Search Results for: Reichert

Yesterday, Congress voted on the Hinchey-Rohrabacher Amendment. The Hinchey-Rohrabacher Amendment would have prevented the Federal Government from spending taxpayer dollars to arrest and prosecute medical marijuana patients in the states where it’s already been made legal (Washington is one of them, of course, passing a law via voter initiative in 1998). Now I expect the Republican Congressmen of this state to vote against it. We already know that Reichert, McMorris-Rogers, and Hastings don’t give a rats ass about the voters of this state. But three two Democratic Congressmen also voted against this bill. And one of them, Norm Dicks and Adam Smith, changed their vote from last year. Can we have an explanation from their offices for why they’ve decided in the past twelve months that the people of Washington State need to be protected from their own decisions? Can someone from either Norm Dicks’ or Adam Smith’s office explain why it’s so important for them him to have the federal government come here to overturn our laws? The second question also goes for Rick Larsen, who has consistently voted against this bill.

We are long past the point of where the old notions of “we need to protect the children” hold any water. In states where medical marijuana has been legalized, the numbers of underage marijuana users has actually decreased more than in other states. I think we deserve an explanation from our Representatives on this. There is absolutely no rational justification for voting against this bill, and they know it. The old days where votes like this aren’t noticed are over. I don’t care if you’re a Democrat or not. When you vote against the sick and dying to advance the special interests of those who benefit from having more people flowing through our criminal justice system, we should know why.

UPDATE (–Goldy):
I just received an email from Derrick Crowe, Communications Director for Rep. Adam Smith:

We noticed the vote this morning and have a submitted a statement for the record to correct the error. Adam should have been a Yes on Rollcall vote 733, the Hinchey Amendment to HR 3093, the Departments of Commerce and Justice, and Science, and Related Agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2008. Adam has consistently voted Yes on the Hinchey Amendment in years past.

So in fact, Rep. Smith voted for Hinchey-Rohrabacher. Not sure exactly how common it is for the House Clerk to get these things wrong, but apparently this time around he did. Apparently, Smith misheard the reading of the bill, and has since corrected his vote. Not sure how common that is either.

UPDATE 2: Dominic Holden has more, but still no word from Congressman Dicks…

Whoops. Rodney Tom supporters were likely buoyed by the list of endorsements his campaign emailed out last week when he announced his candidacy for Dave Reichert’s congressional seat in WA-08, but that list seems to be shrinking day by day. First King County Democratic Chair Susan Sheary denied she had endorsed Tom, and now 48th LD Chair Doug Hightower tells me he too should not have been included on the list.

I talked to Hightower today to get his take on the primary race between Tom and Darcy Burner, and he told me that he was “neutral,” and didn’t know how his name got on the endorsement list. Hightower insisted it was “too early” for party officials like him to take sides.

Consultant John Wyble graciously offered to “take the fall” for the erroneous email announcing Tom’s “run for Congresss [sic],” and I suppose it is only a minor embarrassment for both Tom and his campaign. Still, a candidate running mostly on the strength of his five years of experience in the state legislature should probably have enough campaign experience to know that it’s not such a good idea to claim endorsements until, um, you know… you actually have them.

King County Democratic Party Chairwoman Susan Sheary attended his campaign-kickoff announcement, and Tom — erroneously — claimed her endorsement, too.

He said later that support for him is obvious “when you’ve got the King County Democratic chair behind you,” and added, “She is fully behind me.”

Not so, Sheary said: “I have not endorsed anyone and will not. I was there only as a party leader because he had invited me. But I will stay neutral in the (primary) race.”

By the way, I’ve been talking to political insiders, pundits, wags and other members of the courtier class, trying to get a gauge on the conventional wisdom surrounding the Burner/Tom primary, and Hightower’s take was pretty much in line with the consensus: it’s good for the Democrats and a bad, bad sign for Reichert. Two term incumbents are usually unbeatable, yet Democrats are champing at the bit to take him on — compare that to Jennifer Dunn, who basically ran unopposed for much of her career.

And while Burner may not have wanted a primary opponent, almost everybody I’ve spoken with believes the challenge will be good for her… you know, with the possible exception of those few deluded folks who actually think Burner might lose.

