We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
|
Unfortunate Although much will be made of the GOP victories in Virginia and New Jersey, I do not think they really matter that much. The one that did matter, the third party insurgency in New York, was won by Obama’s man… that was the important one.
All the wrong conclusions will now be drawn. The doom-loop has not been broken.
|
Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
|
I must happily disagree. The locals of NY-23 Congressional district had scant opportunity to digest the twists and turns of their NY-23 race, where the Republican candidate dropped out to endorse her Democratic rival only days before his faceoff with a third party Conservative. The importance of the victories in New Jersey and Virginia were underscored by President Obama himself, who campaigned heavily for both losing Democratic candidates. Given the skittishness of moderate Congressional Democrats, the Election Day fallout will likely spell doom for Obama’s healthcare program and cap-and-trade, a most excellent outcome.
Here in NY city we saw a tidal wave of negative filth wash over Christie. Many people were beginning to think that he was going to personally come into their house and infect their wives daughters and mothers with breast cancer.
Corzine spent more than 30 million bucks, the GOP spent something like 11 mil and they still won. Not bad.
I’m not sure I agree. Hoffman ran a VERY strong second place, which is an achievement in itself, and a clear shot across the bows of the GOP establishment that continues to give RINOs like Scozzafava (sp?) succour. The signals that voters in NY-23 sent to the GOP heads are manifestly obvious. Whether those sages choose to pay attention, make the necessary changes and prevent their party from enduring several more years in the political wilderness – now that is the true question at hand.
The real loser in NY23 was the GOP, whose ‘moderate’ candidate bolted to the Democrats. That’s going to make further ‘moderate’ candidates that much more of a hard sell. And certainly, the Conservative candidate wasn’t roundly rejected by the electorate – a two or three percent loss shows that he was acceptable to a great many voters.
Also, elections have consequences as well as ‘meanings’. For instance, NJ’s Senator Lautenberg (D) is an old man: if he should die in office, his replacement, named by the governor, will now be a Republican rather than a Democrat.
Likewise, Virginia’s Federal delegation is now much more suceptible to Republican influence than it was, and the internal dynamics of both states are changed: Democratic legislators must now get their legislation past the governor’s veto, where before they could count on his signature.
These are not small or symbolic changes BUT they do depend on the Republicans showing some spine, which is never a safe bet.
A Hoffman win would have been the much needed shot into the bows of the GOP establishment.
Perhaps what has actually occurred will not have the same impact as the perceptions (by those affected) of what is happening.
American politics still seems to be more about perceptions than facts.
Considering that both the GOP and the Dems (but I repeat myself) were running against him up until 1 week before the election, I’d say Hoffman did quite well.
Of course we must remember that in politics, 2nd place is equivalent to a train ticket to Siberia.
I think the lesson that the GOP will take is that if they had run someone like Hoffman from the start, rather than the lunatic Scozzofava, they would have romped home. Owens only has a year in office. If the turncoat Scozzofava had not traitorously thrown her support behind the Democrat, Hoffman would probably have won.
The other lesson is that for all the support he got from Obama in NJ, Corzine still lost. The Messiah’s coat-tails have definitely disappeared.
Add me to the list of those who think Hoffman did remarkably well in NY-23, and that his result will resonate across the GOP. Remember, Hoffman was completely unknown to most of the electorate only one month ago, and despite her “withdrawal” Scozzafava’s name was still on the ballot. Add the votes she got (the “straight-ticket”, mindless Republican vote) to Hoffman’s and he would have won the election. If he had been running as a Republican he absolutely would have won. That fact won’t be lost on the party leadership next year. (Remember, this was a special election to fill a vacancy; the seat will be up again in 2010, and I would be very surprised if Hoffman didn’t run again then, but without the Scozzafava distraction.)
There are two crises going on and the ‘doom loop’ is the longer term threat. The short term threat was the gramscian socialization legislation threatening to tip us over into a non-capitalist economy. That threat is much lessened and very much a good thing.
