Last Call For Tennant's Lights Out Play

The Pollster.com aggregate of the polls for the WV Senate race to fill retiring Democrat Jay Rockefeller's seat has Republican Rep. Shelly Moore Capito up by about ten points over Democrat and current WV Secretary of State Natalie Tennant.  That's been fairly constant, so the Tennant camp is taking a page from Sen. Joe Manchin's playbook:  attack President Obama as hard as you can.

Natalie Tennant is making it clear: she opposes President Barack Obama's policies on coal. 

"Where do they think their electricity comes from?" asks West Virginia's secretary of state and Democratic Senate nominee, as her new campaign commercial shows a picture of the White House.

"You and I know it's our hard-working West Virginia coal miners that power America. I've fought to protect our coal jobs right alongside Joe Manchin, and I'll stand up to leaders of both parties who threaten our way of life, I'll make sure President Obama gets the message," adds Tennant, as she pulls a power switch which turns the lights off at the White House.

Tennant's campaign says they'll spend six-figures to run the spot for two weeks in four markets that cover three-quarters of West Virginia. The ad is the first by Tennant or her Republican opponent, seven-term Rep. Shelley Moore Capito, who is considered the favorite in the race. The winner in November's midterm elections will succeed longtime Democratic Sen. Jay Rockefeller, who is retiring after three decades in the Senate.

Hey, worked for Joe Manchin, right?  And we know how awesome of a senator he turned out to be.

Technically, Tennant's got to be a better lawmaker than Capito, but not by much.  West Virginia Democrats are basically indistinguishable from Kentucky Democrats in that respect.  But there's no mistaking that Tennant's campaign is now centered around attacking Obama, and she's spending six figures at least in order to do it.

If slagging the President gets her into office?  Hooray, I guess.  Maybe she'll warm up to Hillary.  Capito will be 100% of a problem compared to Tennant's 90%.  There's not much else we can hope for from West Virginia, folks.

The GOP Thinks You're Stupid, Con't.

Today's first contestant on The GOP Thinks You're Stupid(tm) is Mississippi GOP Gov. Phil Bryant, who after blocking Medicaid expansion for tens of thousands of uninsured in the Magnolia State, is now complaining that Obamacare hasn't lowered the state's uninsured as much as it could have, and of course it's all President Obama's fault.

Mississippi Gov. Phil Bryant (R) blamed President Barack Obama for a reported increase in uninsured Mississipians. The problem is, Bryant didn't acknowledge that he's been a staunch opponent of expanding Medicaid under Obamacare and refused to encourage enrolling in private coverage through Healthcare.gov.

Bryant directed his blame at Obama in response to a question about a WalletHub study that showed an increase in the percentage of uninsured Mississippians. The study found that the uninsured rate increased by 3.34 percentage points to 21.46 percent of Mississippi's population, according to the Northeast Mississippi Daily Journal. 

"If statistics show that the ill-conceived and so-called Affordable Care Act is resulting in higher rates of uninsured people in Mississippi, I'd say that's yet another example of a broken promise from Barack Obama," Bryant said. 

An estimated 137,800 people in Mississippi were left uncovered by health insurance because the state did not expand Medicaid.

You see, He Thinks You're Stupid(tm).  He believes that he won't pay any price for refusing federal dollars in order to help insure tens of thousands of people in Mississippi, and that'll you'll just blame Obama.

And hey, it might even work this election cycle.  But eventually voters are going to figure this out, and when they do, it's not going to be pretty for the GOP.

That brings us to our second contestant, GOP Iowa Senate candidate Joni Ernst, who it turns out Thinks You're Stupid(tm) because of nullification nonsense.

Joni Ernst, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate in Iowa, appears to believe states can nullify federal laws. In a video obtained by The Daily Beast, Ernst said on September 13, 2013 at a form held by the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition that Congress should not pass any laws “that the states would consider nullifying.”

