So here we have it. Democrats, despite controlling majorities in both the house and the senate, caved to Republicans on the Fayetteville Finger. All they had to do was vote as a block, let the Republicans scream, and pass the damn map that would have allowed us to compete in three of the four districts. Now we’re stuck with this map for ten years that may not even come close to doing that. Don’t get me wrong, I’m happy that the first gained some southern delta counties rather than moving west, but I wish we could have helped Democrats in the second and fourth as well. Can we still compete in the 4th with this map, post Ross? God I hope so. Do we have a shot at taking down Griffin still? I think so, but it will be tricky. I’m a never say never, charge hell with a bucket of water kind of guy…but I have to say, this leaves a foul taste in my mouth.
Fayetteville Democrats that opposed the finger have much to be proud of here. They made it easy for Republicans to get their way, undermined their own party, and worked to screw fellow Democrats across the state over. Not all of them to be sure. There were a lot of great Democrats in Fayetteville who stood up and got on board, folks like Greg Leding who proved he’s a team player and that we made no mistake in supporting him last year. Again, I will never understand the masochism behind that thinking. But hey, if they’re happy to screw Arkansas Democrats over on something as fundamental as drawing a map we can compete on, I’m happy to litmus test every politician that comes out of Fayetteville on rather they supported the finger or not. If they weren’t on board with helping Democrats compete, then hey, they shouldn’t expect one bit of help from this site in the future.
Truth be told though, I’m more upset with the Democrats in the Senate. There was no reason to undermine Democrats like this, especially after folks like Leding put their necks on the line and Clark Hall had tried his damndest, God bless him, to make sure we could at least stand 50/50 chances in 3/4s of the state. A bunch of cowards and back stabbers, the whole lot of them, and I’m in the mood where I want the names of every single Democrat in the legislature that worked to undermine us on this. As I said many times, no politician has ever lost his job because of a vote on redistricting. But if it turns out that it was the same folks that screwed us on other votes this session, then I say we mount some primary challenges.
From here, well, we do our best of what we got. Things look pretty good in the 1st and so-so in the second. I don’t care about Ross but I was hoping that after he steps down in 2014 we could nominate and elect a good Democrat from that district. I’d like to be more enthused and ready to rally the troops, but it’s hard to do that when folks in the Democratic Party are working so hard to undermine Democrats.
