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You are here: Home / Past Elections / Election 2014 / Shitshow in SD

Shitshow in SD

by | 131 Comments

This post is in: 

I had written off the South Dakota Senate race as a gimme for popular former governor Mike Rounds, but boy was I wrong about that. This doesn’t quite rise to the level of the Wendy Davis ad that John posted below, but it leaves a mark:

The short story is that Rounds is getting some mud from an EB-5 scandal spattered on his heretofore pristine britches. EB-5 is a law that lets rich foreign investors buy their citizenship by investing in companies, and the head of a private company that was skimming from SD’s EB-5 effort committed suicide last year. Rounds endorsed the EB-5 effort and the DSCC and Democrat Rick Weiland’s campaign are going after him hammer and tongs.

In addition to the EB-5 scanda, Rounds has two other problems. First, he hasn’t raised shit for cash–he’s got $750K on hand which is low for a House campaign, never mind the Senate. So when outside PACs and the DSCC lay down $3 million in ads, it’s hard for Rounds to respond. Rounds has spent less than $1 million on ads during his entire campaign. Rounds’ second problem is that a sort-of Republican is running in the race, Larry Pressler. Pressler is the former Republican Senator who’s now cast himself as a centrist (and probably voted for Obama), and it’s likely he would caucus with Democrats, plus or minus a few pirouettes and tours en l’air. Pressler is now polling near Rounds, with Weiland not far behind. The DSCC ad wisely just pummels Rounds, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Democrats in the state strategically hold their noses and vote for Pressler, depending on how the final race polls look. At this point, however, I’d give to Weiland if I were in a giving mood. He ran Daschle’s field operation through some of the toughest campaigns any Democrat has faced in the last 20 years, and he’ll know how to spend the money wisely in the next couple of weeks.

If you want to read more about this race, here’s a suitably negative take on Rounds’ prospects from Jonathan Ellis at the Sioux Falls Argus Leader. It’s also nice to see Larry Lessig’s PAC doing something useful instead of just bemoaning Citizens United, by throwing a million bucks behind Weiland.

Reader Interactions

131Comments

  1. 1.

    Elizabelle

    OT: C-Span to cover McConnell-Allison Lundergan Grimes debate at 8 Eastern, although they’ve got technical problems they’re trying to resolve.

  2. 2.

    PsiFighter37

    There are a few important things to add…

    1) Pressler did vote for Obama (in both 2008 and 2012), so I think it’s pretty clear who we would caucus with. That said, he’d probably be a pain in the ass – he’s waffled on abortion over the past week, he has issues about his residency (similar to Pat Roberts, he claims his primary residence in DC – and he actually contemplated running for mayor of DC), he has zero money, and he also is one of those ‘Fix the Debt’ assholes who want to screw over everyone paying into SS.

    2) Weiland has traveled to every town in SD (literally), so he definitely is a known quantity. That said, he’s a bit liberal for the state, and he basically has had no institutional support because Harry Reid is pissed at Tom Daschle for pushing Weiland into the race (Reid wanted to clear the field for Stephanie Herseth Sandlin – frankly, he was right. SHS would be creaming Rounds right now, given her much higher name rec / popularity). As such, a lot of this last-minute stuff for Weiland is on the fly, not because there’s a shit-ton of institutional support there.

    3) Mayday, as I understand it, is advertising about campaign finance reform / Citizens United. They need to get their head out of their asses and campaign on shit that will move the campaign meaningfully. I would be shocked if there are tens of voters who give two craps about this being THE issue. This election will be won or lost on how much people don’t believe Rounds sold out a federal program to the highest foreign bidders and then had his buddies skim off the top by privatizing the program.

    At least it’s exciting. As I noted in my summary in the open thread, I think Pressler’s support will tank over the next few weeks, with most going to Weiland – but he’ll still lose to Rounds by mid-single digits. Unless a smoking gun comes out that contradicts everything Rounds has said to date, there will be no fire.

