Search Results for: Dave Reichert

On Friday, Dave Reichert campaign spokesman Mike Shields told Postman that they raised $340,800 for the 3rd quarter, beating Darcy Burner’s $306,784. Yesterday, after questions were raised about $47,100 in refunds, Shields insisted that the refunds would be repaid, and thus should be counted in the 3rd quarter. Well, he issued a press release this afternoon, and now… not so much.

“Late last week and earlier this week I made a mistake in representing the amount of money Friends of Dave Reichert (FDR) raised in the third quarter of 2007. FDR had to return some of the funds that were deposited in its account and I misunderstood the accounting surrounding those refunds.

“The correct numbers, as reported to the Federal Election Commission (FEC) show the Reichert campaign raised $294,888 in the 3 rd quarter of 2007. So far this cycle the campaign has raised $766,703. The campaign has $339,460 cash on hand.”

Okay, now that we’ve cleared that up (I think,) maybe Shields can come clean and tell us exactly how much money was raised at that big Bush fundraiser? Was it a half-million bucks? Or a measly $127,025?

UPDATE:
Now that’s the headline I wanted to see! From the AP: “Reichert: Fundraising numbers wrong, Burner ahead.”

The truth will out.

It turns out, Dave Reichert isn’t one of your typical House Republicans after all…

Although House Republicans currently face a tough national political environment, most of their vulnerable members enjoy a substantial lead in the money race over their Democratic challengers at this early point in the 2008 election cycle.

Federal Election Commission (FEC) financial filings for the third fiscal quarter of 2007, which ended Sept. 30, reveal that the 22 Republican House members in races ranked by CQ as “No Clear Favorite” or “Leans Republican” lead more than two to one in cumulative cash on hand versus their nearest Democrat opponent.

[…] The Republicans in these two categories that CQPolitics.com regards as competitive reported a total of $12.7 million cash on hand as compared with $5.2 million in total for the nearest challengers.

Of these 22 vulnerable Republican incumbents, only five currently trail their opponents in cash on hand, putting Reichert in such rare company as Ohio’s embattled Jean Schmidt (who trails not one, but three challengers,) and soon to be indicted John Doolittle of California. Reichert’s poor performance is even more remarkable when you consider that he was the only House member last quarter to benefit from a high-profile, high-dollar fundraiser with President Bush. Ouch.

Reichert spokesliar Mike Shields, the man behind the campaign’s Enron-style accounting, attempts to put a ridiculous spin on Reichert’s disappointing results, arguing that he’s just too busy being a congressman to do what congressmen notoriously do… raise money.

“That’s one of our challenges: Dave actually has a job,” Shields said. “He has to come serve the people, and he takes that very seriously.”

Yeah, right… unlike nearly every other member of Congress. But as CQ points out, incumbents are not only expected to hold a money advantage, it is absolutely critical for vulnerable Republicans given the current political environment.

The Republicans’ overall fundraising edge in these competitive districts, though expected for incumbents, is critical given that the party has few other advantages going into the election season. In addition to the weaknesses of individual candidates, Republican members as a whole also are saddled with the party baggage of an unpopular war and president. And they cannot count on a boost from the party’s fundraising committee for the chamber, the National Republican Congressional Committee, which badly trails its Democratic counterpart in money raised and cash on hand.

Shorter CQ: Reichert’s in deep doo-doo. The NRCC has to be putting together its budget with the expectation that Reichert, now a two-term incumbent, starts carrying his own weight. And with party resources scarce, Reichert just can’t rely on the same sort of huge infusion of party cash that put him over the top in 2006.

If Reichert can’t out-raise Darcy Burner in a quarter that included a presidential fundraiser, there can be only two explanations: he either has the wrong message, or he’s just not working hard enough. And in Reichert’s case, it is clearly both.

