Irish Blogging

Am currently in Dublin, catching up on a few days' worth of email. I'm heading to Belfast soon, and should arrive by late in the afternoon. Expect more details of my trip and photos in the days ahead.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

PS - Here's a joke I heard while sightseeing.

What's the difference between God and Bono?
God doesn't walk around pretending to be Bono.

Under New Management: Election '06 Post-Mortem

After a long night and the dust finally settled, Democrats took control of both the House and the Senate. The message from voters was loud and clear: "Throw the bums out." Here's my analysis of what happened during the election and why.

I. Voters Don't Like Crooks
Democrats had seized on corruption as an issue beginning in 2005. "Culture of corruption" became an all-purpose catchphrase for them to attack the Republican majority. Resignations of Tom DeLay, Duke Cunningham, Bob Ney, along with ongoing investigations into Jerry Lewis, and Curt Weldon gave credibility and political ammunition to the Democrats on the issue.

I noticed that in the past few months Democrats began focusing their attacks on Iraq and political/ideological synchronicity to the President, making corruption a secondary or tertiary issue. I was stunned when CNN exit polls showed that voters ranked corruption as the number 1 issue of the election. This means that the Democrats had effectively nationalized the elections as a referendum on the status quo in Washington, and the "culture of corruption" line of attack was more effective than even they had probably anticipated. Take a look at this list of congressional casualties of the corruption issue:

Tom DeLay? Gone.
Bob Ney? Gone.
Duke Cunningham? Gone.
Katherine Harris? Gone.
Curt Weldon? Gone.
Richard Pombo? Gone.
Conrad Burns? Gone.

With the exceptions of Harris, Cunningham and Weldon, all of the others got tangled up in the Abramoff scandal. Cunningham is serving a prison sentence for taking bribes from defense contractor Mitchell Wade, and Katherine Harris is being scrutinized for her dealings with Wade. Weldon is the subject of an ongoing FBI investigation whether he used his office to influence or benefit contracts for his daughter. He was already down in the polls to Joe Sestak, but the fact that the investigation was revealed with less than a month to go before the election may have been the final straw for voters. I should note that the first three lawmakers on the list all resigned from Congress, two of which pleaded guilty to various offenses. The last four were voted out, and are under a cloud of suspicion but still innocent until proven guilty. While there were certainly other local and national political considerations that played a factor in the case of the lawmakers who were voted out, the corruption issue weighed on them heavily.

Now that the Democrats control both the House and the Senate, and have subpoena power, the public may be able to find out how deep the Jack Abramoff/Mitchell Wade rabbit holes go.

II. We Like You, We Really Do, But You're Fired.
That was the message from voters to moderate Republicans across the country.

A few days ago, I noted that the Democrats were adopting the Republican strategy of consolidating their control of House seats in ideologically friendly geographic regions, particularly the Northeast, but also in areas of the Midwest, Pacific, and Rockies. The strategy worked with devastating results for Republicans.

The biggest scalp the Democrats claimed in this strategy was Lincoln Chafee. It is absolutely astonishing to consider that a member of one of the most respected political families in Rhode Island, with a 63 percent approval rating and a long track record of disagreement with the Bush Administration and his Republican colleagues (Iraq, global warming, reproductive rights, etc.), was defeated 53-47 by Democratic challenger Sheldon Whitehouse. Whitehouse successfully argued that while voters may like Chaffee personally, a vote for him was a vote to maintain GOP control of the Senate.

Chafee is not happy with the administration or the GOP-controlled Senate [see him sticking a finger in Bush's eye over the John Bolton re-nomination, effectively killing it in the GOP lame-duck session Foreign Relations Committee], and is now thinking of ditching the GOP, although I'm not sure what good that would do him at this point. Although not as bitter in tone as some of his immediate post-election defeat comments, check out his op-ed in this Sunday's New York Times.

Rhode Islanders might have liked him, but the (R) in his political affiliation might as well have stood for Radioactive this year. I have a feeling that if Chafee had either defected to the Democrats or gone the Lieberman route and declared himself an independent in the Democratic caucus, he would still have his job.

Another House Republican who voted against the Iraq war, Jim Leach of Iowa, got the boot from voters as well.

Mike DeWine was given the pink slip by his constituents, but in his case he was facing a politically hostile environment for Republicans in Ohio, in the aftermath of corruption scandals involving Bob Ney, Tom Noe, and outgoing governor Bob Taft.

Another big victim of the GOP moderates purge was Nancy Johnson of Connecticut. Democrats and her challenger Chris Murphy threw the kitchen sink at her for her role in crafting the legislation for the Medicare Part D bill. Because senior citizens tend to vote in higher numbers than other demographic groups, and because they were the ones most directly affected by the new Medicare plan, Johnson was toast, losing 56-44. Chris Shays survived a nailbiter of a race, and Rob Simmons is about 160 votes behind Democratic challenger Joe Courtney, and that race is undergoing a recount as of this writing.

III. It's the War, Stupid.
To paraphrase James Carville's famous catchphrase from the 1992 Clinton presidential campaign, Iraq was the issue this year. Unlike 2002 and 2004, this time around it was a radioactive albatross hanging from the neck of every single Republican who supported it, including one who didn't [Lincoln Chaffee].

Republicans committed several tactical blunders on how they treated the Iraq issue this election.

1) Victims of Their Own Marketing Campaign: They lived and died by the "stay the course" talking point ad nauseum for about two years. When they saw that the phrase was not a winning slogan in the final stretch and tried to distance themselves from it, it became impossible for voters and the media not to see the ploy for the politically obvious and expedient flip-flop that it was. Republicans effectively tarred and feathered John Kerry in 2004 for his shifting positions on issues, and Democrats immediately pounced on this.

2) Off with Rumsfeld's Head: President Bush could have and should have replaced Donald Rumsfeld a long time ago. If he had done so, it would have neutralized him as a campaign issue, and it might have helped Republicans get away from the "stay the course" rhetoric which caught up with them in the end.

By waiting until after the elections to announce the change, with new Democratic majorities in the House and Senate, it gives the impression [wrongly] that he is capitulating to the Democratic position and offering them a symbolic sacrificial lamb. Republicans are now criticizing the President for his decision to postpone replacing Rumsfeld until after the election. Newt Gingrich led the charge, pointing the finger directly at the President:

“If the president had replaced Rumsfeld two weeks ago, the Republicans would still control the Senate and they would probably have 10 more House members. For the president to have suggested for the last two weeks that there would be no change and then change the day after the election is very disheartening.”

3) Cheney Off Message: During the final stretch of the election, Vice President Cheney continued to party like it was 2004, effectively undercutting the White House message of being flexible and willing to change course with this little gift to the Democrats during an interview with ABC's George Stephanopoulos:

STEPHANOPOULOS: So will the vote on Tuesday have any effect on the president's Iraq policy?

CHENEY: I think it'll have some effect, perhaps, on the Congress, but the president's made clear what his objective is: It's a victory in Iraq and it's full speed ahead on that basis. And that's exactly what we're going to do.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So even those Republican candidates calling for a change of course are not going to get that on Wednesday.

CHENEY: No. You can't make policy, national security policy on the basis of that.

IV. The Social Conservatives' Big Losses
As if Mark Foley wasn't a big enough problem for Republicans, along comes Ted Haggard one week before the election and turns the evangelical world upside down after allegations he used meth obtained from a male prostitute he was involved with for three years.

The Democrats had painted a bulls eye on Rick Santorum's back since 2004, and they scored a direct hit on him on election night. He was the biggest scalp claimed by the Democrats on Election Day, the number 3 Republican in the Senate. Rumors are that he has presidential ambitions, and I don't think we've seen the last of Rick Santorum on the national stage. I heard someone say to expect a "Draft Santorum" movement among conservatives for 2008.

