The Race To Watch Is Mississippi, Not West Virginia

[dkf]

The contest to watch tonight is not the West Virginia presidential primary. Pay little or no attention to those results. The race to watch, and one that could be a barometer of things to come in November, is the special congressional election in the 1st District in Mississippi where Republican Greg Davis and Democrat Travis Childers face off in what could be another nail in the coffin of the Republican Party’s stranglehold on the South.

A word on West Virginia. It is a state tailor-made for Hillary Clinton. The population is 97% white with the lowest percentage of college graduates of any state in the country. If Hillary can’t win big there, she can’t win anywhere. She will certainly boast about her victory, but taken as part of the big picture it is virtually meaningless.

In Mississippi however, a victory for the Democrats in a district where George Bush won 62% of the vote in 2004, and has been held by a Republican since 1994, would be the third win in three tries this year for Democrats taking long-held Republican seats. It would be another sign that 2008 is going to be the Democratic equivalent of 1994 when it comes to congressional elections.

http://www.chron.com/commons/persona.html?newspaperUserId=desperado&plckController=PersonaBlog&plckScript=personaScript&plckElementId=personaDest&plckPersonaPage=BlogViewPost&plckPostId=Blog%3AdesperadoPost%3A2f8049ca-bce6-4446-8f26-73aef6df64bf

[Pirate Smile]

1. Here is an article on it in Politico. "GOP at risk of losing Deep South seat"

GOP at risk of losing Deep South seat
By JOSH KRAUSHAAR | 5/13/08 5:00 AM EST

TUPELO, Miss. — This northeast Mississippi city, best known as Elvis Presley’s birthplace, has become the site of a desperate last stand by House Republicans who want to keep their already-reeling caucus from truly being all shook up.

After losing two special elections in conservative-minded districts over the past two months, the GOP is now at risk of losing a seat in the heart of the Deep South — and is pouring all its resources into hanging on to it, including a rare campaign trail appearance by Vice President Cheney on Monday.

A third loss in Tuesday’s 1st District special election would prompt new predictions of electoral doom in November, hurt the party’s already flagging morale and usher in a new round of public finger-pointing among an already fractured GOP leadership.

Southern Democrats, turned off for decades by the party’s liberal-leaning leaders in Washington, seem to be coming home. This special election comes one week after Rep. Don Cazayoux (D-La.) picked up a House seat in the Baton Rouge area that Republicans had held for three decades.

“You offer Southerners a conservative Democrat on the issues and a fiscal conservative, then I think they’re understanding it now,” said Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-La.), who campaigned alongside Democratic nominee Travis Childers on Sunday. “They were fooled for about 12 years. What happened in 1994 is going to happen in reverse.”
The increasingly frantic hopes of the GOP rest on Greg Davis, the mayor of the Memphis suburb of Southaven, who is running against Childers to succeed former congressman and now-Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.).

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0508/10295.html

[Leopolds Ghost]

3. The following paragraph makes no sense, please explain:

“You offer Southerners a conservative Democrat on the issues and a fiscal conservative, then I think they’re understanding it now,” said Rep. Charlie Melancon (D-La.), who campaigned alongside Democratic nominee Travis Childers on Sunday. “They were fooled for about 12 years. What happened in 1994 is going to happen in reverse.”

[Pirate Smile]

6. In 1994 the electorate turned on and rejected the Democratic Party, throwing them out of control of

Congress. I assume he means that 2008 is going to be a large-scale rejection of Republicans by the electorate. The Republicans already lost control of Congress in 2006 but they need to be kicked into the doghouse to a larger degree and November 2008 is when that will happen.

The Republican brand sucks. It is an albatross.

Just my guess.

[EFerrari]

2. Wiki link for the 1st District:

Mississippi's first congressional district is in the northeast corner of the state. It includes much of the northern portion of the state including Columbus, Oxford, Southaven, and Tupelo.

The congressional seat is currently vacant as Congressman Roger Wicker of Tupelo was appointed to the U.S. Senate by Governor Haley Barbour to fill the Senate seat of Trent Lott. This caused a special election to be held on April 22, in which no candidate received a majority, so a run-off election will be held on May 13. See: Mississippi's 1st congressional district special election, 2008

http://cache.search.yahoo-ht2.akadns.net/search/cache?ei=UTF-8&p=MS+1st+Congressional+district&y=Search&fr=yfp-t-501-s&u=en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi%2527s_1st_congressional_district&w=ms+1st+congressional+district+districts&d=XIGMEDWxQxY-&icp=1&.intl=us



edit: link

[Kittycat]

4. Before I look at it - how are the candidates polling against each other?

If it was a big gap to begin with, not worth watching. If it was neck and neck - then maybe so.