  3. 3.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    OT – but when your last name is Heir, what on earth possesses you to name your daughter Million. No I am not joking

    http://www.jacksonvilleonline.org/staff.html

    I picked up her business card today when I went to pick up my lunch from the restaurant next door and could not imagine what the parents were thinking.

  4. 4.

    constitutional mistermix

    @PsiFighter37: SHS could have had it if she wanted it bad enough. But she looked at the race and made the same calculation the rest of us did – Rounds was a sure winner. So she didn’t push hard, and Weiland ended up being the candidate.

    Mayday’s ad is a sunshine and roses Rick Weiland ad. Nothing wrong with $1 million spent on that.

    I can’t argue with your conclusion, btw.

  10. 10.

    Roger Moore

    @Litlebritdifrnt:

    OT – but when your last name is Heir, what on earth possesses you to name your daughter Million.

    Some people probably think that kind of thing is a good joke. For example, Bill Lear, the developer of the Lear Jet, named one of his daughters Shanda. At least women can more easily escape a bad combination of first and last name.

  11. 11.

    Botsplainer

    I have a much better shitshow. A Free Republic thread featuring Ron Paul extolling the virtues of letting The Market (Profits Be Unto It) solve ebola.

    By leaving the market as the only solution, wise corporations will contain it and quarantine sufferers because Freedom. He has a great example in a company town in Liberia.

    http://freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3214753/posts

    Everybody is welcome….

  12. 12.

    PsiFighter37

    @raven: Hope Grimes can move the needle. Think that Senator Turtle needs to screw up a bit, and he does know what he is doing…

  13. 13.

    Corner Stone

    @Baud: He’s carping, with very clean white gloves on, about Wendy Davis and the ad.
    He might as well be interviewing for a spot on Morning Joe Concern Squad as the token left wing douchebag.
    Yeah, cut out the first 3 seconds and Wendy loses by 14% instead of the 11% she’s going to go down by.
    Stupid dbag. Take your purity bleached undies and go bunch them down somewhere the fuck else.

  15. 15.

    Corner Stone

    @PsiFighter37:

    Hope Grimes can move the needle. Think that Senator Turtle needs to screw up a bit, and he does know what he is doing

    Maybe if she really vocally embraced President Obama at this point she could pull this whole thing off…

  18. 18.

    Corner Stone

    Wendy Davis is a flawed candidate. Her campaign was not 100% on point.
    Gotcha. Agreed.
    Bill White, who I know a little and really like, was probably a better candidate for D TX Gov. And he got fucking creamed.
    The D party candidate was dead. Fucking dead.to.fucking.rights. And she made it competitive. She put the ball in motion. Was she ever going to win? Probably not very likely. But she did the damned thing and we should be proud of that. I’m not her biggest fan but I am proud of her and I hope she puts the ad on 24/7 rotation until election day. Fuck that fucking hypocrite scumbag motherfucker.

  19. 19.

    Corner Stone

    @Baud: As somebody else said, when Saxby Fucking Chambliss gets called on the carpet for his campaign ad maybe then I’ll start wondering where the line is.
    Fuck you Chris Hayes, you fucking mook hipster motherfucker.

  21. 21.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    @Roger Moore:

    It is parental malpractice, like naming your son Richard when your last name is Head. It may be funny in the moment but you are setting your child up for a lifetime of ridicule.

  22. 22.

    skerry

    McConnell just said he wants to keep the “website called Kynect,” but do away with Obamacare.

    smh

    ETA: He keeps saying “rimrackked” to mean “cuts that hurt business”. Is that a Kentucky word? I’ve never heard it.

  24. 24.

    PsiFighter37

    Watching Turtle flail around the ACA/Kynect question. Love watching this fucker squirm, and the moderator isn’t letting him go easily.

  26. 26.

    Elizabelle

    No shit. This is on the PBS website. (Bored with listening to Turtle and casting about.)

    If the movies “It” and “Killer Clowns from Outer Space” gave you the heebie-jeebies, there’s another reason to be scared of clowns: An outbreak of clowns in the San Joaquin Valley is terrifying residents.

