An open letter to Eliot and Hillary

Dear Eliot, Dear Hillary,

Congratulations on your respective (and quite respectable) victories in the Democratic primary on September 12th. You earned a resounding mandate for the November elections from the party rank and file, and now, you can both look forward to the general election with great confidence.

The same primary confirmed, at least for you, Madame Senator, that you'll be running against a rather pitiable lot. John Spencer, now the official republican designee, inspires "a serious case of the icks" even among republicans - quite remarkable. As to your opponent, Eliot, the less said, the better.

Both of you, in short, and fifty-one days out, seem assured of victory. You have bulging war chests, with millions of dollars that, quite frankly, you could pile up at The Battery and burn, and still get elected with Schumer-esque margins.

I'd like to suggest a better use for those millions than a bonfire. This better use, incidentally, also ties in with your own goals, because both of you, for reasons of your own, need resounding victories all across the state. You need a mandate.

What better way to create that mandate than to finance a huge, statewide get out the vote operation that not only benefits you, but Democrats further down your ticket? Concretely, we have six competitive House races – including the one that always gets overlooked, in the Thirteenth District – and a number of competitive State Senate races. You, Eliot, can't change everything from Day One if Joe Bruno remains as Senate Majority Leader. And you, Madame Senator, whatever your future plans are, would be in a far better position to execute them if you could point to six shiny new Democratic Members of the House that you helped get elected. Campaign with these candidates, print palm cards, help them raise money – you know the game.

Best of all, this is a win-win proposition. If, say, both of you spent $5 million on GOTV, that would directly benefit your own campaign. What it would also do, in a way that television ads won't, is exploit that most precious of political commodities, coattails. Both of you have them, and our party needs to make good use of them.

So what do you say? Do we have a deal?

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