U. S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln deems herself in serious trouble for re-election. I can think of no other explanation.

She had the union card check bill well-finessed. She had waffled until Arlen Specter took her off the hook by announcing his opposition and foreclosing the opportunity for 60 votes on cloture with or without her. Labor had signaled a willingness to compromise.

So, when the matter came up today at the Political Animals Club, she could have said, “It appears from the current climate that that bill cannot move forward in the Senate without some sort of compromise. So I’m going to wait to see what if anything the two sides can come up with. In the meantime I continue to believe our focus should be elsewhere, on jobs and health care.”

But, no. She flat came out against it. This had to be for political purposes rather than policy. Her announcement affects her politics, but not the policy.

That tells me she is highly concerned that she is at risk of running counter to the winning Democratic equation in Arkansas, which is to keep the farm and business communities assuaged.

By the way: These liberals who say they may as well abandon Lincoln because she is no better than a Republican — they need to think long and hard about a U.S. Sen. Gilbert Baker or Tim Griffin. And to run against her from the left in the primary or on a third-party basis is personally futile and politically damaging to her chances to stave off a Republican senator of the aforementioned type. Am I extolling the lesser of evils? Of course. That’s the very essence of politics.

UPDATE: I never before wrote anything Republicans liked as much as they like the above item. Here’s their news release on this development.  ^[1]