Tag: Elections

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LitPAC: Reading Repugs Out of Office

Buck Banks

Mighty, mighty pen: LitPAC is a coalition of authors that is planning a series of readings around the country to register voters and raise money for liberal candidates in the upcoming congressional elections.

Among those involved are Dave Eggers (“A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius,” McSweeney’s Internet Tendency), Jane Smiley (“Horse Heaven,” “Thousand Acres”) and Daniel Handler, aka “Lemony Snicket.”

‘We’re not George Soros; we’re not going to make a massive impact’ — Stephen Elliott

“We feel we can raise $75,000 in hard money for congressional candidates, at $5,000 apiece,” says LitPAC executive director Stephen Elliott, who has written four novels and a political memoir, “Looking Forward to It.”

“We’re not George Soros; we’re not going to make a massive impact. But if you ask any non-incumbent candidate if $5,000 is a big chunk of money, they’ll tell you it’s a very big chunk of money.”

Other LitPAC authors include Mary Gaitskill, whose “Veronica” was a finalist for the National Book Award, Tobias Wolff (“Colected Stories,” “This Boy’s Life”), Rick Moody (“Garden State,” “The Diviners”) and Anthony Swofford (“Jarhead : A Marine’s Chronicle of the Gulf War and Other Battles.”)

What’s interesting to me is these authors are, except for Swofford, not overly political in their writing. They certainly are not militants. But it’s still way cool that they are doing this, so if they come to a bookstore or school near you, go.

The Arnold Show: Why Mavericks Cannot Govern

Jon Ponder

The governorship of Arnold Schwarzenegger here in California — like that of Hulk Hogan, er, Jesse Ventura in Minnesota — is more proof that political careers based solely on the whimsy of egomaniacs are generally doomed to failure:

“Haven’t you been listening to me? In Hollywood, I would know how to deal with this. I would bring someone in from the outside to get it done. Do I have to do that here?”
— Gov. Schwarzenegger

So far, a durable governing coalition has eluded him. Schwarzenegger has chalked up many of his troubles in office to the power of special interests and legislators resistant to reform. But insiders say his policy setbacks and slide in the polls may also owe to stubbornness, a taste for flashy Hollywood-style — but politically unrealistic — moves and a naivete about politics in general.

What is not a surprise, of course, is that the movie star turned governor is a diva. When his former chief of staff, Patricia Clarey, tried to disusaude him from pursing the disastrous special election last year, he barked:

“Haven’t you been listening to me?” Schwarzenegger said, according to one person who was present. “In Hollywood, I would know how to deal with this. I would bring someone in from the outside to get it done. Do I have to do that here?”

Of course, after the special election failed resoundingly, he still blamed Clarey:

He wasn’t always nice about it. On a post-election trip to China, the governor left Clarey to commercial flights and press buses while his personal financial advisor traveled as a member of his inner circle, flying on Schwarzenegger’s jet and dining with him and [Schwarzenegger’s wife, former journalist Maria] Shriver.

Schwarzenegger complained privately that he didn’t like “hanging with” Clarey, and criticized her in front of colleagues. Other aides would join him for lunch; she wasn’t invited. In a final rebuke, Schwarzenegger replaced the Republican Clarey with a Democrat.

Governor, I beseech you: Resign now. You can be back on the set of “Terminator 4” or whatever on January 2, 2007. It’s a win-win-win for you, the Democratic majority in the state and its citizenry.

Another Rove Error: Frist Flames Out

Jon Ponder

Kittens’ karma: Republican Sen. Bill Frist of Tennessee was appointed to Majority Leader of the Senate by White House political director Karl Rove in 2003, after Sen. Trent Lott of Mississippi made a racist remark.

“I hear he was a pretty good surgeon,” a Republican Senator said last week when I asked how Frist had been as majority leader.

The appointment of Frist (who was, of course, “elected” by a majority of Republican senators who knew that defying Rove would be political suicide) was a move to put a reliable White House stooge in charge of the Senate.