James L at the Swing State Project noticed something interesting:

MO-06 and WA-08: So get this. Despite being the beneficiary of a high-profile fundraiser hosted by Republican Lord & Savior George W. Bush, Dave Reichert was out-hustled by Democrat Darcy Burner. Compare Reichert’s haul with the total posted by Sam Graves, a Missouri Republican who received a fundraising visit from Dick Cheney. Graves raised a very impressive $500K+ for the quarter. I guess the President’s star power isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be anymore.

Reichert’s fundraising last quarter was damn anemic for an incumbent, not to mention an incumbent who had the President come to town to help.

Looking more closely at the FEC paperwork reveals how truly anemic the Bush fundraiser was. The FEC rules require that joint fundraisers, like the event held for the Washington State Republicans and Reichert, be handled independently of either group. The Bellevue Bush fundraiser was handled by an entity known as The Reichert Washington Victory Committee.

This FEC form 3x documents the donations and disbursements from the Bush fundraiser. What the form clearly shows is that the event only raised $135,025! That was $127,025 from individual contributions and another $8,000 from a political action committee.

A grand total of $127,025 in individual contributions at a Bush fundraiser in Bellevue, Washington??? That’s fucking pathetic! But…there you have it (maybe—see below).

Somehow or another, the media got the wrong estimate from this event. This KOMO report cites a slightly higher figure:

President Bush, deeply unpopular in Washington state, still raised more than $500,000 Monday for Republican U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert and the state GOP, just hours after the resignation of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

Where would the media get a figure like one-half a million? Perhaps it came from Reichert’s spokesperson, Mike Shields, who is quoted as claiming:

“It’s a huge cash injection before the actual election cycle begins,” Shields said. “An event doesn’t get much bigger than this. This is a huge help.”

Yeah…nice spin, Mike. The truth is a little less “big.” The FEC form shows the loot was mostly split three ways. The Washington State Republican Party got $26,166.73, Friends of Reichert took $35,754.80, and the big winner was the Hyatt Regency, Bellevue that earned $63,146.88 for hosting the fundraiser.

While Reichert was busy raising $35,755, Darcy Burner raised $125,000 from over 3,200 donors. In other words, Darcy Burner kicked both Reichert’s and Bush’s asses.

But these figures are only as good as the accountant filling out the FEC paperwork. We learned yesterday that there was a strange $47,100 refund in the FEC filing for Friends of Dave Reichert this quarter. Mike Shields offered a perfectly opaque explanation to the AP:

Shields said the difference – some $47,000 in refunds to donors – was an accounting technicality that sprang from the Bush fundraiser.

Those refunds had to be issued because of mistakes in dividing the Bush money between Reichert’s re-election campaign and the state Republican Party, which shared the more than $500,000 raised by the president.

The refunded contributions will be repaid, so Reichert is counting those contributions toward his third quarter total, Shields said.

Putting two and two together, it appears that Friends of Dave Reichert illegally processed some of the contributions that were all supposed to be handled by The Reichert Washington Victory Committee. If so, and if the money goes back to The Reichert Washington Victory Committee, it means that the Bush fundraiser only brought in $182,125. That’s still a far cry from the half million being hawked to the press.

Oh…and if The Reichert Washington Victory Committee takes the refunded money and returns it in full, it means Dave Reichert only took in about $84,000 from the event.

Darcy Burner still kicked his ass!

(Thanks to N in Seattle and Daniel Kirkdorffer for their help in untangling Reichert’s mess)

If Republicans breathed a sigh of relief last Friday when Dave Reichert announced he would lead Darcy Burner by about $36,000 in the 3Q money race, they better take a deep breath before reading his actual FEC report. For hidden in his $342,639 of total receipts, is a whopping $47,100 in refunded excess contributions… money he couldn’t legally receive.

Subtract those ill-gotten gains from his contribution totals, and Reichert actually trails Burner for the quarter, $295,539 to $306,784 — and that’s after Reichert’s high-roller funder with President Bush. And again, subtracting the refunds, Reichert only reported $171,134 in individual contributions. So, either our $123,000/3,200 donor netroots fundraiser actually raised more money than the President… or Reichert raised less than $49,000 in individual contributions on his lonesome.