Several ballot initiatives to ban gay marriage and/or civil unions passed, although it narrowly lost in Arizona. However, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported that although the gay marriage ban initiative on the Wisconsin ballot passed, it had the secondary effect of firing up liberal voters, some of whom voted for the ban, who got Democratic governor Jim Doyle re-elected, while giving Democrats the majority in the state Senate and made gains in the state Assembly.

More significant to religious and social conservatives is that Missouri passed its stem cell amendment 51-49 and the South Dakota abortion ban, intended as a direct challenge to Roe v. Wade, failed decisively when presented to the voters, 56-44.

V. The End of the Gang of 14
Also worth noting is that two members of the bipartisan "Gang of 14" in the U.S. Senate lost their re-election campaigns this year: Chafee and DeWine. Four other members of the group [Joe Lieberman, Robert Byrd, Ben Nelson, and Olympia Snowe] were re-elected.

The gang's influence as a shadow judiciary committee is dead for two reasons. First, their memorandum of understanding stipulated that it only applied to the 109th Congress, which is about to end in 2 months. Second, the need for the committee as a moderating influence in preserving the filibuster is no longer necessary, given that Democrats will now control the U.S. Senate and only need to hold their majority together to deep-six any judicial nomination they don't like.

VI. Democrats Pitch a Shut-Out
The Democrats were able to shape the dynamics of the race, forcing the GOP to play defense across the map and limit the number of vulnerable Democratic incumbents. Incredibly, not a single Democratic incumbent in any of the House, Senate, or Governor's races lost. I'm still researching to confirm this, but I think this is the first election where a party did not lose any incumbents.

VII. Republicans (Inadvertently) Do the Democrats' Bidding
Some examples where immediate partisan political benefit (real or perceived) for the Republicans trumped long and short-term strategic thinking.

1) The Connecticut Senate Race: There was never any doubt that a Democrat was going to take this seat, whether it was Ned Lamont or Joe Lieberman. After losing the Democratic nomination, Republicans sent money and operatives to work on Lieberman's independent campaign. Exit polls show that Lieberman lost the majority of Democratic voters (again), but won on the backs of Republican and independent voters.

The problem here is that while Republicans would obviously prefer to have a senator like Lieberman than Lamont (particularly on the Iraq issue) the resources and millions of dollars in contributions that went to Lieberman could and given the benefit of hindsight probably should have been put to better use by contributions to Republican candidates or parties in tighter Senate races like Montana, Missouri, or Virginia, where the margin of victory for the Democratic candidates was 2 percentage points or less.

While Lieberman might have been tempted to defect if the Democrats had remained in the minority, there is no way he would do that now that they control the Senate. Adding insult to injury, Lieberman recently re-declared his allegiance to the Democratic party, with a D in his title instead of the I that got him re-elected.

Bottom line: this time it was the Republicans who got shafted by what some of his critics within the Democratic party were pointing out this election year - his tendency for wanting to have things both ways. Unless he returns a lot of favors to his GOP supporters in the years ahead, he shouldn't expect to call them for help if he runs again in 2012. Regardless of which party he pledges loyalty to, Lieberman will have an enormous amount of influence as the Chairman of the Homeland Security Committee and as the potential swing vote that could mean the difference in a one vote majority or minority for a nomination, spending bill, or legislation.

UPDATE: Looks like I spoke too soon. Lieberman made not-so-subtle comments hinting he might caucus with the GOP this past weekend on Meet the Press:

MR. RUSSERT: If in fact they ask for discipline in the Democratic caucus, and you start to feel uncomfortable with it, would you consider crossing across the—going across the aisle, and joining the Republicans, if they gave you the same chairmanship that you had, and respected your seniority?

SEN. LIEBERMAN: Yeah. Well, that’s a hypothetical, which I’m, I’m not going to deal with here. I’m going to be an optimist, and take some encouragement from the fact that this was an election in which, in the House and Senate, Democrats came to the majority of both chambers by electing moderates mostly. This was an election that might be called the return of the center of American politics. And I think that my colleagues and leaders in the Democratic caucus get that. The fact is that this was not a major realignment election in my opinion. This was the voters in Connecticut and elsewhere saying, “We, we, we’re, we, we’re disappointed with the Republicans. We want to give the Democrats a chance.” But I believe that the American people are considering both major political parties to be in a kind of probation, because they’re, they’re understandably angry that Washington is dominated too much by partisan political games, and not enough by problem solving and patriotism, which means put the country and your state first.

MR. RUSSERT: Jim Jeffords of Vermont crossed over and joined the Democrats.

SEN. LIEBERMAN: Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: And they gave—they gave him his committee chairmanship.

SEN. LIEBERMAN: Yeah.

MR. RUSSERT: You’re, you’re not ruling that out at some future time?

SEN. LIEBERMAN: I’m not ruling it out, but I hope I don’t get to that point. And, and I must say, and with all respect to the Republicans who supported me in Connecticut, nobody ever said, “We’re doing this because we, we want you to switch over. We want you to do what we think—what you think is right, and good for our state and country,” and I appreciate that.

If Lieberman does cross over to the GOP full-time during the next six years, Democrats should give the Ned Lamont campaign and the bloggers who supported it a great big "I told you so" award.

2) John Kerry's Botched Joke: It happened during the final stretch of the campaign, and Republicans decided to warm up the Anti-Kerry Machine that beat up on him to great effect and success in 2004, with President Bush and Vice President Cheney again leading the charge. It sucked the media oxygen for a good 2-3 days, and fanned the partisan flames for conservative bloggers and talk radio hosts. My guess would be that it was meant to energize the base by giving them a figure or issue to rally around and focus their energies on.

The problem is that Kerry, like the Saddam Hussein verdict, forced the Republicans to talk about Iraq and reminded voters of the messy situation in that country. While neither of the two events was beneficial to the Democrats, there was little or no upside for the Republicans either given that Iraq was an albatross hanging around the GOP's collective neck.

The only downside to this for the Democrats was to John Kerry, who was effectively neutralized as a surrogate during the final stretch of the campaign and probably deep-sixed any chances of getting the Democratic nomination in 2008 once and for all.

3) President Bush on the Campaign Trail: The ultimate anecdote of how much of a political liability the president has become to Republicans was his visit to Florida to stump for Republican candidate Charlie Crist, who snubbed him and went to campaign elsewhere in the state, essentially skipping his own event with the president.

During the final stretch of the campaign, President Bush visited states he won in 2004 to help shore up support for Republican candidates. The itinerary included stops in Missouri and Montana on behalf of Jim Talent and Conrad Burns, both of whom were locked in tight Senate races. The presidential visits may have done the opposite of the intended effect, by firing up Democrats and others voting against the incumbents, and possibly pushing undecided voters into taking a decision against Burns and Talent. We may never know.

UPDATE: I stand corrected. See this recent column by the National Journal's Chuck Todd:

The Bush factor
There's plenty of evidence to suggest that President Bush may have been the deciding factor that killed the GOP's momentum in some key Senate races over the last week. One Republican consultant is convinced that Bush's last-minute visit to Missouri on behalf of ousted GOP Sen. Jim Talent did the incumbent in. According to the network exit polls, Democrat Claire McCaskill crushed Talent among those late-breaking voters who decided in the final three days (a full 11 percent of the electorate). Bush also made a last-minute trip to Montana, where anecdotal evidence indicates the president's rally for Republican Conrad Burns stopped the incumbent's momentum in Billings.

Finally, for the record I'd like to re-visit my pre-election predictions. In the House, I predicted a 15-25 seat gain for the Democrats. The number stands at 29 right now according to CNN, but could go higher once the official counts [and in some cases, recounts] in 9 unsettled House races are finished. I was conservative in my estimates, figuring the Democrats would get a narrow majority. Depending on how the outcomes in those 9 undecided House races play out, Democrats could have a 30-38 seat majority. [UPDATE: Again, this is why I'm not a mathematician. The Democratic majority currently stands at 11 according to CNN's most recent calculations, excluding the as-of-yet undecided races.]

