| The National Republican Congressional Committee was technically in the red, even before they spent over $400,000 (about 15% of their cash on hand) to help Bob Latta win a special election in Ohio -- in a district that Bush carried by a whopping 22% in 2004. John Boehner, House Minority Leader -- the one who thinks American lives are a "small price" to pay for victory in Iraq -- explains the money woes of Congressional Republicans thusly: “Now the money sucks for two reasons,” Boehner said in a Politico interview. “People are mad at the president; they are mad at the party. And then [there is] this whole immigration fight. People just turned off the spigot.”
Boehner is bringing in image consultants and trying to "re-brand" the Republican party. It's great to see the other guys wasting money (that they don't have) on image consultants and flimsy attempts to re-brand or re-create their party. Note: Boehner didn't mention actual policy changes, just a PR campaign. Here in Alabama, word is out that George Wallace, Jr. is sniffing around the 2nd Congressional District race. He would join Republicans Jay Love, Greg Wren, Harri Anne Smith and David Grimes who are already in the AL-02 race. Come on in George, the water is fine! The more the merrier, especially since Republican fundraising "sucks." Y'all go ahead and spend a lot of money in an expensive primary -- the NRCC will be there to bail you out next October. Not! Of the 202 Republican held seats in Congress, about 90 are districts with a partisan voting index (PVI) or R+10 (like OH-05) or greater. If the NRCC has to spend $400K per race to hold the other 112 Republican held districts that are as, or less, Republican than OH-05, it will need over $45 million. That's just to hold the current Republican minority -- in a cycle where Republican fundraising "sucks" -- starting from a negative $1 million balance only 10 1/2 months before the general election. This is a good time to be a Democrat -- even in Alabama. |