I had the chance to hear Rodney Tom speak before the 48th District Democrats last week, and while he touched on education and the Iraq war, he led off his nascent stump speech by arguing that the primary race was mostly about beating Dave Reichert. One of his main critiques of Darcy Burner’s 2006 campaign was her relatively poor showing in Pierce County, where she garnered only 42.6 percent of the vote. Tom argues that he is a better fit to this more conservative, blue collar part of the 8th Congressional District. (Apparently because these voters strongly identify with wealthy, Lexus-driving, Medina realtors, I guess.)

The Tacoma News Tribune picked up on this theme yesterday with an article titled “Pierce vote important to Reichert challengers.”

Last year, as she prepared to challenge Republican Dave Reichert for the U.S. House, Darcy Burner said it would take significant Pierce County support for her to win.

She was right. Burner received only 304 fewer votes than Reichert out of over 200,000 cast in King County. But the Pierce County part of the congressional district remained loyal to the Republican, giving Reichert some 7,000 more votes than his Democratic challenger.

Hmm. I know this may sound counterintuitive, but the fact is, Burner lost the race in King County, not Pierce, where despite losing by more than 7,000 votes, she came pretty damn close to meeting or beating expectations. It was the King County results that proved disappointing, and a look back at previous elections explains why.

In 2006 Burner captured 42.6 percent of the vote in Pierce County, more than any other 8th CD Democrat since 1990. In 2004 by comparison, Dave Ross received only 39.1 of the Pierce vote, less than a half-percent better than the best effort by the much maligned Heidi Behrens-Benedict. Burner knew that to beat Reichert she had to do substantially better than previous Democrats in Pierce County. And she did.

In fact according to campaign insiders, Burner’s 3.5 point improvement over Ross (and nearly 7 point improvement over the ten-year average,) was right on target. All it would have taken to win the race was a very attainable 51.8 percent of the vote in the more Democratic King County portion of the district. But it didn’t happen. Late absentees broke decidedly towards Reichert, and Burner ended up losing King County by a few hundred votes out of over 200,000 cast.

Clearly, Tom is more conservative than Darcy, but then so was Ross, and to argue that this somehow makes Tom more electable simply isn’t supported by the facts. Burner did relatively well in Pierce County, a Republican stronghold, and with high name ID, increased turnout and presidential coattails, she’ll likely do even better. Unless, of course, I’m totally underestimating Pierce County’s Lexus-driving Medina realtor vote.

And one more balloon to burst before I go:

Tom supporters note the anti-Republican wave that swept the nation last year and say Burner had her chance to ride it to victory.

What a load of crap. Republicans held 232 House seats going into the 2006 election, and only 22 incumbents lost. Only 22. The GOP poured everything it had into defending Reichert; Karl Rove made WA-08 his number one target. And yet a total unknown with no prior campaign experience came within a silver hair of defeating “the Sheriff.”

Underestimate Burner at your own risk.

I think you know how this works by now, so let’s get to it starting nationally:

* The bullshit artists sure like to make up things about presidential candidates and potential presidential candidates. Speaking of make up, the fact that Mitt Romney spent almost $700 on one makeup session proves that John Edwards’ haircut is horrible. Hillary Clinton wore clothing appropriate for DC in the summer, so clearly that’s bad. Obama supports teaching children age appropriate sex ed, the horror. And Al Gore’s daughter’s husband’s family had a food that has been available at Whole Foods since 1999, and was, you know, “from one of the world’s few well-managed, sustainable populations of toothfish, and caught and documented in compliance with Marine Stewardship Council regulations” so clearly he’s the devil.

* Hew Hughitt thinks that trying to end the war will hurt Democrats, you know, because he cares about helping us out politically. But maybe the horrible war is, you know, just branded wrong.

* And of course the democrats constantly need to have a Sister Souljah moment. No matter how wingnutty the rightwing base is, no matter how in lock step the top tier is on the most compellingly shitty foreign policy decision in this country in decades and possibly ever, only Democrats ever seem to need to distance themselves from their base. You know, anti-war folks who were either right all along, or who have since come to the right side long ago on again, the most important thing on the election by miles.

Locally,

* Dave Reichert still doesn’t have a record of bi-partisanship or independence. As if there was ever any doubt.

* Darryl and The Olympian are calling bullshit on one of Dino Rossi’s main campaign totally not a campaign themes.

* Will has already mentioned Gary Randall, but tee hee hee.

