Cross Posted On Open Left

There is a new backlash against the blogosphere backlash against Obama for his flop on FISA.  For example, the top diary here at Daily Kos right now (or, at least it was at the top when I wrote this) pre-emptively blames those people making the criticism for allowing McCain to win the election (continued in the extended entry):

Cross-Posted on Open Left

I have some good news for you this afternoon. Only one week into the Searching for John McCain campaign, we have already placed five articles into the top fifty searches on either John McCain or McCain. For one week, I think that it pretty darn impressive. We have a foothold, and it is only upward from there on out.

More information, including detailed progress reports, campaign goals, tips to make your participation in Searching for John McCain more effective, and information for new participants can be found in the extended entry.

Cross Posted On Open Left

Searching for John McCain is a massive, online activism campaign designed to make at least ten million non-partisan, poll-tested, on-message voter contacts that reveal the damning truth about John McCain entirely through mainstream news reports and McCain’s own words. Through mass blogger participation and the use of embedded hyperlinks, Searching for John McCain will connect millions of curious, low-information swing voters to negative, mainstream news articles about John McCain without 99% of those voters even knowing that Searching for John McCain exists.

To learn how to participate, and to learn how it will work, read on into the extended entry.

Cross posted from Open Left

Cross posted at Open Left

Today, I am pleased to announce the start of an exciting new campaign from BlogPac: From Blue To Bluer.

Hey online activism fans! I’ve got a couple fun items for you this afternoon. Let’s drop some hyperlink bombs on Republican search engine rankings!

Cross Posted On Open Left and Blogpac.com

Ask CNN to be honest about superdelegates

A controversy over the role of superdelegates in the Democratic presidential nomination campaign has erupted since Super Tuesday. Google News shows well over over 8,000 results for super delegates in the last month, most of those occurring in the past week. With neither Obama nor Clinton appearing able to seal the nomination solely with the support of elected, or pledged delegates, the controversy can be summed up as follows:

Cross Posted From Open Left

Today I am pleased to announce the launch of the Superdelegate Transparency Project on Congresspedia and SourceWatch. It is a joint project of LiteraryOutpost.com, OpenLeft and the Congresspedia community on SourceWatch. It is meant to build on the work at DemConWatch.

The project describes itself as follows:

Cross Posted from the AFL-CIO blog

Yesterday, I attended a House Education and Labor HELP Subcommittee joint hearing with the Senate Employment and Workplace Safety Subcommittee focusing on the impact of recent decisions by the National Labor Relations Board and its impact on worker’s rights. The AFL-CIO paid for my travel to the hearing, but since this is an issue close to me I would have been glad to attend anyway. You see, the entire reason I ended up as an unemployed blogger more than three years ago is because a National Labor Relations board ruling in 2004 placed significant restrictions on the collective bargaining rights of graduate student employees of private universities. My previous job had been working with the AFL-CIO to organize graduate employees at the University of Illinois at Chicago, but my position was cut after new organizing possibilities dried up with that ruling.

Cross-Posted On Open Left

With only 27 days before the Iowa caucus, in case people here had not hear of my Nomination At A Glance series, I wanted to stop by and let people know about it. Four years ago, I started my blogging career with a regular Daily Kos diary series called The Empirical Cattle Call. Even though I was wrong back then, I really enjoyed that series, and wanted to show my new work to the old neighborhood. Four years later, I have significantly tweaked and simplified my nomination projection formula to take into account only poll averages and estimated early state momentum. This is a system that would have projected not only John Kerry to take the Democratic nomination the day before the 2004 Iowa caucuses, but which would have correctly projected every nomination campaign, before Iowa even took place, from 1976--2004. Take that for what it is worth.

It appears the elite bloggers secret has been discovered. In a recommended diary at Dailykos entitled Why has the Blogosphere Accepted Hillary?, David Mizner unlocks why we are apparently not sufficiently anti-Clinton:

The next addition to the Blue Majority page is a candidate returning from 2006: Eric Massa, who is running against Shotgun Randy Kuhl in the NY-29.. Please, give to Eric Massa today.

Cross posted at Open Left

It is interesting to see the huge differences in candidate support online in straw polls such as the one conducted earlier today. One of the reasons I find the large gaps between candidates so interesting is that there does not appear to be a huge number of policy differences between the candidates who are receiving a significant amount of online support. Consider the top three finishers in today's straw poll who also happen to be the top three finishers in most early state and national polls of the Democratic field: Clinton, Edwards, and Obama.

