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WA-08: Burner Concedes

by: James L.

Fri Nov 07, 2008 at 11:39 PM EST


Statement from the Burner campaign (via email):

"It is likely at this point that Congressman Reichert has won re-election, and while we will certainly ensure that every valid vote is counted, we accept the decision of the voters.

"I would like to thank the thousands of people who put so much time and effort into the campaign, as well as the countless thousands more who went beyond voting to actively participate in our democratic process this year. The election of Barack Obama as our new President will ensure that the change to the direction of our country called for in this campaign is realized in the new year."

With both MD-01 and now WA-08 called, the only House races left on the table are AK-AL, CA-04, CA-44, OH-15, and VA-05. Of these, I think we only really have a reasonable shot at OH-15 and maybe CA-04. VA-05 is all but in the bag.

UPDATE by Crisitunity: This evening's ballot dump in Pierce County probably was the last straw; Reichert's lead shot up to 8,000 votes (a 51.5-48.5 margin, with about 80% counted so far), whereas his margin of victory was only 7,000 votes in 2006.
James L. :: WA-08: Burner Concedes
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WA-08: Burner Concedes | 45 comments
Damn
That really sucks.

Guess you can't win them all though.

that sucks
Matt Stoller is going to be very sad.
All right:
This more than sucks, it's bulls___. What went wrong here?
To a large extent
The Seattle Times kept inventing scandals against Bruner...
[ Parent ]
Does anyone else think this is denial?
From the Great Orange Satan-

The Seattle Times spurious attack on Darcy's character, calling her a liar because she accurately described her Harvard degree, apparently worked. So they succeeded in re-electing an already ineffective incumbent who will be even more so mired deep in the minority, with a Democratic president.

Congratulations, Emily Heffter and the Seattle Times. You just assured progress on key issues like transportation and environmental protection in the 8th District won't have an effective proponent in the House. At least we've got good Senators.

As a politician, you have to be prepared to beat back the media when they turn on you. I'm not pointing a finger at Burner, but there's just no other easy scapegoat when a Democrat loses a D+2.

I'll say it again. The netroots needs to consider why it supports one candidate over another. Democrats have dropped $5 million+ in WA-08 over the last two cycles. This year at least $764,609 (ActBlue) of that coming from our pockets because we were told (again) by the powers that be that Burner could win. Sigh.

not winning
doesn't mean she couldn't.  Sometimes campaigns aren't run as well as they could have been.  Sometimes they make mistakes.  It happens.
[ Parent ]
I agree. Blogs in general should be more picky about who they pick
Shulman = Fail, Baker = Close but fail, Burner = close but fail... Taddeo, Garcia, Seals, etc.  The list is very long.  

SenateGuru kept pushing Bob Tuke for some ungodly reason.  I always thought that was some obscure joke.  

[ Parent ]
Heh.
   Do you really find it shocking that most challengers lose to incumbents?  I like that the netroots role is to fund candidacies that CW say are hopeless.

John McCain lets lobbyists shape his economic policy
[ Parent ]
Garcia was hardly a failure
Name me one other candidate who could have given Diaz-Balart a better race in FL-25.  Same with Baker in MO-09.
[ Parent ]
retreads
They just don't do as well the second time around.  Find someone else.  Though it may be that 2006 was the best chance to pick up IL-10 and WA-08, and we missed.

It may be better off to let the races develop and then embrace a candidate, rather than try to push a netroots candidate from the beginning.  

[ Parent ]
That's how you get
Blue Dogs...which granted is the only kind most of these districts will ever elect.  

Liberty Avenue Politics - a place for politics in Southern Queens
[ Parent ]
candidate evaluation...
....is part of the process.  I don't think we always have to be stuck with Blue Dogs, but the whole picture has to be evaluated.  

And in many of these swing didtricts, personalities pay a part.

[ Parent ]
Yep, retreads fail
Just ask Dan Maffei, Eric Massa, and Larry Kissell, and maybe Mary Jo Kilroy and Charlie Brown.  Or, for that matter, Congressmen Joe Courtney, Jerry McNerney, Joe Donnelly, Baron Hill, Nancy Boyda(RIP), Paul Hodes, and Ciro Rodriguez.

Yeah, some highly-touted retreads have lost (like Burner, Vic Wulsin, Linda Stender, and Diane Ferrell), but plenty win too.

[ Parent ]
The real problem.
   Female Democrats are doing much more poorly than they should.  

John McCain lets lobbyists shape his economic policy
[ Parent ]
Not necessarily.
What about Trauner?

Then again, in his particular case, he was running in an R+19 district in a presidential year.

Bill Posey is not half-alligator...and is outclassed by Davy Crockett anyway: http://www.washingtonmonthly.c...

