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Owens Wins

Posted by PATRICK EDABURN in Politics.
Nov 4th, 2009 | Comments

It’s time to call the race for Democrat Bill Owens.

With 84% of the votes counted the tally is as follows

Bill Owens (D): 57,845 or 49.2%

Doug Hoffman (C): 53,603 or 45.5%

That’s a margin of 4,200 votes and based on the trend we only have about 20,000 votes left. For Hoffman to win he would need to beat Owens by 20 points with the remaining voters.

As one of my favorite readers, Elrod, has pointed out this is a surprising defeat given that this district has been Republican since the 1870’s and the trend tonight is clearly for the Republicans. But when you push a hard right candidate in upstate New York you’re going to be disappointed.

As a quasi-Republican I’m not thrilled at losing a district but as a confirmed moderate I am glad to see the sensible candidate win.

Hopefully those on the right will learn a lesson about how to win elections (and those on the left won’t be silly enough to read too much into this, though if the right keeps going….)

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elrod

See my post above yours. I think this is a victory for moderates.

mlhradio

My very, very quick reaction to the three "big" races tonight (NJ,VA,NY-23) is this: Despite major attempts to inject national politics into the races, it appears that local issues and concerns were more prominent. The old adage, "All politics is local" still rings true. Again, it's just a quick reaction, but I would be very leery about trying to read any national implications into anything from tonight - for *all* sides involved. (Even though the spin-doctors on the blogs and cable networks will do so endlessly, I'm sure).

DaMav

The victory was won when conservatives sent a strong message to the stooges in the national party who tried to pass off an extreme liberal as a Republican. Maybe we didn't get the icing on the cake but we definitely got the cake, and the cake is real. :-)

TheMagicalSkyFather

And those poor Dems now have to deal with two new Dems in the House, that'll show'um!

SteveK

DaMav wrote: "The victory was won when conservatives..."
... got kicked out of NY-23? Love your logic DaMav. Yes a victory was won... won by the Democrats!

mlhradio

>The victory was won when conservatives sent a strong message to the stooges in the national party who tried to pass off an extreme liberal as a Republican.

Hard to argue with with the delusional. Extreme liberal? Nope, only someone who is trying to purposely spread disinformation would consider that - she's pretty much dead-center on the conservative/liberal scale, with a "common space" score of 0.02, and actually more conservative than the average "New England Republican". (http://bshor.wordpress.com/2009/10/21/scozzafav...)

"...Scozzafava’s score puts her in the 58th percentile of her party, which makes her slightly more conservative than the average Republican legislator in Albany, so she’s a conservative in her party. For example, she’s more conservative than James Tedisco, who lost a special election to succeed Kirsten Gillenbrand in the 20th District (score: -.22 and in the most liberal fifth of the party). In the legislature as a whole, she’s in the 83rd percentile, which makes her a conservative in Albany in general..."

Honestly - if you're going to spread disinformation, at least be a mildly creative about it - such easily disprovable lies are just plain weak sauce.

PJBFan

I am a Patrick Buchanan listening (hence my name) right-wing nutjob. Yet, I supported Owens. If the GOP wants to win, it needs to muzzle the Teabaggers, and I am less a committed conservative than a pragmatic Republican. So yes, I supported Owens, because this was a race that the nation tried to infuse with its politics, when really, NY-23 should be learning its lesson. Twice the Democrats have won, and twice, it was because Scozzafava wasn't the one contesting the race.

My interpretation of the race was that it was actually Moderates who said to the conservatives: You may come close, but you'll never win without us.

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