Sunday, November 1, 2009

NY23 LIVE from Watertown, N.Y:
'Surprise, surprise! Dede is a Democrat'

That's the response from the Doug Hoffman campaign to the news -- Dede Scozzafava endorsing Democrat Doug Owens -- that broke while Ali Akbar and I were flying westward from Saranac Lake to Watertown this afternoon.

Reacting to the New York Daily News report, Ed Morrisey of Hot Air comments:
Doesn't this prove the point conservatives had been making about Dede Scozzafava all along?
Indeed, in the span of 36 hours, Scozzafava has gone from being a RINO to being an ex-Republican. Having planted this knife deep into the back of the GOP, Dede cannot now expect to win re-election to the state assembly as a Republican next year (or any year, ever, for that matter). Maybe that Working Families Party line will prove a winner for Scozzafava. Or maybe not.

More at Memeorandum, including a report from the Washington Independent by Dave Weigel, who must have filed from the airport. He's due into Watertown this evening. Kerry Picket of The Washington Times is already here, and says that as late as noon today, Owens staffers were denying the Scozzafava endorsement story.

Thanks to Smitty in our London Bureau for updating the previous item. while Ali and I were risking life and limb making the high-speed run on Highway 3 to Watertown.

UPDATE: Hoffman campaign press release:
Surprise Surprise: Dede is a democrat -- sells out the GOP for the liberal agenda of Nancy Pelosi
Statement from Doug Hoffman Campaign:
Senior Communications Advisor Rob Ryan said, "This afternoon Dede Scozzafava betrayed the GOP. She endorsed a Pelosi Democrat who will spend more, tax more, and push the liberal agenda that is dragging down this nation. Doug Hoffman represents the revolution that is taking place against high taxes. Nancy Pelosi and the Democrats are desperate. They are throwing everything they have at us but we're fighting back. The voters now know what Dede Scozzafava and Bill Owens believe in—the liberal agenda of Nancy Pelosi."
UPDATE II: Fred Thompson coming to town Monday!

UPDATE III: Michelle Malkin notes how Dede Scozzafava has repaid the national GOP establishment for their support of her -- which, as TCOT observes, amounts to about $1 million total.

Our complete coverage of the NY23 special election

21 comments:

  1. Every party has a pooper, that's why they invited you...

    Scuzzyf***you, Scuzzyf***you!



    And Newt. Where are you Newt? Are you fighting for Hoffman now Newt? How about you Mittens?

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  2. Gingrich is still licking his wounds. Maybe he should ask Gov. Palin to give him some advice on how to revitalize his political career. Mittens is still sitting on the fence, waiting for Hoffman to pull ahead by double digits before he ventures an endorsement, that's real leadership. As far as I'm concerned, both Huck and Mittens have given up all rights to say that they are leaders of the conservative movement, or even leaders in the republican party. Mitt should stick with combing his hair, and working on his tan, and Huck should stick with his TV show, and let real leaders lead.

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  3. Hmmm ... the Republican Party's conservative faction rejects the Republican Party's nominee, but that nominee is supposed to turn around and support their insurgent third party campaign?

    Not in this lifetime. The very best that the Hoffman people could have reasonably expected was that Scozzafava would keep her mouth shut, but they had no right to expect even that much. Buy the ticket, take the ride.

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  4. What a piece of crap- something stinks like trash-truck juice here. A Trojan Horse, or ?

    I'm sure her union-boss husband encouraged her to do the right thing, too- LOL

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  5. Newt dares not lose the backing of Frum, Brooks, and Chrissy Buckley. Otherwise he would have no friends.

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  6. want to start a pool on when she gets a job in O's administration?

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  7. I have a few words on the subject and give you a link at :

    Dede Is A Democrat

    I also discuss Joe Lieberman and finish with:

    I'll say this about that from a Republican point of view. With enemies like Joe who needs friends like Dede?

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  8. Uh. Palin may be a Conservative but she is not exactly a leader of the conservative movement. She is the leader of the small government movement. There is a difference.

    Why McCain Picked Palin

    The short version? Palin was picked to collect Libertarian votes.

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  9. Kn@ppster: If she were a real Republican, she would have kept her mouth shut. She was under no obligation to endorse Doug Hoffman, but, if she had any loyalty to the Party, she would have faded away from public view until after Tuesday. By endorsing the Democrat, she showed her true color: pink.

