Weigel

Democrats, in a corner, have been playing one card all year -- they've been saying Tea Party-backed candidates are too crazy and too radical to win. I'm starting to notice a few newspaper editorial boards being confronted with the choice of the mainstream Democrat and the Tea Partier and choosing the Tea Partier, despite the flaws. The big example: The Las Vegas Review-Journal backing Sharron Angle , having previously backed Harry Reid.

Sharron Angle sees entitlementprograms that cannot be sustained without significant reforms and shehas the courage to offer solutions. She sees an arrogant federalgovernment that routinely ignores its constitutional boundaries, andshe isn't shy about trying to push it back behind the fence.

Saythis about Sharron Angle: You know what you're going to get. She's areliable vote for individual rights, smaller government andconstitutional principles.

On the other hand, a vote for HarryReid is a vote for the status quo in Washington. More of the same bigspending. More of the same bloated bureaucracies. More of the samepartisan bickering. More of the same inaction on Social Security andMedicare. More of the same class warfare on taxation. More of the samedisdain for the job-creating private sector.

Here's the Denver Post backing Ryan Frazier for the swingy 7th district seat, despite Frazier's flaws.

Besideshis part-time council gig, he is a business partner in what his websitecalls a small information technology business, Takara Systems, thatdelivers Web-based solutions to clients of various sizes throughout theworld. But for weeks, the phone number on its website was disconnected,and although calls now go to voice mail, no one returns messages,according to a Denver Post story.

Still, the economy and jobs are the top issues, and we think Frazier has the better positions.

And here's the Chicago Tribune backing Adam Kinzinger , a Palin-endorsed candidate in the 11th district.

You have to wonder how someone who is personally so chipper asDemocratic Rep. Debbie Halvorson, of Crete, can run the contemptuousand condescending ad campaign she has against Adam Kinzinger.Based on the ads, you'd think Kinzinger, of Manteno, is both a callowyouth and an old-hack pol. "Young man, you have no idea what you'redoing," one guy says in an ad, as though Kinzinger is about to run offand join the circus. A Halvorson mailer photo-shopped Kinzinger infront of a flag of communist China. Oh, spare us.

There are not, strictly speaking, liberal papers that usually endorse Democrats, and I do see that the Tribune went out of its way to dismiss Tea Party favorite Joel Pollak in his House race. But I am not yet seeing the Tea Party wave convince many editorial boards that they have to protect their readers from crazy Republicans. It looks like they're weighing the Tea Partiers' stances against the negative campaigns Democrats are running against them. The result: It's a bit tougher for Democrats to convince voters that a candidate endorsed by your local paper is completely outside the mainstream.

 

I'm keeping an eye on this, though, because there's a rush of endorsements in the final weeks, and we'll get a better sense of whether newspapers in Kentucky, Wisconsin, and other states where the Tea Party won primaries are going to rule these candidates out of bounds. (Spoiler: I expect Delaware papers to endorse Chris Coons.)