Tonight on “The David Goldstein Show”, 7PM to 10PM on Newsradio 710-KIRO:

7PM: Is nothing sacred?
Politics is a dirty business, but are there any areas of a candidate’s life that is absolutely off limits? Writing on Slog, Josh Feit frets that it is “tacky to report on a politician’s religion,” before proceeding to report on Rep. Dave Reichert’s active membership in the ultra-fundamentalist Missouri Synod Lutheran Church. If Reichert’s religion is off limits, why not John Edwards’ haircut or Bill Clinton’s sex life… or the fact that Laura Bush killed her boyfriend?

8PM: But what about the pie crust?
King County bans Crisco! Oh no! Erika Nuerenberg, Senior Advisor to King County Council member Julia Patterson, and Trent House, Dir. Government Affairs for the Washington Restaurant Association, will join me for the hour talk about the county’s ban on trans-fat, and new nutritional labeling requirements for chain restaurants.

9PM: Prison overcrowding: supply or demand?
We’re running out of space in our region’s local jails. Is it time to start building more prisons, or maybe start treating drug addiction as a public health problem rather than a criminal one?

Tune in tonight (or listen to the live stream) and give me a call: 1-877-710-KIRO (5476).

House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Henry Waxman is investigating whether or not the travel done by the Drug Czar in 2006 was politically motivated. Throughout 2006, Drug Czar John Walters’ travel schedule was a roster of the some of the most vulnerable Republicans in Congress.

In an email passing along thanks from Karl Rove for these visits, the Office of National Drug Control Policy’s (ONDCP) White House liaison Douglas Simon wrote:

Folks,

I just wanted to give you all a summary of a post November 7th update I received the other night. Presidential personnel pulled together a meeting of all of the Administration’s White House Liaison’s and the WH Political Affairs office. Karl Rove opened the meeting with a thank you for all of the work that went into the surrogate appearances by Cabinet members and for the 72 Hour deployment. He specifically thanked, for going above and beyond the call of duty, the Dept. of Commerce, Transportation, Agriculture, AND the WH Drug Policy Office.

This recognition is not something we hear everyday and we should feel confident that our hard work is noticed. All of this is due to our efforts preparing the Director and the Deputies for their trips and events. Director Walters and the Deputies covered thousands of miles to attend numerous official events all across the country. The Director and the Deputies deserve the most recognition because they actually had to give up time with their families for the god awful places we sent them. I attached the flnal list of all of the official events that the Director and Deputies attended.

One of those “god awful places” they sent Drug Czar Walters to was Kent, where he met with Dave Reichert in March of 2006. Granted, they talked about meth, which is certainly a valid concern to people in “god awful places” like Kent. But I’d imagine there’s more of a concern that their federal tax dollars were being spent on the Drug Czar being a Republican campaign prop for all of 2006 as well.

[emphasis mine in the email]

What the Seattle Times said:

Legislation that passed the House last week would begin redeploying troops within 120 days and complete transition to a limited military presence by April 1.

Republican Congressman Dave Reichert of Washington voted with the president, and missed a big opportunity to distinguish himself. This is the direction our country has to take.

[…] There is no good time to get out of Iraq, but once we know we must leave, there is no excuse to put off the decision. Delay is also a decision, the wrong one with enormous costs in human life.

From now until November 2008, Darcy Burner will be relentlessly attacked as lacking the experience necessary to serve this region in Congress, but there should be little doubt how Burner would have voted on the House redeployment bill. She would have exercised the judgment to vote against the president, and with the values of her district. She would have displayed the leadership necessary to start bringing our troops home now, not months from now, and only when political expediency makes it absolutely necessary.

I hope the Times’ editors remember this before they sit down to write their next Reichert endorsement.

UPDATE:
Postman interviews Reichert on Iraq:

Reichert still firmly supports President Bush. The congressman is a former sheriff. When he talks about the war he frequently relates it to police work. And in this case he sees parallels between the criticism aimed at Bush and his most famous case, the hunt for the Green River Killer.

“During Green River we were just hammered on by the press and the community and I got hammered by people and criticized and I just feel some of the same pressures are being applied to the president.”

It should be noted that it took 18 years to catch the Green River Killer, even though they had enough evidence to make Gary Ridgeway a prime suspect early on.

That Reichert references his law enforcement career in response to every question is pathetic. That once again people are dying while he hamfistedly continues his investigation is a tragedy. Why do voters constantly reward such mediocrity?

Delayed a bit because Goldy was filling in for Frank Shires, edition. Let’s start nationally:

* My favorite bullshit this week comes from Michael Chertoff’s gut. I don’t even understand the point of mentioning his gut feeling that, “OHMYGOD!!!!1!!!!! We;re all goinna diez!” But, I for one hope that future presidents at least consider not hiring crazy people to secure the homeland.

