The involvement of readers here to the latest poll here was fairly surprising, but pretty clear. First of all, only a little more than one in ten readers of this blog in the last few days are Les Roberts supporters. Secondly, Michael Arcuri supporters appear not to be bothered, for the most part, by their candidate's fuzzy record of a position on the Iraq War back in 2003. Even if they found out that Michael Arcuri supported the Iraq War in 2003, on 22 percent of readers who support Arcuri would change their vote away from Arcuri even if they found out that Mike Arcuri supported going to war against Iraq in 2003. That speaks to both the hawkishness and the dedication of Arcuri supporters.
I'll hazard a guess and say that we will find out that Michael Arcuri outperformed Les Roberts in fundraising the first quarter of this year - by something around 30 or 40 thousand dollars, though the Les Roberts campaign will be shown to have done an admirable job at raising money nonetheless.
If the Les Roberts campaign is to have a chance at gaining the nomination, it will have to mount an underdog's campaign - appealing to Democrats at a grassroots level instead of at the level of county Democratic committees. The national appeal of Les Roberts (search for him on Google News to see the wide reach of his name) will have to be leveraged in order to contest the local lockdown on Democratic insider support by Michael Arcuri.
If there is that kind of contest, it will be fascinating to watch, a struggle not just between two politicians, but between two styles of campaigning, and two ideas about what the Democratic Party should be.
That's exactly what a primary contest ought to be like. "Party unity" of the sort that Leon Koziol recently referred to is more appropriate to Soviet-style Communism than to American democracy. Go to it, guys - the conflict will be good for everybody involved.
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23 comments:
The simple fact of the matter is that nobody is going to be getting very excited about Mike Arcuri because he isn't running for Congress full time and he isn't making himself accessable to many Democrats.
Being in the political middle is worthless since we've had such an extreme dose of the political right and the subsequent massive failures that only a health dose of the political left can bring it back into balance.
As the MSNBC article I pointed to in another post says, the DCCC has not found enough top tier candidates to retake the House without a massive voter rejection of the right wing Republicans. I doubt the voters are going to massively reject the right to slide a bit to the middle.
The Democrats won't win because they are better people than the Republicans. A massive voter rejection of the Republicans will only occur if there is a substantive difference.
You compare those Democrats who want to avoid an unnecessary and divisive primary to Stalinists. What's next? Comparing people who vote for Arcuri to those that voted for Hitler? Pointing out that Arcuri and Stalin are both spelled with six letters? What a stupid and outrageous comment.
You don't seem to understand that winning this race matters. People like you have good jobs and decent incomes. Whether a Democrat or Republican wins means nothing to you in a material sense. Heck, you probably did fine by Bush's tax cuts. And because winning doesn't matter you can afford to be self-indulgent and push for a candidate that strokes your latte-sipping, 401K-watching ego.
But winning does matter for people who can't find a decent job. It matters for those with sick kids and no health insurance. It matters for those in Iraq who face death and dismemberment everyday.
So have fun with your little political games down in your mother's basement and let the rest of us try to actually accomplish something.
Wow! I love this little snide attack, 9:26. First you snipe at me for having a good income, but then you accuse me of living in my mother's basement.
Rule #1 in character assassination: Be consistent.
I do have a good income, but it's not from any job. I'm self-employed and self-made, thanks. I don't live in my mother's basement either. I've got my own house.
Rule #2 in character assassination: Your attacks need to have some basis in reality.
As for sipping latte, that's a line the Republicans use to attack liberals. Are you anti-liberal, 9:26?
By the way, I drink my coffee black.
Now, on the substance: Yes, I believe that putting party unity ahead of principles is the kind of attitude that is more appropriate to single-party autocracies than to mutli-party democracies. I stand by the judgment that grassroots Democrats ought to be given a chance to vote for their favorite candidate themselves.
I'm sorry that you believe that the interests of the Democratic Party establishment are more important than that. It saddens me that you see democratic elections as divisive and unnecessary.
There's a big difference between primary elections and general elections. Most nations don't rely on primary elections, but seem to manage to be at least as democratic as the U.S. General elections are crucial for democracy. Primary elections are not. In fact, primaries were invented by upper-class types like yourself as a way of limiting real democracy. For all your talk about democracy, you're nothing but an elitist. Why not drop the pretense and just join up with the Republicans?
And BTW, I assumed that you lived in your mom's basement not for financial reasons, but because you wanted to.
Atta boy Jon! Kick the sh^t outta those nay sayers! Show 'em what the new democrats are made of.
