I sit here tonight wondering if we should be apologizing to some other good liberal candidates for the resources Becky Greenwald's poorly run campaign sucked out of the system. 

DesMoinesDem – you owe true liberals an apology for all the ink you gave Greenwald all over the blogasphere.  You were blind in your support for her with numerous posts that were misleading and full of inaccurate facts about how that race was really playing out.

It was clear that Becky was already running a horrible race long before her bailout blunder — and after that it was more than over — it was a dead cause – unsaveable.

But you and so many others blindly marched on claiming that it was close and momentum was on her side.  Anyone who had taken a one hour drive around that district could tell that she just was not doing well based on the lack of signs along the road.  And yes — I know that signs don't win elections — but they are a good indication of the strength of organization and intensity of support – it just was never there for Greenwald.

Back to the question to soberly ponder: were precious financial resources – that could have been used on closer races where actual pick-ups were still within our grasp – wasted when they were directed to Becky's bumbling blundering campaign of woe and disaster?

I mean — come on – 21 points?!?!?  Harkin and Obama's name on the same ballot should have gotten her to within 10 easily. 

Think of what the money spent by the UAW and Emily's List and the many other groups that were misled into tossing cash because you and others made them think that anyone over at Greenwald knew what the heck they were doing.

Case in point – Al Franken alone could have benefited from that UAW money — that could have made the difference — but it was wasted on a waste of a campaign and candidate.  Or how about Don Cazayoux who lost in LA?  Kansas Congresswoman Nancy Boyda could have saved her seat with the EMILY's List funds wasted on Greenwald.

I think there are those – and you know who you are because I saw your postings all over the place – who owe Democrats an apology for your misjudgment on this one.

All the best — NOT William Meyer.

I am so rip-you know what mad at our party today.  We caved!  We caved — and we were bought off on some flood provisions that should have been passed already.  The worst part is that our delegation (and Becky Greenwald with her statement supporting Goerge Bush's plan!!!!!!!!) caved and gave George W. Bush a BLANK CHECK for $700 Billion of OUR money to give to his greedy buddies on Wall Street.  Where is the anger?!?!?!

Read the bill yourself — and here is one respected member's take on this:

Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) issued the following statement after voting against the Wall Street bail out plan, H.R. 1424, the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008:

 “The public is being led to believe that Congress has reconsidered its position because we have before us a better bill than we had a few days ago.  It is the same bill plus hundreds of new pages for hundreds of millions of tax breaks.  What does this have to do with the troubles of Wall Street?

 “Driven by fear we are moving quickly to pass a bill, which may produce a temporary uptick for the market, but nothing for millions of homeowners whose misfortunes are at the center of our economic woes. People do not have money to pay their mortgages.  After this passes, they will still not have money to pay their mortgages.  People will still lose their homes while Wall Street is bailed out.

 “The central flaw of this bill is that there are NO stronger protections for homeowners and NO changes in the language to ensure that the secretary has the authority to compel mortgage servicers to modify the terms of mortgages. And there are NO stronger regulatory changes to fix the circumstances that allowed this to happen.

 “We should have created a mechanism for our government to take a controlling interest in mortgage-backed securities and use our power to work out a new deal for the homeowners.  We could have done this.  We should have done this.  But we didn't.

 “Now millions of Americans will face the threat of foreclosure without any help.  And the numbers will soon rise for a number of reasons.  Not only because of the Alt-A, jumbo mortgages which will soon be reset at higher interest rates, but because the London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) is pushing up rates on adjustable mortgages and more than half of the US adjustable mortgage rates are tied to LIBOR.  Homeowner defaults will grow in significant numbers.  Let’s see if Congress will be as quick to help homeowners on Main Street as they were to help speculators on Wall Street.

 “Now the government will have to borrow $700 billion from banks, with interest, to give banks a $700 billion bailout, and in return the taxpayers get $700 billion in toxic debt.  The Senate “improved” the bailout by giving tax breaks to people in foreclosure.  People in foreclosure need help paying their mortgage, they do not seek tax breaks.

 “Across our Nation, foreclosures continue to devastate our communities, people are losing their jobs, and the prices of necessities are skyrocketing. This legislation, just like the one we defeated last week, will do nothing to solve the problems plaguing American families or help them to get out from underneath the oppressive debt they have been forced to take on.

 “Unfortunately, there has been no discussion of the underlying debt-based economy and the role of our monetary system in facilitating the redistribution of wealth upwards.

 “It is not as though we had no choice but to pass the bill before us. We could have done this differently. We could have demanded language in the legislation that would have empowered the Treasury to compel mortgage servicers to rework the terms of mortgage loans so homeowners could avoid foreclosure. We could have put regulatory structures in place to protect investors.  We could have stopped the speculators.

 “This bill represents an utter failure of the Democratic process.  It represents the triumph of special interest over the triumph of the public interest.  It represents the inability of government to defend the public interest in the face of great pressure from financial interests.  We could have recognized the power of government to prime the pump of the economy to get money flowing through out society by creating jobs, health care, and major investments in green energy.  What a lost opportunity!  What a moment of transition away from democracy and towards domination of America by global economic interests.

 “Years ago, in a Cleveland neighborhood, I saw a hand-scrawled sign above a cash register in a delicatessen.  The sign said:  “In God We Trust, All Others Pay Cash.”  The sign above the Speaker's rostrum reads “In God We Trust,” but we are paying the cash to Wall Street.

