Boswell Ad: Vote for Me, I'm a Republican!

Boy, there's nothing that revs up the Democratic base and gets 'em off their duffs and out to the polls to vote like a Democratic nominee who runs television ads bragging about being a republican.

"I'm pro-life, pro-gun and against higher taxes," says a denim-clad Boswell ....

Not one image, not one word in the ad even hints that Boswell is running as the Democratic nominee.

Which figures, since Boswell is not a Democrat. Something the national Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has yet to figure out.

(More after the jump.)

Last week, Boswell sent out a press release bragging about making the DCCC's priority list of races in its Red to Blue Program. The day before that press release, I'd sent him an email asking for details about his elevation to that list and his participation in it.

I see that the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee has promoted your campaign from an emerging race to a highlighted Red to Blue Race. Congratulations!

Could you please provide more details about what this means for your campaign? The DCCC's Red to Blue web page states: "The Red to Blue program highlights top Democratic campaigns across the country, and offers them financial, communications, and strategic support. These candidates earned a spot in the program by surpassing demanding fundraising goals and skillfully demonstrating to voters that they stand for change and will represent new priorities when elected to Congress."

What specific "financial, communications and strategic support" have you received from the DCCC since the announcement September 12?

What specific "demanding fundraising goals" did you surpass to earn a place in the Red to Blue program?

How did you specifically "demonstrate to voters that you stand for change and will represent new priorities when elected to Congress?" What specific change do you propose? What new priorities will you represent?

How much money have you raised through the ActBlue DCCC Red to Blue page for donations to your campaign?

I look forward to hearing from you soon. Thank you very much.

Although I received an email from Boswell's campaign the same day - September 15 - acknowledging receipt of my message, I have not received a reply to my questions.

Can't blame him. If I were a misogynistic, racist coward and waste of oxygen hoping to sneak into Congress on the coattails of a party I despise and betray, I wouldn't answer those questions either.

According to the Swing State Project, the DCCC is dropping a cool $1.75 mil on ads for its Red to Blue candidates, but not a dime for Boswell. Maybe it's not as dumb as it seems.

And the Courier-Journal noted that once again, a "debate" between Boswell and the republican nominee failed to reveal any actual policy or philosophical differences between the two.

Cross-posted at Blue in the Bluegrass.

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Why Liberals Must Stand Proud and Conservatives Should Be Ashamed

Every single good thing that has happened to Americans in the last century has been brought to you by liberals. Every single obstacle in the path of improving people's lives and making the world a better place has been thrown there by conservatives.

It can't be repeated often enough, yet rarely gets mentioned, much less articulated as clearly as Bob Herbert does here.

The liberals who didn’t have a clue gave us Social Security and unemployment insurance, both of which were contained in the original Social Security Act. Most conservatives despised the very idea of this assistance to struggling Americans. Republicans hated Social Security, but most were afraid to give full throat to their opposition in public at the height of the Depression.

SNIP

Liberals who didn’t have a clue gave us Medicare and Medicaid. Quick, how many of you (or your loved ones) are benefiting mightily from these programs, even as we speak. The idea that Republicans are proud of Ronald Reagan, who saw Medicare as “the advance wave of socialism,” while Democrats are ashamed of Lyndon Johnson, whose legislative genius made this wonderful, life-saving concept real, is insane.

(More after the jump.)

When Johnson signed the Medicare bill into law in the presence of Harry Truman in 1965, he said: “No longer will older Americans be denied the healing miracle of modern medicine.”

Reagan, on the other hand, according to Johnson biographer Robert Dallek, “predicted that Medicare would compel Americans to spend their ‘sunset years telling our children and our children’s children what it was like in America when men were free.’ ”

Scary.

Without the many great and noble deeds of liberals over the past six or seven decades, America would hardly be recognizable to today’s young people. Liberals (including liberal Republicans, who have since been mostly drummed out of the party) ended legalized racial segregation and gender discrimination.

Humiliation imposed by custom and enforced by government had been the order of the day for blacks and women before men and women of good will and liberal persuasion stepped up their long (and not yet ended) campaign to change things. Liberals gave this country Head Start and legal services and the food stamp program. They fought for cleaner air (there was a time when you could barely see Los Angeles) and cleaner water (there were rivers in America that actually caught fire).

Liberals. Your food is safer because of them, and so are your children’s clothing and toys. Your workplace is safer. Your ability (or that of your children or grandchildren) to go to college is manifestly easier.

As Warren Street writes about Herbert's column:

Pardon the fuck out of me, but I needed this. I needed something to get my chin up off my chest. I needed this wake-up call. I needed this kick in the ass. I needed this call to action. I needed this because I'm sick to fucking death of sitting on my fucking ass watching these assholes rise up like a Phoenix. It is time to take up the cause and get back to smashing the living shit out of Republicans and their lies.

If you need some Kentucky examples to make this clear, Heather Ryan is a Proud Liberal. John Yarmuth is a Proud Liberal. David Boswell is a sniveling coward who wants credit for liberal accomplishments while denying liberal values.

Here's a question to ask your candidates who want Democratic votes: What are three liberal accomplishments that were opposed by conservatives? If they can't answer, you know what they really are.

Let's put an end once and for all to the oxymoronic concept of the "conservative Democrat." No such animal. Democrats are Proud Liberals. Everybody else is a republican, not matter what they call themselves.

No more DINOs.

Cross-posted at Blue in the Bluegrass.

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Takin' Names for 2008

I hereby nominate Sixth District Congressman Ben Chandler, D-KY, for the first name on the DINO Hit List to get a progressive primary opponent in 2008.

The treasonous schmuck was one of 41 "Democrats" voting to let the Usurper put the finishing touches on his American Dictatorship.

In January, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi gave Sophmore Chandler a seat on the powerful Appropriations Committee, as a fairly obvious incentive to get him to vote the straight and narrow on the Democratic agenda.

At first it seemed to work, too. Benny voted in line with the leadership on most of the important votes, most recently co-sponsoring a bill to impeach AG Alberto Gonzales.

But Benny's been a shill for this maladministration since his special election in 2004, and now he's reverting to form.

Look, I understand the importance of not eating our young, keeping the majority, red-state politics, blah, blah, blah.

But a vote that blatantly invites Smirky to shit on the Bill of Rights? An engraved invitation to declare himself dictator-for-life? When bush's disapproval rate is poised to exceed Nixon's? When republicans are running for the exits? When a significant majority of Americans trust DEMOCRATS more than republicans on the war on terror?

What. The. Fuck?

No, scratch that. I don't really care what slimy rationalizations float in Chandler's wingnut brain.

With Democrats like Chandler (and Nick Lampson and Henry Cuellar, the ungrateful bastards), what do we need with republicans?

We - real Democrats, liberals, progressive, members of the reality-based community, bush-haters all - WE got these assholes elected. WE handed them the House and the Senate.

WE brought them into this new Democratic world, and WE can take them out of it.

Next year, people will not only be looking for a way to punish republicans hard, they'll also be looking for a way to punish Democratic Collaborators.

2008 is going to be our best chance to not just grab huge majorities in both houses of Congress, but to replace Democratic Collaborators with Real Democrats.

Check out this vote roll to find out whether your Democratic representative is a collaborator. If he or she voted yes, start recruiting a primary opponent today.

Do it now, before voting Democratic makes you an enemy combatant, Guantanamo-bound.

I am extremely relieved and proud to announce that Louisville's own John Yarmuth, D-KY voted keep the Bill of Rights and deny Smirky a crown.

UPDATE, 6:42 p.m.: Logical Negativism has the full list of DINOs in the House.

There's more: "Takin' Names for 2008" >>