Talk Elections

Looks like the man who was too scared of terrorism in DC to stay during the election is too scared to run for re-election in a dangerous seat.

The free-for-all cometh...

http://www.startribune.com/stories/587/5231507.html

WASHINGTON, D.C.-- Minnesota Democratic sources said they believe Sen. Mark Dayton, D-Minn., will announce today that he will not seek reelection to a second term in the Senate.

Two knowledgeable Democratic sources said Dayton was believed to have made the decision because of a series of events that darkened his reelection prospects.

A new Star Tribune Minnesota Poll showed his approval rating had plummeted to 43 percent, and Republicans have already made the freshman Democrat their top target for ouster in next year's election.

One source said Dayton told his staff in Minnesota and Washington of his decision shortly before noon today.

Dayton has scheduled a telephone news conference at 1:30 p.m. Eastern time.

I expect Al Franken to announce he's running within 7 days.

I also expect Mary Kiffmeyer to be the junior senator from Minnesota in 2007.

Very interesting. I had never heard anything of this. This would be too bad, but we could hold it.

Kiffmeyer pissed a lot of people off last election, and she's never topped 50% for the Sec. of State position, I have to say she's far too polarzing to win now.

If Dayton don't run again, the DFL probably has a better chance to hold the seat than if he does run again...

Especially if we get Alan Page to run. The GOP can forget about this seat in that case.

The power of incumbency is much stronger than the strength of potential candidates running typically in the Senate.

When we know who the candidates are, we will certainly have a better idea.

Right now, the seat is a definite tossup until then.

Usually

Well, let's put it this way.  I would say there are maybe one, maybe two races every Senate term where incumbency is more of a hindrance than not.  This might have been one of those races; it might not have been.

A 43% approval rating in a Senate campaign is not "you're a goner" territory, just because of that incumbency factor.

It would make things a little difficult though, and I guess the Democrats decided to take their chances in an open race rather than gamble on Dayton.

This may turn out to be a good move, it might not.  Time will tell.

Open seats create other headaches though, in this case for Democrats. Have to have a primary, and it's harder to raise money if you aren't an incumbent. That means less resources for other races.

Page scares me, yes.

While I love the fact that Dayton might be leaving, the seat is now more likely to stay Dem.

Run Al Franken!

If Arnold can win, Franken can win.

Jesse Ventura for Senate!

Franken is not on the same level as Arnold.

Right now, I'm hoping for either Mark Kennedy or Rod Grams as the nominee for the Republicans and Franken for the Dems.

great news!

what a horrible senator mark dayton is.  but then again, rod grams was pretty bad too.

the republicans have a good chance of winning this seat.  but i fully expect them to do something stupid like nominate that f'er that paul wellstone beat (again and again).

I'll assume that you haven't read his books, but I assure you, he knows something about politics. I think we could find a better candidate somewhere however.

I would like to know his positions on issues though. I'm assuming he's pretty liberal, but I'm not sure.

Read his books? Why waste my time?

I'm sure he's educated but I don't think someone like that can win a Senate seat.

I don't think he's electable with Minnesota as a whole, but I could see him winning something within the Twin cities.

I'll read a Coulter classic if you read a Franken, preferebly lies and lying liars who tell them, but Rush Limbaugh is a Big Fat Idiot is fine by me.

I'm not a fan of Coulter so you'd have to read something else but it doesn't matter. I still won't waste my time reading Fraken.

Mary Kiffmeyer would be better suited to run for the 6th district if Mark Kennedy decides to run for the senate.

Mary Kiffmeyer has never topped 50% in any election, but topping 50% is not a barometer for winning a Minnesota senate seat.  If that were the case than a Paul Wellstone would have never been elected to U.S. Senate. Wellstone never had been elected to any public office before he defeated Rudy Boschwitz. And Paul Wellstone is not the exception either.

yeah, but the point is she couldn't even top 50% before she sent out those stupid terrorist warning posters and dug up an obscurish law to kick third parties off the ballot.


lol, nominate Grams for sure! That's a surefire way to keep it in our column.

nominating Grams is the stupidest thing the GOP can do. The second stupidest would be to nominate someone like Alan Quist or Michele Bachmann, which is possible but sadly not likely.

