Our new book is titled Divided We Stand: The 2020 Elections and American Politics. Among other things, it discusses state and congressional elections.
Sen. Claire McCaskill (D-MO) secured the nomination of a weak GOP opponent in 2012 by running "attack ads" that made him sound appealing to conservative GOP voters.
She told the story here: https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/08/todd-akin-missouri-claire-mccaskill-2012-121262/
If Steve Garvey didn’t exist, Adam Schiff would have to invent him – and, indeed, the congressman is busy doing just that. As Monday’s debate between the candidates for California’s open U.S. Senate seat made clear, Garvey is a precious asset for Schiff.
Not an easy asset, mind you. It’s painfully difficult to take Garvey seriously as a candidate for anything. He has no path to victory, no coherent set of ideas, and he doesn’t make a lot of sense. He gets lost in his own answers and projects a novel mixture of arrogance and nearly complete ignorance of any issue that calls for reasoning.
And yet, this political klutz is paving the way for Schiff to win the seat vacated by legendary Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s death last year. To do that, Schiff is running not just his own campaign but Garvey’s too.
The dynamics are a little convoluted, but here are the basics: Garvey, the onetime first baseman for the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres, has enough name recognition for Republicans to gravitate to him, but not enough smarts to pose any threat to Schiff.