(The latest Blue Majority candidate, courtesy of Chris Bowers -- kos)

It is with great please that I am able to announce that the next Blue Majority endorsed candidate: Dan Maffei, from New York's 25th Congressional District

I am particularly excited about this endorsement for several reasons. First, I am from the district, and ever since Jim Walsh originally won the seat by a few hundred votes back when I was a freshman in high school, I have been itching for someone to defeat him. Second, Dan Maffei epitomizes one of my longest-running arguments about the need to run in every district. In 2004, no Democrat ran against Walsh, but in 2006 Dan came within 1% of defeating him. Third, having met Dan Maffei, I can honestly say that there is no member of Congress, or candidate for Congress, with whom I was more personally impressed and within whom I felt more personally comfortable (there are two or three who I feel roughly the same about). When we talked for over two hours over coffee and pizza, it felt like every idea we exchanged about strategy, policy, and life really clicked (like me, he went to local public schools, and hasn't exactly made a fortune working in progressive politics). Dan is a serious, brilliant progressive, who absolutely means more and better Democrats. Please, contribute to Dan today.

Here is a video Dan put together to introduce himself and the district to the readers of Dailykos, MyDD, Open Left and Swing State Project a few days ago:

Now, some of you might ask something to the effect of "wait-he is running against Jim Walsh, the Republican who just said he was now opposed to the Iraq War? Isn't that the sort of Republican behavior we should be encouraging, rather than immediately punishing with a major counter-endorsement?" If you are asking this question, I am glad you did, because even though the Maffei endorsement was decided upon several days before Walsh's announcement, since that time it has revealed the true danger Democrats face in offering up weak, meaningless, "compromise" bills on Iraq. The NY-25 is the first case study of how Democratic weakness in the House on Iraq can allow Republican to potentially blur the difference between the two parties on Iraq, and thus wipe out virtually our entire advantage heading into the 2008 elections.

Here is the situation. Over the past nine months, Jim Walsh has said he was in favor of withdrawal, and then voted a timeline that would actually mandate withdrawal. Even in discussions with local media yesterday, and in calls I made to his staff, he refused to come out in favor of a timetable. Walsh has said that he is in favor of oversight on Iraq, and then voted against oversight. He said he was opposed to the escalation, and then refused to vote against the escalation. In May, he said he was opposed to a blank check for Bush on Iraq, and then voted to give Bush a blank check on Iraq in the capitulation bill. Everything Walsh is saying now, he ha already said before. The key difference is not hat Walsh has changed his opinion, but that Democats in Congress are changing the legislation they are trying to pass through Congress.

Back in the spring, House Democrats forced votes on stiffer legislation that required real oversight and mandated withdrawal. It only received two votes form Republicans, because the many so-called moderate Republicans who are supposedly against Bush's policy in Iraq are not willing to pass binding legislation opposing Bush's policy in Iraq. They are, however, willing to pass meaningless legislation that suggests Bush should change course, but does not actually require him to do so. For example, Walsh is a co-sponsor of the Kirk-Lipinski bill that does not mandate any troop withdrawal whatsoever, but sets it as a "goal." Compromise bills of this sort are in abundance nowadays, and I imagine Walsh will vote for all of them. However, if a bill comes up that actually mandates troops withdrawal, there is still no indication that he would vote for such a bill. Given everything he has said on the matter, I bet he won't vote for mandated troop withdrawal.

This is the crux of the problem progressives face in the 2008 elections. Bad, Bush Dog Democrats are coming up with cover your ass legislation that won't do anything to drawdown our military involvement in Iraq. Instead, the actual impact of these bills will be to allow Bush Dogs and endangered Republicans alike to appear as though they oppose Bush's policies, and thus strengthen all of their hands for re-election. In short, weak Iraq legislation in Congress will help empower Bush Dogs, and help prevent progressives like Maffei from taking over Republican seats. This is the exact opposite of the more and better Democrats refrain that has been traveling around the blogosphere. Weak Iraq legislation will allow Republicans like Walsh to blur their differences on Iraq all over the country, and the result will be fewer, and worse Democrats.