“You know we have talked about this at the state legislature before, nullification. But, bottom line is, as U.S. Senator why should we be passing laws that the states are considering nullifying? Bottom line: our legislators at the federal level should not be passing those laws. We’re right…we’ve gone 200-plus years of federal legislators going against the Tenth Amendment’s states’ rights. We are way overstepping bounds as federal legislators. So, bottom line, no we should not be passing laws as federal legislators—as senators or congressman—that the states would even consider nullifying. Bottom line.” 

That statement alone should disqualify her from office.  The last time states decided they no longer wanted to be under federal jurisdiction was about, oh, 150 years ago, turned into the Civil War, and ended with the assassination of a president.

We settled this long ago, but apparently She Thinks You're Stupid(tm), Iowa voters.

These clowns will never learn.

Nunn, Your Business

So it seems somebody got a hold of Democrat Michelle Nunn's strategy documents for her Georgia Senate run from back in December, and have waited until now to feed them to National Review.

Advisers for Democratic Senate Candidate Michelle Nunn (GA) warned that she might come off as "too liberal" and "not a real Georgian" and also laid out exactly how Nunn needed to approach key demographic groups to win the Senate race.

The documents, which seemed to be posted in December for a brief period of time, were reported by National Review on Monday. 

One of the memos said that there is a "tremendous financial opportunity" to draw from in the Jewish community among fundraisers. But, the memo warned, "Michelle's position on Israel will largely determine the level of support here." 

The documents also said that Asian Americans would need to be key fundraisers. The Asian American community was described as "very tight" and that people in that community strive "become citizens quickly."

It's very blunt and calculated advice for Nunn, you know, the kind of frank, high-level analysis you'd expect for a political consultant.  National Review is of course screaming bloody murder.  And if you want to know why this waited until now to drop, the answer is pretty simple:

The section on research into Nunn's background shows some initial concerns that her tenure as head of the Points of Light, a nonprofit that encourages volunteerism, could be used against her. Nunn has touted her background there as a positive attribute in the campaign, as also recommended in the document.

The document identifies several areas of concern related to Points of Light including: "grants to problematic entities," "layoffs," and "service awards to inmates, terrorists."

The National Review story reports that according to an IRS document, Points of Light awarded a more than $33,000 grant to Islamic Relief USA, a charity with ties to Islamic Relief Worldwide, which has ties to Hamas.

The Nunn campaign noted to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution that Points of Light did not give money but rather validated Islamic Relief USA as a legitimate charity.

The "service awards to inmates, terrorists" reference is apparently, according to National Review, to Nunn and an entity under the Points of Light umbrella praising Shareef Cousin, a former death-row inmate whose murder conviction was overturned but who later pleaded guilty to other crimes.

So boom, Michelle Nunn is now a "terrorist sympathizer".  It's complete nonsense, of course, but apparently somebody thinks Nunn is enough of a threat that this turd had to land square in the punchbowl.  You'd better believe the super-PAC ads attacking Nunn over this are on the way.  This all stinks to high heaven, but that's how the GOP rolls.  The story was apparently broken by NRO's Eliana Johnson, daughter of Power Line clown Scott Johnson, so that's everything you need to know about that.

The GOP knows that they need to run to table in order to get control of the Senate, and they'll do whatever they need to do in order to go after Democrats.

StupidiNews!

• With ten Israeli soldiers killed in heavy fighting yesterday, including five killed by Hamas militants using a tunnel, Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu says Israel must prepare for a "protracted campaign."
• Satanist say the Supreme Court's recent Hobby Lobby decision means that they can sue for the right to exempt members from anti-abortion laws.
• The US is accusing Russia of violating the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces treaty of 1988 with a possible ground-launched cruise missile test, and is urging immediate talks with Moscow.
• Both the US and EU may deliver new sanctions against Russia as early as today targeting "key sectors" of Russia's economy.
• On its 40th anniversary, Hustler Magazine founder Larry Flynt says the internet may mean the end of the print version of Hustler, but diversification and technology means the brand is safe.