In the Senate, I correctly predicted the composition of the Senate (49 Democrats, 49 Republicans, 2 Independents, giving the Democrats an overall 51-49 majority), but because of a typo in the Missouri Senate race projection (I mistakenly typed Talent would win when I meant to type McCaskill), that threw off my math when calculating the Democrats' gains in the Senate. This is why I'm not a mathematician.

Now, on to 2008...

Twenty, Twenty, Twenty-four Hours to Go....

Plenty of time to be sedated later, though.

By this time tomorrow, the ballot boxes will be open and in 48 hours we will know who's going to run the Congress for the next two years, barring any Florida recount-esque electoral debacles.

Here's some reference material to follow the races tomorrow.

The Hotline
CQ Politics
Political Wire
CNN 2004 Election Analysis and Results
CNN 2006 Election Analysis and Results
CNN Political Ticker
MSNBC/National Journal Politics
ABC News Politics
Washington Post Campaign 2006

The Return of Abscam

A few weeks ago, I facetiously suggested that the FBI and other law enforcement agencies open up a field office on Capitol Hill because of all the investigations going on. They might not do that, but the Feds gave a huge hint that they've still got work to do.

FBI willing to go undercover in Congress if necessary
By Greg Gordon
McClatchy Newspapers

WASHINGTON - The new chief of the FBI's Criminal Division, which is swamped with public corruption cases, says the bureau is ramping up its ability to catch crooked politicians and might run an undercover sting on Congress.

Assistant FBI Director James Burrus called the bureau's public corruption program "a sleeping giant that we've awoken," and predicted the nation will see continued emphasis in that area "for many, many, many years to come."

So much evidence of wrongdoing is surfacing in the nation's capital that Burrus recently committed to adding a fourth 15- to 20-member public corruption squad to the FBI's Washington field office.

In the past year, former Republican Reps. Duke Cunningham and Bob Ney have pleaded guilty to corruption charges. FBI agents are investigating about a dozen other members of Congress, including as many as three senators. The Justice Department also is expected to begin seeking indictments soon after a massive FBI investigation of the Alaska Legislature.

If conditions warrant, Burrus said, he wouldn't balk at urging an undercover sting like the famed Abscam operation in the late 1970s in which a U.S. senator and six House members agreed on camera to take bribes from FBI agents posing as Arab sheikhs.

"We look for those opportunities a lot," Burrus said, using words rarely heard at the bureau over the last quarter century. "I would do it on Capitol Hill. I would do it in any state legislature. ... If we could do an undercover operation, and it would get me better evidence, I'd do it in a second."

House of Representatives Outlook

Looking at the state of the horse race less than a week before Election Day, the Bush Administration and its political allies in Congress have been unable to change the basic dynamic that will determine which party will control the House of Representatives.

During most election seasons right now, the playing field of competitive races is shrinking, with both parties allocating more resources to fewer races.

Of course, this isn't your typical election season. Political observers are talking about a Democratic wave hitting the country, but of course the full impact of that wave won't be known until after the ballots are counted.

Democrats seem to have adopted the Republican strategy of trying to lock its hold on ideologically friendly geographic areas (Republicans in the South, Democrats in the Northeast and parts of the Midwest). Some of the Democrats' biggest targets this year are Republican incumbents in Connecticut (Chris Shays, et. al.), New York (Tom Reynolds, et. al.), New Hampshire (Charlie Bass), and Pennsylvania (Curt Weldon, et. al.), although there are also state and local issues that will play a role in whether they are re-elected or not.

If there is a wave, look for several, if not a majority of these blue state Republicans to fall victim to it. In the Midwest, expect Ohio to be ground zero for any Democratic wave, given the political woes of the state and national GOP. Democrats could pick up Republican seats in blue states like Illinois and Minnesota. The Rothenberg Political Report lists 40 House races as toss-ups, all but three of them held by Republicans.

Pickup opportunities seem to be expanding the map for the Democrats all across the country. Look at two examples:

To most political observers, the race to succeed retiring Rep. Tom Osborne shouldn't even be a contest. Republicans have held Nebraska's 3rd district for the last 48 years. Democrats are throwing money and resources into Scott Kleeb's campaign. Republicans sent President Bush himself to hit the campaign trail for Republican nominee Adrian Smith. Nebraska voted for President Bush 66-33 in 2004.

A little farther out west, local and national Democrats are salivating at the possibility of picking up Dick Cheney's old seat in Wyoming, a state which overwhelmingly voted for President Bush in 2004, 69-29. How concerned is the GOP? Concerned enough that the NRCC dropped over $241,000 on TV ads attacking Democratic candidate Gary Trauner, and they sent Cheney himself out to Wyoming about a month ago and again a few days before the election to rally the troops for incumbent Rep. Barbara Cubin, who took a hit in the polls after threatening to slap a wheelchair-bound Libertarian candidate for pointing out her campaign contributions from former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. CQ Politics is now ranking this race as a toss-up.

If Republicans lose these two seats, in solidly red states, then Election Day will be an unmitigated disaster for them. To put it into perspective by reversing the situation, that would be like a Republican candidate having a shot at winning a congressional race in a solidly blue district like Berkeley, Washington DC, or Boston. The fact that they're even spending money and resources defending them should tell you a lot about the national dynamics for the GOP.

Look at President Bush's campaign itinerary during the last week or so of the campaign. He is hitting states that voted for him during the last presidential election and with the exceptions of Colorado and Missouri, he is staying away from swing states where his presence could hurt Republicans on the ballot. On Saturday, he is stumping in Colorado for Rep. Marilyn Musgrave, one of the states where Democrats made gains in 2004 at the state level and are hoping to continue the trend this year.

This stop is interesting because Musgrave is one of the leading Congressional proponents of a federal amendment to ban gay marriage, and because of the Ted Haggard gay prostitute and meth bombshell which dropped in Colorado earlier this week. I should also point out that there is an amendment to ban gay marriage on the ballot in Colorado this year as well. Social conservatives might be more energized to get out the vote and try to get the bill passed in the aftermath of the recent New Jersey Supreme Court ruling. On the other hand, the initiative could fail in the aftermath of the Haggard allegations.

Whether the 2006 midterm elections will be like 1994, 1974, 1982, or 1964, or an entirely different animal altogether, is something we'll find out in a few short days.

House Prediction: Democrats take over the House of Representatives, winning between 15-25 seats on Election Day.

Senate Outlook

Control of the Senate will hinge on ten races. The incumbents in all but three of them are Republicans. The Tennessee race is for the seat being vacated by Bill Frist to run for president in 2008, the Maryland seat is being vacated by retiring Democratic Senator Paul Sarbanes, and the New Jersey seat is the one that used to belong to Jon Corzine, now held by Bob Menendez who is defending it in his first Senate campaign.

The races are:

• Arizona
• Maryland
  
• Missouri
• Montana
  
• New Jersey
• Ohio
• Pennsylvania
• Rhose Island
• Tennessee
• Virginia
  

A state-by-state analysis follows:

Arizona
Incumbent - Sen. Jon Kyl (R)
Challenger - Fmr. Arizona Democratic Party Chairman Jim Pederson (D)

The race had been written off by both parties until recently when the DSCC dropped $1 million on TV ad time in Arizona markets and sending in Bill Clinton following what they say are promising early voting numbers. This could just be a bluff to make Republicans commit money and resources to defend another Senate seat. The Republicans are doing the same thing with last minute ad buys in Michigan to try to take out Debbie Stabenow.

Although Democratic governor Janet Napolitano is cruising to re-election, I don't think Pederson is going to be able to ride her coattails.

