Heath Shuler Plans to Run for House Speaker

Just a few problems with this plan. First, he's no shoo-in to win next Tuesday. Second, it's doubtful he'd find enough support; after all, Nancy Pelosi still has plenty of backers among the Koolaid slurpers in her party. Third, and most important, it will be John Boehner's job. I know Shuler was sacked a lot during his miserable stint as QB for the Redskins, but is he still suffering from the effects of concussions?

Conservative Democratic Rep. Heath Shuler (N.C.) said Wednesday he might run for Speaker if a "viable alternative" to Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) does not emerge.

"If there is no viable alternative [to Pelosi], I will be running for Speaker of the House," Shuler said during a debate with his Republican foe Jeff Miller on WWNC Radio, the Ashville Citizen-Times reported.

The statement from the second-term congressman, a former college football star who played as a pro with the NFL's Washington Redskins, is another sign of Pelosi's unpopularity among centrist and conservative Democrats, many of whom are facing tough reelection contests.

With his statement, Shuler became the sixth incumbent Democrat to indicate they will not vote for Pelosi for another term as Speaker. The other five are Reps. Bobby Bright (Ala.), Jim Marshall (Ga.), Gene Taylor (Miss.), Mike McIntyre (N.C.) and Jason Altmire (Pa.)

Eight Democratic candidates have also said they won't support Pelosi if they are elected to Congress.

Throughout the campaign, Miller has attempted to tie Shuler to Pelosi, saying he votes with her a vast majority of the time.

Shuler's comment sparked a testy exchange between the candidates.

"You're saying you would not vote for Nancy Pelosi for speaker?” Miller said.

“If that's the alternative, I will be voting for myself,” Shuler replied.

Queen Pelosi Has An Enemies List

Used to be having a documented enemies list was grounds for you to become Public Enemy No. 1. Heck, Richard Nixon has been out of office for nearly 35 years and dead for 15 and we still hear about his list of enemies.

Alas, it's perfectly fine if you're a Democrat to have an enemies list. Heck, you even get a glowing profile out of the deal. Although I have to say Rush Limbaugh is going to be disappointed he's not at the top, although we know he's Nos. 1 and 1a on Obama's list.

In fact, three of the top five are Democrats. So much for unity.

So who’s on Pelosi’s list now?

1. Rep. Heath Shuler (D-N.C.). No Democrat has done quite so much in so short a time to arouse Pelosi’s disdain as the failed-Redskins-quarterback-turned-ambitious-North-Carolina-congressman.

The conservative, anti-abortion Shuler would have made the list for voting against both bank bailout bills and the stimulus package, but the way he went about it didn’t help; Shuler told an audience back home that “House leadership and Senate leadership have really failed” on the $787 billion package.

The thing that riles Pelosi most, according to several House aides, is that she believes Shuler’s motives are as much political as they are ideological — and that he’s picking a fight with her to position himself for a run against Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) next year.

Unless Shuler is planning a long House career, picking a fight with Pelosi may indeed have its advantages: His 2006 opponent, incumbent GOP Rep. Charles Taylor, scored points by portraying Shuler as a Pelosi acolyte.

“I don’t know if Shuler is talking without thinking or if he’s just making the calculation that distancing himself from Pelosi is never a bad thing to do,” said a senior House leadership aide.

2. Rush Limbaugh. He’s Pelosi’s sworn enemy — and she views him as beneath contempt and unworthy of her comment.

Asked about the right-wing talk-radio king the other day, Pelosi said: “I don’t speak to that. I’m the speaker of the House. I don’t get into the popular culture.”

3. Rep. Paul E. Kanjorski (D-Pa.). Pelosi and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee made an all-out effort to help the veteran Scranton congressman win a tight race against longtime nemesis Lou Barletta last fall.

So aides say the speaker was taken aback when the western Pennsylvania representative bucked leadership by voting “no” on the original version of the stimulus bill.

He voted for the conference report later, but hard feelings persist.

4. Rep. Eric Cantor (R-Va.). It’s no surprise that Pelosi isn’t crazy about the young, aggressive minority whip, who has marshaled an anti-Pelosi GOP insurgency in the House.

Pelosi has good personal relationship with House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio). But members of her leadership cadre are starting to really dislike Cantor, despite their public pose of studied indifference. Part of the reason: Cantor is employing many of the same techniques Pelosi used so successfully to torture former House Speaker Dennis Hastert when she was the Democratic whip in 2002 and 2003. [hey, I thought Democrats were opposed to torture?]

It remains to be seen if Cantor’s power-of-“no” philosophy will work — congressional approval ratings have actually spiked on the stimulus — but he’s gotten traction by nitpicking Pelosi’s proposals and magnifying the majority’s blunders.

5. Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.). The fiscally conservative gadfly would have topped the list had he not reversed his first stimulus “no” by voting in favor of the final package.

Even so, the most outspoken of the Blue Dog Democrats is still on thin ice with leadership, thanks to his comment that he “actually got some quiet encouragement from the Obama folks” for initially bucking Pelosi on the stimulus. That required a hasty Obama-Pelosi cleanup effort that resulted in a Cooper clarification — although he continues to express dissatisfaction with what he sees as Pelosi’s top-down leadership style.

Some of those Blue Dogs, Cooper and Shuler in particular, could possibly be good candidates to cross the aisle if the Republicans are able to close the gap in the House next year.

Read on. The rest of the list is all Democrats. Doesn't seem like there'll be many tears shed when this woman is dethroned.

Sure, This Would Really Help With Obama's Experience Gap

You really have to wonder if people think before they run with such ludicrous ideas.

One of Barack Obama's primary hurdles in getting to the White House is his lack of experience.

So this genius thinks it's a good idea to have a freshman Congressman as his running mate.

Should Virginia’s extremely talented governor Tim Kaine not capture the VEEPstakes, Barack Obama should look several hundred miles to the south for his running mate—specifically, he should recruit Congressman Heath Shuler, a native of Swain Co. and now a resident of Haywood Co. in the picturesque mountains of North Carolina.

A top passer at the University of Tennessee and runner-up for the Heisman Trophy in 1993, Shuler played several seasons for the Washington Redskins, thus also giving him name recognition in Virginia, Maryland, and D.C. area.

Above all, the quarterback-turned-politicians could help Obama and the Democrats overcome the image of Chablis-sipping, Brie-munching elites who appeal to urban denizens, college graduates, and minorities but strain to “connect” with small farmers, coal miners, and blue- and pink-collar voters.

In April the Illinois senator belittled small-town residents when he told a San Francisco audience that “it’s not surprising then that they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.”

In contrast to Obama’s condescension and extremely liberal voting record as a state legislator and senator, Shuler opposes abortion, favors gun owners’ rights, and believes that newcomers seeking to become citizens should obey U.S. laws rather than sneaking across the border and throwing themselves into the arms of immigration lawyers.

Get real. Shuler sounds more like a Republican, if anything, and does this guy really expect the Democrats to go anywhere near a pro-life candidate?

Heck, they wouldn't even let the pro-life Bob Casey speak at the 1992 convention.