Salena Zito, of the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, has a great column up about the Blue Dog Coalition within the Democratic party, with a look at what it all means to the heated Senatorial campaign in my home state of Connecticut:

Although your average Democrats are true "Blue Dogs" at heart, rarely have any of them heard the phrase. But they sure know what a "progressive" is -- the heir apparent to the Howard Dean movement.

Blue Dogs are economic and social moderates, appealing to the descendants of Reagan Democrats. On the House side of Capitol Hill, they have their own coalition.
The whole "big tent" political phenom has created an identity crisis for traditional Democrats who come home from a hard day's work, flip on the tube and see people rallying for their party but not for their issues. Issues such as fiscal responsibility -- they get that.

Blue Dog comes from two sources: The stereotypical Southerner would vote for even a yellow dog if he ran as a Democrat. And coalition members first met in the offices of two congressmen where hung "Blue Dog" paintings of Cajun artist George Rodrigue...

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