In the first major case study of this kind for the 2008 elections, we can't let this stand. Supporting Dan Maffei means opposing weak, toothless Iraq legislation in Congress. It means taking a stand against a self-defeating Democratic strategy that will not only do nothing to drawdown the Iraq war, but will also go a long way toward wiping out any chance of a second Democratic wave election. It means supporting more and better Democrats, instead of reverting to the pro-war, minority status Democratic Party of 2002-2003.

Contribute to Dan Maffei on Blue Majority. Fight Bush dogs and Republican blurring alike. This lean-Kerry district is going to be a very big race down the road, and a place where a true progressive like Maffei can hold a seat for a long time to come.

Cross posted at Open Left

So, there is some buzz this morning about Edwards pulling into a tie with Obama in the daily Rasmussen tracking poll. For example, here at Dailykos, there is a diary with nearly 200 comments on this subject, heralding that these results mean "[t]he media narrative of a two way race is history." However, in order to satisfy my general urges to be contrary, I wish to point out that the media narrative on the two-person horserace was pretty much always wrong. In fact, given the typical historical bounces candidates receive from Iowa, Edwards has almost always been ahead of Obama in this campaign. In fact, Edwards has been ahead of Clinton more often than Obama has been ahead of Edwards.

(Another great candidate for our Blue Majority ActBlue page -- kos)

Today, it is with great excitement that I am able to announce that Al Franken has been added to the Blue Majority Act Blue page that is collectively maintained by Dailykos, MyDD, Swing State Project and Open Left!

Last month, in a post on Open Left, I wondered if Al Franken was the best example of a progressive movement candidate we had seen to date, given that his campaign is overwhelmingly people powered (over 45,000 donors so far), he passed the "bar fight primary" with flying colors (more than willing to take the fight to Republicans), he comfortably and repeatedly self-identifies as a progressive, and that he came into politics as an outsider, specifically from progressive media. The response I received to that post was almost universally positive, and while I don't know if he is the very best example, he clearly is an excellent case, and so I urge you to contribute to Al Franken on the Blue Majority Page. Let's build the progressive movement together by supporting a first-rate movement candidate.

Today is a particularly appropriate time for us to make this endorsement because, as Jonathan Singer has noted, George Bush is in Minnesota raising money for endangered Republican incumbent Norm Coleman.  Tying himself further to George Bush will only push Coleman's already low approval ratings in the state even lower, and make him more vulnerable than he already is. Progressives in the state are countering Bush's visit through a variety of actions, including protests coordinated by Americans Against Escalation in Iraq, and by the Franken campaign itself looking to counter Coleman's big money fundraiser with small donor, people-powered energy:

Let's be a part of this effort. With his connections to George Bush, there is an opportunity to knock Coleman all but out of the race in 2007, the way Rick Santorum was all but defeated by a progressive swarm against him in 2005.

As a final note, I want to mention that while Al Franken is involved in a competitive primary in Minneosta, this endorsement comes entirely because Al is so fantastic, not because his primary opponents are clearly defective in any way. Al is a Democrat who I believe will never let us down, and always make us proud. He comes from the progressive movement, and will take the fight to Republicans. He is exactly the sort of candidate many of us have looked for these past few, and we are happy to reward that with our support in and of itself, not just relative to other candidates in the campaign. It certainly is great to make an endorsement for someone, rather than against someone else.

--Contribute to Al Franken on Blue Majority
--Al Franken for Senate official page
--Minnesota Senate race tracker wiki

[Another great DIY moment. Kagro X]

Contribute to BlogPac Now, and Build Progressive Infrastructure

Five weeks ago, BlogPac put out a call to "find the five best new, grassroots progressive infrastructure projects in America, and provide those projects with the money, exposure, and connections necessary to get off the ground." Originally, I had scheduled the announcement of the winners for the contest on Thursday, August 2nd. However, due to the sheer volume of submissions, over 100, and to the high quality of many of those submissions, it took us a much longer time to reach a decision than I had originally envisioned.

Now, at long last, the wait is over. It brings me great pleasure to announce the winners of the first BlogPac Progressive Entrepreneurs Contest, in the order in which their submissions were received:

(From the diaries -- kos)

I wanted to send out one last reminder to everyone that the deadline for the BlogPac Progressive Entrepreneur Contest: Five For Under $5K is tonight, at 10pm eastern. Once again, here is how to enter, and what is at stake: