Blanche Lincoln has defeated her Democratic rival Gov. Bill Halter for the Democratic Party nomination in Arkansas. Some people are looking at this race as some sort of silver lining for incumbents. Nonsense. Incumbent Blanche Lincoln is going to get her head handed to her in November by Republican John Boozman. What this race does signify is that even amongst Democrats, Americans have had quite enough of the far left’s agenda.
Big Labor backed far lefty candidate Bill Halter and sunk a small fortune into defeating Blanche Lincoln. Halter too would have been looking at certain defeat in November. Thus, sinking all that time and money in his candidacy was a huge waste. A senior White House official was quick to point out this fact:
Ben Smith-Politico: A senior White House official just called me with a very pointed message for the administration's sometime allies in organized labor, who invested heavily in beating Blanche Lincoln, Obama's candidate, in Arkansas.
"Organized labor just flushed $10 million of their members' money down the toilet on a pointless exercise," the official said. "If even half that total had been well-targeted and applied in key House races across this country, that could have made a real difference in November."
Lincoln relied heavily both on Obama's endorsement, which she advertised relentlessly on radio and in the mail, and on the backing of former President Bill Clinton, who backed her to the hilt.
Lincoln foe Bill Halter had the unstinting support of the AFL-CIO, SEIU, AFSCME and other major unions. And labor officials Tuesday evening were already working to spin the narrow loss of their candidate, Bill Halter, as a moral victory, but the cost in money and in the goodwill of the White House may be a steep price to pay for a near miss.
UPDATE: AFL-CIO spokesman Eddie Vale responds that "labor isn't an arm of the Democratic Party."
Labor is not an arm of the Democratic Party? Given Andy Sterns frequent visits to the White House, perhaps the Democratic Party is an arm of labor?
Liberty Pundits Blog sums up the night perfectly:
It was a great night for the GOP in Arkansas. Nutroots failed, unions bled, and Boozeman will beat Lincoln like a rented mule in November. Also Bill Clinton was the real winner – tonight was a practice run to help his wife primary Obama.
See you in November!
Via: Memeorandum
Via: The Fix
Via: Real Clear Politics
Via: Ben Smith
Via: Liberty Pundits Blog
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2 comments:
This was fantastic news, beating back the progs is always a good time. But it's beginning to look like the predicted pendulum swing hard right isn't going to happen. And it's really what we need to cull the progs completely. Of course, that responsibility rests on the Democratic Party . . . will they save their party (i.e. take their party back) or will they relinquish it completely to the progs? That ball is in their court, but I hope that they do some prog purging . . . for our country's sake.
I'm still sad about Chuck DeVore, he was by far the best candidate out there. But as I said, it looks like we're just going to keep putting RINO's in Congress and keep spending and taxing and building up government. Heart breaking.
So, big labor spent $10 Million to try and elect some far left guy, but the government is about to give these same unions over a hundred million to prop up their pension funds.
Sounds to me the real loser tonight was the tax payer.
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