The Hotline's Josh Kraushaar sent this follow-up to my post yesterday suggesting conservative Democratic candidates had very little to do with the 35 pickups in the House and Senate for the Democrats.

The point about conservatism not being the decisive factor in the Democrats' win is a dead-on point, and Morris misses the mark in his column.

Of the Democratic pickups only 5 max can it be said that the candidates' conservatism played any role in the victory. There's NC 11, where Shuler is well-positioned to hold the seat because of his "mountain values" talk. There's IN 09, where Baron Hill was helped as much by his past experience representing the CD as his conservatism. There's PA 10, where Don Sherwood cost the GOP the seat as much as Chris Carney won it for them. (That said, he ran a strong, values-centric campaign.) And IN 08, where Ellsworth was by far the strongest nominee because of his conservatism... though, you are correct that a more moderate Dem could have held the seat given the statewide and nat'l environment. You could also make the argument for Tim Mahoney in FL 16, even though he won only because of Mark Foley's misconduct.

But there are 9 other seats where not only did the Dems' not emphasize their conservatism, but actively advertised lefty viewpoints. Take Steve Kagen, for example. He won in a 57% Bush district despite taking positions well to the left of his district on foreign policy and health care. Or Carol Shea-Porter and Paul Hodes, who ran on discontent to the Iraq war - not conservative positions at all. Zack Space isn't conservative, nor did he actively advertise himself as such in OH 18. Neither did Nancy Boyda in her surprise KS 02 victory. Conservatism played little to no role in Nick Lampson, Gabby Giffords or Harry Mitchell's victories as well. And if you count KY 03 (which is a 50-50 district), John Yarmuth embraced many liberal positions he took when writing for an alt-weekly paper.

So this by no means was a mandate for Dem conservatism..... in most cases, they took advantage of ballot blunders and other ethical snafus by Republicans, plus the uniquely favorable environment for Dems.

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