Chafee Chafen

It seems the Democrat Senator from RI who calls himself a Republican is under attack from the Republican Wing of the Republican party. The Captain (of Captain's Quarters) has donated money to the insurgent.

Here is what I had to say about that.

The Rs as usual have cause an effect backwards. He is the liberal he is because that is what gets him elected.

Cap'n the money would be better spent changing the minds of the electorate.

But, that is much harder you tell me.

Yep.

We need to be patient. We need to keep people voting for Rs. Move the electorate right through education.

Then when the seat opens through death or retirement we get a more conservatve (probably still leftish) Sen or Rep.

We need to hold what we have and take the long view.

I hope you will do pennance by giving 2X to Chafee.

Besides primary fights give the opposition ammunition. We ought to avoid them as much as possible.

I'd take Bernie Sanders as a Republican if he would caucus with us.

Playing the short game is not tactically wise in politics. Look at the R party in Calif. We have an R governor who is practically a Democrat.

Guess what? He has to be what he has become to get re-elected. Sadly the party in Calif is too pure and short sighted to see what needs to be done.

We have to change the voters, not the politicians.

And how about the Alan Keyes fiasco in Illinois? Brought to you by my State Senator the oh, so, conservative Dave Syverson.

Fortunately Obama turned out more sensible than he ran. There was no certainty in that. Except Illinois is a RINO State. So he moved his position to where the votes are. He can't be assured that he will have the stupidity of the Rs to help him next time.

Update: 01 Sept '06 0512z

Captain's Quarter's is again on the subject.

Last November I selected Steven Laffey as Not One Dime's official candidate of the 2006 elections in his attempt to unseat Republican incumbent Lincoln Chafee. At the time, the task of beating Chafee seemed Herculean. Now, however, it looks like Laffey may have overtaken Chafee and garnered a commanding lead heading into the primary on September 12th:

The primary is not the real battle. The real question is: can Laffey win the general election? If not the Rs are down one seat. Shoot yourself in the foot much lately?