We’ve got two potential challengers to Lamar Alexander’s senate seat. I don’t know enough about them to be able to have a preference but they both look, at least on the surface, to be plausible opponents.
Mike McWherter, a Jackson, Tenn.-based beer distributor and son of former Gov. Ned McWherter, and Bob Tuke, the Nashville lawyer who was until recently the state Democratic Party chairman, both confirmed Tuesday that they’re considering the race.
We’re still hurting in Kansas, North and South Carolina, Mississippi, Alabama, and Wyoming, but it’s good to know we have a strategy in the Volunteer State. Meanwhile, the Republicans continue to come up empty in their search for an opponent for Mary Landrieu.
On the House side, some good news in that Luis Gutierrez has decided not to retire, while former chairwoman of the Republican Conference, Deborah Pryce, has come to the opposite conclusion. And the Dems are on offense, trying to force more retirements. Dennis Hastert will hang up his wrestling shoes tomorrow. Cillizza has some thoughts.
What’s on your mind?
Tuke has zero name recognition and zero chance. McWherter might actually be able to force Alexander to spend some money just by virtue of his family connections, but the sad truth is that there simply is no feeling in TN that a change of course is needed. Bush’s numbers may be down, but that doesn’t mean Tennesseans are flirting with the Democratic Party, bastion of sodomy that it is in their minds.
And that, really, is why the Dems have little chance in Tennessee. The GOP has done a very good job of convincing the public that the Democrats are the party of sodomy and taxes. The God, guns, and gays approach has really worked well here. What else do Democrats stand for locally? Nothing, except maybe the lingering remains of the old-boy network.
What Tennessee needs isn’t a battle against the GOP. It needs a battle against ignorance and close-mindedness. Otherwise, the best possible scenario for the Dems is that we’ll elect another Blue Dog. And the McWherter clan are definitely Blue Dogs.
Harold Ford Jr. got 48% of the vote. I don’t think we can say that the Dems have no chance, although it will obviously be difficult.
Harold Ford was able to mobilize the black vote, especially in Memphis, where his notoriously corrupt family controls the political machine. It is safe to say that McWherter will not appeal nearly as much to black voters.
It is also worth bearing in mind Mr. Ford’s relationship to the DLC. You can count on any Democrat from Tennessee voting with the GOP much of the time. For winning TN to actually count for much, there needs to be a profound change in public attitudes. “God, guns, and gays” plays far too well here right now for a liberal to be elected, unless it’s a stealth progressive from District 5.
Fixing the egregious gerrymandering of our congressional districts would probably do more than anything else in the short term.
Well, there is no gerrymandering of senate seats so we don’t have to worry about that. But Cohen is a true progressive now in Ford’s old seat.
If the guys old man served as Governor and he was popular by most accounts, then he probably has a shot, depending on his skills.
I have no idea whether McWherter would vote like Pryor, McCaskill, Ben Nelson, or Frank Lautenberg, but I’ll probably think it’s an improvement over the lumberjack. Probably.