While I agree with Glenn Reynolds that this Salena Zito piece about how the primary race for PA-13 is shaping up to be an analogy for the post-Obama Democratic party generally, there’s a really revealing passage in here that I wanted to highlight.
In a year in which Democrats have had a hard time attracting quality candidates for House races — a common occurrence for both parties when they know their chances are slim to win a majority — this race has attracted four qualified candidates.
Bolding mine. I certainly would expect that PA-13 would attract qualified candidates: it’s a D+12 gimme and the current incumbent is the frontrunner for the Democratic gubernatorial nod. But in case you haven’t noticed… almost nobody is talking about how badly the Democrats are doing this year in recruitment efforts. I mean, we all know that it’s bad, but most people are apparently being polite and not mentioning it, or something.
So let me just establish that: the Democrats ain’t getting the House back this year. I expect them at this point to lose seats, which mostly means that the modest gains that they achieved in 2012 will be wiped out, which means that the House ain’t going to go back to the Democrats any time soon, either. Democrats should start thinking about the long-term implications of that, because as it stands right now House Republicans know perfectly well that they can say ‘no’ from now until Doomsday…
Moe Lane
Saying ‘No’ is a great first stepl, sure.
However, but if they don’t actually say no, or say no and do yes, or say no and then do nothing when the President just goes around them with an executive order….well, then a robust House majority is worth a whole lot less.
To Conservative principles, that is. I’m sure its worth quite a lot to someone.
Do we have any quality candidates over in Oregon for the EVEN and D+2 seat?
They can say “No” until the MSM or Chamber of Commerce leans on them. Then they’ll cave.