season would extend through November 2 and have no limits on how many taken as we desperately need to “thin” the herd.”

But just like so much else with conservatism, it wasn't his fault for advocating politically motivated mass murder. It was your fault for pointing it out. From a email release today:

"Enough is enough," said Goehring. "Attack me, but on the issues.  This is one more example of radical progressives trying to silence dissent through intimidation. I am up for this fight and won't back down because the future of our country is at stake. The far left in this country have gone too far once again.
...
Maybe it's not politically correct but I won't back down for calling for the defeat of as many liberals as possible on November 2nd and stopping their radical agenda."

This is the type of hypocrisy that makes you throw your hands up in the air and say, "I give up." So apparently, saying that liberals should be hunted and shot isn't intimidating, but complaining about it is. It gets better, though:

"They deserve better than having their name slandered because of their German descent, especially in light of their contributions to protecting our liberty and right to speak freely.  I know the radicals will continue to attack me because I am a threat to their big government socialist agenda.  I wear the smears and cheap shots of Daily Kos, Jerry McNerney, the leftist bloggers and Keith Olbermann as a badge of honor."

Hey, Brad...the only thing I ever said was that you should have been a little more careful about advocating murderous purges of political opponents. I'm sorry if you felt smeared.

Read more...

Polling and political wrap-up: 5/15/10

Funny how much smaller the weekend edition of the Wrap becomes when you actually have an edition or two (or four) during the week....

THE U.S. SENATE

CT-Sen: McMahon's curious homage to "Drill, baby, Drill!"
Well, you have to give Connecticut GOP Senate aspirant Linda McMahon scads of credit for timing. In a mailer sent out to Connecticut voters where she chronicles how to get Connecticut's economy moving again. One of her myriad answers: more oil drilling. Leaving aside for the moment that apparently only McMahon believes that the Long Island Sound is the new North Slope, maybe McMahon wanted to wait until BP figures out how to cap their Gulf oil volcano before playing that particular card?

IN-Sen: Indiana Senate battle is now joined--Ellsworth nominated
Less than two weeks after Indiana Republicans settled on their standard bearer (going back to the future in giving the nod to former Senator Dan Coats), Indiana Democrats used this weekend to formally replace retiring Senator Evan Bayh. As has long been expected, Congressman Brad Ellsworth will take the baton for the Democrats. Ellsworth has represented southern Indiana's 8th congressional district since 2006, when he blew out longtime incumbent John Hostettler.

PA-Sen: Tracking poll moves closer to parity in Keystone State
The Muhlenberg tracking poll has bounced around like a cork in a hurricane over the past two weeks, moving from a sizeable Specter lead to a modest Sestak lead and back to a tiny Specter lead. Today, it is essentially tied (PDF file). Specter holds just a one-point advantage over Sestak (44-43) in the new survey. Clearly, this will be the race of the night on Tuesday.

Also, this reminder: I will be previewing all the festivities on Tuesday in a special essay tomorrow morning during Sunday Kos.

THE U.S. HOUSE

OR-01: Primary poll points to Wu-Cornilles showdown
Someone (either the pollster or the television affiliate that sponsored the poll) must think that there might be a sleeper race in November in the great Northwest. That is the only justifiable reason why SurveyUSA decided to poll the primary elections in Oregon's 1st Congressional District, held rather easily for over a decade by Democrat David Wu. Wu is the sure victor on the Democratic side, but there is a semi-competitive primary on the Republican side. Sports business consultant Rob Cornilles (the establishment choice in the race) leads mortgage broker (and teabagger) John Kuzmanich by a 31-19 margin, with several other candidates further behind.

PA-04: Buchanan stumbling to finish line; ripe for the upset?
Former U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchanan was considered a tier-one recruit when she agreed earlier in the year to challenge sophomore Democratic Rep. Jason Altmire. Instead, her campaign has been mildly disastrous, and it is only getting worse. Buchanan's campaign has been hamstrung by repeated blows landed by GOP opponent Keith Rothfus, who is charging her with (ta-da!) insufficient conservatism. Yesterday, Buchanan went for a counterpunch, and failed miserably. She distributed copies of a printout which she claimed proved that Rothfus had been a Democrat for 13 years. The problem: the "evidence" proved nothing of the sort. All it proved was that Rothfus had been a Democrat at the time of the printout (something that he had already copped to, in an effort to keep Ed Rendell from being the gubernatorial nominee in 2002). This comes on the immediate heels of Buchanan getting dinged for using an NRA logo (presumably to imply an endorsement) without the organization's permission.

PA-12: Critz wins newspaper primary as race enters final weekend
We won't know until Tuesday evening whether Democrat Mark Critz will follow his former boss (the late Rep. John Murtha) into Congress. What we do know, however, is that Critz is the victor in the newspaper endorsement primary. Critz has earned the endorsement of virtually all of the district's newspapers. The sole exception: the right-wing Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, which endorsed Critz's Republican opponent, Tim Burns.