I believe in the primary system, too, but I also believe that the parties themselves just give it lip service. Nowadays, the only time you'll see a primary at this level is if one of the candidates is independently wealthy. The party anoints someone early, based not at all on philosophy, and throws money and support that person's way to drive the other candidates out. And it works! 24 is a perfect case in point. Grass roots is a nice concept, but you can't run on grass.
I hope that if Arcuri is gaining strength in this blog that means he is actually gaining some substance. When I saw him in Auburn a while back, he had no substance but certainly said he was a good Democrat. Good strategy for the primary, but what about the general?
A message to Arcuri: Get specific on the issues or you'll lose this seat for us.
Prediction: Arcuri and the DCCC are so concerned about appearing "moderate" that they will alienate real Dems and end up undifferentiated from Meier, who will probably play the same "moderate" game, despite the fact that he's a true conservative. Since the numbers favor Meier, and no one will understand the difference between a conservative moderate and a Dem lite moderate, Meier will win, and we'll all be stuck with him.
Norway you are correct except for one thing. I think Meier loses in the primary.
The Republicans have been running these wimpy State Senate clones for a while and are slowly losing. Meier probably thinks he has something special that put him in a Senate seat. Wait until he sees what happens in September.
First I had to listen to neocons define what "Real Americans" are now I am hearing what a "Real Democrat" is. There used to be a democratic party and a republican party. There were two other parties called Liberal and Conservative. The two main parties got taken over by the parties to the left and right. Now suddenly a "Real Democrat" has to be a progressive. Well that's simply not true. Some of us just want the extremism on both ends to stop and there are more moderate democrats than their are activists, so please do not tell me you are a real democrat and I am not because I am not a progressive, whatever that means.
But does Roberts support the illegal war in Afghanistan? Saying you only support one illegal war is like saying you are a little bit pregnant. And Roberts doesn't even support an immediate pullout of troops from Iraq. Roberts is just as much a prisoner of the imperialist mindset as Fox News.
Ray Meier has stated that he has the endorsement of every single democratic chair in every part of his district. I guess it's more fun for us to shoot at each other....more fun for the Republicans that is. That's how we lost the house and the senate and we still enjoy turning ourselves into the losing party by nitpicking and looking for extreme candidates who blab as loud as they can and drive all the moderates toward the republicans. Brilliant strategy. Brilliant for the opposition.
Wait a minute 10:31 - You're coming on here and attacking a Democrat because you don't want Democrats to attack Democrats? Oh, THAT'S consistent.
Listen up - we all get to talk about this race as much as we want. It's called democracy. It's called freedom.
What, you think we should all be marching lockstep behind the Democratic Party leaders, who appoint our candidates for us?
Jeeez. Listen to yourself!
Having debates about our candidates is completely appropriate in a free and open society. You DO want a free and open society, don't you?
10:31 - Roberts is no extreme candidate. You've just been sucked to the right so hard that you can't see where the middle and the left are anymore.
The right is wrong, dead wrong in fact. They've been aiding and abetting the loss of the American middle class and the militarization of American foreign policy to the extent that peace appears to no longer be an option. Great for the arms merchants and the Judeo-Christian right I guess.
Roberts is a moderate and Arcuri is a slightly righter moderate.
A true left winger would have you dry-humping trees and manning a picket line in front of your local Walmart.
When will you ask whether Les Roberts used to be a Green?
Green would be no surprise. But did he dry hump those trees in front of Walmart?
I'd vote for a Green over a Conservative every day of the week, twice on Sundays and three times on Holy Days.
12:55 says: "Now suddenly a "Real Democrat" has to be a progressive."
No, a "Real Democrat" simply has to be distinguishable from a "Republican." Boehlert was touted as a moderate, but he voted party line far more often than not. Too often these days, "moderate" is code for "has no opinions" or "is running on ambition rather than ideals." I have FOR SURE not noticed that the Dem Party has been taken over by progressives; if anything, it's been taken over by wusses who call themselves "moderates."
Somebody in these two parties has to act sane and temper the extremist behaviors on both sides. They are called moderates.
Jon, you go dry hump trees and picket...We'll win elections, and when we're done, don't come crying for a favor pisshead.
LOL 8:19. Let's have lunch.
Go and have lunch. Ya got rightfully skewered here this morning.
Will ya go and take yer head outa yer behind for long enough to see the big picture?
No? Didn't think so.
And You will be rightfully skewed on Primary Day.
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