Hey all,

After being ousted from my last job by shady politics and nefarious schemes, I found a job working on a State Senate campaign. My Senator is the incumbent, and she's a good Senator. She works hard for the District, and she honestly works to represent the whole District... not just the vocal ones or the ones who contribute to her campaign.

That said, this past Session, she had to make a few votes that pissed off two key demographics: The Unions and the Far Left Progressives. The votes were necessary, honestly.

1. She voted to approve the budget that the party in power wrote (her party) which cut back state spending and raised some taxes. In this economy, we had no choice but to make cuts somewhere, and with our state having so many unionized workers filling the ranks of the government programs, any cuts made to the state budget were cuts to union jobs. Despite having voted with the unions 89% of the time she has served in the Legislature (about 10 years now) the Unions have decided that she is anti-labor, against the worker, and pro Big Business, pro Wall Street. Because she has worked with banks and insurance companies, they have decided that they must own her... ignoring that she chairs the committee on regulating Banks and Insurance Companies.

2. Again, in approving the budget, she voted to approve cuts to the public higher education system, and some cuts to non-educational aspects of the K-12 system. Several Progressive Groups have jumped all over this point, claiming she favors business over education, that she's harming our community, yada yada yada. They aren't even bothering to think of their own lines of attack anymore, and are all simply parroting each other. The lines they use are devastatingly effective in polls, and they're viciously tearing down a woman who has served our community for the last two decades (before serving in the House and Senate she filled various community roles).

In our District there are three candidates running. Not a single person wanted to file as a Republican, so there is a "Conservative" on the ballot, but he hasn't done anything to work for the campaign... he's shown up at the endorsement interviews for the papers and he's posted a website, but that's it. Then there is my boss, the Senator, who is a Democrat.

The last candidate is a man I respect. He's 31 and has some good ideas, but his experience is that he lobbied the state legislature for a few years and served as the lawyer for one of the progressive PACs. He's also running as a Democrat.

When the legislature passed the budget, the unions went out in our District to find an opponent to my boss. They asked mayors, councilmen, Representatives, business leaders (ironic), and union bosses, but none would actually challenge my boss because they respect her record and think she did the right thing. They finally found the guy I mentioned above, and convinced him that now was his time.

Filing was weeks ago, and most candidates have been fundraising like mad to try to pay for a hard political campaign (not the Conservative though... he's raised and spent $0)... and in that time, my boss has raised a respectable $70k. It's not great, but it is good for our District. The challenger has only raised $30k. Our state limits campaign contributions to $800 for the Primary and another $800 for the General, so no one donor can give more than $1600 total. They've tried to paint my boss's lead as Business trying to protect their Senator, but that's simply not the case. She just knows more people, and more people believe in her than believe in the challenger.

Now, if it were just us against him, we'd be fine... but the unions and several progressive groups have been pouring money into our race. Between the three largest groups, they've spent about $120k so far, and the primary election is another 16 days away. We've been told that they are willing to spend another $100k per week until the primary election is held... sending out doorbellers, doing calls, mailers, and tv ads, and all of those ads, calls, mailers, and doorbellers are going to be going out into our community tearing down the record of someone who's served us very well.

They are buying the seat. Plain and simple. There is no way we can out spend statewide/national groups that take an interest in our campaign. The challenger says he will remain independent, that he won't be a bought and paid for Senator, but when groups put in 10x the money you're able to raise to get you elected, their voice has weight, if for no other reason than you know they could do it to you when you come up for re-election.

The people in our district who know what is going on, know that my boss didn't do anything they're accusing her of, and that she doesn't deserve what they're doing to her... but many of those people will have to work with the unions in their own jobs, so they're not standing up for her.

Then there are the people who don't know enough about the politics to know what's truth and what's not... those are the people who are believing whoever gets to them first/most often.

I guess I wrote this all out to walk through my thoughts on the issue. Sure, my classes have said unions carry a lot of weight in politics. Sure, I was taught how to run an effective campaign (and they're playing by all the rules I learned). And yes, I knew this kind of thing does happen... but it saddens me that men I respect would be part to destroying a good woman's reputation in her community. In previous jobs I've worked with several of the lobbyists and political directors of the progressive groups leading the charge against my boss. I knew they had this in them, but a part of me expected them to only use it against truly bad legislators. People who really are off on the issues that matter, not a good Senator who had to approve a budget.

Working on this campaign, if nothing else, shattered some of my perceptions about how politics actually work. There's no back and forth about ideas and positions, and there's no respect for honest, good people. Dirty tactics hit hard and fast and taint everyone associated with them.

Well, that's my ramble about politics and my job right now.