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10:16 AM PT: FL-13: When I was a kid, one of my favorite pleasures was getting to watch "The Price Is Right" whenever I stayed home sick. I might have even faked illness a few times, just to watch my man Bob Barker bust out the Plinko at noon on weekdays. The agony of going over $1.00 on the big wheel! The delight at the canny contestant whose winning bid was just a single dollar! The Showcase Showdown! A full hour of joys for an eight-year-old with a slight fever.
So when you find out that one of your childhood heroes has momentarily come out of retirement to cut an ad for a Republican candidate for Congress ... well, I'll resist the temptation to make any "price is wrong" cracks. But yep, that's what ol' Bob is doing, in a new spot praising lobbyist David Jolly for his efforts on behalf of veterans. The commercial will air during a special "Price Is Right" episode celebrating Barker's 90th birthday this week, and as Abby Livingston notes, the show is still quite popular with the 65+ set, of which there's a sizable contingent in Florida.
I have to admit, I've since moved on. But I will never forget to spay and neuter my cats and dogs.
10:46 AM PT: MI Ballot: On Wednesday, Michigan's Republican-held legislature passed the so-called "rape insurance" measure that would require women to obtain separate health coverage for abortions, meaning that it now becomes law. As we explained previously, conservative activists used a little-known loophole in Michigan law to get around both voters and Gov. Rick Snyder, who had previously vetoed similar legislation.
Organizers collected petitions to seemingly put this law on the ballot, but rather than send the measure directly to voters, the legislature had the opportunity to vote on it. A simple majority in favor, plus the signatures of about 4 percent of the state's population, and presto! You have a new law on the books. It's a bizarre way to conduct democracy, and thanks to Republican gerrymandering and the relatively small signature requirement, it means that the will of a very small minority can be imposed on the entire state, with little recourse. At this point, opponents' best response is to fight like hell to turn the legislature blue next year.
In the meantime, there were a few Democratic turncoats who voted in favor of the rape insurance law. (All Republicans supported it.) On the list of shame are state Sen. Tupac Hunter and state Reps. Terry Brown, Charles Brunner, and John Olumba, a Democrat-turned-independent. Hunter and Brown are both term-limited, while Olumba sits in a 98 percent Obama district in Detroit, so he ought to be readily disposed of in a primary. Brunner's a bit trickier, since he sits in a swingy district (54 percent Obama), but he may find himself cut loose. At most, though, he only has one term left, so in the worst-case scenario, he'll be gone before long, too.
1:14 PM PT: DCCC: The DCCC has added four new candidates to its Jumpstart program: former North Little Rock Mayor Patrick Henry Hays (AR-02); former FEMA Director James Lee Witt (AR-04); former State Department official Bobby McKenzie (MI-11); and Burlington County Freeholder Aimee Belgard (NJ-03). All are running in GOP-held open seats except for McKenzie, who would either face Rep. Kerry Bentivolio or his primary challenger, foreclosure kingpin David Trott. McKenzie's inclusion is the most notable, since the D-Trip's top choice, law school dean Jocelyn Benson, recently declined. The committee said some positive things about McKenzie following Benson's decision, but it was unclear how interested in him they really were. This move says "at least somewhat."
1:44 PM PT: TX-Sen: Daniel Strauss at Talking Points Memo has a good roundup of who is and who isn't endorsing Rep. Steve Stockman in his damn-the-torpedoes primary challenge to fellow Republican Sen. John Cornyn. Actually, I'm just kidding. It's only a list of people who haven't endorsed Stockman, because so far, not a single prominent conservative group or notable tea partier has taken his side. It's clear now that Stockman laid absolutely zero groundwork for this jihad. In other words, he's being perfectly Stockman.
1:47 PM PT (David Jarman): NC-06: When octogenarian Rep. Howard Coble announced his retirement in November, there wasn't a rush of local Republicans, pent up by almost 30 years of demand, to grab his seat; there was Phil Berger Jr., and, given his presumed front-runner status, that was about it. However, Roll Call reports the recent entry of another GOPer who hasn't held office before but apparently has the capacity to freely self-fund: banker John VonCannon.
1:51 PM PT (David Jarman): LA-Sen: Just a day after the first ad from the Mary Landrieu campaign was unveiled, along comes another pro-Landrieu ad, this time from the moneybags at Senate Majority PAC. The ad hasn't been released yet, but the buy is fairly substantial, at either $218K or $250K, depending on who you believe. This early in the game, we aren't likely to find out whether they have recent internal polls convincing them of the need to act fast, or if it's just a prudent "define yourself early and often" approach.
1:53 PM PT: NC-Sen: State House Speaker Thom Tillis, the nominal Republican frontrunner for North Carolina's Senate race next year, recently decided to take a dump on those who disagree with him:
"I think for the most part, what I see from the folks who are opposing our agenda is whining coming from losers," he said in an interview in his Raleigh office. "They lost, they don't like it, and they are going to try to do everything they can to, I think, cast doubt on things that I think are wise and that the average citizen when they know what we're doing, I think, like it."