It’s still an open question, to my mind whether a small government takeover of the GOP would be better than going through the branding problem of establishing a replacement party. What is needed is a better reporting system so that when things start to go amiss, they can be corrected much earlier. Those sorts of tools would be useful whether ‘fix the GOP’ or ‘replace the GOP’ ends up being the final answer.
Corzine, another one of those over-rated Goldman Sachs characters that seem to get on so well in the realms of US politics.
Owens 63,496 49%
Scozz 7,137 6%
Hoff 58,161 45%
LINK(Link)
Keep in mind Scozz withdrew at a late date and was still on the ballot and that many absentee ballots had already been submitted while Scozz. was still in the race . We’ll never know for sure who she bled the most votes from. It certainly muddies any analysis of the results.
I don’t think you’ll see many third party candidates in 2010, instead you’ll see primary challenges.
Doug Hoffman getting 46% of the vote was a win both for conservatives and the Conservative Party of New York. Now the question is this, will the New York State GOP learn from this and run conservative candidates (as opposed to opportunistic, repackaged Democrats like Mike Bloomber and Rudy Giulianni) or will the Conservative Party of New York grow in members, funding, and influence and displace the GOP as one of the two major parties.
As a registered Conservative I may be biased but I’m inclined to believe the later. This is because the New York State GOP leadership (??) doesn’t have the wherewithal to do anything but follow in the failed path of liberal Republican Nelson Rockefeller. Practice politics ladies and gentlemen don’t play at it as if if was only a diversion.
I suspect Perry is correct.
If Mr Hoffman had won the establishementarians in the Republican party (the people who write in the New York Times and go on NBC news to say how much they love Comrade Obama “we must remember he is our President to and…..” and how everyone should vote for him) would have been finished.
But he did not win and they are not finished – they will be defeated in the end (via Primary fights and so on), but a lot of energy will have to be used destroying these rats, energy that could have been used in fighting Obama.
As for New York 23 – fighting BOTH the Democrat and the Republican machine was just too much.
And the right conclusion?
Do not wait till a few days before the election – force the rats out (in every State) right NOW.
No matter how bloody the fight it is better to force these “Progressive Lite” (and not so “lite” as many of them are Obama supporters or collabrators) now, than to wait till just before the 2010 midterms.
Some quick tests to see if your Republican Senator or Congressman is a rat.
Are they in favour of a “deal” on healthcare – Comrade Obama is losing on healthcare, only Republican “moderates” (i.e. leftist swine) can really save this for him and help snuff out what little freedom remains in the area of health.
Is your Congressman or Senator trying to “help the President close Gitmo” (a person should be concerned with helping defeat the Islamists as mortal enemies of the West – not getting Comrade Barack Obama out of a problem with the ACLU).
And is your Congressman or Senator in favour of “Cap and Trade” and the World Government plans of the Copenhagen conference.
If the truth of any of these questions is “yes” – then drive that person out, whether they are called a “Democrat” or a “Republican”.
“What is it to do with you, British dog”.
Fine – if you want the United States to become another Britian.
No right to bear arms.
Ever less freedom of speech.
All radio and television stations with exactly the same (leftist) politics.
A national Parliament reduced to the powers of a local council – totally under the jack boot of the “European Union” and the “World Community”.
And a Conservative party whose leadership neither believes in limited government (“if we prevent you spending a billion Pounds in bonus payments, you non government banks will have ten billion Pounds to lend” – yes they are not sane either) or national independence (“you can have a vote on any treaty after Lisbon”, but the Lisbon Treaty gives what is left of the powers of Parliament to the E.U. “shut up”).
Want all the above for the United States?
To be fair:
Chris Christie got enough people out to vote to beat the fix. He said he would do it, I doubted him – I was wrong.
He is also a friend of Neil Cavuto (is so much as Neil has any friends) and seemed genuine when he pledged himself to cut taxes and government spending.
He will face a hard job to deliver on that in the face of Democrat State legislature – but it is not impossible.
For example, his fellow Republican Governor up in Rhode Island just faced down a Democrat State Legislature.
Chris Christie got no great help from the “great and the good” of the Republican party – in fact they were wrighting him off in the final stages of the campaign.