    On Thursday, a 14-year-old boy dressed as a clown was arrested for scaring neighborhood child on Thursday night. The teenager was charged with annoying a minor. The disturbance was one of 20 reports from Kern County in the last week of clowns terrifying children. Police have received reports of clowns wielding guns, machetes and baseball bats.

    PBS, folks.

  27. 27.

    Baud

    @Corner Stone:

    While that’s a spot-on criticism of the media generally, to be fair to Hayes, I believe he would critize Chambliss for that ad if it aired today.

  29. 29.

    KG

    @skerry: I really hope someone points out that those two things are the same thing. From the sound of the comments, somebody might be

  30. 30.

    Thor Heyerdahl

    OK – FYWP, what word did I use that pissed you off to moderate me?

    edit – never mind found it. Error in the email field.

  31. 31.

    Corner Stone

    @efgoldman:

    Until Dems in TX can get massive GOTV going, any candidate with (D) after his or her name is flawed.

    Of course. The last perfect person died leaving a bunch of cats to fend for themselves.
    I mean she made some things easier to use against her than they had to be.

  33. 33.

    Corner Stone

    @Baud: No, I guess my point is that only the D will ever take meaningful heat for putting something hard out there.
    Chambliss’ ad was straight bullshit and false all the way through. But it got him elected.
    Davis’ ad is true, and makes the point and it’s going to be hung around all the D party as much as possible.

  35. 35.

    Roger Moore

    @Litlebritdifrnt:
    I do know something about unfortunate names, and it’s possible to overcome one. For the most part, people make a stupid joke or two about your name as if they’re the first person to notice and then they’re done with it. If anything, a name like that might give you a slight advantage because it’s memorable and means people are more likely to remember you.

  36. 36.

    JPL

    @Corner Stone: They need to stand behind it. She was pointing out a fact. Just like in GA, I don’t see TX turning blue but at least it’s time to stand up and call the hypocrites out.

  37. 37.

    Thor Heyerdahl

    Worried about negative ads…that horse left the barn long ago – see Jesse Helms’ “hands” ad.

    BTW – being moderated right now since I screwed up the email address.

  39. 39.

    Violet

    @Mike J: How is annoying a minor a thing someone can be charged with? That’s ridiculous. “My mom is playing 90’s music in the car and it’s annoying me. I’m going to have her arrested.”

  40. 40.

    rikyrah

    Immigration Activists Call Out Kentucky Dem’s “Morally Reprehensible” Tactics

    Alison Lundergan Grimes promises she won’t support amnesty. “She is essentially aligning herself with her opponent.” posted on Oct. 13, 2014, at 6:28 p.m.

    Latino advocates were shocked to learn Monday that Democratic Senate candidate Alison Lundergan Grimes is running an under-the-radar campaign to paint herself as less interested in a pathway to legal status for undocumented immigrants than her opponent, Senator Mitch McConnell.

    “I approve this message because I’ve never supported amnesty or benefits for illegal immigrants and I never will,” Grimes says in a TV ad first uncovered by Vox. The ad attacks McConnell for voting in favor of a bipartisan immigration bill in 1986 that was the last time Washington provided a path to legality for undocumented workers.

    The TV ad is, as Vox notes, “unlisted on YouTube, meaning it doesn’t show up on Grimes’ main YouTube page and isn’t searchable — minimizing the likelihood that out-of-state supporters will see it.”

    The subterfuge did not sit well with Latino and immigrant advocates, most of whom are supporting Democrats like Grimes against the GOP in November.

    “It smacks of desperation,” said Frank Sharry, president of the immigration advocacy group America’s Voice. “It’s a real eye-roller. First of all, when Democrats try to get to the right of Republicans on immigration it just doesn’t work. Number two, she’s attacking him for a vote in 1986? Really?”

    http://www.buzzfeed.com/evanmcsan/immigration-activists-call-out-kentucky-dems-morally-reprehe?utm_term=2foe0ef#2vy8gfn

  41. 41.

