Marjorie Traitor Greene’s northwest Georgia district is nuts country. She doesn’t have to worry about any unpleasant surprises there. In 2020, while he was losing the country and the state, Trump won GA-14 with 73.4%. The PVI is R+22, the worst in the state. The old partisan lean was R+55. With redistricting, it became slightly less red— R+45. In a good year, a good Democratic candidate can win a district with an R+5 or 6 lean. But not an R+45… and this isn’t going to be a good year anyway, not for Democrats and certainly not in northwest Georgia. Despite her opponent having raised $15,318,792— almost $4 million more than Traitor Greene— FiveThirtyEight forecasts a 71.8% to 28.2% win for Greene.
That has freed her up to run around the country campaigning for other far right extremist MAGAts, where she can make news by joking about political violence directed against Democrats or by reciting Kremlin propaganda by rote about the Russian caused tragedy in Ukraine.
I don’t think the GOP has her out on the road to persuade any swing voters to vote for Republicans. Her job— aside from being an entertaining opening act for Trump— is to rev up MAGA enthusiasm among people who might skip voting. Democrats also have equally shitty spokespeople on the road for their candidates— like Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris. Is Jill Biden a viable surrogate? The White House believes so. Last week, Mayor Peter’s awesome p.r. team successfully planted a story that he’s the most-in demand campaign surrogate in the country, which is patently false. But it shows how desperate the Democrats are if they’re sending out turnoffs like Hillary, Kamala and Mayo Pete to rev up the base, not to mention electoral non-entities like Hakeem Jeffries and Pete Aguilar.
Yesterday, the Washington Post ran a piece by Toluse Olorunnipa about Democratic Party leaders running around defending blue seats. There are a lot of stories like this in the media now. They all have something in common: they never mention— or even hint— that the incumbents who need defending SUCK… that they need defending because they are terrible candidates with terrible records. Last night New Hampshire Senator Maggie Hassan was on MSDNC with Lawrence O’Donnell. She was lucky to be on with a propagandist instead of a news anchor. The segment was produced to smear her admittedly horrible opponent but I’m certain it never even crossed O’Donnell’s— or his producer’s mind— to ask her why she expects Democrats to vote for her after years of voting like a Republican on key issues, like raising the minimum wage (which she helped the GOP kill). She’s the worst incumbent Senator the Democrats have up for reelection this cycle. But they have plenty of terrible House candidates. And then there’s unelected New York Governor Kathy Hochul, who had Hillary and Kamala campaigning for her. Who wants to vote for this kind of garbage politician?
Obviously unmentioned in the mainstream media.
Olorunnipa reported that Kamala nd Hillary held a joint rally in an effort to rescue Hochul, “who faces a close race in a state Republicans haven’t won in two decades. Biden traveled to New Mexico and Southern California to support vulnerable Democratic incumbents— bypassing Arizona and Nevada, where officials fear he could be a drag on [very mediocre] senators in tight races. Biden and Harris plan to spend part of the weekend in Illinois, boosting House candidates in suburban districts that have been trending back toward Republicans since 2020.”
You get a sense from Olorunnipa’s reporting that the Democratic establishment is pessimistic and despairing but he never notes that they are unable to look in the mirror and see the rot. “There’s a growing sense among Democrats that there’s little they can do at this point to combat the combined forces of history and economics. ‘There’s a general malaise that’s hanging over the country,” said Joel Payne, a Democratic strategist. ‘What you’re seeing is an angry electorate that keeps kicking the people in charge out. They did it in 2016. They did it in 2018. They did it in 2020. And, if things hold to what it’s looking like, they’re probably going to do it again in 2022.’” That’s one way to look at it. Another is that the candidates are not worthy of being voted for. Or is even thinking about that just too dangerous to the whole rotten, dysfunctional edifice? No one in the mainstream media ever wants to talk about the quality of Democratic candidates, just about what a laugh Republican candidate quality is. It’s the acceptable narrative.
While many Democrats have privately believed for months that Republicans were likely to take the House, they have expressed increasing fears in recent days that voters could hand the GOP a significant majority— an outcome that would amount to a major rebuke of the party in power. In some cases, the party appears to be conceding seats it previously competed for, a retrenchment that strategists worry could signal a “red wave” of widespread Republican victories on traditionally Democratic turf.
…In recent days, [Jill Biden] has traveled to Rhode Island and New Hampshire to appear alongside Democratic candidates in areas her husband carried in 2020. Some candidates have preferred campaigning alongside the first lady, even as they have avoided appearing publicly with her husband.
The president has avoided campaigning in Arizona, where his approval ratings are underwater. Kelly has kept him at arm’s length while fighting off attacks from Masters that he is too close to Biden.
…Democrats face head winds in a number of races, particularly in the House.
For example, the party has grown increasingly concerned that Republicans have a path to win all three House seats in South Texas, a longtime Democratic stronghold.
Party leaders in Texas and Washington have long expected that Republicans could gain a foothold in the region by flipping the state’s 15th Congressional District, where Republican candidate Monica De La Cruz has run an aggressive and well-funded campaign. But, now, Democrats are alarmed by GOP momentum they’re seeing in the neighboring 34th and 28th districts, where Biden won by nearly 16 points and more than seven points, respectively.
Local Democrats have been urging the national party and donors for months to send more resources and place more focus on the Hispanic-heavy districts, particularly Texas’ 34th District, where Republican Rep. Mayra Flores won in a special election in June. But national Democrats largely shrugged off Flores’s win because the district was set to become much bluer for the November midterms due to redistricting.
The 34th and 28th have conservative Blue Dog incumbents running, less than worthless candidates, Vicente Gonzalez and Henry Cuellar, Neither deserves to be reelected. The only case is that the Republicans are worse or that the GOP will gain a majority and end abortion or democracy or whatever. The 15th is a more interesting case. The Democrats actually have a great candidate, Michelle Vallejo, a progressive who the Hakeem Jeffries faction tried defeating in the primary and, when she beat the conservative candidate— Ruben Ramirez— the had the DCCC pull all support from the district. The DCCC has spent $95 in the district while the NRCC has spent $1,523,349. Jeffries allies at Democratic Majority for Israel spent $492,042 smearing Vallejo. And she’s still ahead. Jeffries and his allies are doing all they can to lose this seat-- and allow a deranged MAGAt to win!!
Olorunnipa concluded by noting that “Some party officials have begun to consider a potential silver lining of a potential drubbing in House races, which are held every two years. Because some of the losses are expected to be in blue states and districts that Biden won handily in 2020, Democrats could have more opportunities for easier pickups in 2024, said one Democratic strategist familiar with House races, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to frankly discuss the state of play. ‘Clear path back in 2024,’ the strategist said, ‘if we lose those seats on Tuesday.’”