Thursday, February 08, 2018

Randy Bryce's campaign to take Paul Ryan's Congressional seat will test the mood in the nation.

A nice interview, NewRepublic; he wears his hardhat and Iron Worker shirt in his pic for that item, and on his web homepage.

 https://www.randybryceforcongress.com/

NOT WRAPPING HIMSELF IN A FLAG! WHAT AN INNOVATION FOR OFFICE SEEKERS. THAT ALONE MERITS SENDING A CONTRIBUTION TO THE CAUSE.

AS A BET, A GOOD HALF OF THE FLAGS RYAN ALWAYS HAS AS BACKGROUND PROPS WERE MADE IN CHINA. PROVE ME WRONG.

______________UPDATE________________
Slate reporting Sept. 18, 2017, an item just found online, draws a contrast worth consideration; stating mid-item:

Bryce’s campaign team likes to contrast him with another candidate in whom Democrats invested their hopes and dreams: Jon Ossoff, the 30-year-old former congressional aide and documentary filmmaker who ran for the Georgia House seat vacated by Trump’s Secretary of Health and Human Services Tom Price. With his clean-cut visage and Capitol Hill pedigree, Ossoff seemed to point a way forward for Democrats that would compensate for the loss of white working-class voters by winning in prosperous suburbs populated by right-leaning, college-educated Trump haters. While Ossoff raised an impressive $23 million, his vagueness on economic issues led to distrust among the party’s liberal base. Ossoff came away with 48.1 percent of the vote in his runoff against Republican Karen Handel, precisely what he’d garnered in the Democratic primary eight weeks prior—proof that there’s likely a hard ceiling for Democrats in the right-leaning district.

“Ossoff was such a debacle—such an enormous waste of money for a district that we were never going to win, certainly not with a spoiled … kid who worked on the Hill,” said David Keith, a veteran Democratic operative who serves as Bryce’s campaign manager. “Randy [is] the anti-Ossoff.”

Bryce could still end up being a hard sell in southeastern Wisconsin, where boasting of working on the iron might not carry the same cultural frisson that it does out East. Even though Obama carried the district in 2008, no Democrat has gotten more than 43 percent of the vote against Ryan since he was first elected 20 years ago. The Speaker of the House also has a $10 million war chest and the ability to bring in much, much more. “So you have a hard hat. How does that qualify you go to go to Washington?” said Brandon Scholz, a long-time Wisconsin Republican strategist. “People don’t want to know what your job is. They want to know what you are going to do for them.”

Saying "debacle" about Ossoff is harsh, but the loss in that traditional [Newt Gringrich] GOP district was not exactly proof of The Schumer Conjecture, a proposed immutable law of physics that for every blue collar vote the Dems lose they gain two moderate suburban young professional votes away from the GOP. The best term for Ossoff's showing is "disproof of the Schumer Conjecture by counterexample."

The final quoted paragraph reduces to another Schumer/beltway Dem conjecture, if you've no money you're nobody worth considering, and that Ryan having a ton of money and a network for more and you massively outspend the opponent that pattern can outweigh much else - call that The Clinton Fallacy. Or even The Ossoff Counterexample, Part II.

If Randy Bryce can unseat that career politician of doom toward the poor, 20 years of being mean, it will be both a blessing and a lesson.

The blessing would be undeniable and apparent to all; the lesson? Donkeys are noted for being stubborn. Excessive stubbornness can lose to four more Trump years and can face a shrinking pool of the already low Governorships and legislatures that the Dems can claim as proof of concept for the Schumer Conjecture and superdelegate decision meddling. The sooner the Ossoff Counterexample is acknowledged and acted upon, the better the chance that further erosion of Dem effectiveness might be turned around.

BOTTOM LINE: Tom Perez won't do it, Tom Perez can't cut it. There may be a 2018 Trump backlash even if scorn by inner party types toward progressives is not abated and turned around, but one lasting into 2020? Bet against it. Especially if the Joe Biden thing gets imposed upon progressives who already have giant Debby Schultz grounds for distrust and for finding another way. If superdelegate mischief is persisting, what's to trust?

Superdelegate undermining grassroots popular will is a turnoff. It was dishonorable from the start back in McGovern years and became glaringly so, 2016.

The single-most important bottom line fact that must be accepted and learned from, Bernie would have won.

_____________FURTHER UPDATE______________
The DebbyJoe image was added because it cried out for inclusion. Never forget.

____________FURTHER UPDATE_____________
No surprise, but a reassuring early endorsement for Bryce.

One that should resonate, even with Paul Ryan intending to throw millions against this challenge.