Our Freshmen Blue Dogs

Posted by Bob Lord

I'm a little late to the party with this one, but it looks like none of my BfAZ posted on it either. Apparently, two our freshmen reps, Ron Barber and Kyrsten Sinema, in their infinite wisdom, have joined the Blue Dog caucus in the house. It's just a tiny little itty bitty caucus at this point, down to 19 members even after the addition of Ron and Kyrsten. 

Here's the report from last week's WaPo:

Now, the Blue Dog Coalition is a shell of its former self, shrunken to just 15 members because of political defeat, retirements after redrawn districts left them in enemy territory and just plain exhaustion from the constant battle to stay in office. Several are not running for reelection in November, and a few others are top targets of Republicans.

In danger of losing even more clout, the leading Blue Dogs are regrouping and rebuilding. They are adding four members to their ranks this week — Reps. Ron Barber (Ariz.), Cheri Bustos (Ill.), Nick J. Rahall II (W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (Ariz.) — and angling to play a key role in bipartisan talks over the next few years in the belief that the polar tension in the Capitol will thaw.

My first thought on seeing this about our two illustrious freshmen was Dana Carvey's old line on SNL: "Well, isn't that special."

Comments

[Wileybud]

Two thoughts:

1. After the Blue Dog Apocalypse of 2010 one would think the Blue Dogs would be deservedly extinct by now.

2. Despite what Blue Dogs, New Dems, Third Way, etc. think, the public couldn't care less about "bipartisanship" as long as good legislation results in policies that actually benefit the public.

But then I don't live in a bubble so what do I know?

[Thucydides]

Silly post, everyone knows that Sinema and Barber vote with the Republicans only on bills that the Senate is going to kill. They are only members to the extent that their membership is meaningless.

[wjbill]

She has lost the votes of my wife and I and I will be doing what I can
to convince our 3 kids (all in the district still) to abstain or write
in