There were several. But this biggest, I think, was:
The American party process….The New York state GOP by-passed the primary process, and got slammed for it. A third party candidate rose to the mainstream. Energized voters forced the hand of party leaders. All positive signs of health, I think; the more third parties we have, the more responsive party leaders are obliged to be, the more people pay attention to political primaries, the better for American democracy.
More here, if you’re interested.
Being as biased as I am it’s difficult analyzing the results of this election. My hope is that this rise of a ‘conservative’ non-aligned candidate might signal a shift in the traditional, corrupt American party system.
If this election result, nation wide, indicates a collapse of public support for the Marxist BO agenda, then 2010 will be another ’94. If that’s true, my hope is that ‘conservative’ candidates swamp the GOP/Dems. The neocons and the Dems are destroying our country.
And, yes, I agree with you Arben, we need viable third parties, but that requires the American people to pay attention.
As much as I want to go with you on this Russell, I think you get it backwards. This will only solidify the two-party system and will be trotted out as an example to push everyone dissatisfied with their own party’s candidate back onto the reservation. I haven’t seen Gingrich’s reax yet this morning, but I wager he is going to be crowing a big fat I TOLD YOU SO.
Bob,
If that’s true, my hope is that ‘conservative’ candidates swamp the GOP/Dems.
I’ve been hoping for years that social conservatives and populists in the Republican party would run the libertarians and neocons out, or force the issue by bolting for someone else. I think if there’s any one thing that would be beneficial for expanding the possibilities of political reform in this country, breaking up “fusion conservatism” into rival camps, thus throwing the Democrats in disarray and allowing for some real openings for leftists and localists alike, would be it. Hoffman wasn’t a signal that’s happening, but he is a small bellweather that my hopes aren’t entirely dead.
Caleb,
I haven’t seen Gingrich’s reax yet this morning, but I wager he is going to be crowing a big fat I TOLD YOU SO.
You may be right. But Gingrich is such a tool that I’d like to believe that people who take politics–not just winning and losing, but the whole participatory process–seriously will see through him. The mass media probably wouldn’t let that happen, though. Anyway, as with everything, we hope for the best. If the story of Hoffman inspires other activists, left and right, to try the same thing, the flabby, corpulent existence of the Republican and Democratic establishments might see some real action yet.
Hey, check out the discussion on my blog, Caleb; Nate Oman has some interesting things to say about the Virginia race.
Living in Canada, when I first saw that the ‘Conservative Party’ was running in the US, I thought they meant the Tories and was thrilled. When I saw interviews with Hoffman, I felt like he was more an avatar for his supporters’ desires than a serious candidate. The desires will remain and serious candidates will come, so I’m not terribly upset.
There are libertarians in the Republican party?
With respect to third parties, the NY-23 race had enough anomalies for every pundit to be able to say, “Whatever else happened in NY-23, clearly… [enter what pundit wants to believe here].”
But it seems that there’s at least great discontent with the GOP establishment in NY, and I’m glad of that.
Newt Gingrich is many things, but a tool he is not. Even his opponents recognize that.
We attach significance to some many things. Everything becomes a trend. But sometimes a local election is just a local election.
rufus,
The Conservative Party in New York has been around for quite a while, electing the great gentleman James L. Buckley, brother of William F. and recently retired Federal Judge to Senator in the early 70’s.
Gingrich – architect of the Contract with America, is not the same as Gingrich – Scozzafava apologist extraordinaire. In today’s political landscape, laud from one’s political ‘opponents’ equates less to fear or respect and more to the degree they believe they’ve coopted you. Case in point, regardless of what you think of Palin, and for all her faults, she inspires fear in any leftist with a single active brain cell.
Gingrich’s fear of the left’s willingness to use the same brute force he previously exhibited in control of Congress, appears to have driven him to channel his considerable faculties to perfecting the sell-your-soul to retain/regain power mantra.
I agree with Russell that the treatment of the participatory process in this case was insightful. But for sheer entertainment value, I thought Gingrich’s myopia trumped it.
Scozzafava would have voted with the left on nearly everything of social and fiscal import, quite simply because the social has become the fiscal has become the social, and like every good libertine thinker, she’s bereft of the discernment necessary to figure it out. Maybe Gingrich has joined her.
It should be taken as a kind of summary event that one of the GOP’s oldest continuously operating redoubts is no more. Upstate votes the same party as Gotham in perdition southward. Some may assert it means the GOP folded its big tent but personally, I think it amply demonstrates that this “new” Democrat party, like its inbred cousins the GOP aint quite the political party of yore either. The Demopublican Party owns the jernt and we learn today that the Investment Edifices recently propped up by the drunken sailors in the inbred government have received the same number of flu vaccines for distribution by their “in-house clinics” as Lenox Hill Hospital received. So much for Health Reform and equal access to medical care.
When one’s government and its corporate retainers operates on a tin ear auto-pilot that leaves serial embarrassment in its wake, one can only assume that any third party will not be of the sweetly smiling sort.
Screw the dems and repugs, with their….”ohhh, we hate the dems….”oh yea, well we hate the reps”…..”oh yea, well lets all disagree on who we like and agree that we are all bastards bankrupting the american public, fiscally, morally and anally…..and we will sing the star spangled banner, recite the Lord’s prayer and search for the boogieman…..excuse me Mr. Joe the plummer, its time for your colonostpy again!”
……we need to get more third party guys, more rope and more scaffolding!
Begin construction…….
-Junker
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