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Warrior candidates not yet battle-hardened, Dems worry
The Hill ^ | February 9, 2006 | Peter Savodnik

Posted on 02/10/2006 12:22:23 AM PST by West Coast Conservative

The band of brothers that Democrats are banking on to win back the Congress this year may inspire voters with tales of wartime valor, but many in their own party doubt they are prepared for the battlefield of professional politics.

Iraq war veteran Paul Hackett, perhaps the best-known Democratic veteran running for office, energized liberals nationwide last year by criticizing President Bush during his House race but alienated conservatives in Ohio’s 2nd District by calling the president names.

Hackett stumbled in early September, Democrats add, when he failed to announce his bid to unseat Sen. Mike DeWine (R-Ohio) sooner instead of later, inviting a challenge from Rep. Sherrod Brown (D). Now the party faces a protracted primary.

Similarly, many of the 40 or so Democratic veterans running for the House who turned up on the National Mall yesterday to promote their candidacies often flout the unwritten rules of modern politicking: They mention their opponents by name, have a hard time delivering catchy stump speeches and, as one Democratic aide noted, lack a veteran politician’s “polish.”

Sam Rodriguez, the political director of California’s Democratic Party, said the veterans have had a tough time raising the money they need to stay viable. In competitive districts, House races typically run as much as $2 million to $3 million per candidate.

“A number of veterans, when becoming politically active, have a learning curve,” Rodriguez said. “You have to be disciplined in raising and knowing how to raise money.”

Rep. Tim Ryan (D-Ohio) said adjusting from a military to a political mentality could prove challenging to veterans. “In some ways, you’re taking orders from, in our case, 700,000 people,” Ryan said. “Figuring out what that order is sometimes is a difficult thing.”

Other Democratic officials and activists from around the country voiced concerns that the veterans would be single-issue candidates railing against the Iraq war, or else might stumble on the campaign trail like Colleen Rowley, the former FBI agent running in Minn.-2.

Rowley’s campaign website recently posted and then removed a picture of the incumbent, Rep. John Kline (R-Minn.), in Nazi garb. Rowley attributed the gaffe — even some of Kline’s fiercest rivals call him a decent man — to an inexperienced aide.

Democratic campaign aides called Hackett and Rowley, like retired Gen. Wesley Clark, who ran a 2004 bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, loose cannons who could not be counted on to say the right thing at the right time.

Many have charged forward, valiantly perhaps, into strongly held enemy ground.

While many, if not most, of the lawmakers in Washington spent years strategically jockeying for a House seat, many of the Democratic veterans are running in districts where any Democrat, seasoned politician or newcomer, would have a tough time winning: Colorado’s 5th, where Rep. Joel Hefley won 71 percent in 2004; Florida’s 6th, where Rep. Cliff Stearns won 64 percent; California’s 2nd, where Rep. Wally Herger won 67 percent; and Indiana’s 4th, where Rep. Steve Buyer, the chairman of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee, won 70 percent, among others.

Tim Walz, a former Army National Guardsman who is running against Rep. Gil Gutknecht (R) in Minnesota’s 1st District, acknowledged that there are “huge challenges” facing the veterans that may not factor into other challengers’ campaigns.

Walz said that veterans’ sense of self-reliance, for instance, could hinder them. “It’s fine to be independent and to be a positive leader,” he said, “but there are people who know how to win these things, and you have to listen to them.”

The former football coach said that, at best, he sees six of the veterans winning. A Democratic campaign aide in Washington, asked which veterans showed the most promise, listed two: Tammy Duckworth, in Ill.-6, and Patrick Murphy, in Pa.-8.

Michael Duga, a spokesman for the Band of Brothers, a group dedicated to electing Democratic veterans to Congress and the organization behind yesterday’s event on the Mall, said that, at present, there are 56 running.

Despite the uphill battle, Walz said, there is a nobility in running for office. True, elections are zero-sum games, Walz conceded. But the simple act of stepping into the fray and shaping, or reshaping, the political discourse serves a greater good, he said.

Duga, like other Democrats, insisted that the veterans’ inexperience was a strategic advantage, saying that voters are tired of professional politicians, particularly given the scandals surrounding GOP lobbyist Jack Abramoff.

Jim Dornan, a Republican consultant who most recently worked on Rep. Katherine Harris’s Senate campaign, said the Democrats’ rush to recruit veterans reflected the party’s deep-seated problems with voters.

