Christine O'Donnell: Mea Culpa?

I see that Robert Stacy has another postmortem about Delaware— as if another one was needed— and I’ve been putting off doing mine so here it is.

Am I at fault for losing control of the US Senate by supporting Christine O’Donnell over Mike Castle and Chris Coons? No.

Need more?

The most grievous charge against Christine O'Donnell is that not only did she lose her race, she lost others as well. Usually, the names names Ken Buck in Colorado and Dino Rossi in Washington are dropped. I have to cry bullshit on that. A race in Delaware affects races two time zones away?

If— this is not an admission— that was the case, then Pat Toomey would have been affected as well. Much of Delaware is a suburb of Philadelphia. O’Donnell needed to advertise on Philly TV in order to cover a significant portion of the population in Delaware. Why didn’t she tank Toomey? He won.

It’s more about finger pointing and what-ifs more than anything else. It was said that Mike Castle had a proven track record— until he didn’t— with voters in Delaware and would have easily won the election-- until he lost.

So by that logic Linda McMahon should have had a cake walk with the proven liar that is Dick Blumenthal. She was the establishment pick by the GOP and the NRSC. She distanced herself from Sarah Palin and any Tea Parties. Yet she was soundly beaten by a guy who most likely to be typecast as a pedophile in most movies.

McMahon ran against Peter Schiff and Rob Simmons in the GOP Primary for Connecticut, both of whom were superior candidates. Schiff is an economic prophet and Rob Simmons is a certified war hero. On paper, she should have been dead last to the other two. But money talked and McMahon had the deepest pockets of the three.

But I have yet to see the spit on the sidewalk when people mention Linda McMahon’s race. No snarky ‘recriminations’ postings about her. No one is wailing in the streets wearing sackcloth and ashes. Her loss was almost as bad as Christine O’Donnell’s. If anything, McMahon’s loss is more directly related with the loss of Joe DioGuardi and Jay Townsend in New York. Connecticut is as much of a suburb of New York City as Delaware is of Philly.

I think most if the blame being directed toward O’Donnell is due to the fact that the Tea Party and Sarah Palin supported her. O’Donnell obviously wasn’t the party pick so with her loss the GOP and others are throwing their arms out of socket pointing towards her direction and blaming her from the 'potential control' of the Senate to their food coma they had on Thanksgiving.

Out of spite, the GOP and many others on the right-- acting as an echo chamber for the MFM-- repeated all the charges that the MFM has said about O'Donnell. She’s a religious kook, a witch (burn her), she’s paranoid, she turned Karl Rove inot a newt (he got better) and personally lost control of the Senate despite all evidence to the contrary.

If you wonder why she was thought to be paranoid, consider this. She didn’t receive any help from the Delaware Republican party. She was bad mouthed by Karl Rove repeatedly the very night of her primary win. And it took the NRSC about a day to try to squelch rumors that they weren’t going to support her. Any wonder where she might get the feeling that they were out to get her?

She had her faults. She was poorly organized with her campaign. I have it on good authority that they weren't really expecting to win the primary. The “I’m not a witch” ad was awful. The multiple cancellations for TV interviews. I think she stumbled out of the primary gate and never was able to find her footing. Understandable considering she was getting pummeled by both sides of the isle, which really isn’t an excuse but a statement of what happened to her.

What I know about her is that she wasn’t the strongest candidate but I still would have preferred her over Mike Castle any day of the week.

So do I still need to offer a mea culpa? I did miss-read the Big Red Wave, after all. Why take the ‘safe’ bet of Mike Castle when all the odds look to be in your favor?

Well, if you consider the recent vote in the Senate, chances are that Castle would have been one more Republican voting for the Farm bill that needed to be defeated.

So no, I don’t need to say I’m sorry for supporting O’Donnell.

If anyone says that O’Donnell lost someone else’s election, look behind that person. There is either a party loyalist hack or a wannabe party player saying that.

Do you know what was really scary about Christine O’Donnell? Nothing about being a witch or human sacrifice or that she was going to ban masturbation. It was that even though she was a known quantity in Delaware— she ran several times for office before— the rank and file of Republican voters rejected the party’s pick of Mike Castle. It wasn’t who she was but what she represented. She was a choice, not an echo. A departure from the normal power brokers and gave the people a real choice in that election.

That’s the real crime she is guilty of.