I happened to be on a conference call with FL-23 candidate Karen Harrington, who of course is the person facing DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz in the general election. So it’s going to be a tough race; after all, if there’s any seat that the Democrats would be personally embarrassed to lose, it’d be this one. But when I asked directly whether Karen Harrington would welcome Paul Ryan campaigning for her in the district, she replied:
Absolutely… it would be a honor to have someone of Paul Ryan’s stature. Absolutely: not just because he’s the Vice President [nominee]; if he didn’t accept that role, and it was just Congressman Paul Ryan I would welcome him.
I bring this up because a number of people started this week by suggesting that adding Paul Ryan to the ticket would hurt the GOP downticket, particularly in states like Florida. While that argument seems to have largely died off – mostly of embarrassment, apparently – I would be remiss in my duties if I didn’t point out that Republican candidates and politicians don’t seem to be particularly nervous about the Ryan pick. In fact, the default emotion that I’ve been detecting seems to be relief…
Moe Lane (crosspost)
PS: Romney-Ryan reported: 10.16 million in online fundraising in the last week; average donation, $81; 68% were first-time donors. 45K new volunteers signed up in the last week, too. I guess that the base is equally relieved.
Also: how did Obama-Biden do, in terms of raising money last week? I only ask because they were planning to fundraise off of the Ryan pick, too: I was merely wondering how they did.
I’ve “liked” the Paul Ryan for President facebook page for 2 years, so the only thing I’m disappointed about is the order the Repubs will appear on the ticket.
@Jbird – don’t fret too much, President Ryan will assume office after President Romney completes his two terms.
Now that you mention it, Moe, it is interesting that we haven’t heard about the huge haul of bucks the Obama campaign got from all the folks terrified when the Ryan pick was announced. I guess we can assume that no news is good news…for us. 🙂
Wombat-socho: you should see the stuff that doesn’t make it through the filters. It’s like there’s a generator that only ticks over when Romney gets above a certain polling number. 🙂