“The Democrats have such a huge image problem that they are eager to recruit candidates like this without looking at the long-term problems these candidates can create,” Dornan said. The Democrats, he added, “are looked at with such disdain by the electorate right now, for their liberal views, their lack of agenda and their anger, quite frankly, that they are desperate to take any candidate who, at least on paper, dispels that image.”

Former Sen. Max Cleland (D-Ga.), who headlined the Band of Brothers event yesterday and lost three limbs while serving in Vietnam, views his fellow Democratic veterans as defenders of the American faith.

Noting that the Democrats assembled had more than 400 years of military experience together, Cleland, reading from a three-ring binder, told the veterans behind him: “The time has come for people like yourselves to put our country right again.”


TOPICS: Foreign Affairs; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2006; 2006election; democrat; demprimary; iraq; oifveterans; paulhackett; savodnik
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1 posted on 02/10/2006 12:22:25 AM PST by West Coast Conservative
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To: West Coast Conservative

I wonder if voters will see through a rent a vet strategy.


2 posted on 02/10/2006 12:30:25 AM PST by Anti-Bubba182
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To: West Coast Conservative

Other vets that served with these rats are lining up to tell the truth about these dim "warriors". A dim (even a JAG lawyer rat) can't hide what he or she is. People serving with kerry knew, and TRUTH will once again win the day!

LLS


3 posted on 02/10/2006 1:56:20 AM PST by LibLieSlayer (Preserve America... kill terrorists... destroy dims!)
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To: West Coast Conservative

The appeal of Paul Hackett is that he's running against DeRino.


4 posted on 02/10/2006 2:53:59 AM PST by Rudder
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To: West Coast Conservative
The only Democrats I knew when I was in the military were incompetent, gay, or bipolar.

I am not kidding.

5 posted on 02/10/2006 3:16:27 AM PST by SkyPilot
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To: West Coast Conservative
Gee how many times do you suppose the DNC is going to get one of their tame Junk Journalists to rerun this story?

Hey Dims, actually try GETTING an agenda instead of dreaming up more stupid PR schemes to fool the voters. This one is particularly stupid. People who honor Military Service are going to be turned off listening to the trash talk Hate America Propaganda coming out of these "Vets" mouths.

6 posted on 02/10/2006 4:09:59 AM PST by MNJohnnie ("Vote Democrat-We are the party of reactionary inertia".)
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To: MNJohnnie

Duckworth is their best???? She doesn't live in the district where she is running.


7 posted on 02/10/2006 4:37:34 AM PST by ClaireSolt (.)
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To: West Coast Conservative

Any Swift Boat '06 groups forming against these people?


8 posted on 02/10/2006 4:40:55 AM PST by blackdiamondracer
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To: Anti-Bubba182; Congressman Billybob
Yes!

In an Army/Marine Corps group of 200,000 people who have served over there, it's easy to find 40 "rent-a-vet" to parade around and mouth the international socialist's agenda.

But that is ALL they are; No experience at all in politics, law, business OR ANYTHING ELSE (except possibly reservists who have had other careers), except their ability/duplicity in democrat (er, socialist's) talking points.
9 posted on 02/10/2006 4:45:23 AM PST by Robert A Cook PE (I can only donate monthly, but Hillary's ABBCNNBCBS continue to lie every day!)
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To: SkyPilot

Luckily for our nation, the Howard Dean wing types of Democrats rarely serve our country. It's probably safe to say that those who do are one of the smallest special interest groups you can find in a unit or base. I only met a few in my Air Force career and observed that they were some of the most miserable people ever. Talking to them, you could almost swear they were draftees. Most said they joined to get training or money for college but I personally thought they were there as a fifth column.


10 posted on 02/10/2006 4:51:13 AM PST by Hillarys Gate Cult (The man who said "there's no such thing as a stupid question" has never talked to Helen Thomas.)
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To: MNJohnnie
The demo's are trying a "rent-a-vet scheme: Have found 40 mouths that will echo their diatribes after returning from Iraq, and are running these inexperienced people as Congressional candidates. Based on NOTHING but the person's Iraq "he was over there" schemes.

But when Bush uses a real-world terror prevention to explain the NSA surveillance, the lib reporters claim it is a "publicity stunt" and "uses the 911 attacks for political purposes"!
11 posted on 02/10/2006 4:54:32 AM PST by Robert A Cook PE (I can only donate monthly, but Hillary's ABBCNNBCBS continue to lie every day!)
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To: Anti-Bubba182
I wonder if voters will see through a rent a vet strategy.

