Monthly archives: February, 2018

Get To Know Conor Lamb, The Next Dem To Upset A GOP Dark Red District

Conor Lamb, Democratic candidate for Congress in Pennsylvania's 18th.

Conor Lamb, Democratic candidate for Congress in Pennsylvania’s 18th.

Conor Lamb has as real shot at upsetting a dark red GOP district that includes Houston, PA.

Lamb speaks on, wait for it, Jesus, as only a young man of faith who knows the teachings of Jesus can:

“Jesus always started out by going and being with a certain group of people,” says Conor Lamb as we’re winding down hilly back roads to the Washington County Gun Show.

Jesus, Lamb tells me, tried to get to know people as people before he tried to win them over with arguments. He “wasn’t asking people where they stood on abortion before they came and sat down with them.”

Lamb, the Democratic candidate in a neck-and-neck special election on March 13, has to hope the people of Pennsylvania’s 18th Congressional District will likewise listen to what he has to say before judging him by his party affiliation.

Described as a “square-jawed 33-year-old Marine Corps officer who resigned from his job as a federal prosecutor in Pittsburgh to run, has a chance to upend the district’s politics—as long as he can avoid being labeled a liberal without discouraging the district’s not inconsiderable Democrat base from turning out. A devout Catholic, Lamb is pro-union and pro-gun, backs bipartisan deals for fixing Obamacare and the nation’s infrastructure, wants more job training and less college debt, and says he’s pro-fracking but pro-environment, too. And he’s betting that this mix of economic populism and moderate social politics can win the predominantly blue collar district.”

And I couldn’t be happier for him. Or for Pennsylvania’s 18th, which, currently, begins northwest and west of Pittsburgh, south to the state line, and explodes east into Westmoreland County.

Let’s see what the district looks like after the Pennsylvania Supreme Court is done redrawing it.

Pennsylvania's 18th Congressional District

Pennsylvania’s 18th Congressional District (Since 2013)


Round And Round: The Web Spins ‘Round Trump

Nick gates to change plea

Nick Gates will change his plea to guilty, testify against Paul Manafort.

The web spins ever more tightly, creeping closer and closer to Donald Trump.

From the LA Times:

A former top aide to Donald Trump’s presidential campaign will plead guilty to fraud-related charges within days — and has made clear to prosecutors that he would testify against Paul Manafort, the lawyer-lobbyist who once managed the campaign.

The change of heart by Trump’s former deputy campaign manager Richard Gates, who had pleaded not guilty after being indicted in October on charges similar to Manafort’s, was described in interviews by people familiar with the case.

Gates will change his plea to guilty within the next few days, according to the report.

And this:

Gates, 45, who is married with four children, does not appear to be well positioned financially to sustain a high-powered legal defense.

“He can’t afford to pay it,” said one lawyer who is involved with the investigation. “If you go to trial on this, that’s $1 million to $1.5 million. Maybe more, if you need experts” to appear as witnesses.