On the other hand, Lieberman leads strongly (51%-27% over Lamont as an Independent heading into November. More evidence that the Democratic activist base and the "netroots" is not in sync with the general public? Actually, I've been saying this for a LONG time, often to the great anger of that "activist base," but the evidence just keeps mounting that this is, indeed, the case.
An exception to the rule? Right here in Virginia, where the "netroots" helped encourage a war hero, Jacksonian populist and former Reagan Administration official to run as a Democrat for U.S. Senate against George "97% Bush Rubber Stamp" Allen. Something tells me, this story is going to have a quite different ending than Connecticut.
Once Lamont wins the primary and he gets some press, his numbers will jump by leaps and bounds in general election polls.
I've given him some loot, and recommend that others do to. You can Donate Here
You'd think they would at least not use the same program every time.
Of course one would expect the Dems who helped us get into Iraq and other terrible situations to want to keep doing the same old thing. Truth be told, the Dems aren't going anywhere without the netroots. The netroots are to the Dems like a transfusion to a dying patient.
Lieberman is in tune with the leadership of the Republican party and some of the Democratic leadership as well. One thing is evident as we watch events unfolding in the Middle East. We need to avoiding being an agent of Zionists (Notice I'm not saying Jews or Israel.). Zionists are the far right wing (politically) of the Christian and Jewish faiths as well as the neo-con imperialists. Zionism gives the neo-con dominionists a quasi-religious cover for their dirty deeds.
I've certainly cursed Lieberman in the past, but I suspect if he runs as an independent, he may very well win. If he's gonna win, I'd rather have him sitting in Washngton with a D behind his name. I'm all for netroots--but for me, the netroots activity is a way for me to help get Democratic candidates elected. Lamont will have a couple of hoops to jump through.
I used to only work for candidates in Kentucky. Paul Hackett was the guy I first worked for outside my state. I knew Jim Webb's work before he started running and thought he was a natural guy for me to support, but I'm still uncertain about the CT election and sometimes I worry about getting myself carried away with netroots fever and giving here and giving there, frittering my donation money away.
I'm going to stay out of the CT race. I'm concentrating on the one race I think is a must win for the country. That race is the Webb Allen race. In a week or so, I'll have the money to donate a decent sum to to someone and it all goes to Jim Webb. We lose this one, Virgina and the whole damn country loses big time. I look at Jim Webb and I see him as the potentially one of the finest Senators I'll see in my lifetime. As I have no heart for any candidate in Kentucky and as I see the VA race as the most important one in the country--Webb gets all my money this fall. It's fun to play around and feel like I'm changing things for the better all over the country, but I keep remembering Allen is no pushover. He's won elections in VA before and a lot of those voters who didn't vote in the primary are Allen voters and they are used to voting for him. I believe Jim is the rare Democrat who can actually bring those Reagan Dems back to the fold, but it's gonna take the money to do it.
The VA primary was a great victory for the netroots community, but remember how low your turnout was in VA. There's a lot of voters out there who are not getting their information from the internet. Jim needs hard cash to get his message out those voters and that still means TV ads and nice looking mail pieces in every voters mailboxes.
We are seeing the ascendancy of the internet as a true power in politics, but we're not all there yet. Take a good look at the money Webb and Allen have. Like the above poster, I say let's not take our eye off the ball. Jim Webb still needs big money and I'm saving mine for him.
In the Andrew Horne race here in Kentucky, there was a certain glee in the thought we were going to win. How could we not? Andrew would bring out the Reagan Dems from the south-end of Louisville. There was a lot of national dem support. Kos was writing about him. He was on Hardball and Air America. He was a combat vet, and war hero. He was ramrod straight, well loved by the unions and the guy looked like he could be presidential material. We even won the blog wars. We had twice as many yard signs. We had a rabid group of volunteers. Guess what happened? We had our ass handed to us. John Yarmuth won by 20 points. Why did we lose? We didn't have the money to reach into the South End and get those Reagan Democrats to come out and we were rolled over with a bunch of TV ads we couldn't afford to compete with. But the real loss came when we didn't have the money to get the name recognition up. Oh, there were mistakes made, but not enough to lose the race by the twenty points.
Name recognition may not be sexy business, but it's at the heart of a lot of wins in the political arena. My advice is hold on to your money and save it for Jim.
I've overmade my point here, but I'm a still a bit raw from losing a race we should have won.
This is off-subject, but I just spent 4 days in lovely Southwest Virgina on a farm near Coeburn. As Louisville feels like New Orleans in the summer, I was glad to be in the cool clean air of the beautiful Virgina countryside.
For those of you who don't spent much time in the Mountains, I hope you go up there and talk to voters. The folks I met up there don't know a lot about Webb, but as they're sending a lot of sons and daughter to this war, a lot of them are looking for change. When you have some time off, take a trip to Southwest Va and knock on some door. There are fine folks up there. It's the area where my people and Jim Webb's people come from. They'll invite to in to drink tea and be glad to talk some politics. Also, as little news. I'll be playing at Wise County fair this fall with the Music of Coal Show. Come on up and say hello.
Nick
On the other hand, Lieberman leads strongly (51%-27% over Lamont as an Independent heading into November. More evidence that the Democratic activist base and the "netroots" is not in sync with the general public?
I think this is a rush to judgment. If you were to do a poll on the issues, my guess is that the Democratic activist base are more in sync with the so-called ''general public" than this poll would indicate. The differnce here has more to do with candidate preference. When you poll the general public on that, we find that it becomes much more a "cult of personality" than anything. The netroots are paying a lot more attention to this primary than anyone else. They like Lamont.