I wonder if my state sen. John Hottinger will jump into this. He'd  has aspirations for higher office and would be a prety good candidate. He's liberal enough to win the primary and satisfy the base, but he's from outstate so the GOP can't claim he's some Twin Cities liberal elitist.

I wonder if Betty McCollum would run. She'd be a great senator but she might too liberal to win statewide, then again Kerry did. She'd have no problem beating Grams, Quist or Bachmann for sure though, so if the GOP is stupid enough to nominate one of them she'd be my favorite.

And what about Mark Kennedy?

Like I said, he's pretty generic. No real strengths or weaknesses, except that he's never topped 60% in his district and came within 6 points of losing to a political novice last election.

The best GOP candidate like I've been saying forever would be Jim Ramstad. But he is very unlikely to run since he wants to keep his House position, and the conservatives would hate him since he's basically an Arlen Specter Republican.

Then let's keep Ramstad out of the picture.  :)

What about Gil Gutknecht? (Just trying to get your opinion of the possible candidates' chances.)

Let's get rid of more bad Senators from Minnesota...COLEMAN OUT IN '08!

he's my congressman. I'd like for him to run to get him out of the house seat because he is absolutely worthless and does nothing for the people in the district who don't live in Rochester. However he would be stronger than Kennedy since he comes from a swing district. Outside of that though, pretty generic. He'd be stronger than Kennedy and the other clowns I mentioned but would still stand no chance against Alan Page or Dean Johnson.

what makes Coleman a great Senator? Let's ssee, there was that time, he, ummmm, oh wait he hasn't done sh**t because rubber stamp the GOP agenda.

I've never said he was a great Senator. I just agree with him often.

Dayton/Coleman '08 - Two Jokes for Two Equally-sh**tty Americas!

And they are...?

dayton = the reason why many Dems in Minnesota think about voting GOP

Coleman= The reason they stay with the Dems

It would be great if Dean Johnson ran. He'd be almost impossible to beat, and would almost certainly be Al's favorite senator once he won :)

I really doubt he will though, especially since his wife just died last month.

If Al Franken somehow managed to win, he would be the Maxine Waters of the Senate.  Talk Radio would have a field day with him. 

They already hate him.

Rod Grams would be a very weak candidate for the Republicans to nominate. The former senator was a nice and decent man, but like Mark Dayton he was not a terribly visible senator; he was not a great fundraiser, and he was just too conservative for the state. Grams even admitted that he had tough time campaigning and articulating his message; and he found it easier to ask the questions (he was a T.V. news anchor before holding public office.) than to answer the questions.

Mark Kennedy on the other hand has the willingness and the drive to run and be elected to the U.S. senate. He reminds me very much of former senator Rudy Boschwitz.

At any rate, the U.S. senate race here in Minnesota should be spirited and fun to watch.

It's true that Rush and the boys hate Franken already, but currently he is just a third rate comic on a fourth rate radio network (just below PBS).  As a US Senator he could wreak real havoc (or try to) on the whole nation. 

True :)


:(

I'm new here...but i thought I'd get some input from minnesota experts...

While I think Alan Page is clearly the best Dem candidate (and I hope he runs!), I'm hearing that its not likely that he will.  Names like Ciresi and Judy Dutcher are being bandied about.  What are their chances in a primary/general?

If Gutknecht enters the race, what does the field for his congressional district look like?  Right now, I'm guessing Kennedy has a decent shot at clearing the field and will be a formidable nominee for the Rs, leaving his seat as a competitive race with Wetterling v. whoever.

What about Oberstar or Peterson?
Might one of them run, and what would be their chances?
Also, is this official or are we all jumping the gun?

http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/09/politics/09cnd-dayton.html

As for the Congressmen: Oberstar is getting on a bit (he's been in the House since the '70's) and IIRC Peterson got himself onto (or higher up?) the Agricultural committee

Oberstar is too old and would probably rather keep his seniority. Peterson could never win a primary and wouldn't want to give up his House seat since he just became ranking Democrat on the Ag committee.