Now Frist’s leadership is going down in flames, but, so far, hardly anyone is connecting the dots between Frist’s incompetence and the Bush’s “Boy Genius” who engineered his accession:

Frist, once esteemed as a citizen-politician, a heart- and lung-transplant surgeon who spent part of each year donating his services in the most desperate parts of Africa, has transformed himself into the ultimate political opportunist. His moves—like last week’s ludicrous attempt to hijack the Senate’s immigration debate and move it in a punitive, populist direction—have been so clunky that he has lost the respect of his colleagues, especially Republicans. (The Democrats are thrilled by his ineptitude.) “I hear he was a pretty good surgeon,” a Republican Senator said last week when I asked how Frist had been as majority leader.

Next up, watch the wheels will come off Dr. Frists’s quixotic bid for the presidency:

Frist will leave the Senate at the end of the year and start his presidential campaign. “He’ll disappear,” said a Republican consultant. “He’s not built for heavy weather. He’s just not an instinctive politician. And when you’re a light candidate, every maneuver seems naked and tactical. With Frist, it’s been college Republican sort of stuff.”

Last One Out of the Harris Campaign, Please Turn Out the Light

Jon Ponder

Saturday mutiny: The floundering campaign of Rep. Katherine Harris, a Republican, to take the seat of Florida Sen. Bill Nelson, a Democrat, took a triple hit yesterday when four top advisers resigned:

Congresswoman Katherine Harris’ U.S. Senate bid suffered a surprising setback Saturday with the resignation of her campaign manager, press secretary, media consultant and outreach director.

“I didn’t know I was going to get the knives in my back from my own party, and I’ll be honest, it’s infiltrated my campaign staff.”
— Harris

“I was told if I didn’t get out of the race, I would have an April surprise,” Harris said at a meeting at the First Baptist Church of Cocoa Beach, where she met with about 50 Brevard County Republican stalwarts Saturday morning. She said she could not verify who warned her.

“I didn’t know I was going to get the knives in my back from my own party, and I’ll be honest, it’s infiltrated my campaign staff . . . For too long, we have been undermined by people in our own party and staffers in our own campaign.”

Harris said campaign manager Jamie Miller, campaign spokeswoman Morgan Dobbs, director of field operations Megan Ortagus and media consultant Adam Goodman have been replaced by people who will be publicly announced next week.

“We have real professionals coming on board,” Harris said.

Former campaign manager Jim Dornan, who resigned in November, disagreed.

“She had the best people in the country. This is a campaign that is spiraling downward by the minute and the smartest thing for her to do would be to get out of the race,” Dornan said. “Katherine’s trying to run it and a candidate can’t run her own campaign. It’s foolish for her to try.”

The resignations follow a half-dozen others from Harris’ campaign in recent months.

“I don’t think we’ve ever had anything quite like it,” said David Colburn, a history professor at the University of Florida and the author of several books on Florida politics. “I can’t help thinking what the Republican Party is going to do.”

Meanwhile, recent polls show that the incumbent, Sen. Bill Nelson, a Democrat, maintains a healthy lead:

Nelson, who was targeted by the White House as one of five “red state” Democrats who might be toppled, remained above 50 percent [at 51 percent] in the Mason-Dixon Florida Poll.

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Former Reaganite Jim Webb Running as a Dem Against Sen. Allen in Virginia

Jon Ponder

Jim Webb has been on my radar since he was Secretary of the Navy in the Reagain Administration. At the time, he seemed to me to be a rare honest broker in administration full of connivers. (What gentlemen they were compared to the Bush crowd.)

Now he’s running against uber-rightwinger incumbent George Allen for a U.S. Senate seat in Virginia. Because Allen is such an odious Bushite and since he plans to run for the prsidency in 2008 from his senate seat (and you gotta wonder how Virginians feel about that), an upset here would be — and I use this word advisedly — thrilling.

If it can be done, it wouldn’t surprise me that Webb could do it. He has also hired the new wunderkind of political consulting, Mudcat Saunders and Steve Jarding, who helped get Mark Warner elected governor of Virginia.

And he has the endorsement of Gen. Wesley Clark, who is one of the very few politicians I trust.

Here’s what he said about his campaign in an March 14, 2006, interview with Markos Moulitsas Zúniga, founder of DailyKos:

WEBB: We’re running on four themes, and the first one is to re-orient our national defense to a more traditional set of policies that truly relate to defending our interests abroad. I believe the Iraq War was a serious strategic error that has cost the nation a great deal in terms of blood, treasure and international respect. At the same time I am a realist when it comes to the legitimate need to defend our interests. These needs are sometimes strategic, and in rare instances (e.g., now, the need to root out international terrorism) related to direct combat. We need to begin a careful withdrawal from Iraq. The first step in doing so involves a clear signal to the region that we have no long-term interests in that country.

