No, Paul Hackett did not win. He lost, in a district that went 75%-25% for Bush last year by a mere 4000 votes, in a heavier-than-anticipated turnout.
How did he get 48% of the vote, and come within a whisker (and a highly corrupt voting apparatus in Ohio) of winning? By being a straight-talking candidate who's tough, who's pragmatic, and most of all, who MOTIVATES PEOPLE TO GET MOVING.
Bob Brigham of Swing State Project, who no doubt has been up all night, says it far better than I can:
As Paul Hackett would say, "ROCK ON!"
Raise your glass to fighting in every district, in every state, every day. When the assholes in D.C. (cc) write off a district a district, my answer is FUCK THEM. Because Democrats want to fight and we'll do it ourselves. There are no roadblocks -- let's get some shit done. People are going crazy celebrating tonight, the 2006 backlash will be huge.
(From Tim:) We are sitting in the bar right now, literally blogging this together. The mood is jubilant as we look forward to 2006. When Howard Dean was elected as DNC Chair, he made a promise to fight in every precinct, in every district, and in every state. For the past several weeks the future of the party, the grassroots, came together and fought a fight that the pundit political class said wasn't worth fighting. Consider this the opening salvo of the 2006 election cycle. I sat five feet away from Paul Hackett tonight as he talked to Jean Schmidt--he congratulated her and told him to say hello to the president for him ("the S.O.B")--This is take no prisoners now. The Republican Party is on notice. For that matter, the Democratic Party establishment is on notice; get with the program or we will leave you behind. We have a country to take back.
Paul Hackett is no wild-eyed left-wing extremist. He is, in fact, a Howard Dean Democrat -- pro-gun ownership, pro-choice, fiscally responsible. But what fighting a competitive fight in a red district means is that the Dean 50-state strategy can work, if the candidates are there and if We The People get behind them.
The netroots were extremely powerful here. Hackett's campaign needed $30,000, we raised almost $50,000. Over $400,000 were raised online through the power of Blogtopia -- enough when combined with Hackett's natural star quality and near-universal appeal, made this race a squeaker, when Hackett was supposed to be a sacrificial lamb.
And all this in the face of the kind of smear campaign by conservative talk radio that in a just world would make Republicans ashamed to be Republicans -- this idea that military service somehow "doesn't count" unless the veteran is a knee-jerk kool-aid drinker Bush supporter.
Well, guess what, Republicans, and guess what, Al From and Bob Shrum and Hillary Clinton and the rest of you DLC'ers:
We are not a fluke. We are not going away. We have money and energy to give in order to take our country back.
AND WE. WILL. NOT. BE. FUCKED. WITH.
UPDATE: Steve Gilliard:
Understand this: yesterday, thousands of Bush-supporting, longtime Republicans went into the booth and voted for a Democrat who attacked the President. A pro-choice moderate against the head of the local pro-life outfit.
These are people who haven't voted Democratic since 1980.
We're realists and we gave the money knowing he was a long shot. At no point did I think he would get this close. I thought 55-45 would send a message that we would fight anywhere, anytime. Those extra three points makes a big difference. In most of the counties he lost 51-49
This sends a completely different message.
This says we can support candidates, get them noticed, and get them competative. Hackett had NO chance before the Net went to support him. What has to be realized is that Schmidt will only have the seat for 14 months, Hackett is in a great position to run again. It often takes two or three runs to win a Congressional seat.
First of all, the NRCC had to come in and save Schmidt after her campaign manager was caught flatfooted by the extra money Hackett suddenly had.
Second, the attacks on Hackett's military service was a major, major mistake. In polling last year, Zogby showed that the Swift Boat attacks had no real effect on Kerry.
But the attack on a serving reservist blew up in their faces. There is NO other way, except for lingering resentment about Coingate, to account for the massive swing in such a solidly red district. A 12 point swing, which is massive. As people have been saying, in any other district in the state, he'd be going to Congress.
And to compound it, the people critizing him were Navy staff officers. Jesus, Marines, even, ex-Marines, have no love for the Navy. That pissed off a LOT of people. The region south of Columbus has been hard hit by Marine casualities in Iraq. Six dead scout-snipers Monday, 14 riflemen killed and wounded a month or so ago. Slandering a man who served in Iraq was a dumb strategy, especially in a region heavy with veterans. But to have sailors question a Marine's honesty and courage in battle? Jesus, that was dumb. People have been hurt in bars for less.
There was almost a Pavlovian reaction when he attacked Dear Leader. The GOP went nuts. They didn't use any common sense or discuss other issues. They made it about him, not their crappy, lying candidate.
So he ran with it and we helped him.
There are some lessons here, but we can discuss them later.
What people should take away from this is that this was a Pyhrric victory for the GOP. A formerly safe seat was turned into a squeaker.
We did some good work here. A win would have been nice, and the trolls and the clueless will whine about this, but that wasn't the point of this exercise.
Think of this as a commando mission. We messed with the opposition in their heartland, made some points and will take what we learned here to do it better next time.
We went into a deep red district and almost took it. Think of a deep blue district where they could do the same. It's a bad day when you have to fight for what is a safe seat.
And to you, Major Hackett: Thanks for a job well done. And please...if you go back to Iraq, please watch your back. People who embarrass the Bush Junta have a nasty habit of turning up dead. Please stay safe.
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