[ Parent ]
Exactly
Challengers to incumbents normally don't succeed at all, regardless of whether they've run before or not.

Follow the elections in Georgia at the 2010 Georgia Race Tracker.
[ Parent ]
Well
For the dailykos, Markos has always picked the more long-shot races on purpose. He's said that repeatedly. Sure it doesn't always give the greatest win% but it helps spread the Republican money around and makes these districts more ripe for the Democratic Party in the future.

If things had gone differently Burner could have won, Garcia got 47% in a district Democrats had never challenged before, and many of the others came close. The help blogs gave Lord may have very well forced the NRCC to spend more there meaning less money elsewhere and more and easier wins for us in Ohio or Michigan races the GOP had to drop out of.

[ Parent ]
Hahaha...
AZ-03... You picked a pretty bad example to roll out your "Spread their money around" deal.
DCCC spent over 2 million dollars in AZ-03.  How much did NRCC spend?  $0.  They didn't spend a penny.  
[ Parent ]
They picked Lord
Long before the DCCC started spending money. It was a long-shot race even when they started spending money. It's his site, he can choose who he wants to support. There was a particularly good reason since Shadegg is a leader for conservatives. Personally, I never thought we could win that one, but it doesn't make it a bad decision to try for it.
[ Parent ]
I take a bit of offense at Shulman as a fail...
Particularly having spent my election day out there knocking on doors and holding up signs for him. He probably got more than could have been expected against Garrett.  As far to the right as Garrett is of his slightly-Republican leaning district, most people just aren't that engaged that they know anything more about him than he has an R next to his name...Shulman may have gotten a slight bump with the negative ad. Really, he was likely more the victim of time simply running out as he gained momentum (see CQ politics). Shulman didn't do much worse than the highly funded repeater Stender. There's a reason I chose to spend my day out there; Dennis Shulman is PRECISELY the sort of candidate we want to support...an eloquent (listen to his concession speech), intelligent, unique citizen who decides to run because he sees a problem and believes he can do better than what we have. From what I could tell in my short time up there, he turned enough heads as to probably be our best shot (but still a long shot) in 2010. It's easy to cast stones...but it's not always right.
[ Parent ]
She could have, but she didn't.
   You just don't know.  That's why you try.  No one without a crystal ball would have predicted that Perriello would win.  Why is this uncertainty so hard for you to understand?

John McCain lets lobbyists shape his economic policy
[ Parent ]
This isn't about me.
Again, your attacking me personally for criticizing Burner. What was it last time, "because she's a woman and I only support conservative men?" Please, let's not make this personal. And frankly, my bread and butter comes from uncertainty. If you ever decide to study law, you'll know exactly what I'm talking about.

I'll make my thoughts clear. I suspect that one of the reasons that Burner receives so much attention from blogs is that she's friends with those who control the blogs.

My bottom line: Spread the wealth. There may have been more candidates out there like Periello who could have used a boost. There's no reason for one candidate to get so much, especially one who I suspect was chosen for the wrong reasons.

[ Parent ]
So easy to criticize a losing campaign.
   Other candidates got plenty of money from the netroots.  Burner was the marquee race.  Burner got the most support from the netroots because she is always talking to us.  I don't really understand the problem.  

John McCain lets lobbyists shape his economic policy
[ Parent ]
Can't I just express an opinion?
And I take umbrage with your statement that I only criticize losing campaigns. I was criticizing Burner's back when she was supposedly winning.

Also, tons of campaigns post to DailyKos and MyDD. Not just Burner, so I really don't see the "she is always talking to us."

But I give in. I admit I don't have a clue what's really going on. And I promise never to criticize Burner again.

[ Parent ]
Glad to hear it.
   You must stay in line!

John McCain lets lobbyists shape his economic policy
[ Parent ]
Seriously, he was expression an opinion
No need to beat him over the head.

We should look at all of our candidates, where did we put money in losing races, where would have been more effective, etc.

It isn't so bad to say that she was promoted, a lot, and for a second time around had the better name recognition, she is a decent candidate but couldn't break it again.

[ Parent ]
Mr. Mac Man!
Wow, long time no see! Hope you're doing well, man.
[ Parent ]
No more
I for one would not contribute again to Burner and probably not to a Dem running in WA 08 unless something very substantial changed.  Having spent hundreds of dollars over two cycles fruitlessly, I feel my limited funds can be better spent elsewhere.  I recall the Tammy Duckworth campaign in '06 in which millions of dollars were dropped, also in vain.  

It seems to me that monies should be expended based on at least two criteria: quality of candidate AND the likelihood of success.  After all it is unlikely in the future for us to have such an overwhelming financial advantage.  Even in this election I can't help wondering if some candidate(s) in cheaper districts might have won had the DCCC spent more there and less in WA 08.

