Tuesday brought one of the craziest races I have ever seen, and it was even more notable that not a soul in the television media talked about it. No, I’m not talking about how Mitt very narrowly beat Santorum the same way Bush squeaked past Kerry in 2004. I’m talking about the REAL race that had actual consequences…The congressional race that saw the unthinkable happen…novelty candidate Joe the Plumber win, and legendary Dennis Kucinich lose.
Just to explain: On the Republican side the tool bag formerly (and currently for no good reason) known as “Joe the Plumber” won against an opponent nobody has ever heard of. How did he do this? By getting big name endorsements like Herman Cain, national television coverage, and outspending his opponent (some real estate agent) five to one. Not bad for a guy who’s supposed to be a working class plumber. Of course, it turns out that old Joe is pretty damn phony. Even his name is wrong as he’s 1. Not a plumber, and outspent his opponent five to one, so he can’t claim to be “working class” anything. 2. His name’s not even Joe. It’s Samuel Wurzelbacher. Jackass.
Then you had the Democrat side which was even more competitive. Due to suspicious “re-districting” of the state (i.e. to force two Democrats to share one seat and get rid of one of them) two longtime congressional Democrats Marcy Kaptur and legendary progressive Dennis Kucinich had to share the seat and therefore fight each other in the primary. In a type of “Superdome” for Democrats where “Two Dems enter, one shall leave!”
Kucinich, played up the fact that Marcy is a half-assed liberal at best and has a very conservative voting record. Marcy played up the non-sense issue of Dennis supposedly spending time in the Pacific Northwest (gee, would I rather spend time in depressing rust-belt Ohio or progressive coastal towns?) and some vague talking point about “jobs.” You guessed it, Marcy won.
Representative Kucinich was a prickly, sometimes unlikable figure, but a very important one for progressives nonetheless. Sure, he flirted with being a jackass quite a bit (scowling during interviews, running for president so he could waste everyone’s time, saying Obama should be impeached for doing something in Libya, etc.), but he was there to be the liberal side’s version of Ron Paul.
In fact, calling him the “Liberal Ron Paul” is probably a very accurate description. Some people in the party hate him, while others are thrilled that finally someone is speaking out against the military industrial complex, you know, things Democrats are SUPPOSED to do. Perhaps it says something about where the Democrat party is at now that Ron Paul is a beloved cult icon for saying things his party doesn’t stand for but Kucinich couldn’t even hold onto his congressional seat for saying things his party should stand for.
One thing’s for certain, having Kucinich out of congress makes the Democratic side just a little bit more worthless. Keep in mind, this is the same party where Alan Grayson was voted out, Anthony Weiner was pushed out, and Barney Frank is retiring. Kucinich was arguably one of the last true fighters left in the Democratic congress, and certainly the best-known of whatever’s left. I’ll miss Kucinich and what he represents, and I seriously doubt anyone would have said the same about Marcy Kaptur if she had lost.