With less than a month to go until election day, the race for NY's 23rd congressional district is beginning to heat up. Via
The Politico:
The nominee in a looming House special election is at the heart of an angry dispute between conservatives and Republican House leadership, a rift so serious that it threatens the party's chances of keeping control of the upstate New York seat. At issue is the National Republican Congressional Committee's support for Dede Scozzafava, a New York assemblywoman who conservatives assert is so liberal that they absolutely cannot support her candidacy. Instead, many conservative groups are rallying behind Doug Hoffman, a third-party candidate running on the Conservative Party line, even though their support for him might pave the way for a Democratic takeover of the seat recently vacated by GOP Rep. John McHugh.
At a private Washington luncheon attended by activists last week, frustrations spilled over, and several attendees demanded to know why NRCC Chairman Pete Sessions of Texas, who was the featured speaker, was supporting Scozzafava over the more conservative Hoffman. After Sessions conceded that Scozzafava's record on gay marriage and abortion fell short of where those at the lunch wanted it to be, he sought to defend her record on taxes. At that point, according to two sources who were present, the Texas congressman came under forceful pushback from several conservative leaders.
The National Republican Campaign Committee has gone on the offensive against
Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman as well with a new web ad.
Irene Jay Liu has the details at the Times Union:
Affirming that Conservative Party congressional candidate Doug Hoffman is a viable campaign threat in New York’s 23rd congressional contest, the National Republican Campaign Committee is spending precious ad dollars to go after the self-identified “conservative Republican" . . . We just heard back from Hoffman spokesman Rob Ryan, who clarified that his candidate is opposed to civil unions . . . Ryan’s response to the NRCC’s web ad: “It’s obvious that Dede Scozzafava is slipping the polls. So the NRCC is getting desperate and throwing mud. They realize that Doug Hoffman is the true conservative in the race and is the perfect candidate to succeed John McHugh,” he said. According to the American Spectator, the NRCC was due to release a poll on Monday, but it “has been withheld due to a poor showing by the Republican candidate. An NRCC denied that the poll was being held back, but was being reviewed for ‘margin of error issues.’”
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9 comments:
I wonder if we'll hear about this struggle on conservative radio. It'll be interesting to see what side the talkers take when they actually have to choose a side between a Republican and a conservative.
Definitely. Though I wouldn't be surprised if a fair number of them stayed away from it altogether. They're entertainers after all, some topics are still taboo.
Rush has touched on it. He's entrenched in the camp of "reclaiming the Republican Party."
I'm pretty sure Levin has been, too.
Neither have been specific, focusing more on the conceptuality of the issue.
Interesting. I haven't had much opportunity to listen to daytime radio in a while, probably won't for a while either. It'd be a pretty glaring omission if they didn't mention it at all. I'd get a kick out of hearing Limbaugh and company shill for Scozzafava, the most liberal candidate in the race, or have to backtrack on all their anti-third party rhetoric to support Hoffman.
Rush, Levin and Hannity are all dead sure that Conservatism can reclaim the Republican Party.
I really don't know. I'm not sure Conservatism right now really WANTS to reclaim the party.
One wonders where we'd be if Ross Perot hadn't had the lives of his family members threatened when he was leading the Reform Party.
Making this situation all the more demonstrative of the solidarity to be found within and between the Democratic and Republican media establishment is that Kos of Daily Kos has more or less endorsed Scozzafava as well, precisely because of her "liberal" credentials.
I don't think there's anything wrong with Kos endorsing her, as long as she's the closest to his views. Regardless, he does hate third parties and alternative major party candidates.
I didn't mean to imply that there was anything "wrong" with it. On the contrary, it makes complete sense and perfectly illustrates the proposition that the Democratic and Republican Parties constitute a contiguous establishmentarian ideological unit.
Ah, I understand what you're saying. That they are so close that it's little surprise when a partisan Democrat endorses a Republican.
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