An important Primary Election was held in Arkansas on Tuesday.
Incumbent Senator Blanche Lincoln defeated primary challenger Bill Halter by a narrow margin in an effort to keep her seat on the Senate.
It was an important election for many reasons with maybe the most important being hard-working people verses the corporations.
Unions, tired of being snubbed by a moderate Senator, backed Lieutenant Governor Halter to seat a Senator that would vote for the people—those the Senator is supposed to represent.
A look at Senator Lincoln’s campaign contributions reveals why she voted against healthcare, before she voted for it. She has received nearly a million dollars in campaign contributions from healthcare and healthcare professionals, hospitals, and pharmaceutical companies over the last 5 years. She has also taken over $830,000 from financial services institutions, and $300,000 from lobbyists.
More recently Senator Lincoln introduced an amendment to the FinReg Bill dealing with derivatives which would make them more transparent and bring them out of the shadows and into the light. It is hated by financial institutions but may have been a pre-election move of atonement for all the destructive votes she’s made since 1999.
She had help from the President and the still popular Arkansas pol, Bill Clinton, and barely squeezed out the victory.
The Halter campaign fell short, but receiving 48% of the vote against a multi-term incumbent should be viewed as a victory for labor, despite the loss.
And, though Lincoln has her work cut out for her against Republican opponent John Boozman in the general election, she may have learned a valuable lesson in her hard-fought primary contest.
In her acceptance speech she told her supporters and the voters of Arkansas that she heard them. Hopefully she understood what they were saying to her. It was clear that working ‘for the people’ should be on the top of her list of priorities.
Her first priority should be to push the toughest derivatives bill she can through the Senate. ‘The people’ deserve to know how much damage the derivatives market is going to wreak on the financial world before it’s too late. Arkansans deserve her best efforts.
It’s time our Senators and Representatives do something good for the country instead of for corporations and the top 1% of the population.
This country can no longer tolerate corporate lap dogs in their political houses.