Hiatus

unfortunately, I haven't been posting very often. This is a sad consequence of my college schedule. There are a number a good campaigns going on, but I have my hand in a few of them so I feel it would be a conflict of interest.

In the meantime, I'll be posting about the MD Senate district 34 & 35 races on my www.dailykos.com diary (Spuchuu.dailykos.com) [I've been told this doesn't work, but this is all I can do for the time being]

DailyKos is a very good site for Progressive and/or liberal blogging and most of the regular people posting are well-informed. (Caveate: They tend to be a bit more aggressive than Harfordem, just warning you)

When I find time to post, I will. Do not feel as though you're alone in the cold. There's a new HQ opening up this Saturday.

Council Races

I currently see this set up: [I'm mentioning races that are competitive, or what can be done to make them so.]
[Race: (potential voting pattern)
description]

Council A: (Dem)
Guthrie has exponentially more cash-on hand than Biggs. Unless Biggs can tear apart Guthrie topic-to-topic (and Dion WILL delcare everything he had a hand in), District A will stay blue. Dion has a great word-of-mouth campaign and an equally good amount of Republican support; enough to overcome the undecided all voting for Biggs.

Council B: (Toss-up/Likely Republican)
Val Twanmoh has gone against Chenowith twice and is hoping, "...third time's the charm..." [actual quote]. Interesting factoid: Val gained 4,000+ more votes in 2002 than in 1998. If she repeats and gains HALF of that, she wins. She has a serious financial shortfall compared to Chenowith. Also consider Bittner, but not as a winner. The Green party can consistently cannibalized the Democratic vote. After 12 years with little to show for it except, "I have unfinished business..." Chenowith might have a fight on her hands.

Council C: (toss-up/too close to call)
There was MASSIVE voter apathy in the 2002 general election. Little over 16K votes with over 22K possible voters. This ALL depends on the GOTV efforts. Word has come to me that Morrissey-Ward is hungry for victory. Such candidates have won on sheer will alone. McMahan has what I consider a 'minor' cash advantage.

Council D (Toss-up/Lean Republican)
I can not go so far as to say that Chad Shrodes has a cash advantage, but it could be the only one he has. If any election has an obligatory popularity contest, this is probably it. Republicans call Shrodes the, "...Ultimate Switch-o-Crat..." and I haven't seen someone YET come forward to say "I like Terence Cox". A good ground campaign and GOTV effort will win this seat.

Council E (Lean Dem)
I call this a 'lean Dem' race only because of registration figures (which badly need to be updated). If Wheeler can get a good GOTV and convince some 'undeclared' voters to side with him, the race will be Wheeler's, despite Slutzky's $15,000 advantage.

Council F: (Likely Dem)
More dems than repubs voted in the primary by almost 2 to 1. Lisanti is driven and has actual motivation to win. Lisanti also has an easy-to-find website. I tried for five minutes to Google a Correri webpage and I did not find much. Mary Ann has a strong ground campaign and good HdG support. Correri needs to get a message out if he wants to win.

Council President: (Republican)
Now that Boniface is the clear competitor, White presently has a clear target. If White wants to make the race competitive, he has to step up fundraising (no candidate for this position can win without it), get a solid ground campaign, or find the world's best GOTV effort if he wants the Council President job. This is liable to be a very uphill race for White. Meanwhile, if Boniface doesn't want to lose his foothold, he must not accept developer contributions...or open his mouth. Boniface can in theory not say anything at all, or even lift a finger, or spend money to win Council President.

Voting Day

Cross-posted on FreeStatePolitics

I'm keeping this short and sweet...

Vote! The primary is more important than the general and here's why...

You actually get to choose the candidate you prefer over the ones you don't. So if you like Mfume or Cardin, vote for him and support whoever wins the nomination.

The more people in your voting precinct vote, the more attention you are given in future campaigns!

So, keep up the American tradition and vote! If you stay home because you don't like the candidates, then you're just lazy, and who likes lazy people?

The Aegis does it again!

Cross-Posted on Maryland Federation of College Democrats and Diaried on Dailykos...


