Last night at the 37th LD Dems’ monthly meeting, U.S. Rep. Adam Smith talked about the tough electoral climate Democrats will be facing this November, pointing out that even he faced a credible challenger for the first time in years.
Really?
According to the FEC, Rep. Smith was sitting on nearly $650,000 cash on hand at the end of the March quarter, while his closest rival, James Postma, had an almost respectable reserve of about $135,000 at the end of 2009. I emphasize the date, because Postma has failed to file the Q1 report due April 15. Postma also hasn’t updated his website since at least early April, his Facebook page since March, and his Twitter feed since, well, ever. So it’s not really clear that Postma is still running.
Not that Postma was ever all that credible. Rep. Smith already defeated him by a nearly two-to-one margin back in 2008, and of the $150,977 Postma had raised before apparently dropping off the edge of the earth, $150,900 was a loan from himself. No, $77 in individual contributions is not really credible at all.
So I suppose the credible challenger Rep. Smith must’ve been talking about is Pierce County Councilman Dick Muri, who raised $56,000 through the end of March, for a total of $43,000 cash-on-hand. No, money isn’t everything, but from all reports Muri isn’t exactly the kinda imposing political presence who can afford to be outspent by a 15-to-1 margin.
No doubt Rep. Smith hails from a swing district, at least demographically, despite the firm electoral hold he’s managed to take on it over the past decade, but I haven’t heard even whispers of Republican optimism in WA-09, despite the GOP’s almost religious belief in the cleansing powers of an imminent Big Red Wave.
So sorry Adam, don’t mean to put a crimp in your fundraising appeals or anything, but the real opportunity for a GOP pickup is WA-03, where Rep. Brian Baird’s retirement has left an open seat for the taking, and to a much lesser extent in WA-02, where it remains to be seen if Snohomish County Councilman John Koster can wage the credible challenge to Democratic incumbent Rep. Rick Larsen that state Republicans have been promising. But, you know, it never looks good to come off as overconfident, so keep at it.
Big Red Wave?
More like someone peeing in the pool.
No doubt haunted by visions of the dreaded invisible hand.
Mark @2,
Damn! I’ve always wanted to have Adam Smith sign my copy of The Wealth of Nations, which I keep in my car as emergency reading material, and I totally forgot.
I’d keep my eye on this one. If there is a Republican in the state who can blend teabagger activism with traditional republican support, it is John (Freedom County) Koster. He won his part of 39th LD and Snohomish County handily without any “outside help” in the past and is making all the right moves to court rabid tea party support this time around. Coupled with the real disdain Larsen has earned from the Progressives in the northern part of the county (translates to staying home in November), I’m betting this will be by far Larsen’s toughest year.
Peace,
Chad (The Left) Shue
@3
While I’m sure you are not the first person to think of that, it would indeed be rather cool to have a copy of The Wealth of Nations autographed by Rep. Adam Smith.
Chad @ 4:
Rick Larsen is not my favorite Democrat any more than he is yours, but you know my position well.
I would consider any self-described “progressives” who would enable a Koster victory by staying home to be beneath contempt, and you can tell them I said so.
The Big Red wave with chocolate milk salt water isn’t a tsunami. More like a teeny tiny ripple in the GOP pond that is rapidly drying up.
ivan @ 6:
Just reportin em the way I sees em. The Progressives up in this neck of the woods really lost it when Dwight and the Central Committee determined to hold their coronation ceremony sometime last year just to stave off any attempt at democracy within the ranks.
Larsen is so secure in his position as incumbent that he finds no need to even attempt to compromise with the Progressives in his district. His complacency could be his downfall this year.
Peace,
Chad (The Left) Shue
Adam is OK, and touts his progressive bona fides, but it strikes this observer that he is all progressively gung ho on measures that don’t have a snowball’s chance in hell (Employees Free Choice), but on the big ones he waffles, or is dead wrong: Single payer health care; the tragic waste that is our “war on terror”; and his almost wingnut deficit hawkery.
He calls these his “big 3”, and all all of them he is dead wrong, alas, much like the majority of the Democratic Party these days.
What Chad and Ivan don’t want people to know is that ALMOST EVERYONE likes John Koster, who knows him. Not just “tea party” folks, but everyone on the right, and everyone in the middle. He even gets a lot of moderate Democrats to support him (including colleagues, present and former, from the County).
Rick Larsen’s job is to paint Koster into something he’s not, before the voters get to know Koster. His first attempt at this was utter fail, asking Koster whether he stood with “Wall Street” or “Main Street” (as if Wall Street doesn’t support the bill Larsen’s pushing — as it supported the past jobs/stimulus/bailout efforts — and as if this line works with voters anymore).