* A little bit away from the homeland, remember Republicans, supporting the war in Iraq is the means to victory at the polls. Especially when your argument for the war is reduced to we don’t want to make a general sad. And of course, it helps to be able to put words into the troops’ mouths.

* But never fear, Mitt Romney is projecting the goodness that can only come of attacking Iran.

Locally, a lot of the good bullshit has already been mentioned here on HA. Including by me. Still, there’s other bullshit:

* Eric Earling is concern trolling Darcy Burner.

* And finally this week, Forbes Magazine calls bullshit on the state Republicans. Apparently, since the Dems took total control of the reigns of government, the state has gone up to 5th best business climate. I would avoid thinking that business climate is the most important measure of the health of the state but still, it kind of puts a kink into the Republican claim that they are the best people for business.

One of the things that jumps out at me from Darryl’s post on the final Q2 fundraising numbers in the Burner/Reichert race is the disparity between the contribution total that Real Clear Politics reports ($192,000) and the number that Dave Reichert’s staff recently gave the Seattle Times’ David Postman ($245,000). Huh.

The difference is mostly explained by a $64,000 transfer from ROMP, the NRCC’s “Retain Our Majority Program”. (Note to NRCC: you’re in the minority.) Apparently, the folks who cover these sort of things for a living don’t consider committee transfers like these as “contributions” when comparing dollars raised. In fact, Real Clear Politics points out that of the 19 “vulnerable House incumbents” on the Republicans’ ROMP list, only one raised less money than Reichert during the second quarter: NY Congressman Randy Kuhl, who pulled in a paltry $68,000.

And when you delve a little deeper into Reichert’s numbers they look even worse, especially as an early measure of his relative organizational strength and grassroots support. Of the $257,000 he ultimately reported, only $70,800 came from 86 individual contributors in Washington state — the rest came from PACs, out-of-state residents and outside committees. Compare that to Burner, whose $199,000 haul included $156,675 from 120 individual Washington residents.

I’m just sayin’.

UPDATE:
In the comment thread, RonK suggests that I might have missed Reichert’s small, unitemized donations. I’m about to go on air, so don’t have the time to go back to my spreadsheet, but if so, the point remains the same, even if the numbers above aren’t exact: the bulk of Reichert’s money comes from PACs, out-of-state contributors and ROMP, whereas the bulk of Darcy’s money comes from individual, Washington state contributors.

UPDATE, UPDATE:
I’m certainly no FEC expert, but after further review of the FEC filings, my original post appears technically accurate as an apple-to-apple comparison of in-state individual contributions. In addition, Reichert raised $25,052 in unitemized, individual contributions, while Burner raised $21,286. But since these are “unitemized,” they do not provide the information necessary to evaluate in-state support. Even if one were to assume that most of these unitemized contributions came from in-state, that would not change the premise of this post.

Naturally I was really busy on Thursday, on a news day replete with interesting Republican accomplishments. Here’s a recap….

First there was Bush’s report to Congress (and the nation) on “progress” in Iraq since the Surge™ began. Check out Fred Kaplin’s Slate piece on the “accomplishments” titled “You Call That Progress? The outrageous White House report on Iraq.” I sense skepticism.

President George W. Bush achieved something of his own “benchmark” when he tied Richard Nixon’s low mark in a recent Harris poll of presidential approval.

Florida Rep. Bob Allen (R-Men’s Room) shows that even Republicans can try earning $20 the good ol’ fashion way.

President George W. Bush creates more scandal by trying to fire someone.

Now 3600+ U.S. soldiers have given their life for Saddam’s WMD Saddam’s role in 9-11-2001 stopping the Iraqi humanitarian crisis ousting Saddam training…er…fighting them over there oil somethin’ or the other that is really, really worthwhile.

Daniel at On the Road to 2008 noticed that Rep. Dave Reichert’s web site has carefully documented Reichert’s “record of independence and bi-partisan leadership.” Mmmmmm….impressive!

Republicans show their fund raising prowess by finishing somewhere in the top five.

Wingnut Pundit Jack Burkman demonstrates his commitment to small businesses.

President George W. Bush finally takes credit for his administration’s accomplishments in the Valerie Wilson covert dissemination case.

You gotta give them wingnuts credit…they’re always accomplishing stuff….

