By The Prowler on 7.21.08 @ 12:08AM
Democrats target GOP Senate leader. Also: Romney's veep viability.
MITCH MATCH
Sen. Chuck Schumer and the Democrat Senatorial
Campaign Committee are targeting the man who has spent a great deal
of time the past two years targeting them: GOP Senate leader
Mitch McConnell.
McConnell would be an unexpected victim in a Senate cycle that
has Republicans fighting to keep a working minority, and the
Democrat candidate opposing him in Kentucky, Bruce
Lunsford might be a good candidate to do some damage.
Lunsford, a moderate Democrat, who in the past has supported
Kentucky Republicans, is a Louisville businessman with the
checkbook to give himself a more than fighting chance against
McConnell, who long has been a favorite of K Street lobbyists.
Lunsford's moderate reputation in bluegrass country, though, isn't
helping him with the radicalized left, which now controls much of
the Democrat party, and which has not rallied to Lunsford largely
because of his past backing of GOP candidates.
"Once the DailyKos Kids realize they have a shot at dropping the
minority leader of the Senate, they will come around," says a
Democrat campaign consultant based in Washington. "Lunsford could
be for us what John Thune was for Republicans a
couple of cycles ago." (Thune defeated Democrat Senate leader
Tom Daschle in 2004.)
Another complicating factor for McConnell is the candidacy of
Libertarian Sonny Landham, a bit movie actor who
has shared the screen with Jesse Ventura and
Arnold Schwarzenegger. While Landham isn't given a
serious shot at winning, there is concern that he would be
appealing enough to some conservatives to weaken McConnell
further.
Lunsford has reportedly been spending more time cultivating
fundraising contacts in Washington through the DSCC, and expects to
pull in about $1 million from Washington-based lobbyists and
supporters this summer.
MITT MATCH
While Mitt Romney's set of paid PR minions are
busy pushing out Mitt for Vice President spin, McCain campaign
insiders say that while it's true they have polled Romney on the
bottom of the ticket, the data confirms that such a move would be a
political disaster for the party.
"Mitt tanks the ticket," says a McCain insider. "We lose fiscal
conservatives. We lose social conservatives. We lose Catholics. We
lose evangelicals. All the groups were spending time and money on
bringing into the camp would be lost. He just doesn't help us
enough to do something like this, as much as Mitt might think we
should. He doesn't even win us Massachusetts."
topics:
Business, NATO