He was outspent more than five to one – and he faced the full force of the Obama machine (Obama people took over and ran the Democrat Governer’s campaign and President Obama and co practically lived in the State they hit it so hard).
And Christie turned a 15 point (or so) Obama win last year to a 4 point (really, when one takes the fix out, a 5 or 6 point) Obama defeat now (and it was Obama who was defeated – media and academic scumbags).
A 20 point turn round in a year.
It is not fair to take that away from Christie.
But now it is the hard part.
Paul, I like your attitude and I want to subscribe to your newsletter.
Is there a Paul Marks newsletter?
The NY-23 election wasn’t only about parties and ideologies.
It had a personal element, all elections have one. The person of each candidate. T
“Owens, [the Democrat] by contrast, is big and rugged-looking(Link). He’s an Air Force veteran and he has that military solidity, calm and self-possession.”
I’m not so sure about that Jacob. It is certainly true in the US presidential elections, but less so in congressional ones, and further, state and local tend to be much more about issues/politics.
But, unlike faraway armchair experts, people in the district actually get to see and hear the candidates.
I, for example, haven’t seen (until now) pictures of the candidates, haven’t heard them speak in person, and haven’t read o word of what they actually said. I assume that the same goes for Perry, too.
The point is that in state and local elections people who vote are those who are relatively closely familiar with both the issues and the politicians, so they are often already beyond such superficialities. This BTW is a major reason why small localized government is better then large central government.
Of course. That’s what I meant too. It’s not only about the ideology angle, it’s about the personality and particular positions of each candidate, also on local issues. At least that plays some not negligible part.
Besides, I read that Scozz was pro small government and small taxes. It was her support for gay marriage and abortions that earned her the RINO epithet. Meaning: from my point of view she wasn’t such a terrible candidate. But I’m not sure, I haven’t really learned all her positions.
I mean – I’m not sure about assigning too much meaning to this election.
Say what??? Big Labor supportin’ ACORN courtin’ Scozz has a strange way of showing she wants small government and small taxes! Did her endorsement of the Democrat not clinch the deal in your mind that she just might be a RINO?
Scuzzyfavors supports card check. That’s all you need to know. She was more liberal than the Democrat candidate, who is no raging red lefty. Hoffman made a great showing, more than your typical third party candidate (think Nader and Perot).
Don’t minimize Hoffman’s achievement–especially if you haven’t seen him speak. He shouldn’t have made such a strong showing.
The achievement is bitch-slapping the GOP for ignoring their voters. Out of touch much?
Newt made himself look really bad by trying to rally support for Scuzzyfavors by an appeal to party loyalty. He should have directed that encouragement to the candidate herself.
She’s a treacherous whore (politically) whose poor behavior sheds more bad light on women candidates.
Christie is brilliant for overcoming the margin of fraud.
The attack ads about him being fat backfired, I think.
NY23 hasn’t had a D in that position since the thirteenth century (OK so I exaggerate) but the right candidate won–he’s middle of the road, more conservative than Scuzzyfavors, yet not teabag-wacko like Hoffman.
NJ was huge. They are bluer than blue!
VA was big because it turned around a state that went Big Oh last year.
The jig is up.
That’s why there was a 14 1/2 hour day in the House yesterday to push through HCR before people realize the jig is up.
It ain’t over. The fat lady has yet to sing. The Senate is next. Good luck with that!
I never thought I would see the day when kentuckyliz would fall for enemy propaganda – but you just have.
Mr Owens is not “middle of the road” – he will support the expansion of government that is going on (not a middle of the road – do nothing either way position).
Also you used the word “teabag” in relation to the tea party protesters.
Only the left use the word “tea bag” in this context – the protesters never use that word in relation to themselves.
Who are these “weirdos”?
They are the people who are willing to openly show support for rolling back the size of government.
In short they are people like you and me.
To allow the left to brand them “weird” and to even use the word “teabag” (do you know why the left say “tea bagging” – so you know what that means?) is to lose the battle before it has even started.
You know that the “mainstream media’ (and academia and ….) are lying scum (lower than shit). But you seem not to have fully grasped that this is not just a part time thing – the MSM are like that all the time, even when they are picking words for ordinary news reports.