So I found this little gem in the Christmas Eve edition of the Las Vegas Review Journal:
Eric Herzik, a professor at the University of Nevada, Reno, agreed, saying Dodd would be no more able than Reid to end the war.
Liberal disenchantment could even be a good thing for Reid in Nevada, where polls have shown his popularity and job approval ratings have dipped to around 30 percent, Herzik said.
“Harry Reid’s numbers have dropped in part because he is perceived as more liberal and out of touch,” Herzik said. “The way to fix that is to be attacked by the left.”
Yeah, liberal means out of touch, that’s the old Republican mantra, and Herzik is a Republican, which the LVRJ continuously fails to mention.
But that’s really besides the point, as apparently, us bitching about Senator Reid will lift his overall approval numbers. ‘Tis the season, so I suppose I can try and do old Harry a little favor. Here it goes:
Harry is all too willing to sell out to Bush/Cheney. The reason we even have this quote by Mr Herzik is because someone at the LVRJ seems to be reading the Huffington Post and stumbled upon an entry that called for Harry Reid to be replaced by Chris Dodd as Senate Majority Leader. Why’s that? Because Chris Dodd managed to do the unbelievable: he actually stood up for his believes and was not willing to stand idly by when Harry brought a FISA bill to the floor that contained amnesty for the telecom companies.
So here’s a message to Mr. Green (also quoted in the LVRJ saying the following: Michael Green, a history professor at the College of Southern Nevada who describes his personal politics as liberal, said the bloggers have unrealistic expectations. “A lot of the people who are most upset with Reid have no conception of how the Senate works or doesn’t work,” Green said. “They want Reid and (House Speaker Nancy) Pelosi to end the war just by snapping their fingers.”)
Yeah, well, maybe Mr. Green should actually read the blogs and follow the news (watching C-Span might help) before giving this cute soundbite to the LVRJ: this was not about the war. It’s a question of leadership. Is Harry willing to lead the Democrats in the Senate or not? And leading means holding the caucus together and getting all Dems to vote for important legislation. When the passing of the energy bill was one vote short it was because of a Democrat: Mary Landrieu.
But I digress, this was about boosting Harry’s poll numbers. So, yeah he sucked on Iraq too. And he still does. Why is it so complicated to let the Senate vote each day on bringing the troops home? What’s he afraid of? Why does the Senate pass one appropriations bill after another for the war when the American people want out?
So, basically, Harry Reid has done a few good things as Majority Leader (keeping the Senate in session to stop Bush from making more recess appointments comes to mind). But generally I’m just not satisfied. And Nevadans are not satisfied. And here’s a novel concept on why that is: maybe it has nothing to do with him fighting for liberal (and mostly very mainstream legislation – see SCHIP), maybe it has something to do with continuously caving to Bush/Cheney. Maybe Mr. Herzik hasn’t noticed yet but Nevadans want out of Iraq just as badly as people in the 49 other states. And in that respect (and so many other issues – like telecom amnesty) Senator Reid is not getting his job done. And that just may explain his low approval rating.
But hey, the left’s attacking him, so he’ll get a boost in the next Las Vegas Review Journal poll. You read it here first.
Cross posted from My Silver State.