[EFerrari]

5. Someone put up a blog on this race:

http://missfirstdistrict.blogspot.com/

[EFerrari]

7. Race Draws National Attention

Race Draws National Attention
Reported by: Sarah Buduson
Email: [e-mail]
Last Update: 7:22 am

DeSoto County, MS - Mississippi voters will cast their ballots in a heated political race Tuesday, May 13, 2008.

They will decide whether Democrat Travis Childers or Republican Greg Davis will hold Mississippi’s first congressional seat for the next six months.

The close contest has brought national attention to the northeast part of Mississippi. Vice President Dick Cheney appeared at a rally for Southaven Mayor Greg Davis at the DeSoto Civic Center Monday night.

During an interview on a Mississippi radio show on Friday, Vice President Cheney said, “We want to do everything we can to help him (Davis) get elected."

http://www.myeyewitnessnews.com/news/local/story.aspx?content_id=0b3576c7-041a-47d8-a770-947b2568548b&rss=59

[phrigndumass]

8. Good heads up

K/R

[madrchsod]

9. 3 out of 3 would send a clear message to the party...

the 50 state strategy is working

[ForeignSpectator]

10. Not exactly up to date on the math but anything below 80% for Hillary in WV...

...is a mathematical loss for her, right?? ( ie setting the bar even higher for the primaries to come )

[EFerrari]

11. Verified Voting: MS Primary snapshot

Mississippi Primary Snapshot
By Verified Voting Foundation
March 09, 2008

Mississippi holds a Presidential preference primary on Tuesday, March 11. Primary elections will also be held for federal offices and for Commissioners of the Yazoo-Mississippi Delta Levee District.

Mississippi has just under 1.8 million registered voters. Mississippi voters do not register by political party, and voters may choose a Republican Party ballot or a Democratic Party ballot at the polls. Absentee voters must have an excuse for being unable to come to the polls. Most votes in the primary will be cast on DREs with a voter-verifiable paper trail printer. The state does not require post-election hand audits of the electronic vote tallies, so there will be no manual verification of software-tabulated election results.

See the Verifier map for a complete breakdown of county systems. Here is a statewide summary:

* 77 of the 82 counties in Mississippi use the Premier (Diebold) TSx direct-recording electronic touch screen as the only voting system in the polling place. In all of these except Jackson County, the TSx machines are equipped with voter-verifiable paper audit trail printers. The TSx has been subject of extensive scrutiny in the past several years, most recently following the discovery of critical security vulnerabilities by computer scientists commissioned by the secretaries of state in California and Ohio. Both reviews concluded that neither the TSx's electronic records nor its VVPAT printout is sufficiently secure to record and store votes.

http://votetrustusa.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2775&Itemid=26

[ellacott]

12. Rush's Operation Chaos May Have Helped the Democrat

Those that followed his advice to switch parties and vote for Clinton are disqualified from voting for the Repub in this special election.

[uponit7771]

13. Yeap, Mississipi was one of the big OC states too...it come after Texas & Ohia

[Barack_America]

14. And considering a full 24% of her votes in MS were Republicans...

That rule could affect this election big time.

Lol.

Oh to be a fly on the wall watching the Rushsters getting turned away.

[ellacott]

15. I would love to see that also

:)

[Jim Lane]

18. I don't think that's accurate

Each party held a primary to pick its nominee, with, I think, the same 50%+ requirement in place. No Republican broke 50%, so there was a Republican runoff. I think the rule is that Rush's party-switchers who voted in the Democratic primary to boost Clinton couldn't then vote in the Republican runoff, a rule that makes sense because the runoff is a continuation of the Republican primary and you can't vote in both parties' primaries. It was thought that those "Operation Chaos" voters would have tended to support Davis, the more conservative of the two Republicans. Nevertheless, Davis won the Republican runoff even without their help and is the candidate today.

Today's vote is the general election to fill the seat. It wouldn't make sense to disqualify anyone from voting in the general election just because of which primary they voted in.

Disqualifying them because they pay attention to Rush Limbaugh? Well, it's tempting, but it would be wrong.

[Texas Hill Country]

16. wow, are you saing that white working class wont vote obama... you must be a race baiter!

see how dumb that is?

[nebula]

17. "lowest percentage of college graduates of any state in the country."

stupid people shouldn't be allowed to vote. :evilgrin: