Discussion: Can An Old-Fashioned Charm Offensive Save Joe Donnelly And Dems' Senate Hopes?

A Democrat running in a state filled with idiots who support the Trump GOP has a difficult road to travel. He has to combine charm with moderation, and show heā€™s one of them.

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Speaking as a card carrying member of the Hoosier State, I like Joeā€™s chances. Itā€™ll be a nail-biter for sure, but I think we squeak by.

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Ah yes Indiana. Another Red state where the Republicans put their finger on the scale complaining , ā€œHow are we going to win if we donā€™t cheatā€

Journalist Greg Palast reported on 9 October 2018 that as many as 20,000 Indiana voters may have been purged using the Interstate Voter Registration Crosscheck Program (Crosscheck) even though U.S. District Judge Tanya Walton Pratt sided with government watchdog group Common Cause, which sued over allegations the method could unlawfully disenfranchise eligible voters. Pratt ruled that a 2017 law allowing election officials to boot voters without notice if their names were flagged by Crosscheck violated the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA)

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Hey now. Yes Indiana is reddish, but we also went for Obama (the first time). Plus this state was headed toward a sound defeat of a terrible governor Mike Pence before Dotard picked saved him. Donnelly has a strong following and should win this. Any democrat in a reddish state is a huge win. Helpful would be sending a donation to Joe, not calling the stateā€™s residents ā€˜idiotsā€™ unless Braun wins, then proceed.

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I sent $25 to Senator Donnelly. I like him. I also know Trump won easily in 2016 in Indiana. I wonā€™t retract my belief anyone taken in by Don the Con is incurious, ignorant, and likely stupid.

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Bob Roach, an electrical engineer at a Northwest Indiana steel plant who attended the Donnelly-Biden rally, had been so turned off by both Trump and Hillary Clinton that he skipped the top of the ticket in 2016.

He said heā€™d ā€œnever, ever voted straight-partyā€ in his life.

Yā€™all can still blame the old Jewish guy though. I know, itā€™s much easier than facing reality.

As a liberal Democrat in Indiana I will be holding my nose and voting for Donnelly. He is a typical politician: He voted against a womanā€™s right to choose and marriage equality because he is Catholic. He voted for a known torturer which is against all Catholic Teaching. He supports a border wall, voted for the rethugā€™s stolen SCOTUS seat, runs ads with the orange turd thanking him. Does this make him a partner in the abuse of women when he supports the orange turd? He was a weak representative for IN2 and only got elected to the senate because his opposition said a baby resulting from rape was a girt from god. But Braun is so much worse and teamed with Young Indiana has the most deplorable representation in the Senate of most states.

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Rhea Arthur attended the Pence-Braun rally in Indianapolis Saturday morning, and said sheā€™d been leaning towards voting for Donnelly ā€” until the Kavanaugh vote.

Pence rally attendant was leaning towards Donnelly before Kavanaugh vote? Yeah, right.

Itā€™s a bit demoralizing to see TPM trot out the ā€œKavanaugh-bumpā€ narrative that the GOP immediately rolled out after the Kavanaugh fiasco. I donā€™t doubt that the partisan fervor stoked during those 2 weeks had an effect, but at this point I very much doubt that there are still a bunch of voters out there who were going to vote D or sit this one out but have been enduringly persuaded by the Kavanaugh thing to change course. Kavanaugh won. Dems lost. So while it may be that the white authoritarian base is stirring againā€“they always come crawling out, like cockroachesā€“letā€™s not stenograph GOP talking points.

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What a load of crap. If Arthur went to a Pence-Braun rally and voted for Mourdock despite the rape ā€œgaffeā€, then she was never going to vote for a Democrat. Period. Sheā€™s clearly a partisan, through and through.

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Thatā€™s not fair. Some of them arenā€™t incurious, ignorant, and stupid; some of them are rich, self-serving, greedy, and evil.

And, of course, some of them are rich, self-serving, greedy, evil, incurious, ignorant, and stupid.

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I used to have roughly the same opinion (not great but best we can hope for) but then I had the chance to meet Senator Donnelly and hear him speak about issues I care about. Changed my mind, Iā€™m happy to back Joe because he works hard on behalf of issues that matter for Hoosiers and Democrats. The Kavanaugh vote was tough but he was on the right side of history even though it likely cost him votes.

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I know it sucks to do so, but thank you for understanding the stakes here. I hope you can eventually get him primaried, but until then heā€™s the best that the state is going to get in office. Democrats need to get control of the Senate and then they can start to work on putting more liberal politicians in.

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Donnelly had a great debate last week against Braun. Until I saw the last 3 minutes of Abigail Spanbergerā€™s debate, it was the best performance Iā€™ve seen this year. (Kyrsten Sinema also had a great debate performance in my view). Iā€™m not worried about Joe. Give him money. Heā€™s got this.

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Agreed with all you wrote - indeed, didnā€™t Penceā€™s successor have to walk back some of the Pence (extremist) actions as governor? That is the reaction was so negative to Pence that his conservo-successor had to do a little (almost immediately in office) moderating.

But the thumb on the scale here via gerry-mandering of state and congressional districts and voter suppression has grown as a means of political domination in the state over the past 12-15 years. Makes the tough road, even tougher. I would also say it paints an increasingly purplish/reddish state with a brighter red hue than really exists.

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I agree. And find that many in the BluedotofBloomington feel the same.

Do we have any evidence that the narrowing in the polls has been due to Kavanagh? I canā€™t imagine that so many Republicans thought, hmm, poor barf boy, Iā€™m going to vote R now. I think itā€™s just Rs coming home to their party, like they always do. If anything, their victory on getting a dry drunk rapist on the court should diminish their enthusiasm with time. Ds, especially women, should be willing to crawl over broken glass to vote this time. Given the voter suppression in their way they may be forced to.

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Not making any excuses for anyone who believed Don the con was moral, a leader, a patriot or even marginally capable of being a president. BUT, Clinton never visited Indiana to campaign. As someone who canvassed for Obama, I was dismayed the Hillary camp never even tried here.

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ā€œI did like Donnelly. But heā€™s not thinking about Indiana people. Heā€™s thinking about his [party] leaders,ā€ she said.

This is a straight up lie. Bart will do nothing for the people of IN. Sheā€™s just using that as an excuse for a choice that she was always going with.

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Yes Holcomb did have to track back to a far more moderate middle than Penceā€™s ā€˜hate-the-gaysā€™ policies that severely damaged the state.

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