Either way, the President of the United States got his ass kicked by a bunch of bloggers, but rather than acknowledge this simple reality, Reichert chose to cook the books. The bulk of the excess contributions were recorded on 9/30, the last day of the quarter (and then somehow refunded two days earlier.) This is the type of accounting that made Enron famous, allowing Reichert to inflate his quarterly results by simultaneously booking the $47,100 in excess contributions as both a receipt and an expenditure. And since Burner announced her totals early, Reichert’s accountants knew exactly how much they’d have to pad his numbers to convincingly beat her mark.

And for Reichert fans, the news only gets worse. Daniel Kirkdorffer has a thorough breakdown of the two campaigns relative performance, and it presents a stunning contrast:

More impressively, 89% of Burner’s contributions this election cycle came from individuals, while Reichert’s contributions from individuals made up only 57% of his totals, the rest, over $340,000, coming from PACs and campaign committees. Just about half of Burner’s contributions are unitemized, i.e. less than $200 a donation. Only 7% of Reichert’s contributions from individuals are categorized as unitemized. As much as anything that tells so much of the story regarding the breadth of Burner’s support and how much Reichert is having to rely on wealthier donors.

Yeah, you want a really amazing number? Over her two campaign cycles, Burner has raised money from over 22,000 unique contributors — more than some presidential candidates — a donor base she can go back to again and again over the next year. Meanwhile, a sizable chunk of Reichert’s contributions have come from individuals and PACs that have already maxed out. Indeed, unless he turns things around, Reichert faces the very real possibility of recording a quarter-to-quarter decline in cash on hand at the end of the next reporting period.

If the Reichert camp isn’t nervous yet, they better stop believing their own math.

The headline on Postman’s blog was “Reichert bests Burner, a bit, in latest money totals,” but a closer look at the numbers doesn’t bode so well for the incumbent. According to Postman, Dave Reichert will report raising $340,800 from July through September, compared to $304,901 for Democratic challenger Darcy Burner. So yeah, Reichert raised a bit more than Burner in the third quarter.

According to Postman, Reichert also leads Burner in total dollars raised Year To Date (YTD), $830,440 to $518,630, but of course, the whole point of raising money now is to spend it later, and despite Reichert’s presidential fundraiser, Burner still leads $370,228 to $339,400 in the all important category of Cash On Hand (COH).

That puts Burner in a pretty damn good position heading into an election year against one of the GOP’s most vulnerable incumbents. How good a position? Well, a quick comparison of the numbers this cycle to those at the same point in the previous cycle is quite stunning.

	Reichert:	Burner:
Oct. 2005, YTD:	$937,829	$105,156
Oct. 2005, COH:	$455,120	$43,952
Oct. 2007, YTD:	$830,440	$518,630
Oct. 2007, COH:	$339,400	$370,228

In October of 2005, Reichert led Burner by a substantial ten-to-one margin, with over $455,000 in the bank (both went on to raise about $3.1 million each,) but this time around Reichert’s fundraising is noticeably down while Burner’s — fueled by her $123,000/3,200 donor netroots fundraiser — is way up, actually giving her a $31K lead in the number that really matters, Cash On Hand… and that’s after Reichert brought President Bush into the district for a high-donor fundraiser. And note, the YTD numbers represent “net receipts”; if you only look at contributions and subtract out Reichert’s $64,000 2Q “committee transfer,” Reichert’s fundraising is running about 20-percent below last cycle’s efforts.

It’s harder to raise money when you are in the minority, as Reichert is discovering, but it still ought to be easier as an incumbent than as a challenger, especially this early in the contest. If the Reichert folks were as pleased with their candidate’s anemic showing as they claimed to Postman, I’m guessing they wouldn’t have buried their announcement on a Friday afternoon.