Clearly this is the perennial question, and I feel a good deal of ambivalence about it.  Still, I do think it's important to keep in mind the question of how much is too much.  

[ Parent ]
WA-08, OH-02, and FL-13 really need
completely game-changing candidates to come in and blow everyone else out of the water.

Bill Posey is not half-alligator...and is outclassed by Davy Crockett anyway: http://www.washingtonmonthly.c...
[ Parent ]
Community group
Darcy Burner per Matt Stoller was part of a community group that pressured the Seattle Times into paying the Post Intelligencer $18 million (or thereabouts IIRC) to allow the PI to stay in business.  The two share a print facility owned by the Times and the payment had to do with profits from printing stand alone advertisement circulars not part of the newspapers.

The family owned Times took it personally and took the money out of Darcy's hide this cycle, at least according to Matt's diary.  The chain owned (Hearst) PI didn't want to look beholden to the woman that kept them in business so even they endorsed Reichert without the vitriol and stories.  If true, Darcy preserved a second newspaper for Seattle at the cost of her political career.  She never should have taken the task of mediating the dispute in the community interest.  Never.

Look it up on Open Left.  I'm sure the details are much more clear than I remember them.  The essentials are true though.  She cost them a boat load of money and they cost her the election.

[ Parent ]
here it is
Local Media, Darcy Burner and the War over the Obama Franchise
He wrote it during that hectic week before the election day. I remember reading it but it slipped from mind
[ Parent ]
In all fairness
Can anyone beat Reichert in that district?  It seems he just skates by with more support than a normal republican would have thanks to his celebrity status.
Rodney Tom?
State Sen Rodney Tom wanted to run and would have been a good fit.  State Sen from a swing district and a former Republican, but is a solid progressive now. Would have been perfect.

But didn't make it to the starting line, largely due because he didn't want to have to compete with the netroots fundraising for Burner.

[ Parent ]
too bad
That is really just too bad. Especially after she was up a bunch early on Tuesday, but that is the nature of mail-in-voting.  
Alaska
Does anyone find it odd that Alaska is the only state where all the results differed so greatly from the polls?  
No, we had two polls
One was overconfident (R2K), the other one was accurate, it just turned out that nearly 100% of the undecideds flew for the Republicans.  
[ Parent ]
I agree with the consensus.
I never really warmed to Burner, and, it appears, neither did her constituents.

Time to find someone else for the 8th District run.

Maybe Darcy Burner can go on a killing spree and a cop can bust her who will then run as a Dem and beat Dave Reichert and Burner can finally claim success in this district?  

i bought the darcy kool aid this year
i'll admit. but what's good for the netroots may not work in the district.

Darcy was at least close.

Dan Seals on the other hand was a complete debacle.

the problem with pushing these two is that we didn't really gain anything. neither of them can run again. and we can't beat Reichert or Kirk.


spoiled?
I suspect we've become a wee bit spoiled over the Dems success rate of defeating incumbents the last couple of cycles. And have forgotten how seldom an occurrence that really is, on a historical basis.
I'd say that's quite true.
But I'm overall pleased with how Tuesday came out. It was a pretty historic day.
[ Parent ]
OTOH, Microsoft
I generally dislike Microsoft products as much as the next guy, and hate the Microsoft Co. and their FUD business model as much as the next guy.

But would I take that out on an ex-employee running for office?
Hmmm, I'm not sure... it's possible I just might. Especially if I were a low information voter putting only a couple minutes of thought into my vote, and it's between "The Sheriff" and a Microsoft manager, well...

Low information voters
in this district might tend to blame the long-term Microserfs and their abundant stock options for driving up house prices and forcing them to live further out in the sticks and thus spend more time commuting.
[ Parent ]
Ah. Envy, leading to bitterness. Powerful emotions...
(especially with the outrageous price of gasoline the past few months)
[ Parent ]
Agreed
Going into the 2006 cycle, many people thought only 25 or so House seats would even be in play. It was a surprise that the number went into the 40s, and even more so that the Democrats won so many of them without losing a single incumbent.

This year, perhaps expectations were too high. Polling showed even more seats in play, up to 70 or 80. Seems to me that the polling was optimistic: some seats that were supposed to be Democratic favored or toss-ups were not that close, and some that were supposed to be worth looking at turned out to be blowouts. But in just about any other year, a party would be thrilled to pick up 20+ House seats.

Yeah, I was hoping for more too. We had some terrific candidates who didn't win, and some who lost by a lot. But the rest of the country is where it is, we still had some excellent candidates who won, and we have many good folks from 2006 returning to the Hill. Helps to keep things in perspective.

also remember
that these seats were drawn to protect Republican incumbents.  And we still have picked up all these seats the last two cycles.  
[ Parent ]
WA-08: Burner Concedes | 45 comments

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