And Chad, PLEASE keep pushing this “Freedom County” stuff. I fail to see why you think it’s a negative for an elected representative to want a large chunk of citizens to get better representation, but regardless, the fact that you have to pick this one small issue from 15 years ago as the centerpiece for your campaign against him is pretty telling.
It’s almost as if YOU like Koster, too, and you can’t think of anything actually bad to say about him.
Pudge @ 10:
I can sure as hell think of something actually bad to say about Koster. He is opposed to women’s reproductive choice.
Ivan: except, of course, he’s not. You’re a liar, as usual. That’s like he’s saying he’s against “parental choice” because he is against parents killing their born children.
What he is against is the “right” to kill a living human individual inside the womb. Please don’t use deceptive language, and say what you mean.
However, even that is not something bad about him as a person: it’s a policy disagreement you have with him (and most other 2nd CD voters). I never meant to imply Chad didn’t have significant policy disagreements with Koster: obviously, he does.
“You’re a liar”
That line’s starting to get a little tiresome, Pudge.
Per wingnut Koster,
“My 100% pro-life voting record is a testament to the commitment I have to the culture of life. Our Declaration of Independence states that our unalienable rights include “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” and “That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men.” Therefore, it is the express job of government to protect all innocent human life.”
Short on detail, of course. We’ll skip the Declaration vs. Constitution BS and just say that you freaks win. So just how is the government going to protect all the millions of little American blastocysts, Pudge? Details, please. Daily womb inspections? And in the wingnut vision of an America where blastocyst is a constitutionally protected human life, just what are the consequences going to be for a woman who is convicted of murdering the blastocyst in her womb?
Back to the tired, “You’re a liar” remark. If Koster is not “opposed to women’s reproductive choice”, then in what way does he actually support women’s reproductive choices to the point that you believe that you’re justified in calling Ivan a liar?
Feel free to apologize to Ivan for lying when you called him a liar. Bye the bye, if you tell him that calling people you disagree with “liars” is just a thoughtless, knee-jerk reaction coming from a thick-skulled nim-com-poop, I’m sure we’d all buy into it.
So let’s see how this “small L libertarian” vision of yours plays out, Pudge. Statistics are a little fluid but it appears there are approximately 600,000 miscarriages in the US each year. Each one needs to be investigated as I’m sure you’d agree that a woman who smokes, drinks, does drugs, drinks coffee, exercises, etc, and who suffers a miscarriage would be guilty of at least involuntary manslaughter. Let’s figure an average of just 10 investigative hours per case. That’s 6,000,000 hours of investigation per year required to sort out these miscarriage murderesses. The hours necessary to investigate miscarriages alone would require nearly 2,900 full-time womb cops. Help me out here. Is this your vision for America? Thousands of womb cops patrolling our nation’s vaginas?
C’mon, Pudge, just admit that calling Ivan a liar was just you thoughtlessly shooting from the hip, some uncontrollable knee-jerk reaction, deliberately pulling something foul from your ass, whatever you want to call it, but be a man and apologize to Ivan for calling him a liar. Man up and get on with it.
After you apologize to Ivan you can go back to sharing your “small “L” libertarian” vision of an American utopia with thousands of government pussy cops investigating the hundreds of thousands of possible murders of our little blastocyst citizens.
pudge @ 10:
you said:
I said:
Outside of the fact that I like to refer to Koster as “Freedom County” (based on his effort to carve out a new county with his hometown as the county seat) and I didn’t outright predict a Koster win, where is the difference between what I wrote and what you wrote about Koster? If you actually read what I wrote, I was saying that Koster actually appeals to a broad spectrum and may give Larsen a real run for his money.
Oh and by the way, you really do owe Ivan an apology.
Peace,
Chad (The Left) Shue
If I was a Repub, I would be really juiced for the upcomming election. It’s hard to fire up the majority party, they are either happy with what’s going on or their angry that the leaders have not done more.
Hopefully 2010 will be similar to 2004 when we Democrats did not make the gains that were predicted.
Some people might want to CHECK facts before putting them out there…. Nice way for Smith to sling the mud already must be he has something to fear!
Steve, Steve, Steve…
As Puddy said before it was Libtardos who can’t call a human baby in the womb a human baby yet call all other species by baby names for their unborn young. Give a shout out to the arschloch as he has the original Puddy post with all the species baby names. John Koster calls an unborn child in the human womb an unborn human baby. That’s his right. You hate people who think differently than you do Steve.
So Steve, when your relatives get together for a family reunion and one shows up pregnant do you walk up to her and say “wow that’s a big blastocyst/foetus”? Or, “how many months are you along with your blastocyst/foetus”? Or, “do you know the sex of your blastocyst/foetus”? Or, “wow you are big… are you carrying two blastocysts/foetuses”? Even Puddy’s most strident libtardo progressive relatives all use the term baby to address the pregnancy. Well maybe you call it a blastocyst/foetus Steve, you are a very strange one here.
