Counting the Votes, waiting a year to see conventional wisdom play out.
Let us now take a note of this list of Congress critters — Democrats who voted against the House Health Care Bill — and come back in a year to see how much this staved off re-election disaster. Another way of looking at this is geographically, and with a good guage on geographic size a rough rural / urban dividision — note that the Southern and border state Democratic vote favors the “no”.
 Jason Altmire D PA-4,   John Adler D NJ-3,  Rick Boucher D VA-9, Allen Boyd D FL-2,  Brian Baird D WA-3,  John Barrow D GA-12, Dan Boren D OK-2,  John Boccieri D OH-16,Bobby Bright D AL-2,  Ben Chandler D KY-6,  Travis Childers D MS-1,  Lincoln Davis D TN-4,  Artur Davis D AL-7,  Chet Edwards D TX-17,  Bart Gordon D TN-6,  Parker Griffith D AL-5,  Tim Holden D PA-17,  Stephanie Herseth Sandlin D SD-1,  Dennis J. Kucinich D OH-10,  Larry Kissell D NC-8, Suzanne Kosmas D FL-24, Frank Kratovil Jr. D MD-1,  Mike McIntyre D NC-7,  Jim Matheson D UT-2,  Jim Marshall D GA-8,  Charlie Melancon D LA-3,  Betsy Markey D  CO-4, Eric Massa D NY-29, Michael E. McMahon D NY-13, Walt Minnick D ID-1,  Scott Murphy D NY-20,  Glenn Nye D VA-2, Collin C. Peterson D MN-7,  Mike Ross D AR-4,  Ike Skelton D MO-4,  Heath Shuler  D NC-11,  John Tanner D TN-8, Gene Taylor D MS-4,  Harry Teague D NM-2.
The other thing I’d need to know is the list of Congress critters classified as “Blue Dogs” not on this list — who voted for the Act — and see how much that one staved off re-election disaster. It is also worth noting that Dennis Kucinich chose to vote “no”, coming from the opposite direction with his party dissent.
Than there’s Joseph Cao, the lone Republican vote for this bill, and the man who made mince-meat of John Boehner’s claim that “The only bi-partisan vote is the one against” the bill. I hate rhetoric like that one. We’ll come back in a year and see if his job was saved. I suppose that he’s likely going to be elected out of office will be shown by Republicans that this tact is senseless electorally, but in all honesty I always think that Cao should take his term of office as a bit of “funny money”, a license to vote as he sees fit without too much concern for figuring out his re-election prospects.
November 9th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
http://www.govtrack.us/congress/vote.xpd?vote=h2009-887&sort=party
ND-AL Pomeroy, Earl R+10
WV-01 Mollohan, Alan R+9
AR-01 Berry, Marion R+8
IN-08 Ellsworth, Brad R+8
PA-10 Carney, Chris R+8
OH-18 Space, Zach R+7
SC-05 Spratt, John R+7
AZ-01 Kirkpatrick, Ann R+6
IN-09 Hill, Baron R+6
WV-03 Rahall, Nick R+6
AR-02 Snyder, Vic R+5
AZ-05 Mitchell, Harry R+5
CO-03 Salazar, John R+5
VA-05 Perriello, Tom R+5
AZ-08 Giffords, Gabby R+4
TX-23 Rodriguez, Ciro R+4
KS-03 Moore, Dennis R+3
MI-01 Stupak, Bart R+3
NY-19 Hall, John R+3
PA-03 Dahlkemper, Kathleen R+3
FL-08 Grayson, Alan R+2
IN-02 Donnelly, Joe R+2
MI-07 Schauer, Mark R+2
NC-02 Etheridge, Bob R+2
NY-24 Arcuri, Mike R+2
OH-06 Wilson, Charlie R+2
TX-27 Ortiz, Solomon R+2
WI-08 Kagen, Steve R+2
CA-11 McNerney, Jerry R+1
IL-08 Bean, Melissa R+1
IL-11 Halvorson, Debbie R+1
IL-14 Foster, Bill R+1
MN-01 Walz, Tim R+1
NY-23 Owens, Bill R+1
PA-12 Murtha, John R+1
NH-01 Shea-Porter, Carol R+0
NY-01 Bishop, Timothy R+0
TX-28 Cuellar, Henry R+0
It’s especially worth noting that quite a few of these incumbents will be very vulnerable in 2010 and have already drawn strong challenges, such as Tom Perriello, John Hall, Vic Snyder, Mark Schauer, and John Spratt, to name just a few. Also, special props to the “yes” vote from the newest member of our caucus, Bill Owens