“I don’t think, quite frankly, that Darcy being in or out of the race will make that big a difference.”

That was state Rep. Christopher Hurst in today’s Seattle P-I, and while I’ve never met the guy, I have to wonder… is he an absolute moron?

He doesn’t think Darcy being in or out will make a difference? He thinks now that he’s decided not to run, the nomination is Rodney Tom’s for the taking? What planet does he live on?

“No disrespect to Darcy,” Hurst told the P-I, while totally dissing her, “but she had her run, in what was probably the best year in 40 years to run as a Democrat, and she came up short.”

That is the sort of simplistic analysis that may comfort the thumb-suckers in the GOP, but as the basis for a Democratic campaign, it is downright embarrassing. It is also insulting, as it implies that the only reason Burner came close in 2006 was a national trend beyond anybody’s control or power of prediction.

But there were many, many factors that played out in 2006, and the Big Blue Wave was only one of them. As Chris Bowers pointed out in a post over on Open Left, as good a year as 2006 was for Democrats in general, it was an oddly bad year for Democratic women:

In 2006, of the thirty Republican-held House seats most heavily targeted by Democratic Party committees and allied progressive organizations, twenty-one of the Democratic nominees challenging for those seats were male, and nine of the Democratic nominees challenging for those seats were female. With the elections over, twenty of the twenty-one men in that group are now serving in Congress. However, Kirsten Gillibrand in NY-20 is the only woman in that group who is now serving in Congress. For some reason, of the top thirty Democratic House targets in 2006, Democratic men won 95% of the time, while Democratic women won only 11% of the time.

I’m not exactly sure what is behind this statistical anomaly, but it is unlikely to be explained away by simple randomness alone. Something unusual happened in 2006 that we don’t fully understand, and it left Burner in some very good company.

Of course, each race is unique, and you have to look at both internal and external factors to understand the final outcome. As I mentioned yesterday, the Burner campaign made some tactical missteps during the final weeks of the campaign, and the late vote ended up breaking toward Reichert. Those mistakes won’t be repeated. Externally, second tier races like WA-08 drew the brunt of the GOP firepower, leaving Democrats to romp in the first and third tiers. Karl Rove’s now infamous PowerPoint presentation highlights the Reichert/Burner race as the RNC’s top example of a massive get-out-the-vote campaign that targeted 585,164 voter contacts into the 8th CD — 41,666 on election day alone. That’s over 100,000 more than the next closest district.

I suppose if Hurst had been the nominee, this never would have happened.

But perhaps the biggest factor that Hurst, Tom and other nay-sayers ignore is the most obvious one of all: turnout. Despite the national Democratic tide, turnout was actually much lighter than expected in WA-08. Only 251,383 people voted in in 2006, compared to 336,499 in 2004. Democrats simply don’t turn out in the same percentages as Republicans during non-presidential years, and thus with greater turnout and presidential coattails, we can expect that 2008 will be a very good year for the Democratic nominee. And with the war in Iraq continuing its tailspin into disaster, who’s to say that 2008 won’t be the “best year in 40 years to run as a Democrat”…?

Finally, wave or no wave, Burner started out with zero money, zero name ID, and zero support from the Democratic establishment. She worked hard to earn her credibility, and the media and institutional attention that made her viable, and she continues to work hard today. All of those disadvantages have been erased, and if Hurst really doesn’t understand how this changes the dynamics of the 2008 campaign, one has to wonder why anybody would take anything Hurst has to say seriously?

Hurst told the P-I that he and Tom “talked things over pretty extensively in the last six weeks or so.” If that’s true, it isn’t a very good sign for Rodney Tom fans.

This post is not about Seattle’s police this time. What recently happened to a Kent family is beyond a disgrace. From the NWCN website:

It was supposed to be a special trip for a Montana man and his 8-year-old granddaughter. But their truck broke down on Snoqualmie Pass and the grandfather was killed.

If this wasn’t tragic enough for an 8-year-old girl to see her grandfather get killed and be left stranded on I-90, this is what happened when the police brought her home:

The story took a strange turn when troopers were re-uniting the child with her parents in Kent. Police say they found illegal drugs. But the parents say it’s medical marijuana prescribed by a doctor.

…

The Osmans acknowledge growing marijuana. They say it’s prescribed by their doctors to treat symptoms of hepatitis C, chronic pain and other ailments.

They say the police didn’t care about the medical authorization forms signed by their doctors.

