OK if you must have the aid of a picture for perspective, go here: http://www.metacafe.com/watch/225403/ashley_judd_flashing/
It seems that the folks at Wall Street Journal Political Diary and HuffPo have picked up on our theme regarding Karl Rove’s efforts of late. OK . . . MAAAYBE . . . our reach is not quite that far but today’s post from both provides some validation to our wonderment about Rove’s actions in Kentucky regarding rumors about Ashley Judd getting in the race to oppose Mitch McConnell.
We could be putting the wrong interpretation on Rove’s efforts. Maybe he is just striving for consistency – helping to weed out the weak candidates in the primaries of both political parties . . . you know for the good of the body politic.
Political Diary reports on an analysis of the matter credited to Roll Call:
“As a celebrity and strong supporter of President Obama, Judd’s position at the top of the ticket could nationalize state and local races,” referring to Democratic strategists in the Bluegrass State. “They see her losing the Senate contest—an uphill climb for any Democrat—and potentially poisoning the conservative brand of some state Democrats.”
Both HuffPo and WSJ Political Diary refer to this statement as quoted in Roll Call attributed to Jimmy Cauley, a Democratic strategist in the state.
“If she runs, I think it would be a catastrophe for a lot of down ballot races in Kentucky,”
Jason L. Riley at Political Diary comments:
“Given that Democrats don’t think she can win and would damage the party brand trying, maybe Republicans should be encouraging her to enter the race.”
In a more earthy sense, we just wonder where Rove’s head is. R Mall
If a Republican can win “Teddy’s seat” in “The People’s Republic of Taxachusetts”, Ashley Judd can win in Kentucky. If Al Franken, a deranged lunatic, can win a Senate seat in this country she can win.
She would have the full backing of the Democrat Party, Hollywood and Obummer would probably jet in every weekend to hold a rally on college campuses to whip the drones up into a frenzy. He can fully enbrace and support his moonbat pals now with no election worries.
I am dead serious about this and appreciate Rove’s efforts in proactively attempting to stop her.
We suppose anything is possible but that is true in any state of the union. Romney won Kentucky by 22 points just a few months ago, a presidential year with comparatively high Democrat turnout. The issue is whether there might be better places to spend donor money or better ways to spend it.
It is so early that weakening Ashley Judd now, however much a Democrat star (more like glare) only encourages Dem operatives to beg a more credible nominee to run, who at least won’t drain the coffers and lose anyway. McConnell may be weak but should we be spending money to drive sense into Democrats?
Al star power Franken won running as a Democrat in a basically blue state. He was also capable of attacking. He barely won. Our Repubs do not exactly run as Repubs in blue states, they run as Dem lites. Ashley Judd would be running statewide, no congressional district pocket of opportunity there, she cannot possibly run as anything but a flaming lib, basically a carpet bagger in a Repub state. She can be used to brand Democrats country wide. Let her run.
As we suggested in another post, the strongest excuse for this might be a Brer Rabbit gambit, but if Dems are that stupid you can walk away and have them steer for the iceberg on their own.
Rove’s judgment is an issue – he has made some very bad, seriously bad, devastatingly bad calls, 2006 – 2008 in particular, setting up the disaster we are experiencing now, with some unmitigated flourishes since then. Oh he is willing to be aggressive, but it seems more so against Republicans of late. He is fomenting a party split. He is not smart enough to play with the fire he is stoking.
We are also a bit tired of the wasteful extravagance of candidate specific campaigns bouncing donors all over the map, starving “raise all boats’ tidal efforts to bolster one candidate when a solid vote Republican effort is long overdue.
In our judgment that is the “secret” to Democrat victories, vote Democrat period, straight ticket voting. Give low information voters the simple solution they crave. We need to do the same thing, vote straight ticket Republican, vote against all Democrats, whichever approach will be more efficient. Such an approach will ultimately be more helpful. That is where he should be directing donor money.