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  10. Bob,

    No Republican who supports Hoffman's third party candidacy has any standing to invoke "party loyalty" to the GOP versus Scozzafava. A faction of her party revolted against her duly party-endorsed candidacy, and eventually her party's leadership joined that faction instead of standing by her. "Party loyalty" is a two-way street, and it is now one which has to be at least temporarily labeled "closed for repairs."

    Keep in mind that I'm a third party activist myself, and don't at all mind seeing the GOP take it in the nuts on this race. Apparently my anti-Republicanism allows me to see through the hypocrisy better than all those now-non-Republicans running around screaming "RINO," though.

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  11. Naive much? It's like you all are shocked that this is politics or something. They screwed her, she screwed back.

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  12. Kn@ppster,

    And suppose there was a power sharing agreement between Rs and Ds in NY?

    Eric in the comments here discusses that possibility.

    Dede was a back room deal. Who knows how far back in the room the deal goes?

    And libertarian Republican Dana Rohrabacher of CA supported Hoffman.

    And what about the old "take one for the team"?

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  13. Well, there would be some debate about the "duly" part. When RINOs select RINOs there is blowback by the part of the party that stands by principles before "the team."

    Deb

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  14. M. Simon,

    You write:

    "And suppose there was a power sharing agreement between Rs and Ds in NY?"

    Okay, so supposed. What of it? I'm not talking about ideological principle here, I'm talking about party loyalty. And I'm not even saying that party loyalty is a good thing. I'm just saying that if you don't practice it yourself -- and the Hoffman people didn't -- you're hardly entitled to expect it, or honest in condemning its absence, in others.

    Rohrabacher was a libertarian -- a long time ago. Now he endorses the use of slave labor to manipulate wages. Libertarian my ass.

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  15. Kn@appster: Sorry I did not respond earlier, but I do have to spend some time with Mrs. B. now and again. [Thanks to M. Simon for picking up the baton.]

    Those of us life-long Republicans [41 years, in my case] who have supported, and encouraged support for, Hoffman were being more loyal to the GOP than the GOP Establishment was. The vast majority of things Mzz. Scozzafava stood for were not Republican. Since the days of Lincoln, the Party has been a conservative Party at its core. The type we now call 'RINO' has plagued the GOP since the Reconstruction Republicans tried to force Lincoln to adopt measures only a Lefty could love.

    Let us not forget that New York's Conservative Party was founded as a counter to dominance of the Rockefeller types. They had cleverly seized control of the Party and shut-out the conservatives. Part of the reason for founding the CP was to put pressure on the GOP to stop nominating Lefties like John Lindsey. It has always been, in effect, a shadow cabinet. It has always been the de facto true Republican Party in the state.

    Mzz. Scozzafava was foisted on the NY-23 GOP by out-of-touch State Party Chairmen. She had stayed registered as a Republican for, God knows, whatever reasons, despite the fact that she clearly and unabashedly, it seems, despised everything the Party traditionally has stood for. Perhaps for her, Nelson Rockefeller was a feature and not the actual bug he most certainly was.

    I did not expect her to endorse Doug Hoffman, but honor demanded she keep her mouth shut. By opening it and endorsing the Democrat, she showed herself to be a sore loser at the very best and a disloyal shrew at the very worst. The GOP had helped her enormously over the years and she gladly suckled at the Republican teat. When, finally, some payback was required, she refused to meet her obligation [like the good Leftist she is].

    We conservatives are the heart and soul of the Party--the RINOs have always been the carpetbaggers.

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  16. Dede is just showing us the real meaning of Marx's "Classless Society".

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  17. "Since the days of Lincoln, the Party has been a conservative Party at its core. "

    In some alternate universe, perhaps. In this one, it was born as a party of big government, and has been one in practice 100% of the time and in rhetoric 90% of the time since.

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  18. @Kn@ppster,
    How correct you are.

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  19. Kn@ppster / Smitty: I'm preparing a reply and should have it ready to go tomorrow.

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  20. Bob,

    If you care to respond further, feel free, but don't feel any need to on my account. Keep in mind, I was making a VERY narrow point (that Scozzafava owes neither Hoffman campaign nor the GOP proper any debt of loyalty).

    This is something I've had good reason to think a lot about on a very personal level. Last year, I was a "fourth" party vice-presidential candidate, having deserted my own "third" party's presidential ticket for reasons which I deemed good and sufficient. Now I'm seeking that "third" party's presidential nomination, and you can bet that's going to be a hard sell on (among other things) "party loyalty" grounds. And I won't complain about that.

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  21. Fair enough, Kn@ppster. I'll tuck the response away for whenthe subject comes up again on another day.

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