NJ-5: Retire Garrett

One of my longer term crusades has been trying to get the Katrina 11 voted out of office. The Katrina 11 were the 11 Republicans who voted "No" on the bill that Congress approved and Bush signed to help the victims of Hurricane Katrina. These are cold-hearted bastards who would willingly see Americans die for the sake of more tax cuts for the wealthy. Most of them eagerly supported no-bid contracts for Halliburton, but wouldn't give a dime to help American citizens after Katrina. So far two of those 11 Republicans have indeed been defeated, one in 2006 (Indiana) and one in 2008 (Idaho).

NJ-5 is one of the Katrina 11 districts. This seat is currently held by Scott Garrett who is widely considered far too much of a right wing extremist for his New Jersey constituents. Like Virginia Foxx of North Carolina (another one of the Katrina 11), he opposed renewal of the Voting Rights Act, and he supported oil drilling off New Jersey's coast, both very unpopular stands in New Jersey. He is anti-union, anti-choice, anti-Katrina victims and about as right wing as you can get.

There is a website dedicated to defeating Garrett I'd like to call your attention to called "Retire Garrett." From their site:

Retire Garrett is a site dedicated to building a grassroots movement for the 2010 Congressional Midterm Elections. We are bringing together writers and contributors from all parts of the district to build a strong coalition of Democrats to help the eventual Democratic nominee in 2010.

We want to organize NJ-5 town-by-town, competing for votes in every part of the district, and exposing Congressman Garrett for the true right wing ideologue he is. Eventually we will be holding rallies and other public events to raise awareness of our campaign. Of course having a candidate to support, and not just one to be against, is a crucial part of our campaign – we are currently in the process of selecting a person who will provide the 5th District with the representation it deserves.

We hope you will join us in this effort: comment directly on the site or e-mail me at msimonson19@gmail.com to write a post, tell your friends and family about this site and our campaign, and check back regularly to stay updated on upcoming events. With your help this race can be won, so let’s Retire Garrett!

Check out their website and if you can help them, contact them.

And you can donate to defeat the Katrina 11 (really now the Katrina 9 after our earlier 2 wins) through my Katrina 11 ActBlue site.