THE GUBERNATORIAL RACES

AL-Gov: Dueling endorsements add intrigue to Democratic primary
Give Artur Davis credit for rapid response. Friday, Davis rolled out endorsements from two of the most prominent names in African-American politics. Both Congressman John Lewis (D-GA) and Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-IL) endorsed Davis' gubernatorial campaign. This came a day after two prominent African-American organizations in Birmingham (the Jefferson County Progressive Council and the New Jefferson County Citizens Coalition) had endorsed Ron Sparks for Governor, in part because of Davis' health care vote and in part because Davis had refused to meet with them.

Meanwhile, over on the GOP side of the gubernatorial fence, a new poll out from Baselice Associates hints at a two-man race for the nomination. The poll has Bradley "Don't Call Me A Believer in Science, Dammit" Byrne leading Tim "Son of Fob" James by a single point (24-23). Judge Roy Moore, somewhat surprisingly, has lost a bit of ground, running third with 18% of the vote.

FL-Gov: Famous name could complicate Democratic primary
Less than a month after Republican frontrunner Bill McCollum's path to the nomination got waylaid by the late candidacy of hospital mogul Rick Scott, Democratic frontrunner Alex Sink got some surprising news of her own: she, too, might have a high-profile primary challenger. In Sink's case, the potential challenger is Lawton "Bud" Chiles III, the son of the former Governor who served during much of the 1990s. While there had been some intraparty grumbling about Sink's campaign, her position had improved substantially over the past month or so, and she was now within striking distance of McCollum and slightly ahead of Scott.

NY-Gov: The longest exploratory period ever due to end?
After what seems like several years as a presumed-yet-undeclared candidate, it now looks like we are just a few weeks away from an Andrew Cuomo gubernatorial announcement. Teagan Goddard cites a Bloomberg report, which states that Cuomo will announce sometime around the end of this month, probably coinciding with the state Democratic Convention.

PA-Gov: Stagnation on Dem side heading into final weekend
The field appears to be frozen in the Democratic primary to replace Governor Ed Rendell, and that is good news for Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato. According to this morning's (PDF file) Muhlenberg tracking poll, Onorato still holds a substantial lead (38-14) over Philly-area state senator Anthony Williams, with Joe Hoeffel and Jack Wagner further back. In other Keystone State gubernatorial news, Dan Onorato picked up a trio of endorsements in the Lehigh Valley on Friday, including the endorsement of Bethlehem Mayor John Callahan, who is the likely Democratic nominee to challenge Charlie Dent in the 15th district.

THE RAS-A-POLL-OOZA

(Awesome new title for this segment courtesy of Mark27)

The House of Ras closes the week issue-heavy, rather than campaign heavy. The end result--just a pair of new states get covered by the monstrously prolific pollster. In California, we will be waiting on the gubernatorial numbers, but we have some interesting Senate numbers to tide us over. And Idaho is Idaho, which is not necessarily good news for Democrats.

CA-Sen: Sen. Barbara Boxer (D) 42%, Tom Campbell (R) 41%
CA-Sen: Sen. Barbara Boxer (D) 46%, Chuck DeVore (R) 40%
CA-Sen: Sen. Barbara Boxer (D) 45%, Carly Fiorina (R) 38%
ID-Gov: Gov. Butch Otter (R) 54%, Keith Allred (D) 32%
ID-Sen: Sen. Michael Crapo (R) 66%, Tom Sullivan (D) 22%

Read more...

“Operation chaos, Utah-style”

Chaos!

Some Utah Republicans who harbor hopes of taking a congressional seat that a Democrat has held for a decade are raising the possibility of crossing over to vote for the candidate they perceive as the weakest in the Democrats' open primary.

And of course, who is leading the charge? Carl Wimmer, Republican Representative from Herriman and all around asshole:

"OK. Time for operation chaos, Utah-style. Utah Democrats have an open primary election, so EVERY Republican in the Utah 2nd Congressional District needs to go and vote for Claudia Wright against Matheson. She is very liberal, and would give Morgan Philpot an almost certain victory in that district."

But when Wimmer was called out for being, you know, an asshole, he was all mea culpa:

Wimmer said in a  Tribune  interview he meant his comment as a "parody" riffing on the Limbaugh strategy.

"It was an error in judgment," Wimmer said. "I did not think it would have the effect that it did. ... It's something that I do not condone and something that I wish I had not posted."

Yeah, it's not like he expected anyone to actually listen to him or anything.

So then he updated his Facebook page:

"Let me be VERY clear so there is no misunderstanding. I do NOT advocate voting in anyway other than as your PRINCIPLES dictate. I vote by principle in the legislature, and expect you to do the same at the ballot box. I believe Morgan Philpot can win against either Democrat this year!"

And then again:

I apologize for my post about "operation chaos." I have removed it from my page to show that I have recognized my mistake, along with the unintentional tone in which it was made. I am humbly reminded of the careful and professional manner in which I, as a representative ought to conduct my dealings. I have strived to m...ake a reputation for myself of being principled, and do not advocate cross-over voting.

Oh yeah. He's so principled.

Read more...

Jon Runyan, Ex-NFL Player, Leaks Own Campaign Dirt After Drunk Driving Revelations

MOUNT LAUREL, N.J. — As far as skeletons in the closet go, Wednesday's revelations about ex-NFL lineman and current congressional candidate Jon Runyan aren't campaign-killers: He was late on some property tax payments and has been sued i...

Read more...