Prediction: Kyl wins by 5-10 points.

Maryland
Incumbent Party - Rep. Ben Cardin (D)
Challenger - Lt. Gov. Michael Steele (R)

Republicans are enthusiastic about this race, but I think New Jersey is a better pickup chance for them as far as blue states go. There may also be a down ballot effect at play here, because of Steele's role as Gov. Bob Ehrlich's deputy. Ehrlich is behind in the polls to Democratic challenger Martin O'Malley, and some of that may be rubbing off on Steele.

Prediction: Cardin wins by 7-12 points.

Missouri
Incumbent - Sen. Jim Talent (R)
Challenger - State Auditor Claire McCaskill (D)

This race has been in the news a lot recently because of the recent Michael J. Fox ad on stem cell research supporting Claire McCaskill which drew the ire of Rush Limbaugh, who proceeded to make it a national issue by attacking Fox on his radio show.

The race is a true tossup, with recent polls showing both candidates leading within the margin of error. President Bush hit the campaign trail for Talent today, and it might help him. This one will go down to the wire, and might be the race that ultimately decides which party controls the Senate next year.

Prediction: Talent wins by 1-2 points.

Montana
Incumbent - Sen. Conrad Burns (R)
Challenger - State Sen. Jon Tester (D)

This race had been written off by the Republicans until the last week or so, when polls showed the race tightening. Now, Senate campaign committees and outside groups from both parties are dumping dollars into Montana airwaves for a round of last minute ad buys. Check out this amusing anti-Tester ad from the Free Enterprise Fund: "Brokebank Democrats."

The problem with Burns is that he has one of the highest disapproval ratings of any U.S. Senator, and Democrats are hammering away at him over his Jack Abramoff connection. Montana has been tilting towards the Democrats for the past several years, with a popular Democratic governor and a Democratic majority in both houses of the state legislature.

Given the state's political climate, along with the widespread "throw the bums out" attitude that seems to be building across the country, I think Burns is done.

Prediction: Tester wins by 1-5 points.

New Jersey
Incumbent - Sen. Robert Menendez (D)
Challenger - State Sen. Tom Kean Jr. (R)

This is the most endangered Democrat-held seat. State Republicans (and perhaps to a similar degree, the electorate at large) are not happy with the Democratic party. People still remember the scandals from Jim McGreevey's administration, which came back into the news after McGreevey published a memoir and the state supreme court voted in favor of gay marriage.

Kean has been good at making ethics and corruption an issue against Menendez, and that has certainly hurt him in the polls, most likely among independents.

This shouldn't be a close race, but there are three things working in Menendez's favor. 1) Remember polls in 2004 showing New Jersey a toss up? Both Bush and Kerry sent surrogates to fight it out, but New Jersey went to Kerry 53-46, 2) Governor Jon Corzine has a 60 percent approval rating according to a recent poll, in spite of having raised taxes, and 3) The anti-incumbent, anti-Republican mood in the country, combined with the fact that New Jersey is a blue state, Menendez should be able to hang on.

Prediction: Menendez wins by 5-10 points.

Ohio
Incumbent - Sen. Mike DeWine (R)
Challenger - Rep. Sherrod Brown (D)

In less than two years since Ohio voters secured President Bush's re-election by about 110,000 votes, the state has become politically hostile territory to state and national Republicans.

Rep. Bob Ney pleaded guilty to corruption charges and resigned from Congress today before beginning to serve a jail sentence next year. Democrats are running challengers to Republican incumbents all over the state, including Deborah Pryce, the fourth highest ranking House Republican.

The Toledo Blade uncovered a major scandal involving a prominent Republican fundraiser with ties to Governor Bob Taft. Taft now has an astonishing 80 percent disapproval rating in a recent Quinnipiac poll.

Secretary of State Ken Blackwell is running for governor and is falling behind his Democratic rival Ted Strickland by nearly 30 points according to the same Quinnipiac poll.

The RNC and RNSC have seemingly given up on DeWine, having pulled all advertising from the state airwaves during the final two weeks of the election. Another issue which will fire up state Democrats is a ballot initiative to raise the minimum wage.

The writing is on the wall clear for all to see - Ohio is not the place to be if you're a Republican this year. Besides taking over the governor's mansion, I'd say it's likely that the Democrats are going to take the majority of the state's congressional delegation, effectively laying the political groundwork for 2008.

Prediction: Brown wins by 5-10 points.

Pennsylvania
Incumbent - Sen. Rick Santorum (R)
Challenger - State Treasurer Bob Casey (D)

Santorum has one of the highest negative ratings in the country, only slightly ahead of Conrad Burns. He has trailed Casey by double digits in most polls this year and he has been unable to change the dynamic of the race or make his case to Pennsylvania voters.

Issues about his state residency, a Republican effort to collect signatures and finance a Green Party candidate to siphon Democratic and liberal votes off from Casey, Santorum crowing about having found weapons of mass destruction, and making a bizarre analogy comparing the Iraq war to the Lord of the Rings have energized state Democrats.

Santorum should start updating his resume and look for a lobbying job.

Prediction: Casey wins by 8-12 points.

Rhode Island
Incumbent - Sen. Lincoln Chafee (R)
Challenger - Rep. Sheldon Whitehouse (D)

Chafee narrowly survived a primary challenge from conservative Cranston mayor Steve Laffey earlier this year. As the other New England centrist to face a primary challenge this year [behind the more high-profile race in Connecticut] Chafee has to run a delicate balancing act. He had to convince primary voters that he was genuinely a team player and a loyal Republican, and once he was re-nominated, he had to convince the electorate at large that he could be independent of the Senate Republican leadership and President Bush on issues such as the John Bolton nomination and global warming.

Rhode Island is not friendly territory to Republicans or President Bush, and voters may simply want to send a resounding "NO!" message to Washington, regardless of whether they like Chafee or not. Chafee said as much in one of his most recent ads.

Prediction: Whitehouse wins by 7-12 points.

Tennessee
Incumbent Party - Mayor Bob Corker (R)
Challenger - Rep. Harold Ford Jr. (D)

This race has been looking competitive for the past few weeks, and has the dubious distinction of having been the focus of one of the most controversial ads of this political season. I think that Ford will come close but I don't think he'll be able to pull it off.

Prediction: Corker wins by 1-5 points.

Virginia
Incumbent - Sen. George Allen (R)
Challenger - Former Secretary of the Navy James Webb (D)

This has been one of the most interesting Senate races to watch this year, in the same way that you can't help watch or stare at the scene of an accident when you're driving in your car. This race should have been a slam dunk for Allen, a springboard for the 2008 presidential campaign. Instead, he is fighting for his political life and he should be considered damaged goods by GOP activists, operatives, and fundraisers when it comes to his political ambitions. Bob Novak recently wrote he thinks Allen is going to lose because he let the race devolve into a "circus campaign," and I think he's right. All of Allen's major problems in this race are self-inflicted, either by himself (i.e. the Macaca incident) or his people (the Mike Stark incident).

Prediction: Webb wins by 1-5 points.

One politically interesting scenario which would be amusing to watch and incredibly frustrating to both parties is if Joe Lieberman is re-elected as an independent and we have a tied Senate at 49-49-2 [the other independent in that formula would be Vermont's Bernie Sanders who is replacing retiring independent James Jeffords].

Given the amount of Republican money and volunteers he's taken during the general election, I think it's almost a given that they will call in favors if Lieberman gets re-elected, regardless of whether the Democrats take over the Senate or not.

The nightmare scenario for Democrats would be if both parties lock up their caucuses in a vote for a contentious issue [i.e. Iraq, a Supreme Court nomination]. Sanders will vote with the Democrats, but if Lieberman wavers to the Republican side, that would put the vote at 50-50 and give Cheney the tie-breaking vote.

