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Gauging the winds of change

Published: November 6, 2009

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Voters in New Jersey and Virginia demonstrated Tuesday that they still are deeply worried about the economy and that the electorate still is in a mood for change.

Whether the election of Republican governors in those states signals trouble down the road for President Obama remains to be seen. They were state elections that focused on state issues and the individual candidates, after all.

A better barometer of the national mood will be next year's congressional elections, when all 435 House seats and at least 36 Senate seats will be on ballots. Usually a third of the Senate runs, but special elections will be conducted in Delaware and New York to fill the seats vacated by Vice President Joseph R. Biden and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, which are held by interim appointees.

Tuesday, a special election to fill a seat in New York's 23rd Congressional District was as heartening for Democrats as the gubernatorial elections were for Republicans. And, in terms of national politics, it might have been more telling.

The seat, which had been held by Republicans since 1872, was open because Mr. Obama appointed Republican Rep. John McHugh to be secretary of the Army. New York state Assemblywoman Dierdre Scozzafava, a moderate Republican, was forced from the race over the weekend under pressure applied by Sarah Palin, Fred Thompson and other national-level hard-right Republicans. They backed Conservative Party candidate Douglas Hoffman.

Democrat Bill Owens won, raising the question of whether the ideological purity sought by the GOP's far right wing helps Republicans or Democrats. Ms. Scozzafava received 6 percent of the vote even after withdrawing, while Mr. Hoffman received 45 percent and Mr. Owens, 49 percent.

Overall, the scattered results from Tuesday's election indicate concern about the economy and the rising power of independent voters who increasingly want results. The nation's season of political change continues.

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5 posted comments

Ms. Scozzafava received 6 percent of the vote even after withdrawing because she withdrew only three days before the election, and continued to hold the Republican Party ballot line and the Working Families Party ballot line, as well.

Some voters vote party line. And some voters in NY 23 went into the election booth not knowing Ms. Scozzafava had withdrawn. What could be more obvious.

Those same voters probably were unaware that Ms. Scozzafava was so loyal to her party that, upon her withdrawal, she promptly endorsed the candidacy of the democrat in the race! Now that's the brand of Republican party loyalty that democrats across this great country love.

The real culprit in this matter is neither Ms. Scozzafava nor any democrat. The idiots here are the Republican machine politicians who nominated Ms. Scozzafava in the first place, instead of conducting a primary election and allowing the Republicans in NY 23 to choose their own candidate. In this regard, the Republican party leaders in NY 23 remind me of those in Bradford County. They all personify arrogance. And they, and their candidates, are all repeatedly going down big time.

Around here, the failed candidacy of Don Sherwood should have taught them the days of folks blindly voting party are over. But they most likely didn't learn. Maybe the ouster of Judge Smith will finish the lesson for them.

I'll always vote Republican in preference to the democrat know-nothing jackasses. But only if it's a Republican candidate with integrity, morality, and traditional values. This is something the Republican potentates have yet to comprehend. I wonder if they ever will.

Report
Jane Swift,  11/07/09 9:23
Once again, when you decribe conservatives you use adjectives like hard right etc. I have never seen you use hard left in describing any democrat. Fred Thompson is hardly hard right. Your bias is showing again.
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TiredofIT,  11/06/09 11:16
Once again the Editor of the Review shows his Obama bias. The editor conveniently fogot to mention to Obama actively campaigned in both states for the Democratic candidates in an effort to bring out the vote. He failed, big time. His personality show ran smack into reality and reality won. The reality is that his economic policies have not delivered and independent voters are not buying his message like they did in November of '08.

It is correct to point out the Republican party issue in the New York State election. But to say that an election involving less than 100,00 people has more impact than two elections involving a couple of million people is to strain journalistic credibility. The Editor of this paper seems to have joined the majority of the media that act like a tween at a Hannah Montana concert when it comes to Obama.

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ThomasPaine,  11/06/09 9:48
I've been alive long enough now that I've seen a lot of ebb and flow in my life, be it politically or with the economy. This sort of thing gives writers and talking heads lots of material, but in a few years it'll turn back the other way, and then a few years after that...
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BC Native,  11/06/09 9:39
Blink twice if you have to in order to see a solid repudiation, by common citizens, of governance that tends to erode core values. The corrosion caused by corruption will eventually touch enough sensitive nerves to cause the political reaction we have just witnessed. The politically correct denial balm no longer kills the pain. Amazingly, our freedom of expression is still intact.
Report
Austin Porfiri,  11/06/09 6:42

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