Even with the most recent medical marijuana bill passed, there still aren’t enough protections for patients under this state’s medical marijuana law. Raids like these are still common in the state, and legitimate medical marijuana patients don’t have any real protection under the law. The state board of health has been tasked with establishing what an acceptable medical supply should be, but until then, cops still have free reign to go after the sick and ailing.

The job of police is to protect and serve the public. In this case, the police have done neither. In the process of reuniting a horrified child with her parents, the child told them that her parents grew marijuana. Instead of trying to figure out whether or not her parents were medical marijuana users, this is what they did when they arrived at the house in Kent:

“(They) opened the door, immediately she was shoved inside, turned around and cuffed. Same thing happened to me. Dragged us onto the front porch,” said Bruce.

Lt. Sass says the Osmans had too many plants for personal use, but if Bruce Osman is correct about what happened above, the police certainly could not have known that at the time they dragged them onto the front porch and started tearing their apartment to shreds. Thankfully, the Osmans have a lawyer:

The Osmans’ attorney says police broke the law by seizing the marijuana, initially entering without a warrant, and for ransacking the couple’s apartment.

How is it that we’ve come to accept that wearing a police officer’s uniform is a valid excuse for acting like a degenerate? We overwhelmingly passed a law in this state in 1998 to allow for people with certain medical conditions to use marijuana if they and their doctor found it to be beneficial. The Osmans, like many others in this state, have a doctor’s authorization to use marijuana. What the police did in this situation is absolutely unacceptable. If there is any justice in this goddamn authoritarian hellhole of a society we’ve created for ourselves, the prosecutor should be deciding right now whether or not to charge the police officers with a crime, rather than the Osmans.

And at the national level, the Hinchey-Rohrabacher Amendment is going to be up for a vote in Congress next week. This bill would prohibit federal dollars from being spent to arrest and prosecute medical marijuana patients in states where it’s legal. Please write your Congressman, especially if you live in the 2nd or the 8th, as Congressmen Larsen and Reichert have both voted against this bill (and against the will of Washington voters) in previous years.

UPDATE: I made a minor correction at the top and Dominic Holden writes much more at Slog.

So, state Sen. Rodney Tom is now officially unofficially in the race for the 8th Congressional District Republican Democratic nomination, telling the Seattle P-I that he will officially make his official announcement next Tuesday. Whatever.

There are two minds on this within the Burner camp. On the one hand there are those who welcome Tom’s challenge, as a primary fight will focus media attention on Burner, while a decisive victory over a sitting state senator can only add to her credibility and confidence. On the other hand, Tom’s announcement will definitely freeze some of the early money, shaving maybe a couple hundred thousand dollars off Burner’s 2007 totals.

I’m similarly ambivalent, having come to the conclusion that the positive or negative impact of Tom’s campaign depends on how he eventually runs it. If it is a positive campaign, focused on the issues, everybody wins. If it is a negative campaign, adopting Reichert’s dismissively sexist “oh, she’s just a little girl” meme, well, Tom still loses, but he’ll piss off a lot of people in the process. People with long memories. People who hold grudges.

But my overwhelming concern is whether Tom is willing to make the personal sacrifices necessary for the good of his recently adopted party. Last cycle, Randy Gordon, the first Reichert challenger out of the gate, pledged early on that he would drop out of the race if money and support coalesced around another candidate. It did, and he did.

I would like to see Tom take a similar pledge. By April of 2008 it will become abundantly clear whether Tom has a snowball’s chance of running a competitive primary challenge. If he doesn’t, and he stubbornly stays in a race he has no chance of winning, he will needlessly cost Burner a substantial amount of contributions and independent expenditures that will be committed elsewhere long before ballots are counted in our August primary, one of the latest in the nation.

If Tom is a real Democrat, then his primary focus should be on defeating Reichert. Whatever his personal ambitions, Tom should understand that should he contribute to a Reichert victory next November, he will earn the lasting animosity of those whose support he will need in the future.

I’m just sayin’.

Local Republicans are once again dismissing Darcy Burner, but they do so at their own peril.

As a no-name newcomer with zero electoral experience, Burner came within a shiny white hair of defeating name-brand incumbent Dave Reichert. Ask any experienced politico worth their salt (of either party,) and they’ll tell you the race could have broken either way in the final weeks of the 2006 campaign. It broke towards Reichert. And there are lessons to be learned from that.

