i've talked a lot about the "strategic corporal" and how this fits the combined arms approach to campaigns.  the combined arms approach is where grassroots activists not only contribute all they can to a campaign, but also devote considerable time and resources to it, as well as leveraging their skills, expertise and social networks on its behalf.  one of the congressional campaigns out there that has given plenty of room for strategic corporals to prove themselves (and surprise everyone, including themselves) is the 10th cd in illinois, that of dan seals.

one might imagine that the emergence of strategic corporals in the seals campaign might have been more of necessity than choice, but that would be wrong.  rahm might be the only one who hasn't noticed, but this campaign is serious (and people in the district are trying to get rahm's attention).  it's put itself in a position to win.  it has the money to pay for knowledge and personnel, so it wasn't necessity that allowed these expert volunteers to emerge in hefty roles.  rather it was the force of their will, their determination to succeed, and the intelligence of the candidate to let them.

i went to the dan seals volunteer bbq in wheeling today.  by my count, more than 200 people had turned out by the time i got there, and people trickled in and out afterwards.  it was a great afternoon!

the point of this event was to thank the people who had volunteered for dan's campaign -- and to spur them on to greater involvement.  by that standard, they didn't need much encouragement.  they were already fired up.  the fact that dan tried to get out and talk to each person that showed up didn't hurt any.

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you know what IT is, right?

IT is taking back the house, a goal shared across the netroots, including here in illinois.  smart observers realize that changes in the house's partisan complexion will be clustered, with a few states having a dramatic impact on this outcome, and others having virtually none.

the midwest holds two of those clusters, ohio and indiana.  both these states have internal trends favoring democrats that sit on top of the national trend moving away from republicans.  iow, a wave on top of a wave.  any surfer will tell you, that's the one to catch!

some of the things i'd like to see democrats emulate from republicans (gasp!) are: WORK SMARTER, not harder; and CONCENTRATE your resources.  on the net, we call that a swarm (used to, anyway).  here's where to swarm!

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i'm not particularly a believer in (national) wave elections.  they occur too infrequently and you cannot plan for them, hence i don't count on them.  as an old surfer, i easily identified rahm's electoral strategy: whip a bunch of campaigns into shape, and keep looking over his shoulder for that big wave to ride.  this gamble now looks like it may be paying off.

a lot of what i call (democratic) official-dom here in illinois has been focused on IL 6th, but the duckworth-roskam race will only offer a hint of whether there is a true wave election undertoe.  a better indicator to the strength of the national wave is IL 10th, with the race between dan seals and incumbent mark kirk.  

under normal conditions, kirk should be a safe incumbent.  kirk won 64% of the vote in 2004, pulling 174,158 votes to 97,701.  but kerry won the district (53%), kirk's re-elect number has hovered around 50%, and the generic ballot test has increasingly favored a democrat.  bush's popularity in the district has dived into the toilet with the rest of the country.

the key here is clearly to tie kirk to bush and the administration's failures.

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