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Over at MyDD, a call went out for thoughts on candidates to consider adding to national Netroots Endorsed list. What started as a short comment, turned into a very long and detailed post which I have decided to post here in its entirety. Realize that these thoughts are meant for a national scale. Candidate that I don't argue for particular national focus, are ones that I am very much behind for garnering in state attention. So if you want to have some insight into how this blogger thinks, read on...
So let's talk Congressional seats.
Even though it is 2006, this will only have been the 2nd time that we have used the current map as Texas was victim to the DeLay re-redistricting scheme (the 2000, 2002, and 2004 maps were all different). Since 2004, Bush has become less popular in the state, as has the Republican Governor (drawing 2 independents in the race which may alter some downballot turnout).
We have 32 Congressional seats.
-21 Republican
-11 Democratic (counting Cuellar)
There are Democrats running in 31 of the 31 seats (with my hometown district of TX-11 going empty). The only Democrat with any serious challenge is Chet Edwards, last of the Blue Dogs that hung on in the 2002 'DeLay scrubbing' that knocked off 4 other incumbent Dems, which combined with the Party switch of Ralph Hall and the retirement of Democrat Jim Turner give us a list of seats that I describe as "if we can't win with scads of $$ and incumbent Congressmen, we ain't gonna win them with less money and the people put up this year". (which is why I look to areas we didn't fight for as hard last time where we have better candidates, changing demographics, and a less competition for dollars).
Let's look at the 4 seats we lost in 2004 and what we have this year, none of which I'd nominate for a national netroots candidate.
TX-1 Gohmert (Sandlin loss) - Roger Owen (crazy)
TX-2 Poe (Lampson loss) - Gary Binderim (Dos has a report)
TX-19 Neugebauer (Stenholm loss) - Robert Ricketts (even Stenholm lost by 58%)
TX-32 Sessions (Frost loss) - Will Pryor (this was the most expensive race in 2004, over $8 mil, though Pryor is a good candidate and best of this bunch with some actual cash)
Outside of these, there are a select few candidates who have received netroots coverage among the Texas bloggers, then after that a smaller set that have maintained active fundraising in districts that are actually winnable.
Those on Texas bloggers radar include...
TX-6 Joe Barton (R) - David Harris who is in Anna's territory.
TX-14 Ron Paul (R/L) - Shane Sklar who is out closer to Kuffner
TX-21 Lamar Smith (R) - John Courage with myself in the Austin end and Matt on the San Antonio end.
TX-31 John Carter (R) - Mary Beth Harrell who has Eye on Williamson county on her.
Courage and Harris are Band of Brothers members. Harrell has a son in Iraq. Sklar is one of the few Dems to get the Texas Ag related endorsements.
Of these four though, Harrell is on the weak side of fundraising, and as of a couple of weeks ago, was still hunting around for a campaign manager. I fear that the netroots presence over at Kos that the campaign has built is about the only thing built, and little has changed about the district that makes an already difficult seat easier to pick up.
Of the remaining three, Harris (certainly engaged in the netroots as well) seems to have lagged behind in fundraising in comparison to Courage and Sklar as well, though the Net Neutrality issue seems to have raised the profile of his opponent Joe Barton of late, though I'm not sure if that is enough.
That leaves Sklar and Courage, probably our top two netroots targets among Texas bloggers. I will now attempt to run them through the 3 points given in this post. read on...
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