Let Howie Klein explain:
When 9-term Republican Congressman Jim Ramstad (MN-03) decided to pack it in and retire from politics this year, he was doing a favor for the residents of the Hennepin County suburbs surrounding the twin cities. Ramstad isn’t some kind of radical right extremist like bizarre neighbors John Kline and Michele Bachmann; he’s a mainstream conservative in a moderate blue-trending district (PVI- R+1). Bush managed to win the district with 51% of the vote in 2004; in a rematch today he’d be lucky to break 30%. Ramstad’s would-be successor, Erik Paulsen, is not a mainstream conservative; he’s a far right extremist more in the Kline/Bachmann mold. Hennepin County Democrats have nominated a far more suitable candidate, Ashwin Madia.
Minnesota bloggers are out raising funds for Ashwin today. It’s Ashwin Media Blog Day. He deserves a hand– and in a race that the polls show neck and neck, a hand is just what he needs. The Greenberg Quinlan Rosner poll of March 12 shows Ash and Paulson in a statistical dead heat. Right-wing PACs, Big Pharma, commercial banks, the Insurance Industry have all been pouring money into Paulson’s campaign. Ash has managed to pretty much keep up thanks to grassroots and netroots efforts on his behalf. Paulson’s biggest donor: Target Corp. Ash’s: ActBlue.
Ashwin Madia is a strong friend of the GLBT community, and a Marine Corps lawyer who served in Iraq. He’s also running neck-and-neck with Paulsen, as of the last polling done back in March — which is admittedly an eternity in political time, but political observers like the WaPo’s Chris Cillizza give him a fair-to-good chance of taking the seat.
UPDATE: Check out Madia’s ripping Short Ride Joe Lieberman into little tiny bits:
Today, the Republican Party announced that the loudest defender of status quo policies on Iraq, Senator Joe Lieberman, will be a prominent speaker at the Republican National Convention in my home state of Minnesota. Senator Lieberman and I do have one thing in common. We’ve both changed political parties. I left the Republican Party in 2002 after it replaced “balance our budget” with “borrow and spend” and after we started a war without a plan for success; a war we did not need.
With all respect to Senator Lieberman, talking tough about Iraq is not brave. Bravery is not demonstrated through words but instead through action.
I wish I lived in Madia’s district!