Democrat beggars target Bud

From to the LA Times (hat tip to Brian at Flash Point for the link):

WASHINGTON — In an unusual grass-roots uprising, liberal Internet activists are pressing dozens of Democratic House members without serious challenges in November's election to transfer nearly one-third of their campaign cash to the party's challengers against potentially vulnerable Republican incumbents.

The effort reflects both the belief among Democratic activists that the number of House seats the party can gain is steadily rising and the concern that a shortage of funds may prevent Democrats from maximizing these opportunities. ...

Some leading Democratic strategists, such as James Carville and Stanley B. Greenberg, have urged party campaign committees to increase the spending in several House races by borrowing to pay for more advertising. But Bowers argued that a more accessible financial source was the cash held by Democrats facing token or no opposition.

The amount involved is substantial: Bowers has identified 69 Democratic incumbents without serious opposition whose combined campaign treasuries total roughly $50 million. In his post, Bowers suggested that these lawmakers donate as much as 30% of their cash to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee or directly to challengers waging races against Republicans who had not been considered vulnerable until recently.

Bowers posted a list of the flush Democratic incumbents and asked his readers to contact them. Last Friday, the effort received a boost when the political action committee associated with MoveOn.org, the online liberal advocacy group, asked its members to contact the safe incumbents.

The targeted Democrats include Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts ($2.3 million in his treasury), Robert E. "Bud" Cramer of Alabama ($1.6 million), Adam B. Schiff of Burbank ($1.4 million), and Jesse L. Jackson Jr. of Illinois ($1.3 million), according to the MyDD calculations. Rep. Martin T. Meehan of Massachusetts easily topped the list with $4.9 million in the bank.

I suspect that Rep. Cramer will be keeping a tight grip on his wallet in case he needs it for a future campaign, but the fact that his seat is considered safe enough that anyone would bother asking him for a donation is a real shame. The reason it is safe, of course, is that the Republican Party couldn't come up with a single candidate to face off against him in this year's election.

Alabama's Fifth Congressional district is a fairly conservative district; it is one that Republicans should be able to win given the right candidate and enough resources. Granted, Cramer is a popular, conservative Democrat who has often been courted by Republicans as a possible party-switcher, but it seems to me that he could have been somewhat more vulnerable than usual this year. It appears that the fight over control of the House may come down to a few seats, and a key question for Cramer - if only he had an opponent to ask it - would be whether he would support Nancy Pelosi as Speaker in the unfortunate event that Democrats manage to take over. As it stands, there are at least even odds that we'll know the answer to that question soon enough, but by then the moment to press him on the issue will have passed. Even a token Republican opponent would have put him on notice that he'd better vote the interests of his constitutents when it comes to organizing the House, even if it means annoying the liberals in his own party.

Unless he convinces me otherwise over the next couple of weeks, my thinking is that a vote for Bud Cramer is a vote for Nancy Pelosi, Charlie Rangel, and Barney Frank. That means I'm looking for a suitable person to write in. Any ideas?

It may be a fruitless gesture, but hey - I'm a conservative in George W. Bush's big-government Republican Party. If it weren't for fruitless gestures, we'd all go mad.