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Powell Ads Are Nice, but Opaque · Check with Chip

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Check with Chip, brought to you by Operation
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Blue Dot Red, turning the Blue Dot Red one podcast
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: at a time. I have seen two general election ads
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  Speaker 1: for the Denise Powell campaign. Powell is the Democrat running
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  Speaker 1: to succeed Don Bacon as Nebraska's 2nd District House Representative.
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  Speaker 1: The ads are bright, colorful, smooth, comfortable. Visiting with folks
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  Speaker 1: in neighborhoods, enjoying her son's baseball game, A sharp contrast
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  Speaker 1: from the dark, edgy ads in the primary. That's because
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  Speaker 1: Powell needs to appeal to the rest of us, not
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  Speaker 1: just the angry white female leftists who carried her to
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  Speaker 1: victory in the Democratic primary. In the primary, she was
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  Speaker 1: the P.O. 'd mom ready to fight for abortion. No
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  Speaker 1: mention of abortion in the new ads. And now she's
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  Speaker 1: fed up rather than P.O. 'd. cleaning up the language
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  Speaker 1: and tone to appeal to a broader section of the electorate.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: And she vows to work with Republicans to lower costs
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  Speaker 1: and taxes and fight corruption. And there was a longer-form
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  Speaker 1: fluffer from the baseball mom on teamwork and attitude and perseverance.
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  Speaker 1: The videos are well done, just like the ones in
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  Speaker 1: the primary. I like the person I see in the
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  Speaker 1: new videos. It's all flattering footage of an attractive and
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  Speaker 1: articulate candidate interacting positively with her husband, her children, and
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  Speaker 1: the community. She promotes values and goals that everyone can embrace.
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  Speaker 1: I just don't believe that's what we will get from
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  Speaker 1: Powell as a representative in Congress. I believe this is
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  Speaker 1: a campaign out of the Abigail Spanberger playbook. Campaign as
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  Speaker 1: an affable moderate, then govern as a ruthless leftist. During
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  Speaker 1: the primary, state Democratic Party leader Jane Klebb dismissed concerns
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: about the National Democratic Party lurching far to the left,
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  Speaker 1: way out of touch with Nebraska's 2nd District. Klebb said
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  Speaker 1: some of the Democratic candidates on the coasts are farther
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  Speaker 1: to the left because Democrats run candidates who reflect their
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  Speaker 1: local communities. Yes, the candidate may reflect the local electorate,
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  Speaker 1: but will that person reflect the local electorate as an officeholder?
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  Speaker 1: Brinker Harding, the Republican running against Powell and the Republican Party,
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  Speaker 1: must remind the electorate of the angry abortion champion from
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  Speaker 1: the primary. They also must point out that Powell was
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  Speaker 1: active in urging Nebraska state lawmakers to to reject legislation
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  Speaker 1: to protect children from what Powell called gender-affirming sexual transition surgery,
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  Speaker 1: which is really gender-attacking child mutilation. Voters need to know that.
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  Speaker 1: Then there's the Dark Money Denise nickname hung on her
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  Speaker 1: by fellow Democrats in the primary. Powell received millions of
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  Speaker 1: dollars from hidden national sources. That kind of money has
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  Speaker 1: strings attached. she will be expected to deliver votes for
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  Speaker 1: the national Democratic agenda in D.C. Republicans do it too,
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  Speaker 1: and it's generally a good thing. It's democracy in action.
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  Speaker 1: When I vote for a Republican, I expect that Republican
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  Speaker 1: to support the national Republican platform to which the candidate
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  Speaker 1: professed loyalty in the campaign, especially when that candidate has
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  Speaker 1: been endorsed. by the leader of the Republican Party, who
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  Speaker 1: also happens to be the president who basically has set
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  Speaker 1: the Republican agenda over the last decade. The difference between
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  Speaker 1: Republicans and Democrats is that Republicans are transparent about it.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: I am confident that Brinker Harding, the candidate, will be
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  Speaker 1: indistinguishable from Brinker Harding, the congressman. On the other hand,
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  Speaker 1: I doubt very much that Denise Powell, the candidate, will
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  Speaker 1: be the same as Denise Powell, the Congresswoman. I doubt
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  Speaker 1: very much that Powell will run a general election campaign
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  Speaker 1: ad bragging about her advocacy for gender-attacking surgery. I have
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  Speaker 1: no doubt that she will be a staunch supporter of
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  Speaker 1: it as an officeholder in D.C., just as she will
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  Speaker 1: be for abortion and men and women's sports and the
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  Speaker 1: rest of the national democratic leftist agenda. Make her clarify
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  Speaker 1: her positions on all these social and cultural issues. Ask
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  Speaker 1: her for her opinion of the Lindsay Clancy case. Force
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  Speaker 1: her to make a choice. Force her to choose whether
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  Speaker 1: to appeal to the hard left voters and dark money
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  Speaker 1: donors who helped her win the primary, or the broader
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  Speaker 1: electorate that she needs to win the general election. Now,
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  Speaker 1: it is possible that, again, per the Spanberger playbook, Powell
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  Speaker 1: may say to the leftist hardliners and dark money sources,
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  Speaker 1: I have to say these things and act this way
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  Speaker 1: to fool the majority and get elected. But don't worry,
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  Speaker 1: I'll be there for you once I have the power
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  Speaker 1: as an elected officeholder. Remember the cautionary tale of Ben Nelson? Actually,
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  Speaker 1: he was a genuine moderate. He was one of the
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  Speaker 1: last of a now virtually extinct species. the moderate pro-life Democrat.
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  Speaker 1: But as a U.S. Senator from Nebraska, in the political
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  Speaker 1: crunch time when it mattered most, he delivered the decisive
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  Speaker 1: vote to allow Obamacare to advance and eventually become law.
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  Speaker 1: So make Powell take positions. Get her on the record
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  Speaker 1: on these major social and cultural issues. If she refuses
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  Speaker 1: to own the hard-left, increasingly socialist, sexually open-season-anything-goes agenda of
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  Speaker 1: the Democratic Party, if she won't answer, then maybe another
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  Speaker 1: nickname is in order. Duck and Dodge Denise. That's Check
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  Speaker 1: with Chip. I'm Chip Maxwell. Thank you for listening.