If that scenario happens, Lieberman would wield enormous political influence in the Senate. He would be a de facto second Senate president, with the ability to play kingmaker on a variety of bills.

Senate Prediction: Democrats win 8 out of the 10 races I discussed, for a net gain of 6 seats (the number they need to take control of the Senate) and a Senate tally of 49 Democrats, 49 Republicans, and 2 Independents.

I will have my assessment on the races for the House of Representatives done soon.

George Allen is Screwed

By now, I'm sure you've all seen or heard about this incident involving George Allen, his supporters, and liberal blogger Mike Stark.



I'm suspecting this tape has been leading local newscasts in Virginia for the past few days. The video has gotten national airplay on cable news when discussing the final days of the Allen-Webb Senate race.

This image, of campaign supporters getting into a physical altercation with a political opponent, is the worst nightmare for a candidate or political strategist. The last thing they want voters to read or hear about in the days before the election are the words "police," "investigation," and "criminal charges" in connection with their campaign.

The race was already tight enough as it is, and Allen is being very careful with what he says and who he talks to in the aftermath of the Macaca incident and all of the other mistakes that have made what should have been a shoo-in re-election campaign into a toss-up.

This is one hell of an October surprise, one that the Webb campaign couldn't have planned any better themselves. If they had the time and money, I'm pretty sure this footage would be used in a political ad for the final days of the race, although it might not even be necessary given the amount of media coverage of the incident. If Allen loses next week, this incident might have been the final nail in the coffin for Virginia voters, even if it didn't involve Allen himself.

Insulting the Troops

This story is completely overblown.

By now you've all heard the controversy over John Kerry's widely cited comments during a campaign event with Phil Angelides earlier this week.

Kerry has said that he messed up the punchline for the joke. I have no reason to doubt that, because to think the contrary would imply that he planned those comments in advance, which no rational person would think was the case.

But between the event on Monday and Kerry's two apologies today [the first being a half-hearted "apology" during a phone interview with Don Imus], the Republicans dusted off the Anti-Kerry Machine that worked so well for them in 2004 and turned him into a political piñata.

The only real upside effect to this for Republicans is firing up the base, which it did to great effect in 2004 every time Kerry stuck his foot in his mouth. Remember how they hammered him to great effect over "I voted for the $87 billion before I voted against it"? Other than the red meat value of energizing their base, I see no benefit to Republicans in trying to keep this story alive. However, there is no down ballot effect on the Democrats, since Kerry is not on any ballot this year.

This might have been an issue in the Tennessee Senate race, where Harold Ford was Kerry's campaign co-chairman two years ago and Bob Corker might have tried to make an issue out of it at the last minute. Ford defused that possible scenario by criticizing Kerry and calling for him to apologize. Jon Tester also criticized him.

The only real damage to this is that it neutralized Kerry as a surrogate or campaigner during the final week. Politically, Kerry did the correct thing by removing himself from the equation and not becoming a distraction to the Democratic candidates he was going to be campaigning for. If this had happened weeks or months ago, Kerry's absence as a fundraiser would have hurt the Democrats. You can argue over whether the apology was or was not necessary, but in giving it Kerry has taken away the Republicans' ability to continue to push the story. By neutralizing the issue and removing himself from the races, Kerry is doing the right thing for his party.

That would have been the end of it, but along came John Boehner and the Democrats figured out very quickly that two can play at that game.

Howard Dean and Harry Reid immediately entered the fray, putting out statements calling on Boehner to apologize. I doubt this will get anywhere near the amount of traction that Kerry's comments got, but Republicans made it fair game as an issue and Democrats are fighting back.

And Now For Something Completely Different

I would like to congratulate my friends in the DC band the reserves, for finishing their first album. They've scheduled a release party/performance at Iota Club and Cafe this Friday. I've seen them several times in bars and clubs around DC, and on one weekend trip up to New York City and friendship aside, I can vouch that they are good. You can pick up the album on iTunes or CD Baby. Check them out.

0 for 22

Ouch!

Nelson Sweeps Editorial Endorsements

By Larry Lipman | Sunday, October 29, 2006, 11:26 PM

There are 22 daily newspapers in Florida.

All 22 have endorsed Bill Nelson for re-election to the U.S. Senate.

The first was The Palm Beach Post, the latest two on Sunday were The Orlando Sentinel and the Jacksonville-based Florida Times-Union.

The only newspaper that has endorsed Republican candidate Harris is ironically named the Polk County Democrat, published four days a week in Harris’ girlhood hometown, Bartow.

A Foot-in-Mouth Disease Outbreak in Ohio

Would you want one of these in your congressional district?

D'oh!

Schmidt considers nuke waste
BY HOWARD WILKINSON | ENQUIRER STAFF WRITER

This doesn't happen every day: An incumbent member of Congress, in the middle of a re-election battle, says that storing nuclear waste shipments from around the world in her district may be a good idea.

U.S. Rep. Jean Schmidt does say that, and her support for studying the idea has become an issue in her re-election campaign, especially in rural Pike County, in the far eastern end of her sprawling Southern Ohio District, where the nuclear wastes would be stored.

"I'm not advocating for it one way or the other," Schmidt told The Enquirer. "I'm saying it is something we need to look at."

Schmidt said she sees potential to create "hundreds, maybe thousands of jobs" in an economically distressed part of the state, where double-digit unemployment rates are the norm.

Schmidt has signed on to an effort by the Southern Ohio Diversification Initiative (SODI) and a Cleveland-based company called SONIC to seek a U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) grant of up to $5 million for a study of whether the former Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion plant should be a site for temporary storage and recycling of spent nuclear fuel rods. The 3,400-acre site near Piketon produced highly enriched uranium through the Cold War years for military purposes and for civilian reactors until 2001, when that activity was consolidated at the similar Paducah plant.

A decision on the grant could come this week.

The idea of nuclear waste storage on a site that is still being cleaned up from its previous use has infuriated environmentalists and neighbors of the plant in Pike County and nearby Scioto County, prompting a communitywide petition drive and vows to fight the storage plan to the bitter end.

That and the fact that Schmidt's Democratic opponent, Victoria Wulsin of Indian Hill, has come out against the idea, mean that the issue could have an impact on Schmidt's re-election - meaning it could help determine who represents 650,000 constituents from Greater Cincinnati to Portsmouth.

"All I can tell you is that when it became known that she supports this, every Jean Schmidt yard sign in the county went down overnight," said Geoffrey Sea, a writer whose home abuts the Piketon plant.

While in most towns and congressional districts, outside business investors coming in is usually considered a good thing, I have no idea why the hell Schmidt thought it would be a good idea to have a nuclear waste facility in her district. Maybe she's getting campaign advice from Mr. Burns? Yucca Mountain is a no-brainer for people and politicians in Nevada, regardless of their political stripes. In a close re-election race, a gaffe like this could be costly for Schmidt.

NOTE: The photo is of a radioactive waste facility in Chernobyl, taken by a Ukrainian TV news station.

Something is Rotten in the State of New Jersey

Another October surprise, this one possibly bigger in impact than the one in the Florida governor's race because if it becomes an issue in the Kean-Menendez race, it could affect which party controls the Senate next year.

Menendez added to corruption lawsuit
Friday, October 27, 2006

By OSHRAT CARMIEL
STAFF WRITER

Complete coverage: Election 2006

U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez has been added as a defendant in an ongoing lawsuit being brought against Hudson County by a Union City psychiatrist.

The revised federal suit, filed Wednesday by psychiatrist Oscar Sandoval, says that Menendez, as a congressman in the late 1990s, spearheaded a coordinated campaign by Hudson County officials to squeeze political donations and favors from Sandoval, a county contractor.

Sandoval is a controversial figure who was ensnared in a Hudson County corruption investigation that led to the conviction of former County Executive Robert Janiszewski in 2003.

