"Maybe We Need a Waitress in Congress"

The race between Republican Congressman Jon Porter and Democrat Tessa Hafen in NV-03 (the suburbs of Las Vegas) has been one of the closest in the country with 48.46% for Porter and 46.57% for Hafen and Porter winning by less than 4,000 votes. Therefore, it's not surprising that Democrats, both in DC and in Nevada, are looking for another serious challenger to Porter after Hafen, a former aide to Sen. Reid, declined to run again. Last week, another potential contender, 2006 gubernatorial nominee and State Sen. Min. Leader Dina Titus, took herself out of the running leaving the field with one announced candidate and two others seriously considering.

Thus far only Andrew Martin has announced his intention to run. He's an accountant making his first run for elected office and would be Nevada's first openly gay member of Congress. He's fairly unknown, though, and I'm not sure if he'd be able to raise the funds necessary for a successful run. Another potential candidate is Larry Lehrner, a nephrologist, a former Republican who does not even live in the district but is nontheless taken very seriously because he's married to Shelley Berkley, Congresswoman Shelley Berkley that is. A married couple representing two districts of one state in Congress, I don't think we've had that before and I'm not sure we'd want that.

So, maybe it's time for a waitress in Congress.

There has been speculation that Maggie Carlton, a state senator since 1999 is interested in running and this past weekend she confirmed this:

"My husband and I have been talking about it for a while," she said. "We might try it. I don't think it's too far fetched."

Carlton, a waitress at the Treasure Island resort, said she wants to talk it over with the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee and her supporters at home before she makes a decision.

"He's my congressman, and I don't like some of the things he's done," she said of Porter. "Maybe we need a waitress in Congress, not an insurance guy."

Yup, you read that right, a waitress. Nevada's legislature is only in session for four months every other year, meaning legislators have to keep their job after being elected and work to make a living. Wonder how Maggie Carlton does it? So did NPR a year ago. You can listen to their profile of Maggie Carlton here.

Maggie Carlton represents the working people of Las Vegas and Nevada in the State Senate. One co-worker says:

We got somebody speaking for us on a higher level. [...] She'll bring up the questions that other senators probably wouldn't bring up because they don't know about nine-to-five working people. [...] If Maggie wouldn't be doing it who would do it?

So, you could argue she's too valuable in the State Senate and should stay put. However, term limits were introduced in Nevada which means she cannot stand for re-election in 2010. Having her speak for the nine-to-five people in Congress might not be such a bad idea.

How could she win? We know the district is competitive, Porter is vulnerable. She'd have one distinctive advantage: the Culinary Union Local 226 - the most powerful union in Nevada, so powerful that the Culinary's endorsement might swing the presidential contest in the Nevada Caucus next year. Maggie Carlton is not only a member of the Culinary Union and a Culinary Local No. 226 Shop Steward, she says she was actually encouraged to run for the State Senate by the Culinary:

They wanted someone who clocked in for a living and who understood: running to PTA meetings, trying to do the girl scout thing, getting kids to school on time, all those types of things.

Maggie Carlton has been doing her day-job for 30 years now, maybe it's time she put down that 40 pound tray not just for 120 days every other year but permanently and take her experience to Washington.

Nevada's Congressional Delegation a Disgrace - Primary Challenge for Berkley?

Yesterday, Congress caved in to Bush's demands and passed a war funding bill without any timetables for withdrawal from Iraq. As a little Swiss newspaper puts it: "Capitulation of the Democrats."

In the end the House passed the bill 280-142 with 86 Democrats voting for the bill and 140 against. The Senate passed Bush's war funding by an even wider margin with 80-14. Here the majority of Democrats supported the bill, with 11 Democrats voting against (including Sen. Sanders) and 36 caving to Bush (not counting Lieberman).

Now, here comes the best: every member of Nevada's congressional delegation voted for the bill and essentially against a timetable of getting out of Iraq. You'd expect this from Sen. Ensign, Rep. Porter, and Rep. Heller as they're all Republicans. But to have two Democrats, Sen. Reid and Rep. Berkley, representing Nevada who voted against ending the war is not only a disappointment but a disgrace.

Especially, when you consider that the majority of Americans want a timetable according to the latest CBS/New York Post poll (pdf!):

Do you think the United States should or should not set a timetable for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq sometime in 2008?

Should 63%
Should not 34%

And this is not just Democrats and Independents (61-34) talking here. Already, 42% of Republicans want a timetable. I'm dumbfounded to think that Reid and Berkley don't get this.

There's been talk in the blogosphere of targeting some of these Democrats, like Berkley, in primaries next time around.

That Berkley's increasingly in trouble becomes apparent in this take from MSNBC:

Will anti-war activists force Democratic incumbents to spend money to defend themselves in primaries next year — or could the party actually get stronger candidates as a result of contested primaries?

[...]

Five-term veteran Shelley Berkley, who represents Las Vegas and environs, said Thursday afternoon, “My district is pretty evenly divided. I haven’t done polling, but according to other polls it’s apparent that more than 50 percent now oppose the Iraq war in my district or in Nevada.”

So her vote for the additional finding will go against the wishes of the majority of her constituents, but she explained, “I’m on record as saying I’m not going to leave the troops stranded. As angry and dismayed as I am with the Bush administration having created a debacle, I’m not going to take it out on the troops.”

She predicted, “By September, there will be enough Republicans who will have expressed their concern to the president; it will be a bipartisan effort to moderate his position.”

She also forecast that “as we get closer to election time, more and more Republicans will see that Mr. Bush is not on the ballot, they are.”

And what about the potential threat of a Democratic primary challenger against her? “I don’t foresee that happening. I’ve been very candid about my position.”

