Over at the Seattle Weekly (yeah, the Weekly,) Aimee Curl has been digging through recent PDC filings, and they don’t look so good for state House Republicans. Sixteen months before the next election, the House Dems’ official campaign committee already has over $450,000 in the bank, compared to the Republicans’ measly $40,621. Wow.
The organizing committees are the party machines that give campaign funds directly to candidates. “It’s amazing how big the disparity has become,” marvels former state Republican Party Chairman Chris Vance. […] Vance credits this year’s Democrat cash explosion in part to House Speaker Frank Chopp’s machine. “In terms of Olympia that’s the shadow that looms over everything,” he says, adding that Republican challengers are as good as on their own in 2008.
“The financial advantage is so massive it will put the Republicans completely on the defensive,” Vance says. “The Democrats can force the Republicans to have to worry about their incumbents. Now you have to take whatever money you’ve got and defend them and you’ve got no other money to help challengers.”
Progressives like me sometimes question Chopp’s willingness to use his near-super majority, but we have no qualms about his ability to build and maintain it. Folks smarter than me about these things tell me that House and Senate Dems have stretched the limits of attainable majorities given current electoral realities, but I wouldn’t expect a GOP comeback in 2008.
Still, I’m not entirely comfortable with Chopp’s incrementalist approach, and can’t help but wonder if he took away the wrong lesson from the Republican landslide of 1994. Conventional wisdom asserts that voters punished state Dems for overreaching during the previous session, and it is hard to argue that this didn’t play some role, at least in the rhetoric of the 1994 campaign season. But I think that the important lesson to learn from the “Republican Revolution” of 1994 — and the Big Blue Wave of 2006 — is that electoral politics can shift dramatically, seemingly overnight, and sometimes for reasons apparently beyond your control.
If Chopp thinks Dems can sustain a working majority indefinitely, he’s deluding himself. And even if he does maintain control of the House, that’s no guarantee that the Senate or the Governor’s mansion won’t suddenly fall into GOP hands. Sure, there’s no compelling reason to toss out Gov. Gregoire in 2008, but in this notoriously fickle and ticket-splitting state, voters don’t need one. The Dems are always just one bad campaign away from finding themselves mired in gridlock… or worse.
I suppose one can imagine a rosier political scenario than the one currently facing state Dems. But one would be foolish to expect it.
Bill Clinton was impeached and disbarred because he lied to a grand jury in a failed attempt to conceal a pattern of predatory behavior in connection with a felony assault case that he later settled for $800k.
Can ya imagine being too fucking dishonest to be a lawyer?
Ames Lake Homeowner’s Board member Darcy Burner announced today that she has approved replacement of two trees near the entrance which were damaged in last winter’s storm.
Ms. Burner also announced that the board has authorized a minor repair to a resident’s garage door.
DEMS SHOULD START CUTTING TAXES.
PROPERTY AND SALES IN EXCHANGE FOR A MAINSTREAM INCOME TAX USED BY 43 OTHER STATES.
THE B&O TAX SHOULD BE REFORMED OR REPLACED WITH SOMETHING BETTER.
AND WINGNUTS CALIFORNIA IS AS BAD AS IT IS BECAUSE OF THE DISASTER THAT IS PROP 13.
TAX REFORM SHOULD BE AT THE TOP OF GREGOIRE’S AGENDA IN HER NEXT TERM, FOLLOWED CLOSELY BY TRANSPORTATION FUNDING REFORM. I DON’T KNOW HOW YOU IMPROVE QUALITY OF LIFE AND ECONOMIC PROSPECTS WITHOUT THOSE TWO.
TRAITOR @ 1
GBS SAID IT BEST YESTERDAY – THE IMPEACHMENT OF CLINTON FOR LYING ABOUT A BLOW JOB WAS THE MOST RECKLESS ABUSE OF CONSTITUTIONAL POWER BY A PARTISAN MAJORITY IN HISTORY.
LYING TO GET INTO A UNNEEDED WAR – THAT’S OK TO A TRAITOR.
TRAITOR @ 1
PAY YOUR FUCKING GAMBLING DEBT.
He can’t afford to pay his gambling debt, he’s just another psychopath try to convince us he’s somebody worth reading. He’s a liar, in other words, to paraphrase his hero Bush.
Nutcake Republicans went after Bill Clinton for engaging in the same sorts of sexual indescretions that leaders in the Republican Party were doing then, and are still doing now. Just as David Vitter taking a dump in a diaper with a prostitute doesn’t, necessarily, make him a bad Senator (his idiotic ideas do that,) Bill getting a blowjob or groping some willing campaign workers didn’t make him a bad President(his embrace of the right wing agenda did.)
But neither of these examples holds a candle to the absolute usurpation of power by George W. Bush. He has made the most audacious and extensive power grab in US history. Worse, he has done in only to enhance his own power, not for any perceived good of the country. Even if you buy into his nonsensical claim that sending all our combat military into a civil war in Iraq makes us more secure, he’s so incompetent in the attempt that he shouldn’t be trusted with additional power.
No, it’s all about him being King George IV. MTR is a royalist.
Anybody else notice that Mark only seems to post when the public library is open?
George W Bush was arrested for and convicted of DUI. He also illegally did coke and went AWOL when his daddy got him into the NG to avoid serving in Nam. They he tried to destroy the US Constitution by doing away with our freedom.
You gotta feel sorry for YOS, he is always yelling and yelling the same thing over and over. One can only imagine how filled with hate and discontent his life is.
Looking at it from bush’s point of view… George Sr said, “Son, see how that man wags his finger as he lies to the stupid people of this country? That’s proof we can do anything we want. After Clinton finishes up his term, you can your two, followed by another Clinton in the white house. Jeb will have to wait his turn in the white house. We are the royal families and these stupid morons need us to lead them. If they weren’t so stupid, why would they keep voting us back into office. Or as you say Georgie, back into orifice. Hahahaha!”
“Duh daddy, you’re rite, the people are stoopid.”
10 – NAH! THEY’RE JUST GENTLE REMINDERS. ONLY A WINGNUT IS TOO STUPID TO TELL THE DIFFERENCE.
OF COURSE WINGNUTS WHO SUPPORT THE IMPEACHMENT OF CLINTON FOR LYING ABOUT A BLOW JOB DON’T THINK ABOUT ALL THE GOOD PEOPLE WHO HAVE DEDICATED THEIR LIVES AND EVEN SACRIFICED THEIR LIVES TO DEFENDING THE CONSTITUTION OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
ALL THEY WERE THINKING ABOUT WAS THEIR HATRED FOR CLINTON. SO DRIVEN BY THEIR HATRED, THEY PISSED ON THE CONSTITUTION.
AND THESE PEOPLE HAVE THE NERVE TO POINT THE FINGER ABOUT “HATING” BUSH!
SEE CONSERVATIVE JOHN COLE’S EXCELLENT POST ABOUT “HATING” BUSH.
Well, after being away for a couple of days, then coming back and seeing a topic that even the wingnuts should be able to constructively debate, I find Mr. Redneck pasting the same tired, off-topic posts he was posting a week ago.
Why am I not surprised?
@14
John,
I’m not convinced there’s any topic that the wingnuts can constructively debate. That’s the beauty of their wingnuttery…
You should put this on a T-shirt so that people can buy them and send them to their legislators. And maybe a poster.
It’s like a “This too shall pass.”