Will the Democrats keep the House?

I don't really have much time today to blog, its sunday after all and theres lots of football to watch. But I did read this interesting article form the New York Times today. First off I always take any article from the NYT with a large grain of sand. These people do proudly display the Duranty Pulitzer in their office, afterall. In case you didn't know Walter Duranty wrote glowing pieces on the Soviet Union back in the 30's where he just so happened to gloss over the progroms and famines that were killing millions over there.

But occasionally they do put out a though provoking article every so often. You can read it here.

Whats wrong with Democrats?

George F. Will has a fantastic commentary today regarding the Democrats shrinking stature in all the opinion polls that have been coming out for the past few months and how they are reacting to this. He does a great job focusing on the two major blunders that the democrats are going to be held accountable for this election cycle, namely the massive stimulus bill and the healthcare bill. He then goes on to say that because the democrats really don't have anything to run on that people are willing to get behind, that they will be forced to "pound the table" and make personal attacks against Republican opponents.

He couldn't be more right.

If you've been paying attention to the news in the past few days then you may have seen this attack ad by candidate Alan Grayson, implying that his opponent, republican Daniel Webster is a cooky religious nut. It's back-firing pretty bad for Grayson since Webster is up 7 points in this recent poll and will probably continue to rise higher.

In his article George Will uses the example of Barry Goldwater and the democrats successful undermining of his mental and personal credibility by using various psychiatrists to declare him unfit to hold office. This is a tactic that works well with the collusion of the media. What's the old saying? A lie can go around the world faster than the truth can tie it's shoes. Christine O'Donnell is currently getting a similar treatment. After winning the nomination, it was widely reported that her primary opponent, Mike Castle, didn't think she was fit for the position and would never win. That comment was quickly picked up by the media and started a narrative that O'Donnell will probably never be able to get out of. This in turn has caused a lot of background digging, going so far as the media to breathlessly announce the fact that she "dabbled" in witchcraft in high school. Seriously. That's stupid news. But it builds up that narrative that gives people a negative view of her and kills her standing in the polls.

Now, admittedly there have been other gaffes on her part. The anti-masturbation stance and the fact that she claimed to have studied at Oxford to name a couple but these are things that have come out afterwards and caused this snowball effect of negativity. Which in turn has allowed her opponent to claim that she is too far right from the average Delaware voter (which may be true) and hurt her ability to connect with the people, thereby giving the Democrats the advantage.

Sure there are examples like O'Donnell that liberal pundits point to in order to claim that they still have a chance at keeping the house and senate but when tactics of desperation like the ones being used this cycle are in play, it really does indicate how scared the democrats are. The Tea Party movement has been scoffed at from the very beginning. Yet in spite of all the punditry mocking it, it continues to grow. The people at the top simply aren't getting it. This is a grassroots movement, that while at times can be misguided and a little extreme, is an honest out-pouring of voter frustration. This is what is wrong with the democrats. They just don't get that these people are passionate about what they believe in and are willing to make big personal sacrifices of time and money to fight for it. I have several family members involved with the Tea Party movement (much to my dismay) and they are very ardent in their beliefs about the state of the country, Obama and the democrats policies. This has caused them to devote huge swaths of time and money to the cause and this is something that they are not unique in. I've been dragged to a few rallies and have seen the "rabble". They are, for the most part, everyday people who simply love this country but you can sense the anger they have towards the leadership on both sides of the aisle. The democrats used to be this way. When Bush was in power they were passionate about the war and various social causes. But now that they finally have control they seem to have lost a lot of that fire, perhaps power breeds complacency but it is a mistake they make at their own peril. No matter party you subscribe to people can be just as equally angry and passionate. Its what got the Dem's back in control in the first place. It's what brought them together.

What's wrong with the Dems? They forgot what the people were like. They have forgotten that when you have enough angry people they can quickly coalesce into a powerful group. They have forgotten that their policies and actions while in office will have an affect of the people and manifest come election cycle. it's why I think they are still in big trouble come November.

No vote on taxes AND no vote on a budget??

It would seem that in all the talk yesterday about the Democrats running away from the vote on extending the Bush tax cuts, we all failed to notice that they forgot to pass a budget as well! Yes readers of the liberal slant will argue that there have been many a congress that has ended its final session and not pass a budget BUT were they under such extraordinary circumstances as the ones we face today? Did any previous congress face, such a missive deficit, high unemployment, unsettled taxes, AND two wars? (As long as we have soldiers in Iraq getting shot at I still count it) I think we're in new territory here. It's just another sign the the Democrats have lost their will to govern and aren't willing to fight for what they believe in. More importantly they are making it nearly impossible to convince the American people that they are worth keeping in office.

November is looking better for republicans as of now. They just need to keep their tea-party candidates to pipe down on the crazy speech and they should be OK. That's going to be pretty tough.

How strong is the Tea Party?

The Telegraph has a very fascinating article regarding the Tea Party's rising clout among US voters. I'm always one to take polls with a large grain of sand but when you are putting up numbers saying that over 50 percent of likely voters are more inclined to vote for a tea party backed candidate versus just 37% saying they would vote for an Obama backed candidate, it makes you sit up and pay attention. While yes there is still a lot of time left before November the trend has been favoring republicans and the tea party for a while now. But as some of these Tea party candidates start getting negative press, such as Christine O'Donnell, it may turn off voters in differently areas. Granted the flip side to that is if tea partiers and those sympathetic to their cause start to feel that a particular candidate is being treated unfairly, their may be a bigger anti-incumbent back lash because of it.