“National political pundit Dick Morris last week declared the race “winnable” for Lollar, …”

Nate Silver:

“If you’re a consumer of political news, a lot of the people you encounter are going to err on the side of exaggerating the amount of uncertainty in a particular race. And a lot of the rest may do just the opposite: they’ll make wild, irresponsible predictions that sound good on television, where nobody remembers 99 percent of what you say half an hour later, even in the YouTube era.

Particularly cunning pundits may even do both at once: make a ridiculous prediction, and hedge it to the hilt. On the eve of the 2008 election, Dick Morris labeled states like Tennessee and Louisiana, where there was no evidence suggesting they were close, as being “tossups,” which implied a landslide victory for Barack Obama was in the offing. But in the very same article, Mr. Morris also said the election was “in flux” and that there could be a “razor-thin margin going either way.” That’s called covering your bases!”

http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/09/29/the-uncanny-accuracy-of-polling-averages-part-i-why-you-cant-trust-your-gut/

This is the problem with Republicans who, after two consecutive cycles of Democrat victories, endlessly cite data about partisan alignment as if they were talking about fixed concrete facts — it amounts to a defeatist surrender to the status quo, an argument for inertia and apathy.

Game-changer elections are won by dynamic candidates who don’t buy into that kind of status quo mentality, who understand a basic fact about politics: Polls don’t win elections. Campaigns win elections.

You can’t win if you don’t campaign and the clueless assholes at GOP-HQ — who pour millions into supposed “safe bet” candidates who end up losing — are guilty of abetting defeatism because their “smart” strategies end up starving promising candidates like Lollar of the resources they need to campaign effectively.

I say, fuck the experts, and to hell with trying to build a reputation as a prognosticator: Here’s a good candidate, and I’m going to support him in every way I can.

Here’s the point: Beilat and Lollar would have been equally great men and qualified candidates two years ago, but they wouldn’t have stood a chance. So the calculations do matter, and still must play their part for most of us who cannot possibly offer even token support to every good candidate out there.

A part of these calculations surely involve the opponents. Hoyer deserves targeting as part of the leadership and spear-carrier for Pelosi, and Frank would be the one whose defeat would most benefit the country (him being the principal architect of the sub-prime lending disaster which fed the housing boom into bust and nearly bankrupted the entire world). But there is a very good fellow running against Pelosi, too, and in several of the “safe” Democratic seats with 60%+ black voting age population, as well – none have a ghost of a chance.

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Off topic, are you going to throw Rand Paul under the bus as an establishment collaborator now that he’s promised to vote for McConnell for Senate GOP Leader?

along those lines, I have a nice sendoff message for Mr. Frank, click on this video. Let’s energize and mobilize. http://bit.ly/coO9Xz