    Kathy

    @PsiFighter37: Blue Dog Herseth-Sandlin shit in her own nest. That’s why she lost to that non-entity Kristi Noem in 2010. She screwed over her base and drove Dems away and no Repub in this state will vote for a Dem no matter how “conservative.”

    Good riddance to her. I left the slot blank in 2010 and would do the same if she ran again.

  42. 42.

    KG

    @Elizabelle: just did a search on it because I’ve never heard of it and it looks to be tied to molestation in that it must be driven by an “unnatural sexual interest in children”. So not sure how standing around dressed as a creepy clown gets a conviction

  43. 43.

    RaflW

    @PsiFighter37:

    Pressler … is one of those ‘Fix the Debt’ assholes who want to screw over everyone paying into SS.

    OK, I just donated to Weiland’s campaign. Fix the Debt is the sort of crap that will ruin America with all it’s GOP footsy.

  44. 44.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Roger Moore:

    My maiden name (surname) was Mann. If I had the proverbial dime for every time I heard some variation on “You look like a Mann I know!” I would be a very wealthy woman.

  45. 45.

    Calouste

    @Litlebritdifrnt: There’s nothing that prevents Ms. Heir from going by say Millie in her daily life. Also note that she is listed as Million Heir-Williams, so she might have had an opportunity when getting married, and decided not to take it.

  48. 48.

    Baud

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    I haven’t watched him in a while. His big problem, IMHO, is that he keeps changing his style ever so slightly. He hasn’t developed an identity for his show yet.

  49. 49.

    Corner Stone

    Turtle just stepped on his joint again in that last question. He said that a poll of Congressional staffers had voted him the hardest working member of Congress.
    Well, now! Congressional staffers, you say? That’s impressive!!

  52. 52.

    Gex

    @Roger Moore: This made me realize how Voter ID can cause issues for women voters who have taken their husband’s name. And it seems like the “family values” party has given women a really good reason not to change their name when they marry. It really isn’t worth losing the franchise over.

    @Botsplainer: Um…I didn’t know the government had been stopping private enterprise from addressing ebola. I sort of assumed that we have exactly the amount of ebola vaccines and treatments as private enterprise was interested in making.

  53. 53.

    RaflW

    @Corner Stone:

    The D party candidate was dead. Fucking dead.to.fucking.rights. And she made it competitive.

    I’m hoping she helps move a few state legislative races, judges, etc. I dearly hope the Dems are learning a lesson: keeping your money and your Democratic outrage at home since Ann lost to Dubya in 94 has been a terrible mistake.

    Would Perry have lost a few years ago? Probably not. Would the TX lege flip in a hurry? Probably not. But you build a machine and you work it and you don’t let the margin be any bigger than it might be up in Austin.

    I think Davis, flaws and all, showed Texans (and I lived there for 14 years, left in ’95) that being the minority party doesn’t mean being the culturally and politically irrelevant party.

    As the demographics change in TX, and as they GOP lurches further into the nativist right gutter, the prospects for Dems will improve. They’ll improve faster if they’s got some fight in ’em.

  55. 55.

    Corner Stone

    @rikyrah: I’d take that report with a huge heaping spoon of salt.
    But, she’s gonna do what she has to. Doesn’t anyone here get what level of dirty street fighter she’s running to take down?

  56. 56.

    PsiFighter37

    @Corner Stone: He fumbled the delivery on that one. He wanted to say ‘hardest-working Senate Majority Leader’, since that is apparently his life’s goal (based on the NYT piece on him a few months back).

  57. 57.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @SiubhanDuinne: I don’t mind his weekday show. Sometimes he’s great, like when he interviewed people on the street in Ferguson.

    I think he was better in his weekend show, when he had two hours for a panel to dig into subjects. Instead of having politicians and spinners, he had people you never heard of who were experts in an area so you’d come away actual new information.

