You win some, you lose some

I was hoping the Francince Busby would win in California's 50th district largely because insofar as the media paid attention to her longshot bid to win the Republican stronghold, it was to provide the simplistic frame that it would show whether or not the public was sick of GOP rule. All things equal, it was an uphill battle for Busby. But all things weren't equal, and the Republican party dumped something like 5 million dollars into the race, which will be held again in November anyway. If that's what it takes for the GOP to hold a seat that should've been totally safe, the picture is pretty bright for Democrats in the fall. Instead, we'll probably be subjected to people claiming that this shows how confident the public is under the current party. Ugh. The really troubling news is that the Democratic GOTV efforts didn't seem to amount to much. That might've been due to the very ugly gubernatorial primary (in which the progressive beat a more conservative Dem), but it's a troubling sign.

On the other hand, many bloggers will be pleased today by the victory of John Tester in Montana's Democratic primary. I didn't follow the race closely, and couldn't say how much of an impact the blogosphere's support had on the race, but it's openly being referred to as a "blowout" in which a progressive beat a centrist with the support of the Democratic establishment.

Jon Tester, a populist farmer, won a decisive victory over John Morrison in the Democratic primary for the U.S. Senate on Tuesday and will face three-term Republican incumbent Sen. Conrad Burns, who won his primary handily, in November.

Tester, outspent by Morrison by nearly a 2-to-1 margin, led almost from the start of the vote counting Tuesday evening. He ended up defeating Morrison, the state auditor, by about 25 percentage points in the five-way primary.

Although Tester was considered an underdog in the five-candidate Democratic Senate race, he gained momentum in closing weeks of the campaign through an extensive grass-roots effort.