NYT says Reynolds vulnerable — or maybe not
Like any sensible person, I spend as little time as possible reading the New York Times, which has become a tired, narcsistic dispenser of shop-worn cichés, at least as far as politics is concerned. Perhaps they can’t be blamed for this: two days ago (on a day when violence was raging in the Middle East and Congress was considering raising the minimum wage that milions or Americans work for), the most emailed aritlce in the Times was titled Communal Yoga Mats: Beware of Germs.
Now that that rant is out of the way, the Times has a piece suggesting the NY-26 race between Jack Davis and Tom Reynolds may be competitive, or maybe not:
For Democrats, defeating Mr. Reynolds would be an especially sweet prize, given that he is directing the national Republican effort to maintain control of the House. Only a few weeks ago, Representative Rahm Emanuel of Illinois, the chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, traveled to New York to meet privately with Mr. Davis, who has vowed to spend $2 million to defeat Mr. Reynolds….
Even Democrats concede that Mr. Reynolds will be difficult to topple. Not only does he enjoy the high visibility that comes with incumbency, but as the chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, he has easy access to a national network of donors. Indeed, he had amassed slightly more than $3 million for his campaign, according to the most recent campaign finance disclosure statements. Your fearless political prognosticator — that’s me — says the Democrats will have a very tough time winning this race, but that they’re smart to force Reynolds to spend millions of dollars defending it, since every cent he spends on his own district is likely to come out of the money the NRCC spends on other districts, one way or another.
The article also says this, with which I heartily agree:
Mr. Reynolds is among at least a dozen Republicans whom Democrats would like to defeat in the Northeast, a heavily Democratic region. Independent analysts believe that the region could provide many of the 15 seats Democrats need to take control of the House in the fall elections
Yay! Northeast strategy! The Times can suck, although they endorsed Ned Lamont.
I confess. I still read the New York Times. But I miss the days when I thought that it was the best newspaper in the country.