    Kornacki is good with politics, but he’s not nearly as good at that kind of in depth analysis of a non-horse race subject.

  59. 59.

    Schlemazel

    @Litlebritdifrnt:
    I went to school with a kid whose family name was Teal. Daddy dearest named all the kids after ducks so it was Mallard Teal I graduated with – you can google him, he has a body shop in the old neighborhood.

  61. 61.

    Corner Stone

    @hilts:

    are far more insufferable than Lawrence O’Donnell.

    Woah, woah, woah. I’m no fan of tweety but since they canned Baldwin, there is simply no one else on MSNBC that even comes close to rivaling O’Donell in the insufferable department.
    Morning Joe is in a class of shit all by himself but Larry takes the absolute chocolate covered gnoche cake of indigestible insufferability.

  62. 62.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @Iowa Old Lady:

    I don’t even know when his weekday show is on. I don’t do TV any more; when I catch anything on MSNBC it’s on Sirius XM radio in the car.

    Mostly I just listen to classical music. Better for the blood pressure.

  63. 63.

    Hal

    Off topic, but Rachel Maddow is right now drawing lines from Leon Panetta to Hillary Clinton. Engage popcorn.

  65. 65.

    Violet

    @Hal: I’ve had it on but it’s confusing. Michael Regan, Nancy Reagan and astrology, Clinton and Dick Morris, then Leon Panetta. I don’t know…I tuned out about five minutes ago. Something about people leaving the administration and writing tell-all books where they say Shocking! Things! about the President because they want to sell books.

  66. 66.

    Baud

    @Hal:
    @raven:

    Not watching. Do you have the Cliff Notes version? I’ve never quite understood how Panetta criticizing Obama just before the midterms is supposed to help Hillary in 2016.

  69. 69.

    Corner Stone

    @Baud:

    I’ve never quite understood how Panetta criticizing Obama just before the midterms is supposed to help Hillary in 2016.

    Panetta is out for Panetta. Period. Unless someone wants to tie Robert Gates and Peter Orszag back to HRC somehow.
    Because they did the same shit when they left the admin.

  70. 70.

    JPL

    @Baud: She decided that she has to be tougher on foreign policy. It’s not enough to kill Osama or bomb wedding parties. She wants to be Xena the Warrior Woman or something like that.

  71. 71.

    Baud

    @raven:

    There ain’t nothing new.

    But I’ll try to catch the video on the Internet to get the explanation of how it connects.

  72. 72.

    Iowa Old Lady

    @SiubhanDuinne: I don’t watch in real time. I have it on line the next day so I can skip segments I’m not interested in.

    In the car, I have audio books. I get them from the library.

  73. 73.

    Botsplainer

    @Thor Heyerdahl:

    I know a lawyer who is genuinely named Richard Head. He is a genuinely nice guy and good lawyer; our judges don’t tolerate it when lawyers who don’t know him well try to get cute with it.

  75. 75.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    If the Clintons (the political clan, not just the family) think that running an anti-Obama campaign in the Village is the path to the future, then they mis-learned the lessons of the last time. If they keep this shit up they’ll push me into a protest primary vote, and lose my money.

  84. 84.

    Roger Moore

    @Gin & Tonic:

    You mean that’s your real name, not a BJ nym?

    I started posting under my real name when I got started on USENET back in 1990. By the time people started getting worried about their online posting being tracked back to them and causing real world problems, it was far too late for me to change my mind.

  85. 85.

    hilts

    Alison “shit for brains” Lundergan Grimes does it again:

    Kentucky Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes (D) declined Monday to say whether she voted for President Obama in 2008 and 2012, dodging the question for the second time in five days.

    The Democratic Senate nominee explained her decision by saying she was “not going to compromise a constitutional right” to privacy at the ballot box “provided here in Kentucky in order to curry favor on one or [the] other side or for members of the media.”

    http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2014/10/13/grimes-defends-choice-not-to-say-if-she-voted-for-obama-citing-wish-to-protect-privacy/

  92. 92.

    karen

    I live in the DC metro area so I’ve been seeing ads with Virginia’s Foust and Comstock for the past month or so. I was nervous with the one ad with the quote of Foust implying that he didn’t consider working women had real jobs.

