Harold Ford and the DLC Democrats, Blue Dog Democrats, Liebercrats, Bush Democrats (or whatever you want to call these people) are not just sitting back and doing nothing. They are looking to mess with our crap. Here are some examples.
In TN-09, we elected a very solid progressive in Steve Cohen to replace Harold Ford, Jr. Cohen had to defeat Ford’s cousin in the primary and Ford’s brother in the general. Now Ford’s campaign manager, Nikki Turner, is running against him in the primary.
In CO-04, Angie Paccione is taking a second run at Marilyn Musgrave. But, first she has to get by a former Republican that was recruited by Ken Salazar…Betsy Markey.
A similar thing is happening in OH-02, where Victoria Wulsin is taking a second run at Mean Jean Schmidt. She has to beat out a primary challenge from former Republican, Steve Black.
This is being repeated in WA-08, where Darcy Burner is taking a second run against Dave Weichert, but now has to beat out former Republican, Rodney Tom.
There are other races where Blue Dog-type candidates are challenging more progressive candidates…notably in Dennis Hastert’s district, where Bill Foster is being pushed over John Laesch.
We can sit back and take this…we can play defense…or we can hit back hard. There are a number of Democrats that have earned a primary challenge for their votes on Iraq, the Military Commissions Act, FISA, the bankruptcy bill, and Alito and Roberts.
While Beltway pundits will brand such efforts divisive or ‘purity tests’, the reality is that they are going after our candidates much more aggressively than we are going after theirs.
