We are entreated to adopt a progressive. 

I'm giving to the DCCC.  That doesn't mean it's going to progressive candidates in all cases, obviously.  But they have as good a sense as anyone which races are winnable with a little extra money and which aren't.  Priority #1 is to keep the House Democratic.  If that doesn't happen, progressives in the House will have close to zero influence.

The individual progressive I'm adopting is Jeff Barnett, candidate for Congress in the Virginia 10th (northern Virginia/DC burbs), where we live.

Jeff is challenging the 30 year Republican incumbent Frank Wolf. 

Wolf is very much a part of the problem in Washington.  Before the Dems took the House, he chaired the Appropriations subcommittee that funded the Securities and Exchange Commission.  Following what should have been the 4 alarm fire warnings of the collapse of Long Term Capital Management and the Enron fiasco in the late 1990s and early 2000s, he was part of the Washington crowd committed to the position favored by Dems Bob Rubin and Larry Summers, and, oh, Bill Clinton in his last 2 years, as well as Alan Greenspan and the Republicans of deregulating the financial sector. The SEC was asleep at the switch in re to Madoff, even though an investment professional in the Boston area had written to it saying it was extremely likely that Madoff was running a Ponzi scheme.

Wolf's response to all of this was to do precisely nothing but support the deregulation and sleepwalking that was taking place on federal financial sector policies.  Oh, yes, why that must be the smart and sensible thing to do, he evidently concluded.  No need to take another look at what we're doing on policy in this area to see if it might need a tweak or two.

Barnett talks about this as an example of one of the main reasons why northern Virginia needs fresh blood in Congress.  He's right. 

Barnett is a retired Air Force Colonel.  Our area has fewer retired military than it did 20 years ago but there are still a sizable number. He wants to help small businesses grow and has been working at this locally as a consultant since he retired.  

I'm sure his is judged by the professionals an unwinnable race--I don't even need to look.  Someone has to try.  In his favor are several factors that have not always helped past Wolf challengers.  There are no other high profile local or state races on the ballot.  He says it's going to be a low turnout election and he's right.  Virginia 10 has not in past anti-incumbent cycles been willing to throw out Frank Wolf.  But this time around that sentiment is arguably stronger than it's been.  Wolf has a bland personality that offers no appeal to the folks who are drawn to the Tea Party movement.   

Meeting with a group of canvassers yesterday he quoted RFK (well, ok, it was Winston Churchill to whom the remark is generally attributed, but RFK probably said that, too): "If not now, when. If not us, then who?"  Someone has to make the effort here.  I'm glad this time it's Jeff Barnett.   And I'm doing what I can to try to help him.

10/30 update: (original post was 10/4--not sure if that will disappear when I post this update) Did the first of my two stints distributing sample ballots this morning.  This was outside the in-person absentee voter polling place.  In the two hours I was there I offered a blue Democratic sample ballot to almost all of the roughly 200 people who showed up to vote.  I'd say maybe 10% declined.  There was no organized presence for the 30-year GOP incumbent Frank Wolf.  I don't know of anyone who thinks my candidate, Jeff Barnett, has a chance to win.  If he gets 45% that would be better than anyone challenging him in recent years has gotten.  A number of us are thinking in terms of a 2012 run by him.   

I don't put any stock in what it means for someone to accept the sample ballot I'm distributing unless the person says something indicating which way they are voting, and even if they do, I am skeptical.  Just pleasantly accepting the ballot is the easiest way to politely get rid of someone you want to get rid of on your way in to vote. 

I was prepared for the possibility of incivility but did not encounter any.  A side benefit was having the chance to chat briefly with some local activists I had not previously met.  One of them blogs at HuffPost and Kos, is heavily involved with a green infrastructure advocacy group, and has some interesting, maybe promising, ideas about how to leverage the greatest number of jobs possible out of such investments.  He is intelligently thinking win-win-win for all, including Wall Street. 

My other shift is the early bird Election Day one.

11/1 AM Update: A bit nippy out this morning, around 35 when I arrived.  Nothing particularly eventful to report.  My opposite numbers were a somewhat dour middle-aged woman who warmed up a little bit as we bantered on and off, and a medical doctor who was friendlier from the beginning.  An election protection attorney from DC showed up, a kind and well-informed Dem from DC, whose company I enjoyed.  I'd say 60 to 70% of people accepted my offer of a sample ballot.

One year I did this my opposite number was a Kansas attorney with whom I had a sometimes spirited discussion about evolution and ID to pass the time when I was not handing out sample ballots.  He said he was the brother of a local resident.  Whatever.

I made it my goal to be more upbeat, pleasant and positive than my counterparts, such that if you didn't know which person was working for which candidate, you would tend to think it was my opposite number and not me who was expecting to have a can of whoopass opened up on her today and tonight. 

I try always to greet folks coming in with a "good morning sir/maam" and a "good day sir/maam" on the way out.  Plus a smile and as approachable a demeanor as I am able to convey.   

With working these types of poll shifts I try to get as many sample ballot into peoples' hands as possible but the part I have control over is almost entirely limited to the optics, staying positive, conveying through nonverbal and well as verbal communication that I am pleased to be out there and supporting my candidate and cause. 

Of course it can be harder to stay positive when you are working for the side everyone, and I mean everyone, expects to lose big today.  But many coming to vote also know that.  I like to think there is in some cases at least a grudging respect for the effort made.  Perhaps not.  I try not to think about the bigger picture and focus instead on what/who is right in front of me, and also remind myself that part of what I am doing is about our 2012 House race here.

One gentleman who was voting the other way replied to my "good day" wishes with a smiling "good day to you, too--not too good, though."  I doubt he has much to worry about in that regard.    

Just in the past couple of days, in addition to the "RetireFrankWolf.com" signs (source unknown to me) that popped up here and there, there were also some "Tea Party Express Frank Wolf" signs just in the last 24 hours.  Possible presidential aspirant Newt Gingrich lives in our town and he has been courting the Tea Party crowd.  I thought it was a poorly designed sign because you had to look at the smaller print to be able to tell the folks who put it up evidently wanted Wolf to lose.  Which of course may be the point--they didn't want him to lose, not really. 

I'm not at all sure there are any Tea Party people in this town other than Gingrich.  It would be too embarrassing for many who live in this relatively uptight, buttoned-up bedroom community to associate themselves with the Beck and Palin crowd.  My best guess is that Gingrich or some other Tea Party sympathizing muckety-muck had these put up as a shot across the bow to Wolf.  Figuring Wolf was going to win re-election easily, someone wanted him to know that his votes in the next Congress are being watched by others besides Dems.  He's not a Tea Party kind of guy.  After 30 sleepy years in Congress I don't think he has enough passion in him to be one.