Showing a stunning lack of understanding about the electoral makeup of the 4th Congressional district, yesterday an anonymous writer at the Wisconsin Daily Independent opined that Dan Sebring may finally be able to beat incumbent Democratic Rep. Gwen Moore because “the black community carried Clarke,” a reference to Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke’s victory over challenger Chris Moews in the Democratic primary on August 12. The unknown author provides no evidence to back up his or her claim that “the black community carried Clarke,” and the author conveniently ignores the fact that there was a concerted effort to get Republicans to cross over and vote for Sheriff Clarke.
The black community carried Clarke and they tend to carry Moore. Could the unhappiness with Obama lead them to Sebring? This last election proved a conservative that talks to the black community can make it. A conservative message can break through and Sebring has a lot of name recognition.
A quick glance at the vote totals in the Milwaukee County Sheriff race seems to indicate that efforts by Republicans to get Republican voters to turn out and vote were successful, given the fact that Sheriff Clarke alone garnered more votes in 2014 than both he and Chris Moews did combined in 2010.
At any rate, despite pie in the sky statements that African Americans will turn out and vote for Dan Sebring, there’s absolutely no chance he’ll beat Gwen Moore in November.
Not to endorse Sebring, but it is a damned shame he has a zero percent chance to win. Gerrymandered districts that benefit the Democrats are just as bad as districts that benefit Republicans. When we don’t need to take both sides seriously not only do we end up with complacent unresponsive politicians but we end up with serious alienation of a large number of voters. We need a new progressive era in terms of bringing people back into power in politics
Paul, I don’t think it’s a shame that Dan Sebring can’t win, because he’s diametrically opposed to everything I stand for.
The problem in this case isn’t gerrymandering so much as it’s the benefits of being an incumbent.
Again, I’m happy to see a conservative lose just not happy that given gerrymandered districts Moore never has to provide value to her constituents. It’s not just incumbency, if Moore died tomorrow the winner of the Dem primary would be a lock for the district for decades too. Incumbency keeps the primary challenges at bay I admit but that isn’t why no Republican will ever win here