She recalled, “I was in anti-Vietnam war protests in college.” She said the U.S. exit from Iraq, when it happens, “will be much more complex than the helicopter on the roof of the embassy” – a reference to the Saigon evacuation in 1975. “This is very complex. It is so much more complex than just ‘get out tomorrow.’”

“As we get closer to election time, more and more Republicans will see that Mr. Bush is not on the ballot, they are.” Oh, this is just hillarious! Maybe Rep. Berkley should realize she'll be on the ballot as well. I have my doubts if a primary challenge will work against the Democratic Party machinery but a serious challenger would undoubtedly have support from the netroots.

Shelley Berkley should seriously reconsider her voting pattern regarding the war (among other things).

The Future of Nevada Democrats is Female

Women are clearly on the rise in Nevada politics. Especially so on the Democratic side. Consider the following: in the 2006 elections Democrats nominated women in all three congressional districts, four out of six candidates for statewide office were women, including Governor.

While Jill Derby (NV-02) and Tessa Hafen (NV-03) didn't win their respective races, they did come pretty close and it's quite possible that Dean Heller and Jon Porter will have to run against female candidates again in 2008.

Women have captured high offices in Nevada in the past, though they were mostly Republican: former Congresswoman Barbara Vucanovich (NV-02, 1983-97), former Treasurer Patty Cafferata (1983-87), former Lt. Governors Sue Wagner (1991-95) and Lorraine Hunt (1999-2007), Secretary of State Cheryl Lau (1991-95). The only Democratic women previously elected to statewide office were Superintendent of Public Instruction Mildred Bray (1937-51) and Frankie Sue Del Papa who was Secretary of State (1987-91) and Attorney General (1991-2003). There has not been a female US Senator yet, the only Democratic nominee was Mary Gojack in 1990.

Recently female Democrats were much more successful in being nominated and elected than their Republican counterparts. Currently, three out of four Democratic (six total) constitutional officers in Nevada are women: Attorney General Catherine Cortez Masto, State Treasurer Kate Marshall, and State Controller Kim Wallin. Las Vegas is represented in Congress by Shelley Berkley. The Nevada State Democratic Party has recently elected a woman, Jill Derby, as its chair. Among the five-person leadership are three more women: 2nd Vice Chair Teresa Benitez-Thompson, Secretary A'shanti Gholar, and Treasurer Jan Churchill.

In the State Assembly, Barbara Buckley was recently elected Speaker, the first woman in that position in Nevada's history. Majority Whip Sheila Leslie and Assistant Majority Whip Debbie Smith are among the five person Majority Leadership in the Assembly, while the Democratic leadership team in the State Senate is entirely comprised of women: Minority Floor Leader Dina Titus, Minority Whip Valerie Wiener, and Assistant Minority Floor Leader Bernice Mathews. As far as I could find out, no other legislatative body in the country has an entirely female leadership, at least on the Democratic side.

10 out 27 Democratic Assembly members are women (37%) and 5 out of 10 Democratic State Senators are women, making up 50%.

Therefore, it comes as no surprise that in a recent poll at Helluva Heller, asking who should run against Heller on the Democratic side, out of the seven mentioned possibilities five were women: Kate Marshall, Debbie Smith, Jill Derby, Sheila Leslie, and Teresa Benitez Thompson and the female candidates were in the lead at last count.

When you consider all this, it is only a matter of time when Nevada will send another woman to the House, the first woman to the US Senate and elect its first Governor.

You can read more about the history of women in Nevada politics here.

Here are the women mentioned:

State Constitutional Officers:


Catherine Cortez Masto, Kate Marshall, and Kim Wallin

Elected Officers of the Nevada State Democratic Party:


Jill Derby, A'shanti Gholar, and Teresa Benitez Thompson

Member of Congress:


Shelley Berkley

Members of the State Assembly Leadership:


Barbara Buckley, Sheila Leslie, and Debbie Smith

Members of the State Senate Leadership:


Dina Titus, Valerie Wiener, and Bernice Mathews

How Shelley Berkley Got Her Appropriations Committee Seat

God may work in mysterious ways. Congress not so much. As Josephine Hearn of The Politico puts it in her article: "How to Advance in Congress: Networking. Luck. And Money Doesn't Hurt."

The article chronicles nine Representatives and how they got (or lost) prescious committee assignment. One of the the lucky was Nevada Congresswoman Shelley Berkley:

Friends in the Highest Places: Shelley Berkley

The Nevada Democrat was another member hankering for a Ways and Means seat. And like Pascrell, she'd been waiting a long time. "I expressed interest a year before I was elected in 1997," she said.

Berkley voiced her preference to Rep. Dick Gephardt (D-Mo.), then the House minority leader, who assured her she would get it. But when Gephardt retired and was succeeded by Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Berkley was back at square one when she made clear she would not honor Gephardt's promises.

Repeatedly, Berkley reiterated her interest, but she watched as openings went to other members, including three others who came to Congress the same year she did.

This time, though, she had a friend in the highest of places. Fellow Nevadan Harry Reid, the new Senate majority leader, made a pivotal call to Pelosi on Berkley's behalf

Berkley got the seat. Soon after, she held a breakfast for Reid at her Capitol Hill home, at one point choking up when she noted that it took her "eight years and a phone call" to get on the panel.

"I felt like it was time," Berkley said.

As among the lucky few were a significant number of freshmen, who in some instances even got sub-committee chairmanships, one is left to ponder Jill Derby's fate would she have been elected. Unfortunately, the people in the second district chose a man who will wield little influence in the minority over a woman who could have been a high stakes power broker for her constituents in DC.

You can read the entire article at The Politico.