Of course, I’m just some crazy blogger… one of those wacky, out-of-touch, far-left-of-center, internet agitators who threatens to destroy the Democratic Party’s credibility with mainstream Americans. So when we in the “nutroots” argue that Darcy Burner is in a better position to defeat Dave Reichert in 2008 than she was in the so-called “Blue Wave” election of 2006, you can be sure that the inside-the-beltway professionals will run as fast as they can in the opposite direction…

WASHINGTON — Darcy Burner is becoming a hot commodity in D.C.

Burner, the likely 2008 Democratic opponent of U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert, R-Auburn, was one of seven candidates hosted at a special fundraiser by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC) at Johnny’s Half Shell, a block from the Capitol.

Wow. Burner is a “hot commodity”… one of the DCCC’s top challengers. Who’d a thunk?

One of the other top-seven Democratic challengers is Dan Maffei, who like Burner, was a first time candidate in 2006, yet came from nowhere to draw within a few points of defeating Republican incumbent Jim Walsh.

Walsh, a former supporter of the war in Iraq, made news last month when he changed his mind and called for redeployment of U.S. troops from Iraq, after a two-day trip to Baghdad.

Sitting with Walsh on that trip was Reichert, who did not alter his position. Burner is against the war.

“Burner is against the war.” How many more Americans must die before political expediency forces Reichert to switch positions?

Meanwhile, Reichert finally says something I agree with:

“Republicans should head for the hills.”

Man, I’m looking forward to 2008.

A few days ago I’d heard from somebody in the Darcy Burner camp that Dave Reichert was preparing to introduce legislation this coming week, adding 26,000 acres along the Pratt River to the Alpine Wilderness Area. Sounds like a pretty good idea to me, but it also sounds pretty damn cynical considering Reichert’s poor record on environmental issues, and his lockstep support of President Bush’s anti-wilderness policies. I’d meant to post preemptively, but Reichert’s staff beat me to it, feeding the story to the Seattle P-I’s Joel Connelly.

The curmudgeonly Connelly was the perfect choice: a nature enthusiast and wilderness advocate who longs for the days when the Republican notion of doing the “right” thing spoke more to rectitude of judgment than ideological correctness, Connelly holds an almost messianic faith in the second coming of moderate bipartisanship. Connelly also has a history of rewarding even the most reprobate Republicans for small steps toward the middle, and Reichert’s folks guessed right that their outreach to him might generate a little positive press. Which makes my failure to preempt Reichert’s announcement, putting it in its appropriate context, all the more disappointing.

For at the same time Reichert makes hay over his move to designate these 26,000 acres as protected wilderness, he refuses to oppose Bush administration rules that would open all two million acres of Washington’s remaining roadless national forest land — and 58.5 million acres nationwide — to road-building, logging, mining and other commercial development.

Rep. Jay Inslee and Sen. Maria Cantwell have introduced bipartisan legislation that would do exactly that, reinstating by law the Clinton-era “roadless rule” that the Bush administration summarily revoked. The House version of the National Forest Roadless Area Conservation Act has already secured 140 cosponsors from both sides of the aisle. But noticeably absent from this list of supporters is the suddenly “green” Dave Reichert.

Connelly kvelled that Reichert “took a bold step to embrace a Republican tradition that has lately been sinking out of sight.” Oy. So after rinsing the vomit out of my mouth, I asked Burner for comment. In response, the campaign sent the following statement:

“My family and I live in modest home outside of Carnation because we enjoy being close to the land. I grew up in rural areas, so a connection to open country is something I feel deep in my bones. Growing up, my dad spent several summers as a park ranger at Mt. Rainier National Park. We lived near the park while he worked to protect those areas so visitors from across the state could come and appreciate the great outdoors.

“I remain committed to conservation and to protecting our environment. Our pristine open spaces are disappearing before our eyes as the Bush administration guts the strong wilderness conservation protections established during the Clinton years. If we do not act now to reverse this situation, much of our wilderness will be lost forever.

