A Republican tide in New York state
Yes, it appears that Bill Owens clung to the 23rd House district seat. And yes, Democrats won some marquis races, holding the Governor’s mansion, and walking away with both US Senate seats.
But it was Republicans who stormed back in key House battles across the state, from John Hall’s 19th district seat in the lower Hudson Valley to Scott Murphy’s surprisingly big drubbing in the 20th district.
Mike Arcuri was also toppled in NY-24. In the process, the Democrats lost a couple of politicians widely viewed as rising young stars.
Meanwhile, the GOP is poised to win a statewide race — the first since George Pataki’s last victory — with Harry Wilson locked in a dead head with incumbent Comptroller Tom DiNapoli.
What does it all mean?
Clearly, the national mood altered the landscape everywhere in the US, not least here in Upstate and Northern New York.
The question now is whether these districts will remain competitive or whether the GOP will establish once again the kind of firm grip that they once enjoyed in the region.
The surprising margin in NY-20 — with Gibson breaking away from Murphy — suggests that Democrats have a lot of work to do.
But it’s also increasingly clear that Republicans, Conservatives and tea party activists in NY-23 squandered an incredible political opportunity.
The first-glance impression is that Doug Hoffman once again appears to have played something of a spoiler role, but I think it’s more complicated than that.
Deep, venomous, and personal divides now exist between the moderate and conservative wings of the GOP in the 23rd district. Hoffman is only one piece of that feud.
Until they sort out the mess, Democrats will continue to overperform here.
As always, your thoughts welcome.
Tags: election10
sad night for progressives like me. congrats to the winners.
The old Republican coalition in NNY that elected the likes of Dave Martin and John McHugh with 65-70% of the vote has been broken up. The large margins were made possible with sizeable union support. Doug Hoffman’s candidacy in 2009 shattered that. No one here or elsewhere answered the question on how the Republicans intended to win without the 100,000 union households in NY-23. It didn’t help matters that Bill Owens is a veteran and had NRA support. Doheny’s character issues hurt him and I suspect much of the Doug Hoffman’s support this time may have sat this one out if he were not on the ticket. As for the larger question about the Republican Party in NYS, it remains a moderate party and out of step with the national party at this point. If the swing back and forth between the parties continues every two years, it may be a number of election cycles before we know the answer to Brian’s question.
Well, I was wrong about this election. But at least I was consistently wrong over the long haul.
Don’t feel bad Knuck, the Repubs did better than I thought they would. I am amazed Ritchie beat Aubertine. I thought she was a lousy candidate. So we were both wrong.
Just a note on my personal struggle in the voting booth, or whatever you call it these days. I HATE Cuomo, hated his father, hate his looks, his voice, his walk, his NYC attitude, his “entitled to be Governor” attitude, his answers, his policies, everything. I would vote for satan himself before voting for another 4 years of a Cuomo regime. OTH, the last couple weeks Carl Palidino did his best to destroy his campaign, but at least he wasn’t Cuomo. I very strongly considered writing in for Patterson despite the fact he did wrong in some areas. At least he attempted to address the problems honestly.
That’s pretty sad. The best choice I had was a lame duck Democrat that wasn’t even on the ticket.
NY 23 is populated with over 9500 idiots.
I can’t believe that >9,550 people cast their ballots for Hoffman – that logic is the heart of the Republican problems in the North Country.
It would be a fair guess on my part to say that most of those 9500 people voted with their conscience. That’s not idiocy, that’s character. Were the people voting for the Green Party idiots? For the Rents too high party? Hoffman, for all his faults, represented the ideals of a certain group far better than Dohneney. I’d have preferred to see Owens ousted, but calling people idiots for following their heart is both unkind and inaccurate. A whole group of people followed their hearts in 2008 and voted an extremely inexperienced man with a less than stellar background into the White House. I didn’t agree with them, but they weren’t idiots…, well, most of them anyway. Those that thought he really would pay their rent and buy them new TV’s and “bling”…yeah, they might qualify.
Bret, I agree with you on A. Cuomo even though I voted for him: not an inspiring leader for NY. But who really wants that job? I don’t see state politics getting much better in the short term.
I did love listening to Mario Cuomo – that man has a wonderful grasp of the English language. It may seem small, but inspiring the populace is a very important part of being a politician.
I don’t think most of us who post here were very surprised, in the main. Another mid-term “wave”. I understand that people want things to get better, but that doesn’t happen over night; unfortunately, the ability to delay gratification is a lost virtue. I may be wrong, but I think as long as candidates can continue to convince enough of the electorate that those guys in office aren’t fixing things fast enough, and they can do it right away, we’ll continue to see waves…and little real improvement. As Regan’s old budget director said on 60 Minutes Sunday, this mess has been about 30 years coming. It will not be fixed by 2012. It’s gonna be an interesting ride.
I can’t believe Darrel lost. That is not a good thing, IMHO.
Sorry Bret – casting a “conscience vote” for a candidate who left the race and asked his supporters to vote for his primary opponent is idocy as was a vote for the inexperienced community organizer from Chicago.
I don’t think you can rule out the fact that many of those 9500 voters may have sat out the Congressional vote had Doug Hoffman not been on the ballot.
brian said “venomous” in describing the GOP relationships in NY 23. that’s a perfect description.
other apt descriptions are vendetta, personal…..take your pick.
because the upstate republicans cannot put this aside, owens got 2 free passes through election night.
given the apparent general level of public political literacy, I suspect a goodly proportion of the 9500 votes Hoffman received came from people who were unaware he had dropped out of the race.
If I had been running Doheny’s campaign I would have had big signs as close as possible to each polling place saying “HOFFMAN HAS DROPPED OUT..DOHENY IS THE CONSERVATIVE CHOICE”
I also have to note that, after all the complaints here about over-emphasis of polls and horse race stories..overall the pollsters seems to have had it just about correct in just about every local and NYstate race
Have to agree with everything you say, Fred.
Q: “For the Rents too high party?”
A: Yes
Except for who got the vote to be governor, everyone I voted for won.
And no, I did not vote for Paladino. I knew Cuomo would win so I voted for Kristin Davis – just for fun.
As to the future, probably more of the same old same old. The economy will not suddenly improve. The rich will get richer and the poor will get poorer. In the mean time, in between time, the politicians will have fun.
I went with Howie.
“The surprising margin in NY-20 — with Gibson breaking away from Murphy — suggests that Democrats have a lot of work to do.”
While the margin was surprising (most people thought this race would be very close) there is the suggestion of vulnerability on the Right in this district. As people are fond of saying, this district is 2-1 Republican to Democrat and while Murphy was the incumbent it was only as an incumbent from a special election. On the other hand about $2 million in outside 527 money was dumped into this race in the last month or so on the Gibson side, the Right was highly motivated in this election cycle, and the economy is terrible. Murphy made a few dumb rookie moves early on that came back to haunt him but all things considered a challenger to Gibson might find some encouraging signs.
And thanks Bret, I appreciate your gracious comments.
Looks like the Sienna poll on the Murphy/Gibson race was spot on despite what many thought.
It still doesn’t make sense to me for conservatives to vote for a guy that dropped out or to abstain to vote because it leads to owens winning who has nothing in common with them other than NRA support?