Political pressure

The suit accuses Menendez and his political allies of pressuring Sandoval to give political contributions as a condition of keeping his psychiatric services contracts with Hudson County -- and a condition of getting new ones. The pressure came after they learned that the psychiatrist was an FBI informant in the Janiszewski corruption probe, the suit says.

The lawsuit also hitches Bergen County to the tangled ordeal. It claims that Menendez was playing a behind-the-scenes role in 1999 in awarding a contract to provide psychiatric services to the Bergen County Jail. The psychiatrist who made the proposal, however, did not get a contract.

The legal accusations come in the final sprint of an acrimonious -- and close -- U.S. Senate race between Menendez and Republican Tom Kean Jr., who has made Menendez's ethics the central issue in his campaign.

The Ghost of Jim McGreevey

An October surprise in the Florida governor's race, perhaps?

Crist Denies Trysts
GOP frontrunner: I have never had sex with a man
By Bob Norman

A young rising star in the Republican Party has boasted to witnesses of his sexual relationship with Charlie Crist, the frontrunner in the Florida governor's race who has repeatedly denied that he is gay.

The GOP staffer, 21-year-old Jason Wetherington, told friends at separate social functions in August that he had sex with Crist, according to two credible and independent sources who heard Wetherington make the claim first-hand.

Wetherington, who recently worked as a field director for U.S. Senate candidate Katherine Harris and currently works for state representative Ellyn Bodganoff's reelection campaign, also named a man whom he said is Crist's long-term partner, a convicted thief named Bruce Carlton Jordan who also recently worked for Harris in her long-shot Senate bid.

Jordan made headlines recently when the Miami Herald learned that the felon was working as Harris's travel aide. The newspaper noted that Jordan, 42, was reported to be close friends with Charlie Crist, whom he convinced to attend an annual Florida Funeral Directors Association meeting in 2003.

Jordan was charged in 2003 with stealing thousands of dollars from two organizations for whom he worked, including the Tallahassee-based Florida Funeral Directors Association, where he served as executive director. He completed a 60-day jail sentence in February and will be on probation until the year 2011, according to state records.

When the Herald questioned Crist about Jordan this past August, the frontrunner in the governor's race told the newspaper that he doesn't remember the man. "I don't know who Bruce Jordan is," he said at the time. "It doesn't mean I haven't met him. I don't know who you are speaking about."

I asked Crist during a phone interview on Monday morning if he had ever had sex with Jordan.

"No," he said. "I don't recall the name."

I've seen no poll evidence indicating Crist is losing support in the Florida governor's race over this. However, the fact that Crist is even being forced to deny it isn't good for him politically. If the allegations are true, then in post-Mark Foley Florida it might become an issue. Not only that, but the man believed to be his partner is a convicted felon and he's denying [not very convincingly I think, if you read further into the article] any ties to him.

I Love the Way You Put Me in the Big House...

The first judicial victim of the Abramoff scandal gets jail time.

A federal judge sentenced a former Bush administration official to 18 months in prison in the Jack Abramoff lobbying case Friday — after delivering a 30-minute eulogy for good government in Washington.

"There was a time when people came to Washington because they thought government could be helpful to people," said U.S. District Judge Paul L. Friedman. "People came to Washington asking not what government could do for them and their friends but what they could do for the public."

David Safavian, the former chief of staff for the General Services Administration, was sentenced on obstruction and concealment charges for lying to investigators about his relationship with Abramoff.

Safavian wept in court as he asked for leniency, but Friedman said the ex-bureaucrat had become part of Washington's culture of corruption, where congressmen listen to campaign donors and lobbyists while farming out to staff members the job of writing laws.

Abramoff, the once-powerful lobbyist, shook Pennsylvania Avenue from the Capitol to the White House when he pleaded guilty to corruption in January and began cooperating with an FBI investigation.

The Justice Department and FBI are just getting warmed up. They got Bob Ney to plead guilty, and they gave Abramoff a desk at the FBI because he is cooperating so much (and presumably dishing out the dirt on anything and anybody he had dealings with). The Abramoff story is not over by a long shot. Safavian was small-time, the feds are still going after the big fish.

Note: The title of this post is a lyric from Interpol's song "Specialist."

Rumors of North Korea's Demise...

This came out today from the National Security Archive:

Washington D.C., October 26, 2006 - A CIA panel of experts concluded in 1997 that North Korea was likely to collapse within five years, according to declassified documents posted today on the Web by the National Security Archive. This "Endgame" exercise of former U.S. policymakers, intelligence officers and outsider experts warned that the North Korean regime could not remain "viable for the long term," with the majority doubting the "current, deteriorating status could persist beyond five years." Citing the "steady, seemingly irreversible economic degradation in the North," the panel concluded that "the current situation in North Korea appears beyond corrective actions that do not fundamentally threaten the regime's viability."

Was that a slam dunk too, George?

Another Lawmaker With an Investigation Problem

Only in an election season as wacky as this one [a quasi-sex scandal, a nuclear test, multiple FBI investigations, and an administration reversal on Iraq policy and rhetoric] would this not be getting more play in the media.

So many investigations, so little time... At the rate they're going, the FBI, Justice Department, and every other law enforcement agency in the country might as well open a Capitol Hill field office.

WASHINGTON - A land deal involving Rep. Rick Renzi, R-Ariz., is being scrutinized by the U.S. attorney's office in Arizona, a law enforcement official in Washington said Tuesday.

The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity while the inquiry is ongoing, said the investigation has been under way for a few months and is still in its very early stages.

The official did not specify what land deal was under investigation.

A spokesman for the Arizona U.S. attorney, Paul Charlton, said he could not confirm or deny an investigation was under way.

Renzi also declined to comment, referring questions to his lawyer, former Arizona Attorney General Grant Woods. The lawyer late Tuesday said Renzi was not aware of any investigation and had not been contacted by the U.S. attorney's office.

At least one transaction involving Renzi has raised questions in Arizona recently.

Records and officials involved in the October 2005 deal say Renzi helped promote the sale of land that netted a former business partner $4.5 million.

Singing Like a Canary

This can't be good news for people on the periphery or in the thick of the Abramoff investigation.

From US News & World Report:

Jack Abramoff, the lobbying scandal figure, has become such a chatty rat that probe insiders say he's been given a desk to work at in the FBI. We're told he spends up to four hours a day detailing his shady business to agents eager to nail more congressmen in the scandal. And when cooperative witnesses spend that much time inside, they get a desk. As a result of his help in the ever expanding investigation, we hear that the Feds hope to keep him in a nearby prison after he's sentenced on his conspiracy admission.

Under the Microscope

According to Time magazine, Jane Harman is the most recent lawmaker to have an FBI problem.

Did a Democratic member of Congress improperly enlist the support of a major pro-Israel lobbying group to try to win a top committee assignment? That's the question at the heart of an ongoing investigation by the FBI and Justice Department prosecutors, who are examining whether Rep. Jane Harman of California and the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) may have violated the law in a scheme to get Harman reappointed as the top Democrat on the House intelligence committee, according to knowledgeable sources in and out of the U.S. government.

The sources tell TIME that the investigation by Justice and the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which has simmered out of sight since about the middle of last year, is examining whether Harman and AIPAC arranged for wealthy supporters to lobby House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi on Harman's behalf.

Regardless of the validity of the allegations, this should provide the GOP ammunition to offset attacks by Democrats on ethics and investigation issues during the final stretch of the election season.

Quotable

Matt Stoller at MyDD has one of the funniest and most memorable quotes about a political campaign that I've seen this side of Hunter Thompson's "Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail '72." His post-debate analysis is skewed in favor of Lamont, but this line is too good to not quote.