“That is why I strongly support HR 2516, Senator Maria Cantwell’s and Rep. Jay Inslee’s Roadless Area Protection Act. Fifty-nine million acres of wilderness across the country are at risk – including 2 million acres in Washington State (accounting for more than a fifth of our National Forests here) – because of rule changes imposed by the Bush administration that amount to a giveaway of public lands to loggers, oil companies and the mining industry. Unfortunately, these are changes that Congressman Reichert seems to support, since he is notably absent as one of the 144 co-sponsors – including a number of Republicans – of this important legislation.

“Now I hear that Congressman Reichert, who is not even sure yet that global warming exists, intends to begin portraying himself as going ‘green.’ He is telling the press that he would like to consider designating 26,000 acres of federal land of the Pratt River Valley a wilderness area. Many in the environmental community would like to see this area conserved and so would I. So I applaud Congressman Reichert for taking a small step in the direction of wilderness conservation.

“But I would also hope that he would join so many of his colleagues in co-sponsoring the bipartisan Cantwell-Inslee legislation. Otherwise, his willingness to consider protecting one small area while threatening 2 million acres elsewhere in the state is the equivalent of focusing on a tree while losing sight of the fact that the forest is being chopped down around you.

“Moreover, I believe strongly that we can not forget to take care of what we already have. Congress must adequately fund the Parks Service so the horrible damage the winter storms did to Mt Rainier National Park can be put on a fast track for repair and restoration. When I am elected, the voters of the 8th District can be sure that conserving our untouched public lands, not just in one location but all across the state, will be one of my top priorities. I will move quickly to ensure that the environmental health of our entire region is preserved and enhanced.”

So before other reporters, columnists and editorialists gush over a minority congressman’s attempt to immunize himself on environmental issues by announcing plans to protect 26,000 acres (a bill he is powerless to push through on his own,) I hope they ask Reichert the hard question of whether he will or will not join Inslee and Cantwell in opposing President Bush, and reinstating roadless rules that would protect 58.5 million acres of pristine forest from commercial development.

PROGRAMMING NOTE:
Joel Connelly will be my guest tonight in the 8PM hour on “The David Goldstein Show.”

When Rep. Dave Reichert cast his Nay vote this evening against the Children’s Health and Medicare Protection Act, he didn’t just cast a vote against providing health care to millions of American children, he voted directly against the financial interests of Washington state. The bill not only provides health coverage to children in working families earn too much to qualify for Medicaid but can’t afford insurance, it also more than doubles federal funds available to Washington state to cover uninsured children. According to a press release from Rep. Jay Inslee:

Until now, Washington and 10 other states were penalized for expanding health insurance coverage to children in families with incomes just over the poverty line before the popular State Children’s Insurance Plan (SCHIP) was enacted in 1997. Since enactment, they’ve had to fight every few years to spend even a fraction of unused federal funds to cover children at this income level. States that didn’t cover these children a decade ago have had no such limitation on the use of federal SCHIP funds.

A permanent fix for this inequity was included in the Children’s Health and Medicare Protection (CHAMP) Act, H.R. 3162, legislation that would provide $50 billion in new funding for SCHIP and Medicare. It was secured last week by U.S. Rep. Jay Inslee, when the bill was being considered by the House Energy and Commerce Committee, which has jurisdiction over SCHIP. He, along with U.S. Reps. Jim McDermott, Norm Dicks, Adam Smith, Brian Baird and Rick Larsen, then pressed House leadership to keep the Washington state fix in the bill that was considered on the House floor today.

“It’s been an uphill battle to end this injustice,” said Inslee. “The feds shouldn’t have shortchanged kids in Washington when SCHIP was set up a decade ago.”

The bill passed 225 to 204, no thanks to Reichert and the rest of our Republican delegation, who all voted against the interests of Washington state, and with their President Bush. Keep this vote in mind next year when our editorialists laud Reichert for his “conscience-driven independent streak.”