This is the standard progressive playbook to call anything normally called by a name something else. Hence the use of blastocyst, foetus, etc. on HA Libtardos. John Koster calls it an unborn baby with rights. You want to give terraists who commit atrocities in the US more rights than unborn human babies have! Wow Steve… such wonderful thinking!!!
Now to your silly argument of protecting the unborn babies. Well Steve, you can educate the children in school with the statistics of what happens to teenage girls who have children early and out-of-wedlock. My cousin the teacher has some pretty interesting statistical studies which you can easily find on the ‘Nets. But that would mean the progressive NEA would have to change their teenage brain-washing path and stop being the mouthpiece for Planned Parenthood. Since most teenage pregnancies happen in the inner city (where Puddy is from) Puddy doubts any change will happen since your peeps control just about everything in a city from dog catcher to mayor.
So Puddy asks this of all libtardos with teenage daughters… Would you force them to have an abortion if they came home pregnant or would you keep your grandchild alive to see it born? Just checking… we know how the dumb brick arschloch thinks… (he’ll repost the link real soon now). John Koster thinks the unborn child is an unborn child.
Again Steve, Puddy asked you and other libtardos why did God tell Israel to kill the mothers and their unborn children if He, the Supreme Creator of the Universe, didn’t consider them unborn children. If they are blostocysts/foetuses why kill the pregnant mothers? Why was there a penalty for hitting a pregnant mother and having her spontaneously abort the child Steve? If they are blostocysts/foetuses why would God care? Don’t you remember the HA Libtardo discussion? Give a shout out the libtardo arschloch guy with the brown porn eye. He can refer to his personal HA “database” and give you the links.
John Koster has a right to call them unborn babies just like you have the right to be a fool here on HA Libtardos. It is America you know.
“John Koster has a right to call them unborn babies”
You tire me with your diversionary tactics. The topic of this thread is “WTF is wrong with Pudge”. But to indulge you, Puddy, we’ve been there, done that. “She is with child.” No argument. Do you see me arguing? But it may well be a little blastocyst child. Surely you do not deny the existence of blastocysts? But just to placate you, I’ll go with the more heart-rendering imagery we can associate with the use of the term “little blastocyst baby”.
When it comes to a miscarriage of little bastocyst babies, I’m sure you agree with Pudge that we need to investigate every single miscarriage to determine whether or not a mother’s careless lifestyle was a determining factor in the death. And if such was the case, it’s obvious that you’d want us to have government authorities level manslaughter charges against the mother. This goes back to the question Pudge won’t answer. Since you’re a wingnut, I take it that you see this as a state or county level of law and enforcement. So how many little blastocyst baby miscarriage investigators do you think our state or counties are going to need to handle the caseload? And is there any chance you’d let them unionize?
Back to the thread topic, have you got any ideas about WTF is wrong with Pudge? This alternate reality he has going him where everybody’s always lying to him, this strikes me as being rather odd. I’m thinking it might be another one of those Psych 101 things.
Uhhh Steve,
Nuff Said Sucka!
Puddy says they are humans at conception, unless you breed pups or kits when you deliver sperm!
No need to investigate why a miscarriage happens. You can lead the charge Steve!
“Puddy says they are humans at conception”
Then you obviously believe that any woman who has had a miscarriage that can be attributed to a careless lifestyle should be charged with manslaughter. You support the idea of investigating each and every miscarriage to determine if a crime has been committed. You also believe in a bloated government tasked with investigating American wombs. You go beyond wanting goverment peeking into a woman’s bedroom. You want government to peer into her vagina to make sure that her little baby blastocyst human comes to no harm. You believe in a huge, intrusive government just so long as it does your bidding, as in this case, where you want government to control women’s bodies. Eh, you must be a Nazi or something. Maybe even a commie.
our society in general sure seems confused about the whole issue steve.
a woman can get an abortion, even a late term abortion pretty much on demand. However if she is murdered and is just a few weeks pregnant, the killer can be charged with the murder of the fetus .
just makes no sense.
I dont think we will ever outlaw abortion, but I do think it needs to be reigned in and have much restrictions placed on it. For example, abortion legal up to end of first trimester ONLY. After the first trimester, only legal if medical safety issues come into play.
and lets get away from this whole “womans right to choose”….that is the biggest bunk of BS going and is a dirty remnant of the braburner era. You have a right to choose to have unprotected sex(unless in cases of rape). You are granted the option of abortion for 3 months, after that, your right to choose is trumped by the childs right to life.
3 months to figure out what your gonna do – after that its time to act like a adult and deal with your choices like a responsible human.
…and while we are at: if you are on public assistance or welfare, you are on mandatory birth control. If you cant take care of yourself, then you sure as hell cant take care of another person.