WV Points to Signs of Danger for Incumbents

A 28 year veteran of the House named Alan Mollohan got beat in his party's primary yesterday in West Virginia.

Democratic primary voters in West Virginia showed 28-year congressional veteran Rep. Alan Mollohan, D-W.Va., the door on Tuesday night.

It came after delegates to the Utah Republican convention ousted Sen. Robert Bennett, R-Utah, from serving a fourth term in Washington over the weekend.

But the Mollohan loss could signal trouble for Democrats.

Democratic state Sen. Mike Oliverio toppled Mollohan. Oliverio’s victory made Mollohan the first House casualty in what has already been a turbulent midterm election year.

This comes less then a week after Republican voters did the same to Robert Bennett in their primary. One thing is clear and that is that all incumbents are in trouble. John McCain is facing a stiff primary challenge of his own and in the next month Blanche Lincoln and Arlen Specter may also lose.

The last time we had this sort of a tsunami for incumbents was 1994 and we followed that up with welfare reform, capital gains tax cuts, and several balanced budgets and so this may be just what the country needs.