    Then today I started seeing an ad about Barbara Comstock quoting an article from Tiger Beat on the Potomac of all places. Barbara Comstock pushed client’s issues, didn’t disclose

    Is that bribery? Is it illegal?

  93. 93.

    Hal

    @Baud: I thought her main point was democrats running away from Obama with two years left in his presidency. I’m not anti Hillary at all, but I thought it was a good point to talk about Panetta’s connections with Clinton while selling his book.

  94. 94.

    Baud

    @Hal:

    Thanks. I’ll try to catch it. But it’s kind of meh. Democrats were running away from Obama when he had eight years left in his presidency.

    And the term “lame duck” wasn’t invented for Obama either.

  95. 95.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @Baud:
    I live in Kentucky. On the one hand, I hate it when Democrats run away from Obama. On the other hand, this is a deeply racist, deeply hate-driven state. She and McConnell both know it. McConnell’s entire strategy has been to remind people that Grimes likes brown people, especially OBAMA OBAMA OBAMA. I can certainly see why she’s avoided the word ‘Obama’ like the plague.

  96. 96.

    Gin & Tonic

    @hilts: Voting booths in the US are private, are they not? Why is “none of your fucking business” not an acceptable answer in all circumstances?

  97. 97.

    JPL

    @Baud: Democrats ran away from Obama in 2010 and that didn’t work out so well and he still has his job.

    @raven: That’s a great ad but it needs to be on the TV.

  98. 98.

    KG

    @Baud: so then, it’s a lose-lose proposition for her to answer the question. If she voted for him like 40% of the state, then it proves she will be a rubber stamp for his evil agenda. If she voted against him, then it means she doesn’t believe in Obama’s agenda and if you want someone who opposes obama, go with the guy who has been doing it since 2008

  99. 99.

    Amir Khalid

    @Roger Moore:
    Speaking of dumb names inflicted by parents, I can think of the filmmaker Zowie Bowie, so named by his father David. Fortunately Bowie is only David’s stage name, so Zowie is now able to use his real first and last names and go by Duncan Jones.

  100. 100.

    hilts

    @KG:
    and Baud

    Grimes comes across as an imperious asshole by not having the guts to answer a simple fucking question. She then tops it off with this bullshit about a constitutional right to privacy. I hate Mitch McConnell, but I’m sick and tired of Grimes never missing a chance to kick Obama to the curb.

  103. 103.

    KG

    @hilts: when the approval numbers are 60-30 against the president in a state, a nominee from his party kinda has to run away/against him if they want to be competitive. Otherwise they become republicans in california

  105. 105.

    GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)

    @Baud:

    I threw my 2003 primary vote away on Dean. The only “viable” candidates at the time were Kerry and Edwards, both of who I hated with white hot heat (and pretty much still do).

  108. 108.

    KG

    @hilts: me either, honestly. But it won’t matter because the 2016 campaign will start before kick off of the first college bowl game

  109. 109.

    trollhattan

    @Frankensteinbeck:
    Watched video of the barn speechifying thing she and turtle did last summer and in the process of pulling Mitch’s testicles through his throat she did say something along the lines of, “And it’s my name on the ballot, Mitch, not President Obama’s.”

    So clearly it’s a thing there. Also, too, coal is still kewhl. No matter what happens I’ll still have the memory of Mitch sitting there like a lawn jockey while she pummeled him. Ahhhhh, sweet pummeling.

  111. 111.

    Corner Stone

    Why are people here so damn sensitive? She should never say Obama’s name. Period. Full stop.
    Fucking A, Manchin fucking shot the damn bill Obama was vocally supportive of. Give me a break you fucking weenies.

  112. 112.

    Corner Stone

    @Tommy:

    At what point do you say, shit lady, stop it. We are on the same team.