Many of you may not get the Aegis, the "Premiere" newspaper circulating in Harford county and parts of Baltimore and Cecil counties. The Aegis is published by Homestead publishing, owned by the Tribune Co., which also owns The Baltimore Sun. The Aegis is unapologetically Republican in nature. They aren't even in line with Neo-Cons, or the mainstream conservatives. They hate just about everyone that doesn't strictly act Republican.

Take yesterdays article, "An 'R' Needed To Win?" In which Executive Editor Ted Hendricks pretty much somes up, in-over a half-page of news, that Democrats suck. The venom is so fierce in this article that he assualts Republican Delegate Joanne Parrott because she isn't in the rank-and-file. Hendricks continues on by making the point that because Democrats only outnumber Republicans by little over 900, that Democrats amount to nothing county-wide!

This is probably one of the sickest attempts at "Journalism" I've seen since Fox News went on the air. With the accuracy of reporting and the frequent liberal-bashing coming from that paper, The Aegis makes Fox News look left-of-center! I run a private blog for Harford Co. Democrats, but the people who read that blog know what they're getting; an analysis of the news, local officials and some light advocacy. People actually go to the Aegis for *gasp* NEWS!

This outrages me more than I know. When I finished reading that it infuriated me. How dare a podunk, backwater, contrite, pedantic, and sad excuse for a newspaper attempt to feed me such garbage that just because this district is almost entirely represented by Republicans that Dems can pretty much be dismissed.

This is why I'm a Democrat. People are Democrats, that I've noticed, by choice. I know a guy who was Republican for 15 years and switched. I took him to a meeting with some other Democrats and, while he felt out of place at first, yet he quickly settled in and felt welcomed like he was part of the bunch. If the roles are reversed, you have to bear some harsh punishment from people calling you a switch-o-crat (which doesn't even roll off the tongue, c'mon people think of something better. Cut-and-Run was a so much easier to say!)

If this is how The Aegis treats Democrats, with a 900+ person advantage, just imagine how they treat the third parties!

reader feedback

I would like to hear more from my readers! I have no idea how many people read this blog, nor how frequently they check. As a request from me, please post more often in the comments section. I'm not GOPerative, and I won't be critical of what anyone says.

Therefore, I'm opening a position here at harcodem for an additional blogger. If there are many good applicants, I will consider adding them also.

The duties are as follows...

• At least one post a week.
  
• Any post must be clear as possible.
• The point of any post must be understandable. (There will be flexibility in this duty)
• As little profanity as possible.
• Obviously must be liberal, progressive or left-of-center in their ideology.
• (This is a must and will be enforced...) Must stand by everything you say.

If you wish to be on the HarCoDem staff, please send a sample post to HarCoDem@Gmail.com.

what do I see?

I look at the races pre-primary. I see Kane and Chenowith being the big contested race that gets my interest. Many are focusing on Council President, and I don't blame them; three contenders and all three say they're qualified. Harcodem will not speculate on the outcome of County Council President.

District B is Chenowith vs. Kane vs. Walters , with the general looking like Twanmoh(D) vs. (Repulican Primary Winner) vs. Bittner (G). Now I don't know abotu you all, but I look forward to seeing finance reports from everyone's respective camps and making a call based off of that.

Other interesting races?
District A- Dion Guthrie said he'd have a website for his campaign by June. Guess what? None.

That may have been something you could have gotten away with in the last election cycle, but that's just not something you ignore these days. If Guthrie wins the primary, he has a good chance of winning the general. He has enough support from both sides in district A to win, but if one of the other challengers wins the primary, I will swear to you that that person will be against the current the entire wayand would be lucky to win the general.

More later on... keep your eyes open

Harford Farm Fair

Me and an associate of mine came to the fair. Hot...really hot.

onto the politics...

Val (district b) stood out. Jesse Bane really stood out...it appears that he's either got money to burn, or is afraid of his Terry Serago competition.

The NHDC had a decent showing, but it would have helped if someone at that booth knew a little bit of something on a majority of candidates. A few of the no-names got some good recognition.

short post cut even shorter, the dems had a decent showing at the farm fair. Republicans were too many to really care.