US Senate

Political Note #228   Tina Smith MN US Senate

Tina Smith is a solidly liberal Democratic Senator. She is pro-choice, in favor of action against climate change, for progressive criminal justice reform, opposed to e-cigarettes, in favor of gun safety efforts, in favor of financial support for Central American countries to reduce emigration to the US, and in favor of a single payer health care system. The more money she raises, the more she can be sufficiently dominant to scare serious opponents away from running.

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Political Note #225   Gary Peters MI US Senate

2020               General Election Gary Peters https://petersformichigan.com/ is running for a second term. I had thought I might start by explaining he was unusual among the men in the US Senate. His family had no pretensions to leadership. He did not demonstrate the aspirations that lead a high schooler to attend Harvard or Yale or Stanford or Chicago. He’s not as unusual as I thought. Of the Democratic men in the US Senate, half did not go to schools like Harvard or Yale or Stanford or Chicago. Or have other marks of being or striving to be members of the elite.…

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Political Note #222   Jeanne Shaheen   NH US Senator

2020               General Election Steady as she goes. Jeanne Shaheen https://jeanneshaheen.org/ is running for her third term as Senator from New Hampshire. New Hampshire is a conservative state. A Republican state. Pundits think it leans Republican, by a point or two. Jeanne Shaheen is one of two Democrats to win two terms as a Senator from New Hampshire. With Doug Jones of Alabama, Jeanne Shaheen is the other Democratic Senator up for election in 2020 from a state that leans Republican. New Hampshire doesn’t lean Republican quite as far Alabama does. Jeanne Shaheen’s dad managed a shoe factory. There’s a good…

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Political Note #217 Jaime Harrison SC US Senate

2020               General Election At the end of the rainbow A pot of gold. Jaime Harrison https://jaimeharrison.com is a prize. An improbable prize. Too good to be true. Too good to ignore. Worth searching for a path to victory. Worth searching for the resources to fund that path. Child of a single teenage mother. Raised by grandparents. In Orangeburg, South Caronlina. Not far from the state capitol. 13,000 people. 75% African American. Two Historically Black Colleges – South Carolina State and Claflin University give it an academic tone. Jaime Harrison went to the local high school. The first in his…

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Political Note #189 Doug Jones AL US Senate

You might think the Civil Rights Movement was over by 1992. Not in Alabama. Five months after taking office as US Attorney, Doug Jon. s received national attention when a bomb exploded at a Birmingham women’s health clinic, killing a police officer and maiming a nurse. As US Attorney, he coordinated the task force (the FBI, local police, and other law enforcement) that led to Eric Rudolf’s capture and guilty plea to several bombings. The Birmingham bombing, the Atlanta Olympic bombing, and others. Specially authorized to act in state court, US Attorney Doug Jones was the successful prosecutor of the remaining perpetrator who could be brought to trial for the 1963 bombing of the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham. Four young black girls had been killed. Jones brought the Ku Klux Klansman back to Alabama from Texas, tried him, and convicted him for killing those four girls.

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