President Obama is going to unleash his grassroots army this week in support of his budget proposal. This is the moment when we will discover the power and effectiveness of community organizing, and whether it can compete with mere rhetoric and traditional activism.
Democrats that do not respond to this grassroots push will be easy to identify. And they will become the targets of the next generation of progressive organizing. Now, I do not kid myself that much can be done on the Senate side of things, even though that is where the most movement is needed. It’s just a fact of life that it’s almost impossible to knock off an incumbent Democratic senator. The closest we came was with Joe Lieberman, and even that effort ultimately came up short. It is much easier to knock off members of the House. I want to point out some obvious targets.
1. Jane Harman (CA-36)
2. Rob Andrews (NJ-01)
3. Artur Davis (AL-07)- running for governor
4. Adam Smith (WA-09)
5. Jim Cooper (TN-05)
6. Jim Costa (CA-20)
7. Henry Cuellar (TX-28)
8. Shelley Berkley (NV-01)
9. John Barrow (GA-12)
10. Jason Altmire (PA-04)
I’d start looking for primary challengers to those ten Democrats, plus Ellen Tauscher (CA-10). Let’s just scare the crap out of these people. All we have to do is beat one of them to send a message.
Shit.
So those of us unfortunate enough to be in Arkansas just have to put up with Pryor and Lincoln, the one consistent 1-2 anti-progressive democratic punch from a single state, forever?
Reason to die or move. Actually, I choose move. (In fact, I already chose it.)
He already has a fairly strong primary opponent. And, he’s almost as big an a–hole as Jim Cooper.
his primary opponent ain’t all that and a bag of chips.
I live in Cooper’s district. You may safely assume that if his primary challenger is a comatose aardvark, I’ll be handing out aardvark buttons downtown.
Boo … you live in the Philly area .. right? .. if so .. you should know all about Rob Andrews .. and why it will be next to impossible to defeat him … which speaks to a better question … how can we recruit people that have a chance egainst entrenched encumbents(many of whom have corrupt local “machines” backing them)?