 “It is not as if we had no other choice but to pass this bill.”

While I know that having a D run as an I is not the best situation I do have to raise a red flag when I see anyone – especially one of our “leaders” trying to suppress a legitimate democratic activity — running for office.  While I don’t know if I could vote for an I when we have such a strong D running I do know that William is passionate and full of ideals that will make this a healthy democratic process.  Shame on anyone who plays the game of trying to push him out of what he has every right to do.  Tom and I are of the same generation — it is hard to see him forget and quickly toss away what we all have fought so long for through the years just to help his good friend out.

Meyers Won’t Drop Independent House Bid, Despite Claim of Dem’s Deal

by: Jason Hancock – The Iowa Independent

Jul 17, 2008 at 14:56 PM  

Independent congressional candidate William Meyers said a meeting this morning with a member of the Democratic Party’s 4th District Central Committee has not swayed him to give up his campaign.

Meyers finished third out of four candidates in the June 3 Democratic primary and almost immediately afterward announced he would continue to run for the House seat of incumbent Republican Tom Latham as an independent.

This morning Meyers met for coffee with Tom Harrington of the central committee. Meyers said at the meeting he was offered a spot on the central committee if he agreed to end his independent run. Harrington said no such offer was made, only the suggestion “from one Democrat to another” that if Meyers felt wronged in the primary process,  it would be easy for him to join the central committee and try to change things.

“I was not there as a representative of the Democratic Party,” Harrington said. “And I certainly didn’t make any formal offer. I read on blogs and in the newspaper that he felt he was treated unfairly in the primary, and I wanted to see what his issues were.”

Meyers said that while there was no “formal offer,” it was clear why Harrington was there.

“He was there to discourage me from running as an independent,” he said. “It was pretty clear. I told him I wasn’t interested in what he had to offer, and the meeting ended very cordially.”

District central committee members are elected by county central committees, so Harrington is not in a position to offer a seat since elections took place at county conventions earlier this year. But Harrington said there are seats that were left unfilled, and he mentioned to Meyers it would be pretty easy for him to get on the committee.

Meyers, a former anti-terrorist specialist for the Marines, told the Iowa Independent on June 5 that county Democratic Party leaders improperly shut him out of key meetings and prevented him from obtaining information critical to his primary campaign. He said Democratic chairmen or their staff in Warren, Dallas, Kossuth and Webster counties failed to provide information such as lists of county activists. He also said he was not invited to some meetings at which some of his three opponents spoke to party activists.

It was for those reasons he decided to run, Meyers said, and those issues would not be solved simply by his joining the central committee.

“If I end my campaign, I lose all my leverage to change things,” he said. “There is a lot of behind-the-scenes baloney that goes on, and I am very skeptical of the people in power of the state party right now.”

The first day Meyers can file to run as an independent candidate is July 28. He attained the 300 signatures needed to file before the primary vote even took place. He said he anticipates that this won’t be the last contact the Iowa Democratic Party has with him to try to get him to drop his campaign, but unlessparty members are serious about instituting rule changes to stop what he sees as “good old boy” politics, he will follow through with his independent run into November.

Meyers also said he has heard from nine people looking for help to file as no-party candidates to run in legislative races this fall against incumbent Democrats who supported the state’s smoking ban, but he would not release their names to Iowa Independent without getting permission from the nine first.

“They turned to me for advice on how to do it,” he said. “It’s very encouraging to get that kind of response.”

Meyers will face off with Latham and Democrat Becky Greenwald this fall.

I love to do the quick math when someone dumps a bunch of personal weath into a campaign run — Kurt Meyer (who cares where the heck he lives now eh?) put in $108,000 of his own (or his wifes?) money into this race.

For the just over 5,000 votes he got — he personally paid just over $22.50 per vote out of his pocket.  That is amazing.

Got this from Kurt Meyer campaign — looks like this thing is over and he will breeze into the nomination with figures like this!  I am impressed:

Dear Friends, 

We are pleased to announce that the Kurt Meyer for Congress Campaign has generated more than $130,000 in the first quarter of 2008. In the six weeks after Kurt announced his candidacy in mid-February, the campaign has received hundreds of generous contributions from family and friends throughout the District, across Iowa, and around the country.

Having the financial backing of citizens of the 4th District and the great state of Iowa sends a strong message to Washington: the 4th District is ready for Democratic leadership, and Kurt Meyer is the candidate to deliver that change.  What’s more, every dollar enables Kurt to reach out to citizens from each of the 28 counties of the 4th District to hear their stories and learn about their needs.    

It is undeniable that the generous support of family, friends, and voters has given the Kurt Meyer for Congress Campaign a great start. But it is only a start.  Running an intense, aggressive and effective campaign against an entrenched incumbent can take millions of dollars – but we can do this with your help.  If you’ve already given, we ask that you consider giving again. If you have yet to make a contribution, we ask that you join the hundreds of Kurt’s supporters who have already made a difference in this campaign by going to www.kurtmeyerforcongress.com and making a contribution.

We appreciate your continued support and look forward to broadening our support base with your help.

Best,

Emily

Emily Caponetti

Campaign Manager

Kurt Meyer for Congress