Burner is nothing if not smart, and you can be damn well sure that she’s learned those lessons. And as her 2Q fundraising numbers prove, she’s also a damn hard worker.

Over at u(SP), Eric Earling says that’s it’s too early for me to be crowing about Burner’s record fundraising, but let’s put those numbers into perspective. Burner didn’t start raising money until March, giving Reichert a four-month head start (coming out of the campaign with a six-figure debt, Reichert never stopped raising money)… and yet she still beats Reichert $185K to $160K in cash-on-hand, the all important figure by which DC insiders judge the health of campaigns.

Last year the Reichert campaign never pre-released its quarterly numbers, even while Burner was making headlines for her surprising totals, but this time around the other guys blinked, rushing to match Burner’s announcement of a $200K quarter (yes, a WA state record for a challenger) with a $244K quarter of its own. But the cash-on-hand disadvantage is such an embarrassment that one Democratic politico laughed that “the idiot” who made the decision to release it won’t be with the campaign much longer. (I hear John McCain has some job openings.)

What do strong Republican fundraising numbers really look like? IL-10, in the suburbs just north of Chicago, is a competitive district somewhat comparable to WA-08, in which 3-term incumbent Rep. Mark Kirk got quite a scare from netroots challenger Dan Seals. After slipping by with only 53-percent of the vote, Kirk has transformed himself into a fundraising machine, chalking up $617K in 2Q for a comfy $1.1 million total cash-on-hand. Those are the type of fundraising numbers one might expect from Reichert, given his 51.5 to 48.5 percent squeaker. And you wonder why I’m crowing?

Earling knowingly points to a quote from the Seattle P-I, in which “other Democrats” criticize Burner for failing to defeat Reichert in a Blue Tide year, and for repeating the same campaign themes as 2006, but those “other Democrats” are those backing undeclared Republican Democratic challenger Rodney Tom. That’s okay. They’re entitled to their rhetoric. But they’re wrong.

Burner, like the other second-tier Democratic challengers, was a sacrificial lamb in a grand strategy in which all of the first-tier and most of the third-tier Democrats won. She played an instrumental role in the Democrats taking control of Congress, drawing heavy Republican fire in a district the R’s hadn’t planned on seriously defending. And yet she came within a few thousand votes, and a couple tactical decisions, of winning. Had she responded to Reichert’s derisively sexist “job interview” ad in kind — had she nailed Reichert on his fundamentalist opposition to reproductive rights (both abortion and some forms of birth control) — it would be Burner who was posting Kirk-like numbers in defense of her incumbency.

As for Tom, the presumed “Democratic” challenger, he’s in for a shock. In 2006 my fellow bloggers and I took great joy in launching withering attacks on Tom’s opponent, the much-hated state Sen. Luke Esser. Tom didn’t ask for our support back then, and he shouldn’t this time around either, because he ain’t gonna get squat. No doubt, he’s a nice enough guy, and a helluva lot better than Esser, but he has a voting record as a Republican legislator that’s not going to endear himself to many 8th CD Democratic primary voters. Talk about great blog fodder.

And for all Tom’s misreading of the 8th District (you know, that the best way for the Dems to defeat the Republican Reichert is with another Republican,) general election strategies don’t mean a damn if you can’t find a path to the general election. Burner is gonna kick Tom’s ass. That’s a fact. She’s smarter, she’s harder working, and with likes of Dan Kully and Sandeep Kaushik on board, she’s assembling a killer team with a killer instinct.

That said, run Rodney, run! It’s good for Burner. Keeps her looking over her shoulder. And it helps build cred to crush a state senator early in the campaign. All I ask is that you bow out gracefully next April when you’re trailing by 20 points in the polls, and $700K in the bank.

Democrat Darcy Burner will report campaign contributions of $199,768 for the second quarter of 2007 — more than any challenger in any congressional district over the same three month period in the history of Washington state. Burner’s fundraising efforts now put her nine months ahead of her impressive 2006 pace, in which she raised nearly $3.1 million.

With $185,000 cash on hand, a 16,000-strong contributor list, the unwavering support of the local netroots, and a top-notch campaign team forming around her, I can’t imagine why another Democrat would attempt to challenge her for the opportunity to face-off against Sheriff Reichert. (But then, I’m not sure why any sane person would put themselves through the rigors of a race like this.)

When final numbers are reported on the 15th, I’m guessing we’ll find Burner ahead of Reichert in cash-on-hand, and in the top tier of challengers nationally.