re: #232 Interesting Times

You’re in a deeply red part of TX - can you think of any message that could successfully peel away enough voters to make a difference? Or are they hopeless “GOP uber alles” types who’d excuse anything up to and including a full-blown kleptocracy?

re: #247 Belafon

In this deeply red part of NE, the message is more of a local one: Jane Kleeb is looking to run against Adrian Smith. Mrs. Kleeb is deeply respected here for the fight she mounted against the Keystone XL Pipeline on behalf of everyone in the state courts (hunters, ranchers, farmers, conservatives, liberals, &c).

She also gained valuable organisational skills for that fight, winning in state court showing the GOP Unicameral violated the state constitution by giving the state governor the authority to approve a route. Right now, the pipeline is a dead letter in this state. The only way any route could be approved would be if the Federal government somehow took state authority away for that, and doing that would go over like a lead balloon with the voters.

Democrats winning in deeply red areas of the country involves identifying the local issues that matter to the voters and making sure they understand who it is that is putting the screws to them.

You probably won’t get a whole lot of Republicans to cross lines and vote for Democrats, but you’ll get a few, and in a highly gerrymandered district like mine that makes the difference. Moreover, if the Republican voter decides that “they’re both the same” and simply chooses to stay home rather than vote, that works against the GOP as well.