It's not that Lamont has overperformed, or that Joe has melted down, it's that Connecticut Election 2006 has gone off the deep end. It's not your normal white picket fence suburban election, with attack ad facing attack ad. No, this is more like a white picket fence election that suddenly gets bored with life and decides to live in the forest, take a bunch of LSD, trout-fish naked, and taunt a bear cub before ending its life suddenly and with total and inexplicable resolution on November 7.

The Secret Plan and the Tet Offensive... in Iraq?

The Iraq war and occupation has been repeatedly compared to the debacle in Vietnam a generation ago, mainly by critics of the Bush Administration and opponents of the current conflict.

The comparisons received play from two unlikely sources.

President Bush and the Tet Offensive:

Bush Accepts Iraq-Vietnam Comparison
George Stephanopoulos Interviews President Bush on Iraq, the Midterms and His Legacy
By ED O'KEEFE

WASHINGTON, Oct. 18, 2006 — - President Bush said in a one-on-one interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos that a newspaper column comparing the current fighting in Iraq to the 1968 Tet offensive in Vietnam, which was widely seen as the turning point in that war, might be accurate.

Stephanopoulos asked whether the president agreed with the opinion of columnist Tom Friedman, who wrote in The New York Times today that the situation in Iraq may be equivalent to the Tet offensive in Vietnam almost 40 years ago.

"He could be right," the president said, before adding, "There's certainly a stepped-up level of violence, and we're heading into an election."

"George, my gut tells me that they have all along been trying to inflict enough damage that we'd leave," Bush said. "And the leaders of al Qaeda have made that very clear. Look, here's how I view it. First of all, al Qaeda is still very active in Iraq. They are dangerous. They are lethal. They are trying to not only kill American troops, but they're trying to foment sectarian violence. They believe that if they can create enough chaos, the American people will grow sick and tired of the Iraqi effort and will cause government to withdraw."

Bush said he could not imagine any circumstances under which all U.S. troops would be withdrawn from Iraq before the end of his presidency.

"You mean every single troop out? No," he told Stephanopoulos.

Sen. Conrad Burns and the President's Secret Plan to Win the War:

Burns, however, said the U.S. does need to change its military tactics there. “If we don’t change, we’ll pay a heavy price, but we cannot afford to lose it,” he said.

Tester said that Burns has finally admitted that his “stay the course” position in Iraq is wrong and welcomed the senator to his own side.

For nearly a year, Tester has called on Bush to develop a plan to remove U.S. troops from Iraq. Burns has criticized Tester’s position as “cut and run.”

“We’re in a quagmire over there,” Tester said.

Burns told Tester firmly not to put him in the Democrat’s camp on the issue.

“I said we’ve got to win,” Burns said. “He wants us to pull out. He wants everyone to know our plan. That’s not smart.

“He says our president don’t have a plan. I think he’s got one. He’s not going to tell everyone in the world.”

Many in the crowd, which was dominated by Tester supporters, openly laughed at Burns’ claim that Bush has a plan.

Tester said Bush’s only plan is staying the course in Iraq at considerable sacrifices to U.S. troops and the federal treasury.

“We went in under false pretenses,” Tester said. “We pulled the troops from Afghanistan and put them in Iraq. Osama bin Laden is still running free.”

The war is costing the U.S. billions of dollars a year that could be better spent on helping middle-class families and small businesses, the challenger said.

Tester said he is not for “telling our opponents what we’re going to do. The fact is, we don’t know what we’re going to do.”

Replied Burns: “We’re not going to tell you what our plan is, Jon, because you’re just going to go out and blow it.”

Immediately following the debate, Tester campaign spokesman Matt McKenna likened Burns’ claim of a Bush plan to President Nixon’s secret plan in 1972 to end the war in Vietnam.

The Burns campaign spokesman Jason Klindt, however, said there is no secret plan. President Bush has said from the start that he wants to empower Iraqis to govern their own country.

Republicans should really avoid making any deliberate or inadvertent comparisons of Iraq to Vietnam. Democrats are doing enough of that already and they don't need any help.

Lieberman's Challenge from the Right

Last night, I mentioned how Alan Schlesinger had emerged as the winner of the first Connecticut Senate debate and how his performance could bolster his support among state conservatives to the detriment of Joe Lieberman's independent candidacy.

It looks like Schlesinger's challenge from the right has rattled Lieberman's cage enough that he endorsed John Bolton's re-nomination to be confirmed as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

Lieberman's position would put him at odds with the other senator from Connecticut, Chris Dodd, who has been one of Bolton's fiercest critics in the Senate and on the Foreign Relations Committee. This would also put him at odds with the other New England moderate centrist in a tight race this year, Lincoln Chafee, who voted against Bolton earlier this year. It seems to me that both Lieberman and Chafee appear to have taken their divergent positions on Bolton purely out of their own political self-interest in an election year.

Given the unfavorable political narrative shaping up for Republicans before the election, particularly with an increasingly competitive effort to maintain control of the Senate (check out these articles from Time, the New York Times, and the Associated Press from the past few days), Republicans may wind up hedging their bets and pulling out resources from Connecticut to focus on maintaining control of Senate seats held by endangered Republicans like George Allen, Mike DeWine, and Jim Talent. If that happens, Lieberman will truly be on his own, getting attacked from the left and the right during the final weeks of the campaign, with little or no money or ground operation to rally his voters on Election Day.

Update: Following up on the Bolton issue, a visit to the Senate voting record shows that Lieberman voted to uphold a filibuster against the Bolton nomination on two separate occasions. Chafee voted in favor of ending the filibuster on the same two motions.

R.I.P. CBGB's

Check out this Rolling Stone report from the final performance at CBGB's.

On that note, watch this epic 3-song, 6-minute performance by the Ramones at CBGB's.



Gabba Gabba Hey!

Under the Microscope

Over the weekend, it was revealed that Curt Weldon is the latest Republican congressman to have an FBI problem.

Federal agents raided the homes of Rep. Curt Weldon's daughter and one of his closest political supporters yesterday as part of an investigation into whether the veteran Republican congressman used his influence to benefit himself and his daughter's lobbying firm, according to sources familiar with the investigation.

The investigation focuses on actions the Pennsylvania congressman took that may have aided clients of the business created by his daughter, Karen Weldon, and longtime Pennsylvania political ally Charles Sexton, according to three of the sources.

A grand jury, impaneled in Washington in May, has obtained evidence gathered over at least four months through wiretaps of Washington area cellphone numbers and has scrutinized whether Weldon received anything of value, according to the sources. They spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitive nature of the investigation.

The investigation focuses on Weldon's support of the Russian-managed Itera International Energy Corp., one of the world's largest oil and gas firms, while that company paid fees to Solutions North America, the company that Karen Weldon and Sexton operate.

Weldon, who has been a proponent of some pretty far-out theories (i.e. Able Danger, and his proposed WMD hunt in the Iraqi desert), has a new one: that a Democratic conspiracy consisting of Melanie Sloan [who according to Weldon is a former aide to Democratic Congressman John Conyers and Senator Charles Schumer and wants them to win so she can get a job on Capitol Hill] from CREW [who asked the FBI to investigate Weldon's dealings in 2004], the DCCC, 9/11 Commissioner Jamie Gorelick, Bill Clinton, fired CIA officer Mary McCarthy [who gave money to Weldon's Democratic challenger Joe Sestak], and former National Security Adviser Sandy Berger [who also gave money to Sestak] are all out to get him. This is beginning to sound like something out of a Dan Brown novel.

Watch the full video of Weldon's comments [from The Spin/The Daily Pennsylvanian]:

Joe Lieberman's Two Front War

I watched most of today's Connecticut Senate debate, featuring Joe Lieberman, Ned Lamont, and Alan Schlesinger.

I assumed that it was going to be a constant back and forth between Lamont and Lieberman, with Schlesinger trying to get an occasional comment in or someone to notice that he was in the debate as well.

My assumption was wrong.