Darcy Burner has issued a press release challenging Rep. Dave Reichert to hold a town hall meeting during the August recess to explain to constituents his unwavering support for President Bush’s Iraq war policies:

“Doesn’t Congressman Reichert have the responsibility to stand in front of the people of his district to explain his stand on the War in Iraq? If he can vote more than a dozen times in favor of continuing and even escalating the war, can’t he talk to the voters in person just once about why he believes what he does?

“The voters deserve to hear directly from their elected representative on an issue of this magnitude, especially when the representative disagrees so strongly with the views of his constituents, as Congressman Reichert does,” Burner said. “While he is back in the district for his August vacation, I hope that this time he will not just hide from his constituents as he has done so many times in the past.”

Reichert, who has attacked Democrats for “meddling” and “politicizing” the war, has held only three town hall meetings since first being elected in 2004, and none since his reelection in 2006. Burner has consistently pledged that she would regularly meet with voters in an open and unscripted manner.

I called Reichert’s district office to ask if he had any town hall meetings, forums or public appearances coming up during the August recess, and was told that he has received invitations to events, but that there is currently nothing on his schedule.

This week the Seattle Times finally acknowledged that Rep. Dave Reichert is conservative, “maybe too conservative for his district,” and that was brought home again yesterday when Reichert voted for a Republican-backed amendment that would have cut off Title X funds for Planned Parenthood. The amendment was defeated 231 to 189.

“Congressman Reichert was one of 189 House members voting for this mean-spirited amendment,” said Karen Cooper, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Washington. “The Title X program provides birth control to low-income Americans and Planned Parenthood clinics play a key role in actually delivering those services,” Cooper said. “There are already a number of restrictive policies in place that ban any federal money from being used to pay for abortion care, and the notion that law makers would also try to deny low-income people birth control is very troubling,” she added.

“Millions of Americans rely on Planned Parenthood clinics for basic health care services every year,” said Cooper. “I find it unconscionable that Reichert and his anti-choice cronies in Congress tried to single out an organization that provides cancer screening, breast exams, and birth control and target them for a ban on family planning funding just because some Planned Parenthood clinics also provide abortion care,” she said.

“Reichert’s vote in favor of the Pence amendment was just another reminder of how truly out-of-step he is with the pro-choice voters of the 8th Congressional District,” Cooper said. “It is clearly time for a change,” she concluded.

I’ve been told that polling conducted in the wake of the 2006 election showed that a substantial proportion of pro-choice 8th District voters were not aware of Reichert’s staunch anti-choice/anti-birth control stance on reproductive issues. I’m guessing voters might be better informed next time around.

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.

The FEC reports for the second quarter (1 Apr–30 Jun) are in. The result: Darcy Burner has raised more money than Dave Reichert (R-WA-08). She has also spent less money, and has more cash on hand.

Here is how Real Clear Politics describes it:

The NRCC may be concerned about three of their incumbents who raised less than $200,000 for the quarter. Washington Congressman Dave Reichert (R-WA 08) raised $192,000, while his 2006 opponent, businesswoman Darcy Burner (D), raised $199,000. Burner held on to $185,000, while Reichert retains $162,000.

The reason the NRCC should be concerned is because of Reichert’s anemic performance. The 19 Republicans enrolled in the NRCC’s (erronously titled) Retain Our Majority Program for vulnerable incumbents raised an average of $316,000 with an average of $455,000 in hand. It seems that Reichert’s fundraising prowess and fiscal management are not quite up to snuff.

Burner not only out-fundraised Reichert, but her campaign spent only 38% of what Reichert’s campaign spent (Reichert: $140,000; Burner: $53,000).

The contribution profile differs between the two candidates. Darcy raised $183,500 from individual contributions compared to Reichert’s $99,600. Nearly half of Reichert’s contributions ($92,800) came from political action committees; whereas, Burner took in only $16,000 in PAC contributions.

