It's in the P-I

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, along with its comrades in the Washington state Democratic Party, is showering unprecedented admiration on a conservative Republican Senate candidate who has no chance of winning the nomination, let alone the general election:

Reed Davis is waging a steeply uphill campaign for the Republican U.S. Senate nomination, but help occasionally arrives from an unusual source.

To boost Rep. George Nethercutt, the near-prohibitive favorite for the GOP nomination to oppose Democratic Sen. Patty Murray, state and national Republican Party officials have treated Davis as a non-person.

The state Democratic Party, meanwhile, has done its best to promote the burly political science professor and former King County Republican Party chairman -- and, of course, to embarrass Nethercutt.

To be fair to both Prof. Davis and the state Republican Party, nobody is treating Davis as a "non-person". I think it's more correct to say that Davis has himself boosted Rep. Nethercutt by running on a platform that most party activists consider a "non-winner".

The P-I/Democrat distortion machine is putting out a bizarre three-part message somehow intended to damage George Nethercutt more than it is designed to help elect Reed Davis:

1) Reed Davis' conservative views are outside the mainstream
2) Never mind that both George Nethercutt and Reed Davis say that Nethercutt's record and stated priorities are different from Davis', the Democrats want you to believe that Nethercutt and Davis are indistinguishable conservative extremists.
3) Never mind that a debate between Nethercutt and Davis wouldn't reveal any new information, as most of the Republicans who care about such things already know that George Nethercutt is a center-right candidate with statewide appeal while Reed Davis has insufficient appeal and experience. Nevertheless, Democrats are trying to persuade independent voters to reject Nethercutt because he won't spend his time debating an unviable candidate.

If this is the best the Democrats and the P-I can come up with to explain why Patty Murray deserves another six years in the Senate, then God bless them all. At the same time, I will permit myself a little fun by playing their game for a moment. Let's call on Patty Murray to debate her fringe primary challenger, Dr. Mohammad H. Said. Why should the Democrats re-nominate a Senator who merely praises Osama Bin Laden, when they could have a candidate who is a full-bore jihadist?

Posted by Stefan Sharkansky at September 03, 2004 12:24 PM | Email This