American Action Network’s targeted advertising and the redistricting wars.

It’s interesting.  If you look at these two ads from American Action Network – one for California, and one for New York – solely from the perspective of a national observer, it’s a headscratcher as to why a conservative-leaning group is targeting six Democratic Members of Congress (Tim Bishop, Lois Capps, John Garamendi, Jerry McNerney, Bill Owens, & Louise Slaughter) in two Blue States; particularly since none of the individuals involved are freshmen.  And yet AAN did not merely do the ads; they’re going to be backing them with targeted online advertising.  And why are they doing this?

Because California and New York both had… unexpected… results in the redistricting wars.  Ones that actually ended up not hurting Republicans as much as expected. Continue reading American Action Network’s targeted advertising and the redistricting wars.

Did Tim Bishop (D, NY-01) REALLY skip out on the SEIU ‘reform rally?’ [UPDATED]

[UPDATE]: Congressman Bishop’s office informed me that while he had been invited to speak at Thursday’s rally, he did not accept the invitation, and thus was not scheduled to attend.

When I mentioned it a few days ago I assumed that last night’s out-of-district’s ‘rally’ would be just the usual staged event designed to make the Congressman look… well, less bad.  Only there’s now a report from a NY Gathering of Eagles group indicating that Bishop didn’t actually show up for that one, either.  Which is downright bizarre, if true: and I’ll be calling his office later to confirm it*.

In the meantime, mark your calendar if you’re in NY-01: Bishop has scheduled an in-district town hall for health care! On August 27th, which is about as late as you can get:

On Thursday, August 27 at 6:30pm, Congressman Tim Bishop will host a Town Hall meeting at Brookhaven Town Hall, located at 1 Independence Hill in Farmingville. The meeting is open to all members of the public. Constituents may ask the Congressman about any issue.

I’d note what important things Tim Bishop’s doing up until that point that would prevent him from having a town hall before two more weeks have passed, except that he hasn’t listed any.

Moe Lane

*This being no reflection on GoE’s reporting, of course: they could have been misinformed about Bishop’s presence.  We are talking about a Congressman who’s holding health care rationing rallies well outside of his nominal district, after all.

Crossposted to RedState.

Rep. Bishop, Boswell having health care meetings allllll the way over *there*.

[UPDATE] Welcome, Michelle Malkin readers.

Tim Bishop (D, NY-01) is having something called a “health care reform rally” on Thursday, at (of all things) SEIU’s Hicksville NY offices (1199 Duffy Ave, starts at 1 PM). This is otherwise known as “over twenty miles outside the borders of NY-01.” Bishop is of course one of the first Democrats holding down a Red district (NY-01 is a R+0) to discover that his constituents are paying attention to his votes: he rather famously canceled his future in-district meetings. Presumably he assumes that his constituents won’t drive twenty miles to complain.

Meanwhile, Leonard Boswell (D, IA-03) has at least decided to stay in-district for his “health care listening post” – barely.  Although his district includes Des Moines, Boswell has instead decided to travel 80 miles east this week to the Sigourney Public Library (Thursday, 2 PM).  He won’t be actually having any meetings on the subject in the Des Moine area (where the vast majority of his constituents live) for another two weeks.  Still, at least he’s having them; apparently being D+1 can make the difference between in and out of district.

Neither one of these two Congressmen are freshmen, and neither were considered to be hardline liberals before this Congress.  And both of them are clearly not interested in facing their constituents just quite yet.  Very interesting, that.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.