All of us who write diaries of a political bent have long ago realized that Hair Gropinfuror is a Vegas buffet of material almost nonstop. But sometimes being assaulted by so much low hanging fruit can have the effect of distracting us from more important things that have nothing to do with Russia, and only involve him in passing. I’m here today to try to correct one of those things that escaped what should have been a bugle call to all of us progressives.
One day late last week it was reported on Rachel Maddow’s show that there is a very promising trend for Democrats in 2018 brewing. It had to do with candidates for the US House of Representatives next year. Someone did a study of announced candidates for the House in 2018, but they weren’t interested in collating erstwhile entertainers like “Deez Nutz”. They had two criteria to make it in the survey. One, they had to have already filed all of their qualifying paperwork with the FEC. Second, they must have already raised at least $5,000 in campaign funds.
The results were stunning. In the last several cycles, in only a couple of years did that number top 100, and both were years in which the Republicans accomplished it, and both years turned out to be “wave” years for the GOP. But by the end of June, 16 months before the election, the Republicans had 26 candidates running for House seats who qualified. The Democrats? 219! No, that is not a mistype, I had to look at the screen again to reassure myself I wasn’t seeing things, but Rachel even had a little bar graph for proof.
It turns out that with all of his nonsense, His Lowness has single handedly erased what had for years been a kind of a built in Republican advantage, incumbents running unopposed. We got an early hint of that during the filing period for the off year VA state elections, suddenly, almost every district had a challenger to at least make the incumbent GOPasaur try to defend their turf. But this is the first time in my recollection that we have had any kind of a national barometer in the nationwide Democratic appetite to take back the House. It is, to say the least, a very positive first impression.
Here is where the math comes in. Let’s eliminate districts and states where there may still be upcoming Democratic filings for seats and a serious effort to challenge, we’ll just go with the number we already have in the hand, 219. Let’s go worst case scenario. If you’re a MLB shortstop that’s hitting .100, you’ll be back in AAA in a heartbeat. But let’s just say that we only flip 1 seat out of every 10 districts that we have candidates. That’s 22 seats right there. But let’s look just a little deeper for some more positive news, shall we?
If I remember correctly (50-50 at best), there are 26 incumbent GOP Representatives that are sitting in districts in a state that Hillary won in 2016. I find it inconceivable that there will be a single one of those seats that will be uncontested, in fact, I’m just as sure that a good number of those districts are represented in that 219 figure. Again, let’s lowball just to minimize the expectations. Say we split those districts 50-50, that’s a pickup of 13 seats. Not a bad start, right?
Now, let’s subtract 26 from 219 (calculator time). That leaves us with 193 seats. Now, let’s apply our pathetic batting average of .100. That would flip 19 more seats. 19+13=32. Can you say “Welcome back Speaker Pelosi”? And does anybody in here really believe that with a serious effort, combined with the political tomfoolery Trump is loosing on the land that we’ll only convert at 10%? But just for fun, let’s look at another factor.
We have two secret weapons that nobody is talking about here. As I pointed out earlier, with the sudden increase in Democratic participation, Republicans in a lot of districts are going to have to do something they’re totally unused to. They’re actually going to have to campaign. And they’re as rusty as hell at it, some of them haven’t had to do it since they won their seat. They file for reelection, raise a little play cash, hold a couple of rallies, and write their victory speech in March. It’s hard enough to hit a curve ball in mid season, how about trying to hit one on opening day of spring training when the pitcher played winter ball? That’s what Trump is doing to these poor slobs, he has put them at what they will see as needless risk. This is where Democratic candidates need good help to prepare them for exactly what to say, and how to say it for maximum effect.
And now onto secret weapon number two, the Republicans themselves. Contested by Democrats or not, they have spent the last 7 years running solely on the “Repeal and replace Obamacare” bumper sticker. Forget Trump, their own base is not going to take that failure laying down. And there are going to be extreme RWNJ’s coming out of the woodwork to challenge them in primaries. The survivors are going to be bloodied by the primaries, and poorer for having to spend on them, and the primaries will give their Democratic challengers more shit to throw at them. If they lose, the new meat will be even more extreme, with two things missing. The incumbent name advantage, and the lack of years of a fundraising advantage already in place.
Virginia’s state election this year is going to be the testing ground for us for 2018. We need to get behind all of these candidates to make sure that they have all of the ammunition and financial support they need to make the best showing they can. The biggest benefit of running candidates in previously uncontested seats is that it allows the changing demographics in districts to make an impact. What difference does it make how many Democrats move into a district if a Democrat doesn’t run? This is a chance to not only find out, but to provide some guidance for the national district game plans for next year.
Here is the challenge, and an all call. Anyone who writes a diary in here needs to pick out a Democratic candidate in Virginia and write at least one candidate diary for them. If you don’t know any, go to the master site of all things Virginia Democratic politics 90 for 90. Once you have a name, Google and their website link will give you all you need. Don’t be afraid to contrast their progressive views with the inane nonsense of their opponent. Later this week I will be following my own challenge and jumping into the fray.
Virginia is our 2018 spring training. It will allow us to hone our campaign diary writing skills for the upcoming national 2018 struggle, and if we all pitch in, it can turn Virginia’s house blue, something we can strive to maintain through 2020 so we can take a whack at redrawing a map. If you need a little help to get stated, just look for the Virginia candidate diaries up on the site and ask any one of us for pointers, we’ll all be glad to help.
All of those simple numbers I talked about above can still come up with a net profit of “0” if we don’t join the fight to make a great possibility into an actual reality. Nobody in this life does anything really worthwhile all by themselves. Let’s put our money where our mouths are.