Mississippi’s 1st Congressional District is inching toward a political showdown between incumbent Congressman Travis Childers, who is up for re-election, and Republican state Sen. Allen Nunnelee.

The incumbent and his challenger will be competing for 335,000 1st District votes, with an eye toward the November 2 General Election.

Here in Panola County, Batesville resident Wally Pang has indicated he plans to enter the 1st District race. Pang ran in 2008 and finished with three percent of the vote.

Nunnelee is also facing a June 2 Republican primary, where the seasoned and well-financed GOP candidate is expected to prevail.

If Nunnelee wins the primary, expect a Childers-Nunnelee match-up to be tough and dirty. Both political parties savor a win. Republicans are eyeing a Scott Brown-like win that would embarrass the Democrats. The Democrats, meanwhile, want desperately to keep the seat, since just two years ago they were boasting that a solid Republican seat had been snatched from the GOP.

The 1st District race has been rated a “toss-up” contest by Congressional Quarterly, the national political newspaper, and the Cook Political Report.

Campaign contributions flowed to both incumbent and challenger in 2009, with Childers raising nearly twice as much as his opponent, The Clarion-Ledger has reported.

Childers raised $822,780 by year’s end compared to $421,937 for Nunnelee. The state senator, although trailing in campaign money, had out-raised the incumbent Democrat in the final quarter of the year.

Childers the ‘Blue Dog’

Childers, during two campaigns for the 1st District, has touted his credentials as a fiscally and socially conservative, a so-called “Blue Dog” Democrat.

Press releases from the Congressman’s office describe him as a “pro-life, pro-gun Mississippian,” though Republicans continue to try to tie him to a liberal White House and liberal House Speaker.

Childers voted against the controversial bank bailouts, known as TARP I and TARP II, and he supports a return to PAYGO, a formula for spending funds that are available rather than borrowed.  

The PAYGO statute expired in 2002 and critics have said its demise set the stage for record-breaking deficit spending.

Most recently Childers voted against a Democratic effort to raise the nation’s debt ceiling, which passed.

Childers voted in favor of the Stimulus bill, telling The Panolian last year that the controversial legislation was among his most difficult votes. He supported the bill because of its potential to provide jobs in the 1st District, he said.  

The Stimulus legislation was passed, minus any Republican votes, at a cost to taxpayers of $787 billion.

A New York Times poll conducted last week showed just six percent of those polled believed the Stimulus created jobs.

Childers is from Prentiss County, where he served as chancery clerk before seeking the 1st District seat.

In the most recent congressional race, Childers defeated Southaven Mayor Greg Davis, a Republican. The incumbent Democrat won Panola County with 59 percent of the votes cast.

Nunnelee the ‘Young Gun’

In the Mississippi legislature, Nunnelee, who is from Tupelo, chairs the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee. He has served in the state senate since 1995.  

The state senator wears the label of a conservative Republican, but Democrats are already aiming at his “broken” pledge to oppose tax cuts. His votes to raise Mississippi’s tobacco tax 50 cents a pack, and to bring back a tax on hospitals, amount to broken promises, according to Democrats.

Nunnelee is enjoying support from Congressional Republicans. He is participating in a three-tiered campaign program, known as the Young Guns, which recruits and grooms candidates to run for Congress.

National Republicans are touting Nunnelee’s most recent fund-raising effort, which is viewed as a prerequisite for running a formidable race.  

First things first: win the primary

Nunnelee faces two challengers in the Republican primary, former Eupora Mayor Henry Ross and political analyst and author Angela McGowan.

Ross served at the Justice Department under former President George W. Bush. Ross has yet to raise or spend any campaign cash according to The Clarion-Ledger.

McGlowan announced February 1, in Oxford, that she is running for the 1st District seat. She is originally from Lafayette County, though it’s unclear if she owns a home or property in Mississippi.

In the conservative 1st District, McGlowan is already politically wounded after she suggested in a radio interview that gun owners should list their personal firearms on federal tax returns.   

“I think the government has the right to know what guns we have in our homes,” she told show host Paul Gallo last August.   

McGlowan has since said she was playing “devil’s advocate” about proposed legislation, the Blair Holt Act, which she said she now opposes.

On the campaign trail, McGlowan has also taken shots at Nunnelee, echoing the Democrats’ talking points that the state senator broke a pledge to vote against tax increases.

McGlowan was set to speak to Panola County Republicans Monday night in Batesville, said county GOP chairman Calvin Land.

Stimulus: wonderful or a waste?

In Mississippi’s 1st District, the congressional race is set against a bleak background: double-digit unemployment throughout north Mississippi, and a recession with no hint of recovery.

Against that backdrop, Childers and other Democrats last week marked the one-year anniversary of the Stimulus, known officially as American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.

Childers, in a press release, stated Wednesday that the Act “has created or saved” 17,000 jobs in Mississippi, according to White House economic advisors.

 The congressman went on to state that the legislation is expected to “create and save” 30,000 jobs statewide and 9,000 jobs in the 1st District.

Republicans, who voted against the Stimulus bill, have replied with plenty of scorn and ridicule.

Across the country, scrutiny of Stimulus funds have shown that monies were going to nonexistent congressional districts, to build a $550,000 skate park, and to fund a $339,000 study to research the link between malt liquor and marijuana use, among other projects.

Democrats have responded that Republicans have also enjoyed the flow of Stimulus funds, mainly in infrastructure improvements, in their home districts.

The Panolian has reported that Stimulus money has been allocated to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Mississippi to build an equipment shed, repave a parking lot, and build public showers, all at area lakes.

Stimulus funds have also flowed to Panola County’s two public schools, North Panola and South Panola, though with federal strings attached: the monies are earmarked for Title programs and special education programs.