Read the interview here.

Prediction: Al Gore Will Be Elected President in 2008

Jon Ponder

I am not an Al Gore fan. I couldn’t wait to vote against him in the 1988 primaries. I was then, and still am, a Bob Kerrey fan because I like my liberal pols to be tough, smart and aggressive.

I hold Gore responsible for one of the greatest travesties of the modern era: the Bush presidency.

I had my doubts about Bill Clinton in 1992, thought he was too malleable. And my heart sank when he picked Gore as his vice president. But as the Clinton presidency unfolded, with each new fake scandal trumped up by wingnut whackjobs, and with every successful policy initiative, I became a Bill Clinton fan. (Hillary, not so much. As I said here, I just can’t understand why Republicans are so provoked by such a bland, middle-of-the-roader.)

In 2000, I wondered if Gore could pull off picking up the Clinton mantle. The campaign — under the leadership of GOP-appeaser Bob Shrum (who also ran Kerry’s campaign) — was awful, and I believe the Gore team bungled the Florida recount. I hold Gore responsible for one of the greatest travesties of the modern era: the Bush presidency.

Nonetheless, it appears to me now that the 2008 election is Gore’s to lose, and here is why:

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GOP Rival Claims Hillary Is Spying on Her in Helicopters

Jon Ponder

I will never understand why Hillary Clinton brings out the worst in Republicans. The liberal concensus is that she is a rather bland but relatively effective middle-of-the-road politician. (I don’t know anyone personally who thinks she ought to be the next president.)

In any case, her reelection as senator appears to be a shoe-in, if this nutcase is the best Karl Rove can come up with:

A Republican challenger to Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton is bizarrely claiming that the former first lady has been spying in her bedroom window and flying helicopters over her house in the Hamptons, witnesses told The Post yesterday.

“Hillary Clinton is really worried about me, and is so worried, in fact, that she had helicopters flying over my house in Southampton today taking pictures.”
– KT McFarland

Former Reagan-era Pentagon official Kathleen “KT” McFarland stunned a crowd of Suffolk County Republicans on Thursday by saying:

“Hillary Clinton is really worried about me, and is so worried, in fact, that she had helicopters flying over my house in Southampton today taking pictures,” according to a prominent GOP activist who was at the event.

“She wasn’t joking, she was very, very serious, and she also claimed that Clinton’s people were taking pictures across the street from her house in Manhattan, taking pictures from an apartment across the street from her bedroom,” added the eyewitness, who is not involved in the Senate race.

Suffolk County Republican Chairman Harry Withers, who hosted the reception in East Islip, confirmed McFarland’s paranoid statements.

“Yes, she said that,” Withers told The Post.

CA Governor’s Race: Westly Leads in Fundraising

Jon Ponder

California State Controller Steve Westly, a founder of E-Bay, has considerably more campaign funds in the bank than the other candidates for governor this year, including Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, according to John Mercurio of the Hotline, via C-SPAN Washington Journal this morning.

Westly reports that he as $23 million in campaign funds. His Democratic rival, State Treasurer Phil Angelides has $14.6 million.

Governor Schwarzenegger reports $5.2 million in his campaign coffers. He raised over $2 million at an event in Beverly Hills this week, at which Sen. John McCain was the headliner.

Angelides has the endorsements of California’s Democratic Party establishment, including senators Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer.

Westly and Angelides square off in primary elections in June.

GOP House Retirements Favor Dem Control in November

Jon Ponder

So many rats, such a large iceberg, so little time:

Primary filing deadlines will have passed in about half of all congressional districts by late April, and it will then be clear whether Republicans face a wave of retirements, said Amy Walter, House editor of the Cook Political Report. Nineteen House Republicans retired in 2004.

Democrats now hold 201 House seats and need 218 to regain majority control. Boehlert’s and 10 of the other seats that Republican incumbents are abandoning are rated as “competitive,” according to the Cook Report.

Expecting a favorable political environment in part due to the president’s falling popularity, Democrats believe they can retain almost all of their present seats and knock off at least five to 10 Republican incumbents in closely divided districts or where scandal allegations are a factor. Still, to take control, Democrats may have to win as many as a dozen of the seats held by retiring Republicans.