Given that at least some of the folks opposing his agenda are known as "voters," it's amusing that Tillis calls them "losers." I don't think politicians are generally supposed to do that, but what do I know?
2:03 PM PT (Darth Jeff): NH-Sen: Could New Hampshire Republicans have a credible candidate who's actually, you know, from New Hampshire? Maybe, but it won't be former Sen. Judd Gregg. News broke Thursday that Gregg was stepping down from his job heading a Wall Street lobbying firm, leading to the expected speculation that Gregg would try and return to the Senate.
If Gregg had run, he would have faced a primary with former colleague Bob Smith and possibly former Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown for the right to take on Democratic incumbent Jeanne Shaheen. Alas, this War of the Four Senators is not to be: Gregg shot down the rumors pretty quickly, declaring, "Been there, done that."
2:13 PM PT (Darth Jeff): NC Legislature: Democratic hopes for retaking either chamber of the North Carolina legislature were always going to be long due to the Republican gerrymander, and this doesn't help things. PPP finds Democrats lead the generic ballot only 45-43, an identical lead from November. While Mitt Romney carried the state 51-48, the median House seat is a brutal 57-42 Romney and median of the Senate is 56-43. Suffice to say, Democrats would need a massive edge to have a chance.
2:14 PM PT (David Jarman): Census: The Census Bureau is out with a slew of new data on income and poverty at the "small area" level (counties and, interestingly, school districts). There aren't any new surprises -- income is highest around major cities, especially the Washington DC area, while poverty is highest in rural non-white areas like the Black Belt, Rio Grande Valley, and Central Valley -- but there are some excellent new maps to click on.
The most noteworthy map may be the map of changes in household income from 2007-2012. It puts in sharp relief how the biggest gains were in energy-sector areas (like North Dakota and west Texas) and, to a lesser extent, agricultural areas, while the biggest drops came in housing bubble regions (Florida, Nevada, Arizona), manufacturing areas like Michigan and northern Indiana, and also, unexpectedly, the New York City suburbs (perhaps thanks to Wall Street taking a haircut).
2:33 PM PT (David Jarman): NH-Gov: One race where the Republicans haven't landed a recruit -- not even of the Some Dude variety -- is New Hampshire's gubernatorial race, where Dem first-termer Maggie Hassan has been polling well and where the House races present more appealing targets for ambitious GOPers. A new name is at least bubbling up, though, pushed along by some of the local party elders; it's Andrew Hemingway, a behind-the-scenes player (Newt Gingrich's former state director, and loser of the state GOP chair race to Jennifer Horn). Earlier in the year, he had run some ads out of his own pocket against Ann Kuster (though he never made any moves to get in to the NH-02 race), so it seems like he's interested in running for something.
2:36 PM PT: NY-11: Longtime election watchers love Staten Island for its bizarre and hilarious congressional hijinks, and once again, New York's fifth borough does not disappoint. Disgraced ex-Rep. Vito Fossella has managed to net himself a new puff piece in the New York Post, in which he claims that "significant people" have tried to recruit him to run for his old seat again. Of course, a Republican already holds the 11th, Mike Grimm, but the Post spins this as GOP power-brokers looking for an alternative, since Grimm could implode due to scandal at any moment.
And it's a pretty humiliating spot for Grimm to be in. Since this is the Post, it's not all love and kisses for Fossella, who's described in the headline as "DWI pol with secret family." (The article also features the mugshot from the drunken driving arrest that led to the discovery of Vito's second family.) Grimm and local Republicans reacted angrily to the idea that a sleaze like Fossella might be more appealing than the incumbent, with the head of the Staten Island party calling the story "a false statement planted by Democrats." The problem, of course, is that Fossella himself was quoted on the record. Oh, and he didn't rule out a bid, either. Fun time ahead? We can only hope.
2:46 PM PT (David Jarman): NJ-12: Give yourself a political junkie pat-on-the-back if the name Alieta Eck rings a bell for you. (She was a speed bump for Steve Lonegan in the Republican primary for the Senate special election this year, and is also a leader in the fringe movement to get doctors to switch to cash-only practice rather than participate in the dread Obamacare.) Well, it seems as if she's come down with an incurable case of the political bug, as she's now planning to run against Rush Holt in NJ-12 next year. Holt did have a fairly close call in 2010, but thanks to redistricting, he's in a much safer version of the 12th (67% Obama in 2012), so this outbreak of Eckmania may be short-lived.
3:38 PM PT: • RootsCamp: Anyone headed down to RootsCamp in DC, the annual conference hosted by the New Organizing Institute devoted to digital and grassroots organizing? I'll be there myself (as a civilian, not a presenter), so if you're a Digest reader, please say hi!