Reichert’s anemic fundraising is likely a symptom of voter dissatisfaction with the continued military operations in Iraq. That is, Reichert’s 100% support for Bush on Iraq is causing him the same difficulties that Presidential hopeful John McCain has. As Goldy pointed out earlier, Daniel Kirkdorffer at On the Road to 2008 predicts a Reichert flip-flop on the Iraq issue this coming September, right after the Petraeus report.

That might help his fundraising a bit. On the other hand, a Reichert flip-flop will highlight Reichert’s blind loyalty to Bush for three years in which thousands of U.S. soldiers died and tens of thousands were wounded.

I suspect voters will be ready for a change.

Daniel Kirkdoffer is demonstrating his eerie psychic powers over at On The Road to 2008:

Congressman Reichert has a tendency to flip. Sometimes he’ll simply flop. Often, he’ll change his position on an issue during the time it is being considered by the U.S. House.

We saw him flip on stem cell research.

We saw him flop on raising the minimum wage, before finally supporting a Democratic bill that did just that.

We saw him vote for ANWR drilling, while simultaneously stating his was against it.

Sometimes we’re not sure what exactly is driving his votes, as he has stated that he often votes how his party tells him to vote.

So I’m here to predict that later this year, Dave Reichert will once again flip, but this time on an issue he has voted with the Bush administration 100% of the time: the Iraq occupation.

Of course Reichert will eventually flip-flop on the Iraq war occupation. He’ll have to… at least, if he wants to win reelection. With a 100-percent Bush/Cheney voting record on Iraq in the face of a rising sentiment to bring our troops home, Reichert must either flop where he once flipped, or follow the President’s lead in flipping the bird to public opinion. I’m betting his handlers will convince him to choose the former.

So let’s start a betting pool. Post in the comment thread your prediction of when Reichert will flip-flop on Iraq — that is vote, or make a public statement in opposition to Bush administration policy — and the person who comes closest will win a pitcher of beer (or the cash equivalent) courtesy of HA.

The rumors from Washington are that Rep. Dave Reichert (WA-8) is absolutely miserable, being a bit player in a fractious, fractured, and demoralized minority party. Perhaps Reichert has aspirations for bigger and better things…

In a surprise announcement on Saturday evening, Congressman Dave Reichert declared that he has switched political parties. “The time is right for me to switch to the Democrat Par…I mean, the Democratic Party,” said Riechert who represents Washington’s 8th congressional district. “This is a move I’ve considered seriously since early last November, when I suddenly realized my independent-minded values were more in line with those of the Democrats. As my critics have pointed out, I’ve increasingly become indecisive, and that is a reflection of the inner conflict.”

When asked why he waited nearly six months to make the change, Reichert responded, “I was waiting for the right time. Today is Joel Connelly’s birthday, and I guess I saved it as a birthday surprise for him.” Also, my investigations of global warming are now complete. I’m convinced that Al Gore is right—we really do need to be manufacturing and dropping giant ice cubes into the ocean.”

Reichert’s former spokesperson Kimberly Cadena resigned last week fueling speculation that the Congressman might be considering a jump to the Democratic party. Reichert announced that Cadena will be replaced by Sandeep Kaushik, currently the part-time Deputy Communications Director for King County Executive Ron Sims.

When asked about the reaction of his former Republican colleagues Reichert replied, “Let me make one thing perfectly clear. I’ve stared down the barrel of a loaded pistol and saw my name inscribed on the tip of the bullet…you can believe I can stare into the eyes of any disgruntled Republican colleague without flinching.”

Reichert told reporters that his first priority as a new Democrat will be to “figure out how they want me to vote.” Reichert also expected he might be called upon to personally provide security for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA-08). “I moonlighted a bit as a Republican in protecting her footwear. Now, if she wants me to, I’ll be acting more as a personal sheriff for the Speaker. And let me be clear, here, that school bus drivers are on notice—you respect the Speaker because this sheriff is watching.”

Rep. Pelosi was not available for comment.