One DCCC takeaway from PA-18: Lamb "fit the district," per memo to reporters.
— Rebecca Berg (@rebeccagberg) March 14, 2018
"There are dozens of Democratic candidates like Conor Lamb – with deep records of service that take them outside the partisan frame."
Paul Ryan says he won because he's basically a Republican! Both sides agree: Lamb is not really a Democrat!
I'm not interested in arguing about where he - or his campaign - actually falls on the political spectrum, but this kind of thing is a reminder that for as long as I have paid attention, "professional Democrats" have been running against brand Democrat. Yes people like me carp about the Democrats, but nobody carps about Democrats more than the people who earn lots of money to get them elected. I don't know what's standard now, but back in the old days- the aughts - candidates were advised to keep their partisan affiliation (that they were a shhhh Democrat) off of their web sites. One of my criteria for raising money for candidates, when I did that, was that they did the bare minimum of identifying as a Democrat (psss... it's on the ballot no matter what you do, idiots).
"Another kind of a Democrat." "A new kind of Democrat." "A Democrat, but not like those other nasty Democrats." This is not a branding operation that works long term. There's just an immense amount of self-loathing in the party that assholes like me can't even begin to match. The right thing to do when someone like Lamb wins - whatever his politics - is to stamp a big D on the win and claim him, not distance him from the party. It's one thing to expand the tent, it's another thing to say that everyone who wins does so by standing outside the tent pissing into it.
I used to always say that one Democrat can win by running against the party, but when they all do they just bring down the brand. What do Democrats stand for? Well, you see, Jimmy, mostly they stand for not being Democrats. Um, ok.