Randy Kuhl

The mission statement fot this website indicate that we are here to build a new, vibrant responsive Republican Party. Not to accede to letting failed insiders continue the insanity that resulted in back-to-back election debacles in 2006 and 2008.

If there's ever been a reason for the Rightosphere to rise up and nip a bad idea in the bud it's coming this morning from upstate New York.  Failed former Republican Congressman Randy Kuhl   now thinks he ought to run again for the seat he lost to the now disgraced and soon to resign Eric Massa.

In a world full of bad ideas, this ranks up there as one of the worst.

Randy Kuhl is an aging member of the NYS GOP establishment who simply isn't a very popular politician. In three runs for this district, he never exceeded 51.6% of the vote. And this district is probably the closest thing to a GOP stronghold in contemporary New York.

No, when you run thousands of votes behind John McCain's performance in a state he didn;t campaign in you are simply not a good enough politician to be offered a second chance. (McCain won NY 29; Kuhl didn't) Not when you accomplished little in your prior stint in Congress. And where your 24 years of service in the hideous cesspool known as the New York State Legislature is going to be held against you.

And consider this. Kuhl lost to Massa in spite of the fact Massa had never held a single elected or appointed office in the district.   

Randy is a "Cuse grad. But that's about his only attribute.

Kuhl is worse than the usual "Certified Pre-Owned candidates" the GOP establishment are finding--most of them were successful politicians in the past.  This campaign would have the reek of failure from the get-go.

Before Massa fell on his sword the Republicans had what one wag thought was a "sacrificial lamb" in the race--former Corning Mayor Tom Reed, Jr.   But there's no comparison to Kuhl.  Reed is young, on his way up and actually won an election.

If the powers that be think the populous Monroe County portion of the district near Rochester need a candidate, then County Executive Maggie Brooks makes more electoral sense than a retread from tiny Hammondsport.

Here's the main point. If we don;t make abundantly clear this is a huge mistake that we aren't signing up, then the good old boys in the DC and NY GOP establishment are going to take care of their own.

This can't happen on this one. We've got to go to the mattresses on this one.

Running retreads to public office in 2010 just isn't "Kuhl". And we aren;t going to be "Kuhl" with them even trying on this one. 

I have been a little skeptical of the whole #dontGo thing. Perhaps inappropriately so. I saw three thinigs today that might be changing my mind about the effect. At the very least, it is changing Democratic minds and raising GOP coin. I can't ask for better than that.

Grist and Open Left's Matt Stoller both object to this language from a letter from Al Gore's We Can Solve It campaign:

Last week, the U.S. Congress left Washington without addressing the energy crisis. They didn't deal with gas prices. They didn't move on solutions to climate change. What's worse, their inability to renew the clean energy tax credits means that government incentive programs to support the solar and wind industries will expire at the end of this year. Jobs will be lost as a result of their inaction.

Grist and Matt are right. When the greenies use that framing, we win.

Second, a Democratic candidate in upstate New York running against Rep. Randy Kuhl (R-NY) demands that Nancy Pelosi bring back Congress:

A top Democratic House candidate is calling for Congress to convene a special session to address the lingering energy problems that went unaddressed when the chamber adjourned earlier this month.

Gulf War veteran Eric Massa, who is making his second attempt at taking down Rep. Randy Kuhl (R-N.Y.), stressed that he disagrees with Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on the issue. Pelosi has resisted calls — which have come almost exclusively from Republicans — for a special session.

And third, the RNC got in the game with an email this morning. This is both educating activists and raising coin. As Morton Blackwell noted last Friday, Republican activists see the GOP fighting for something. That's good.