A Different Approach to Accountability

I saw this first in the Washington Post, and then over at Daily Kos - labor, trial lawyers, and progressive activists are launching a PAC and a lobbying firm aimed at making sure Democratic elected officials - in this case, in Congress - vote in a manner which matches the political makeup of their districts. If Democratic Congressmen do not vote their constituencies, They Work For Us and Working For Us PAC pledges to find primary opponents for them. There's one main difference separating this organization from the plans to do the same against Texas state reps - They Work For Us says they will not target Democrats with conservative districts.

So it is a plan that makes sense: holding Democrats accountable when they come from "safe" Democratic districts, where Republicans usually run a token strident super-right-winger who has no chance of winning; more realistically, in many of these districts it is not unreasonable to say that no Republican could win, as is the opposite case with some Texas districts. As usual, there's almost never a credible third party candidate. So, these Democrats are free to do what they want, with all the advantages of incumbency and no real danger of defeat.

Consider the difference between this kind of Democrat and the Patrick Roses of the world, who come from conservative districts, in which no other Democrat on earth would have a chance of winning. Does the same dynamic exist? Are these Democrats actually voting against their districts or their constituencies? I would argue they are not. I would also argue that mounting a primary opponent against someone like Rose and defeating him for the nomination would almost certainly guarantee the loss of the seat to the Republicans.

Now, in the case of Henry Cuellar, who keeps winning by increasingly larger margins in districts that continue to get more Democratic - he was unopposed in the 2006 special election for the 28th - the details are different and important. Cuellar has been endorsed by the Club For Growth, which in their organization's description states they support Republican candidates. He got a ton of love from George Bush after last year's State of the Union address from the Republican side of the aisle. Perry appointed him Secretary of State in 2001. The Blue Dog Democrats, the conservative Democrat caucus in Congress, were so certain he would switch parties that they rejected him as a member. The jury is not out on Cuellar - it is decidedly in, and everyone knows it. Additionally, we're not just talking about one vote where there were no Democrats to vote for, as in the Speaker's race: Cuellar stridently and often fails to represent the actual bent of his district.

The difference here is that in Cuellar's district, another credible Democrat could win the general, and another credible Democrat almost certainly would win the general. In Rose's district, that seems unlikely. The local approach seems to advocate scorched earth and teaching lessons as the expense of the seat, while They Work For Us seems more geared towards the battles that make sense, in large part because the party doesn't lose a seat if the primary challenger wins.

The leadership of the group is comprised of Steve Rosenthal, former political director of AFL-CIO and ; Anna Burger, the SEIU's secretary-treasurer; Linda Lipsen, a VP at the American Association for Justice, which you used to know as the American Trial Lawyers Association; and MoveOn.org executive director Eli Pariser. These guys are all well-known organizers and activists with a stated intent to ensure proper representation for liberal districts.

This is not necessarily a full-on endorsement of the idea of running Democrats against Democrats, but if its going to be done, a longer view in context of which districts are safe and which are not, as well as from which challenges the party would benefit most, seems more responsible, or reasonable.