Brown for Senate

Six months ago, nobody would have predicted that the race for the U.S. Senate seat from Ohio currently held by empty suit Republican Mike DeWine would be competitive. Democrats have not fared well in Ohio lately, after all. George W. Bush carried the state (albeit narrowly) in 2004, and no Democrat has held office statewide since John Glenn retired in 1998.

But all of a sudden, thanks to Bush's remarkable implosion, Ohio Gov. Bob Taft's conviction on ethics violation charges and DeWine's unremarkable record, there is a real opportunity for the seat to change hands. And Ohio Democrats know it.

Two of them, U.S. Rep. Sherrod Brown and Paul Hackett, have throw their hats into the ring. Both candidates have their strengths, but Brown is far and away the better candidate.

Hackett nearly won an unexpectedly close race in a strongly Republican congressional district earlier this year, and he undoubtedly has a promising future in politics. His resume is impressive, and he deserves credit for sticking his neck out to undertake a race nobody thought could ever be competitive. But he is still a political neophyte who is largely an unknown quantity. Maybe a Senate campaign would give him a chance to flesh out his views and give voters a chance to know what he stands for. Besides that, too many of Hackett's supporters are relying too much on a cult of personality that they've built up around their candidate that is too insular and off-putting. And instead of trying to sell Hackett, they have already started an online campaign to attack Brown's character and ruin his reputation.

Sherrod Brown is what progressive bloggers claim to want: a proven leader with the credentials, the organization and the political savvy to take on an incumbent Republican on the issues. Brown led the fight against CAFTA in the U.S. House and would have prevailed had House Republicans not held open the vote long after time had expired to twist arms and bribe representatives into supporting it. He voted against the war in Iraq. He has a 100 percent rating from the AFL-CIO for his tireless support of workers' rights. He opposes Social Security privatization plans that would subject the program to "Enron-style market risks." He opposed a school voucher scheme for Washington D.C. and according to his campaign site believes that "tax dollars should be used to fund the public education system, which educates 90% of all American children."

Brown has been in Congress since 1993 and in that time he has been consistently progressive. He is a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. There is no question whose side he is on -- the side of working Americans.

And for those who consider fund-raising the most important criterion for choosing a candidate, Brown has $2 million in the bank in preparation for this race.

Paul Hackett will make a good public official one day in the not-too-distant future. But as David Sirota points out, Brown is the stronger candidate. He is deserving of support from the blogosphere and the voters of Ohio.