Yup :)

12 posted on 02/10/2006 4:57:55 AM PST by mewzilla (Property must be secured or liberty cannot exist. John Adams)
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To: West Coast Conservative

Thankfully we have Kerry and Murtha as examples that just because someone is a veteran doesn't mean necessarily that they won't backstab their country.


13 posted on 02/10/2006 5:03:26 AM PST by winner3000
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To: mewzilla

Yep it's the Rent a Vet Program... After serving under five different CICs it was obvious that pay and readiness take a hit when a Dem is running the show. I see these guys as having sold their souls.


14 posted on 02/10/2006 5:03:37 AM PST by Wristpin ("The Yankees announce plan to buy every player in Baseball....")
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To: West Coast Conservative

"A Democratic campaign aide in Washington, asked which veterans showed the most promise, listed two: Tammy Duckworth, in Ill.-6, and Patrick Murphy, in Pa.-8."



Five of these Democrat"Kamikazes" are crashing into GOP incumbents who won unopposed in 2004.

Forty six will be serving themselves up to keep the minority party from being without a candidate in races against Republicans who won with 60% or more ( 4 are in a primary to suit up and fly into a Republican aircraft carrier). Many of these Republican “targets” won with numbers in the 70s and one with 86%.


Of the twelve Iraq vets running under the anti war party’s banner just one, Bryan Lentz Pennsylvania 7 CD has had the courage to say we should pull out immediately. In fact of the total 56 "brothers" only 4, three men and one woman, including Lentz, have the stomach to stand up and demand an immediate pull out.

This means the other 52 are no different from the run of the mill socialist Democrat. Their websites call for welfare reform, protectionist job policies, repeal of the Patriot Act and of course more money for Education.


The winning margins for the incumbent Republicans the "pull out immediately" Kamikazes will be battling, ranges from 59% to 84%. How much courage does it take to yell “Pull out now!” in races like these? Why aren't the military veteran Democrats in the close races? Why aren’t the vets offered a chance to run against Republican incumbents who could conceivably be defeated?


The answers are obvious. The minority party is using these veterans. The Democrats don’t really care about these people. They are useful now, but for most,if not every single one, the day after Election Day will be very cold indeed.


These men and women have been recruited by the minority party to project a false image of Democrat strength and concern when it comes to keep America safe. How believable is this sham if they can find just 4 people willing to actually spout their anti war "pull out and surrender now!" line?


This whole project is just another example of how the democrats look at what drives voters. The Democrats think the messenger is more important than the message and they always have.

For the record, neither Duckworth, nor Murphy has found the courage to actually call for an immediate pull out.



Where’s the power in this strategy?


15 posted on 02/10/2006 5:09:24 AM PST by jmaroneps37 (We will never murtha to the terrorists. Bring home the troops means bring home the war.)
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To: jmaroneps37
The Democrats don’t really care about these people.

Someday America's black voters will realize this.

16 posted on 02/10/2006 5:43:13 AM PST by Jacquerie (Democrats soil institutions)
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To: West Coast Conservative

The article could be summed up:

DEMOCRATS WORRY THEY CAN'T QUITE HOLD VETERAN/CANDIDATES AS TIGHTLY TO THE FOLD (BY THE HUEVOS) AS NEEDED

Funny thing about those warriors. No matter where they come from, they have a sense of independence not seen often in the party of appeasers. This is going to be fun.


17 posted on 02/10/2006 6:38:20 AM PST by campfollower (Supporting the troops means funding them and uniting behind their mission...)
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To: ClaireSolt

Duckworth lives in Melissa Bean's (D) district.

Bean lives in Mark Kirk's (R) district.

The guy running against Kirk lives in Hyde's (R) district, where Duckworth is running.


18 posted on 02/10/2006 7:01:59 AM PST by The Old Hoosier (Right makes might.)
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To: The Old Hoosier

Is that legal?


19 posted on 02/10/2006 12:32:30 PM PST by ClaireSolt (.)
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To: SkyPilot
The only Democrats I knew when I was in the military were incompetent, gay, or bipolar.

To a great extent, that carries over to the population at large...
20 posted on 02/10/2006 12:34:00 PM PST by Antoninus (The only reason you're alive today is because your parents were pro-life.)
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