Senate 2008 Guru: Following the Races

Keeping a close eye on developments in the 2008 U.S. Senate races

Friday, June 08, 2007

Friday Morning Quick Hits

  • South Dakota: Senator Tim Johnson will likely return to the Senate by September.

  • Alaska: The FBI investigating Ted Stevens' 'situation' isn't just the talk of blogs and DC talking heads. He is getting bad local press too.

  • New Hampshire: Former NH-Dem Chair Kathy Sullivan discusses the Draft Jeanne Shaheen movement that she is spearheading.

  • Wyoming: A law professor makes a Constitutional argument against Wyoming's Senate vacancy-filling policy, in which the state Party of the late Senator selects three potential replacements from which the Governor appoints one.

  • Kansas: The KS-GOP may be sweating more than the cursory observer might notice. Right now, Kansas is my sleeper pick for a competitive Senate race.

  • New Jersey: Another sign that Frank Lautenberg is probably very safe: an NJ-Dems event with Bill Clinton raised double what an NJ-GOP event with George W. Bush raised.

  • Nebraska: Another insightful look at the latest round in Hagel v. Bruning from New Nebraska Network. After three rounds, they score two for Bruning, one for Hagel.

  • Minnesota: CQPolitics profiles Democratic Senate candidate Bob Olson.

  • New Fox show: "When Republicans Attack!"

  • Remember Brit Hume's question to the GOP Prez candidates in the Fox News debate about the lengths to which the prospective Commanders-in-Chief would go to get information on possible terrorist plots, basically asking if the candidates would allow torture to prevent an attack? Well, in light of this letter, I have an important question for the Republican Presidential candidates: "Would you be willing to eliminate the 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' policy if having gay members of the military directly prevented a terrorist attack?"

    • posted by Senate2008Guru | 11:44 AM

    1 Comments:

    Blogger VA Blogger said...

    That Wyoming bit is pure crap. The 17th grants Governors the power to "appoint"; it doesn't not specify the process before the appointment. In the absence of Constitutional clarity or specification, it is up to state law. Even though the law directs the Republican Party to select three names--even if the law directed the town crier to select a name randomly from a pool of guys named "Johnson--it is still the Governor who actually appoints the person to the Senate, fulfilling his Constitutionally-assigned duty. Straying from outside this process would be a violation of Wyoming law.

    The article you linked to makes a supremely large assumption when it asserts that the state legislature cannot "make or constrain" such appointments (emphasis mine). It is true that the state legislature cannot make the appointment. But there is no inkling in the Constitution that states that the state legislature cannot write law setting parameters on his power of appointment. We live in a Republic with at least shred of federalism left; since the Constitution does not forbid it, the state legislature is in full compliance with the Constitution when it enforces such a provision. In the same manner, other states are in full compliance when they demand the Governor appoint a member of the same party in the event of a vacancy.

    12:31 PM, June 08, 2007  

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