    Maybe at the point where you want to cue the video tape up and say roll tape, “I Love Obama! OBAMA! Did ya hear me, Kentucky? I said OBAMA!!”

  113. 113.

    Howard Beale IV

    Hate to say this, but the current crop of Democraps are nothing more than neoliberals under the beck and call of the multinational corporations, vs. the GOP who are under the control of the the oligarchs (Kochs, Waltons, Gates, Slim, Cohen, Buffet)

  114. 114.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Corner Stone: Agreed. I think we all want a Dem. elected in KY. How that happens should be given a bit of a Nelsonian blind eye. ALG knows a shit load more about her her state and how to get elected there than the median commenter here.

  119. 119.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Corner Stone: Trick question. The right answer is “None of them. By participating in the process they all have shown that they are unworthy of any support.”

  120. 120.

    Violet

    @hilts: Would you rather have her say nice things about Obama and lose the election or keep quiet and win? Because saying nice things about Obama is going to tank her campaign. Keeping quiet won’t guarantee a win but it won’t guarantee a loss either.

    It’s politics. She’s going to be a conserva-Dem if we’re lucky enough for her to win. Get ready to hate her even more than you already do. At least McConnell won’t be in the Senate if she wins.

  121. 121.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Violet: She’s going to be a conserva-Dem if we’re lucky enough for her to win. Get ready to hate her even more than you already do. At least McConnell won’t be in the Senate if she wins.

    Yup, her, Michelle Nunn, Orman… I thoroughly hope they will be driving me crazy for the next six years

  122. 122.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Violet: Some people need perfection. Hell, if I ran and won elections, I doubt that my voting record and campaign behavior would meet my (notional) standards – but I would be a shitload better than any Republican anywhere.

  124. 124.

    mai naem

    I don’t give a shit if Grimes runs away from Obama, I don’t care if she doesn’t want to admit to voting for Obama, if it helps her win the seat. I doubt if Obama gives a shit either. I’m not sure if that’s the right way of doing it but I can understand her not wanting to give McConnellthe “I voted for Obama” soundbite to run in a gazillion ads. I would bitch if it was a blue state candidate though.

  126. 126.

    Corner Stone

    @mai naem:

    I doubt if Obama gives a shit either.

    Are you kidding me? If she took out the guy who proclaimed his #1 goal was to make Obama a 1 term president?
    He’d make some obscure hostage/arms/money swap with a South American country or two to funnel funds for the purchase of the best bubbly for her to celebrate that victory.

  127. 127.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @mai naem: in ’06 or ’08, Nancy Pelosi said it was fine if the Blue Dogs, Southerners etc ran against her during their campaigns, as long as they voted with her when the campaigns were over.

  128. 128.

    Violet

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist: Yeah, that’s how politics works. People like Nancy Pelosi and President Obama have to have thick skins. They know how the game is played. They’d rather have the Senate than have Grimes say lovely things about Obama now.

  130. 130.

    Adam Lang

    @PsiFighter37: Pressler did vote for Obama (in both 2008 and 2012), so I think it’s pretty clear who we would caucus with.

    Wow. Someone is an optimist. You have to remember, he was a Republican politician until last year, and the only reason he publicly said he voted for Obama was because he was fishing for an appointment.

    If he gets a Senate seat and the Senate is split, 49 caucusing with the Democrats and 50 with the Republicans, he will shake down the Republicans for a committee chair or two and then caucus with them. If somehow the Democrats win 50 seats even without him, and he wins, then he will try to shake down the Democrats for a committee chair or two. If he can’t, he may well caucus with the Republicans. It is clear from his views on the world that he’d fit in better with them (because his views are ‘I will say or do anything in order to gain a little power.’)

  131. 131.

    Adam Lang

    @Omnes Omnibus: And some people are satisfied with “getting worse every year, but still a lot better than the other guys”. If that makes you happy, then that’s great, but it’s hardly cricket acting surprised when other people don’t share your viewpoint.

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