Guardian UK: Reading the NY-20 tea leaves

[marmar]

Reading the NY-20 tea leaves
If the special election in New York's 20th district tells us anything, it's that Democrats in conservative areas may be alright

Dylan Loewe
guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 1 April 2009


The race to fill the congressional seat left vacant by Hillary Clinton's Senate replacement ended last night with Democrat Scott Murphy ahead of Republican Jim Tedisco by only 65 votes. Absentee ballots have yet to be added to the tally, suggesting the race will almost certainly hinge on which candidate built a better absentee organisation.

Republican leaders have tried to frame the race as a referendum on President Obama, suggesting that a loss for Democrats would signal some kind of vindication for Republican opposition to the Obama presidency. In reality, Republicans may unknowingly dodge a bullet if Scott Murphy holds his lead. Nothing could endanger the long-term health of the GOP more than a little misunderstood positive reinforcement. Believing that the special election did anything to justify their continued political missteps would be a serious mistake. After all, the seat wasn't exactly a Democratic stronghold.

The seat vacated by Kirsten Gillibrand was traditionally a Republican district. Gillibrand's win in 2006 grew out of a perfect storm of events – disapproval over the war in Iraq boosted Democrats nationwide; her political ideology matched that of her district; and seven months before Election Day, her opponent stumbled into a frat party after getting hammered at a bar. Yikes.

Regardless of the outcome in the special election, the results, as they currently stand, tell an important story – one that might echo all the way to the midterms. After two landslides, the big question in the next election cycle will be whether Democrats will be able to hold onto the most conservative seats they picked up in 2006 and 2008. There are a number of seats that ended up in Democratic hands in ways that just won't repeat themselves. In 2008, Democrat Tom Perriello picked off Virgil Goode in Virginia in an extremely conservative district. But in 2010, without an Obama campaign investing unprecedented dollars into turnout operations in Virginia, does he have a chance to hold the seat? If New York's 20th district tells us anything, it's that Democrats like Tom Perriello might be alright after all. .........(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/apr/01/ny20-special-election-democrats-republicans