The only Rep I can see running is McCollum, who like I said I'd like but she might be too liberal to win statewide. Although she'd win easily if the GOP nominates a far right winger.

Page is a state Supreme Court justice and former Vikings player. He is very well known and well loved all over the state.

Johnson is Senate Majority Leader and a populist Democrat from outstate. He's also an ordained ELCA minister (and he's a Democrat! Take that religious right.) He's pro-life but I don't care since he's done a good job so far and he would play very well outstate making it almost impossible for the GOP to cancel out the urban margins.

I'm not sure who Ciresi is.

Judy Dutcher is the former State Auditor and a former Republican who switched parties shortly before the end of her term to run for governor in 2002. She lost the primary though. She'd have a great chance though.

If Gutknecht runs, my state Senator John Hottinger is very likely to be the DFL nominee for his House seat. I'm not sure about who the Republican would be, although it'ld likely be another State Senator.

And if Kennedy ends up running, Wetterling would likely run again and have a better chance, especially if she faces Bachmann. It's a fairly GOP leaning district, but Bachmann is extremely polarizing and a complete loony.

Looks like Franken is running. New question: Will Bill O'Reilly suddenly want to move to Minnesota?  :)

Is Garrison Keillor going to run as well ;D

Franken said he won't run.

My mistake. I saw a topic on another board saying he was running. I clicked on the link of the story and it was updated saying that he won't run. Too bad. I wanted to see him get beat.

2006-- the 6 year itch is usually bad for the incumbent president (except for Clinton in 1998). I think it would be smarter for him to go for it now than wait until 2008. At least he can run on an anti-Bush campaign in a state Bush lost twice. He won't have that in 2008. 

I just want Alan Page to sit this out. PLEASE!

Bubba had his six year itch four years early

Yes, the legendary Gingritch.

I was listening live...I didn't want him to run, since I didn't want to see his name get shattered, but in a way I did, because I could actually get excited about that campaign in a way I couldn't if it's just some representative.

Hell, if Franken were running I'd want him to win more than a local candidate for my own district.

I think 2006 will be a good year for Republicans, particularly in the Senate.

And, other than Reagan in 1986, whose party lost a lot of seats six years into his presidency? Nixon did, but that's because of Watergate, as everybody knows.

Article in the StarTrib on this today didn't mention Franken even once.

Ciresi is almost a given. He lost the primary narrowly to Dayton in 2000 and said he'd jump into a race "in a nanosecond" if Dayton dropped out. He's a huge attorney who won a $6 billion case against the tobacco industry, and has the huge plus of being able to finance his own campaign.

The other mentioned candidate is Hennepin county attorney Amy Klouboucher. She's actually pretty high profile and was a speaker at the DNC, and has a strong record of a prosecutor of being tough on crime. Her dad was also a well known columnist giving her name recognition. But I think she's more likely to run for Attorney General since Mike Hatch is almost certain to run against Pawlenty.

I can't remember the third profiled guy's name, but he's a legal counsel for the U of M who's been hinting he's interested in a run at quite some time. He was the chair of Lieberman's campaign in MN so he must be a moderate, but that means I won't be supporting him in the primary for sure. I don't mind moderates, but supporting Lieberman runs me the wrong way.

Dean Johnson, Betty McCollum and Alan Page were all mentioned as possibilities. It also said Alan Page couldn't be reached for comment yet.

I just realized I have almost 2 years until the primary so that's plenty of time to make up mind, but out of the mentioned ones, I'd be supporting Ciresi now. But there's a LOOOOOONG way to go.

Also, apparentely Rod Grams is officially in now. Let's just hope he wins the nomination.

I have seen from anywhere 6 to 9 Minnesota Democrats vying for the nomination. The DFL does not need an embittered primary especially against potential strong challengers like Mark Kennedy or Gil Gutknecht.

Rod Grams is DEAD ON ARRIVAL with respect to the nomination.