Alan Schlesinger, polling in the mid-single digits range, had absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain in the debate, and it showed. He was the clear winner, by far. He showed an understanding of the issues and had the right combination of energy, political irreverence, and use of rhetoric to stand out among the candidates. Lieberman, being the 18-year Senate veteran, not surprisingly was the first candidate to burn through his 18 minutes of response time. Lamont sounded like he was trying to cram as many words as possible into each of his responses, essentially going into long John Kerry-esque musings while sounding as if someone was playing a tape on fast forward.

Schlesinger went after both of his opponents, although it seemed to me most of his jabs were directed at Lieberman, who is relying on Republican money and votes in his independent candidacy to try to save his political career. Lieberman was at a disadvantage, since at several points in the debate he had both Lamont and Schlesinger double-teaming him.

While Schlesinger may have been the winner of the debate, the big beneficiary was Lamont. If Schlesinger can shore up some more support from conservative Republicans by tapping into Lieberman's base, Lieberman could lose the race.

Lamont is aware of this, and he even implicitly encouraged Schlesinger to play spoiler in the race at one point during the debate, recounting his own experience bucking his own party in his decision to challenge Lieberman.

Lieberman is stuck in a political no-man's land. He's essentially given up on the Democratic activist base that rejected him in the primary so is now forced to appeal to conservatives, moderates, and independents. Lieberman's strategy has been to shore up support from conservatives and independents, who when combined outnumber the liberals in Connecticut's registered voters. If Schlesinger starts tapping into the conservative base in the polls, Lieberman would be facing a challenge from his right flank, and that would mean he would have to fend off both Lamont and Schlesinger for the next three weeks.

The International Community Forcing Kim Jong Il to Go Cold Turkey?

This from the New York Post:

KOOKY KOREAN TO LOSE BOOZE
U.S.: CUT OFF KIM'S HOOCH

October 10, 2006 -- The United States moved quickly yesterday to seek tough U.N. sanctions against North Korea - including an export ban that would cut off alcohol-guzzling Kim Jong Il's flow of his beloved top-shelf booze.

The U.S. plan for hard-hitting sanctions against the rogue communist nation came as world leaders joined the international outcry against Kim's underground test Sunday night of a nuclear weapon.

The Bush administration urged the United Nations to take urgent steps, including:

* Banning sales of military hardware to North Korea,

* Inspecting all cargo entering or leaving the country, and

* Freezing assets connected with its weapons programs.

But it was a ban on countries exporting "luxury" items to North Korea that would hit Kim the hardest - right in his prodigious liquor cabinet, stocked with the world's best libations.

The often-drunk Pyongyang dictator is known for his huge consumption of pricey French wines, Johnnie Walker scotch and the finest cognac.

He is said to spend an astounding $650,000 a year just for Hennessy cognac, and the basement of his official residence is a wine cellar with nearly 10,000 bottles of one of France's most famous exports. And those foreigners who have spent time with Kim say his thirst is never sated. Reaction to Kim's boast of a successful nuclear test was swift at the U.N. Security Council.

How come they didn't show this in Team America?

Woodward on Bush and North Korea

In light of yesterday's nuclear test, this seemed worth highlighting. [Note: At the time, Bandar was the Saudi ambassador to the United States and a close friend of the Bush family] From pages 12-13 of State of Denial:

George W. pulled Bandar aside.
"Bandar, I guess you're the best asshole who knows about the world. Explain to me one thing."
"Governor, what is it?"
"Why should I care about North Korea?"
Bandar said he didn't really know. It was one of the few countries that he did not work on for King Fahd.
"I get these briefings on all parts of the world," Bush said, "and everybody is talking to me about North Korea."
"I'll tell you what, Governor," Bandar said. "One reason should make you care about North Korea."
"All right, smart aleck," Bush said, "tell me."
"The 38,000 American troops right on the border." Most of the U.S. 2nd Infantry Division was deployed there, along with thousands of other Army, Navy and Air Force personnel. "If nothing else counts, this counts. One shot across the border and you lose half these people immediately. You lose 15,000 Americans in a chemical or biological or even regular attack. The United State of America is at war instantly."
"Hmmm," Bush said. "I wish those assholes would put things just point-blank to me. I get half a book telling me about the history of North Korea."
"Now I tell you another answer to that. You don't want to care about North Korea anymore?" Bandar asked. The Saudis wanted America to focus on the Middle East and not get drawn into a conflict in East Asia.
"I didn't say that," Bush replied.
"But if you don't, you withdrawl those troops back. Then it becomes a local conflict. Then you have the whole time to decide, 'Should I get involved? Not involved?' Etc."
At that moment, Colin Powell approached.
"Colin," Bush said, "come here. Bandar and I were shooting the bull, just two fighter pilots shooting the bull." He didn't mention the topic.
"Mr. Governor," Bandar said, "General Powell is almost a fighter pilot. He can shoot the bull almost as good as us."

Buffalo, We Have a Problem

Last week, I wrote that the Foley scandal was radioactive to anyone it touched. Tom Reynolds, the congressman most directly responsible for maintaining the GOP's majority in the House of Representatives, is in serious political trouble.

How serious?

Serious enough that Reynolds felt it necessary to address the scandal in a new campaign ad running in a $200,000 buy in his district. I can't find the ad on YouTube or Reynolds' campaign website right now, but will update this post to include it if I find it later. But apologies may not be enough.

A weekend poll of residents of New York's 26th district commmissioned by the Buffalo News now has Reynolds 15 points behind his Democratic challenger. The same poll says that 57 percent of respondents disapproved his handling of the Foley scandal.

Reynolds is now Exhibit A of what the Foley Effect might bring to incumbent Republicans who are entangled in the scandal. If Jim Kolbe weren't already retiring from Congress, he would probably be facing a similar backlash from constituents based on today's story in the Washington Post.

If Bob Novak's reporting in his column today is accurate, this will not endear the now-embattled Reynolds with his constituents.

Disgraced former Congressman Mark Foley had two excellent job offers in the private sector this year when Rep. Tom Reynolds, National Republican Congressional Committee chairman, talked him into seeking a seventh term.

Although Reynolds says Foley was merely deciding whether to run again, the talk in Republican circles on Capitol Hill was that he was ready to leave Congress. His inappropriate e-mails to a former page were known to the Republican leadership late last year. The 16th Congressional District was considered so safely Republican that any GOP candidate could carry it but now likely will be lost with Foley still on the ballot.

Supporting the Troops

Captain's Quarters points out the photo on this section of the DNC's website:



The problem? The soldier is Canadian.

The Other Nuclear Option, North Korea Edition

I will take a break from Foley coverage to note the breaking news out of Asia tonight.

SEOUL, South Korea (CNN) -- North Korea on Monday claimed it has performed a successful nuclear test, according to that country's official Korean Central News Agency (KCNA).

South Korean government officials also said North Korea performed its first nuclear test, the South's Yonhap news agency reported.

The apparent nuclear test was conducted at 10:36 a.m. (0136 GMT) in Hwaderi near Kilju city, Yonhap reported, citing defense officials.

"The field of scientific research in the DPRK (North Korea's official name) successfully conducted an underground nuclear test under secure conditions on October 9 ... at a stirring time when all the people of the country are making a great leap forward in the building of a great prosperous powerful socialist nation," KCNA reported.

Late Sunday in Washington, a U.S. military official told CNN that "something clearly has happened," but the Pentagon was working to fully confirm the report.

Senior U.S. officials said they also believed the test took place, citing seismic data that appeared to show one.

South Korean intelligence officials said a seismic wave of magnitude-3.58 had been detected in North Hamkyung province, according to Yonhap.

This is big news, no matter when it would happen. Politically, it hands Democrats more ammunition against the Republicans on foreign policy issues for the November elections. Republicans wanted something to get Foley out of the news, but I think this isn't what they had in mind.