Battle Cry: If Not Now, When?

Erick Erickson urges Senate Republicans to fight ObamaCare with every parliamentary means available:

Some might argue that Republicans should not look "obstructionist." But they are wrong -- the vast majority of Americans don't like this bill and don't want it to pass. The Tea Party movement was the upheaval of millions of ordinary Americans who are scared and angry about the out-of-control growth of the federal government, federal spending, and the national debt. They want to see the Republicans obstructing passage of this bill and if they think the Republicans are not fighting with every tool they have at their disposal, then any advantage that the Republicans think they will get in next year's elections from such a bill being passed will evaporate.

Erick makes reference to the Doug Hoffman campaign in NY23, which is the subject of my 1,400-word article in the December-January issue of The American Spectator:

Yates Walker ate breakfast in the Blue Moon Café on Main Street in Saranac Lake, New York, on the morning of November 4, and delivered an after-action report on the battle that had just been fought in the upstate 23rd District.
"We took a CPA from 9 percent to 46 percent in two and a half weeks," said Walker, a young veteran of the 82nd Airborne Division who had been hired 18 days earlier to work on Doug Hoffman's congressional campaign staff. "I couldn't be prouder." . . .
Hoffman's surprising surge in the closing weeks of the three-way special election in upstate New York had, in Walker's words, turned the bespectacled accountant into "an electric symbol of conservatism." . . .

You can read the whole thing. That article was written in the Buffalo airport, where I had these thoughts:

As I was lashing together my article, it seemed to me that the tipping-point of the Hoffmania momentum shift was Oct. 16, when the Siena poll showed Hoffman surging while Scozzafava had fallen behind the Democrat. That was the same day Michelle Malkin's column called Scozzafava "An ACORN-Friendly, Big Labor-Backing, Tax-and-Spend Radical in GOP Clothing."
Two weeks later, the final Siena poll confirmed what the Hoffman people had known for some time: Dede was heading for a weak third-place finish. So the RINO quit and repaid the GOP Establishment by endorsing Democrat Bill Owens. Exposing RINOs as untrustworthy creatures was worth whatever damage might be suffered by having Owens in Congress -- until next year, when the freshman Democrat will face a re-energized GOP grassroots in NY23.
Go back and read my "Memo to the Grassroots." I didn't know it at the time, but that Hot Air Green Room post was written the same day that Yates Walker decided to hire on as manager of the Plattsburgh office of the Hoffman campaign. Yates was just one of several people who helped turn the Hoffman campaign into such a stunning dynamo of grassroots energy. . . .

Those of you who followed my coverage of the NY23 campaign may remember Yates Walker from this video:

The meaning of NY23 has been twisted beyond recognition by the MSM, as I explain in the Spectator article:

Op-ed pundits and TV talking heads portrayed the battle in the North Country as evidence of an intraparty schism, a Republican "civil war," but in fact the ideological factor of right vs. center was less important than the uprising of the party's rank and file against a GOP establishment that grassroots activists consider out of touch, politically inept, and hamstrung by favor-swapping among well-connected Republican insiders. . . .
One GOP Internet operative of libertarian leaning saw the lesson of the NY23 fight as a training exercise for the bigger battle in the 2010 midterm elections, comparing it to the way Web-savvy liberals lined up behind Howard Dean during the 2004 Democratic presidential primaries. "Right now, we're where the Democrats were with Dean in 2003," the Republican operative said, remarking on the left's online advantage that the GOP has struggled to overcome. "We're getting there, but we're not there yet."

Perhaps the most important lesson of NY23 is the value of time. That wild three-week Hoffman surge that began in mid-October produced spectacular results, but it was just a little too late.

Had more conservatives jumped onto the Hoffman bandwagon in August -- when Erick Erickson did -- maybe Scozzafava could have been driven out of the race a couple of weeks earlier. Instead, she got about $1 million from the RNC and NRCC and hung in until the last weekend before Election Day, then endorsed Bill Owens, making just enough difference to elect the Democrat by a margin that, in the end, amounted to about 3,200 votes.

A similar situation exists with ObamaCare, where the White House and Harry Reid (whose poll numbers are in the toilet) want to hurry the bill through the Senate during the holidays, when most people aren't paying attention. Erick Erikson is urging Republicans to fight now -- delay the bill, at risk of being called "obstructionist" -- to give the grassroots more time to put heat on the issue. He quotes Winston Churchill:

If you will not fight for the right when you can easily win without bloodshed, if you will not fight when your victory will be sure and not too costly, you may come to the moment when you will have to fight with all the odds against you and only a small chance of survival.

The odds still favor opponents of ObamaCare, and the National Taxpayers Union is calling for Tea Party people to attend a Code Red Rally at the Capitol on Tuesday with Laura Ingraham.

Where will you be Tuesday? Are you ready to fight? If not now, when?

(Cross-posted at Right Wing News.)

Is Kathleen Parker's evil underrated?

In a wee-hours Twitter rant this morning, after discussing whether the University of Alabama's No. 2 poll ranking was fair (it's OK, and the ranking will take care of itself if the Tide upsets the No. 1 Gators next Saturday), I shared my 2009 Evil Top 10 rankings:

Evil rankings are indisputable: 1. Satan. 2. Auburn.
-- rsmccain

No. 3 is a tie between Charles Johnson and Osama bin Laden
-- rsmccain

Which makes Fidel Castro No. 5, David Brooks No. 6, Kim Jong Il, No. 7, Charles Manson No. 8
-- rsmccain

10th Place (tie): Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and Kathleen Parker
-- rsmccain

Naturally, this brought protests: What about Maureen Dowd?

Too bad. This year, Maureen Dowd got knocked off the Top 10 Evil list!
-- rsmccain

No, Kathleen Parker clearly managed to out-evil Dowd this year. Decisions of the judges are final.
-- rsmccain

Today, however, as if she had anticipated her emergence into the Evil Top 10, Kathleen Parker's column appeared on Memeorandum with the headline, "Ten 'principles' could keep thinkers away from the GOP." For some bizarre reason, the column itself has a different headline: "The GOP's Suicide pact," and begins:

Some people can't stand prosperity, my father used to say. Today, he might be talking about Republicans, who, in the midst of declining support for President Obama's hope-and-change agenda, are considering a "purity" pledge to weed out undesirables from their ever-shrinking party.
Just when independents and moderates were considering revisiting the GOP tent. . . .

All of which is in reaction to a proposed resolution -- note the emphasis -- that circulated via e-mail last week among Republican National Committee members. The fact that it was first reported by MSNBC tells you where Kathleen Parker gets her news nowadays, and look how the pro-Obama cable network framed the issue:

This comes on the heels of a rift in the party that was exposed in the once-obscure special election in Upstate New York's 23rd Congressional District, in which national conservative leaders, including Sarah Palin, clashed with national establishment Republicans. The so-called GOP civil war threatens to derail moderate Republican candidacies in heated 2010 Republican primaries already underway. Florida's Senate race is perhaps the best and most prominent example.

For the past year, the mere mention of "Sarah Palin" has been enough to inspire Sully-esque ranting by Kathleen Parker, and she does not disappoint:

The list apparently evolved in response to the Republican loss in the recent congressional race in Upstate New York, when liberal Republican Dede Scozzafava withdrew from the race under pressure from conservatives and endorsed Democrat Bill Owens, who won. Republicans had held that seat for more than a century.
James Bopp Jr., chief sponsor of the resolution and a committee member from Indiana, has said that "the problem is that many conservatives have lost trust in the conservative credentials of the Republican Party."
Actually, no, the problem is that many conservatives have lost faith in the ability of Republican leaders to think. The resolutions aren't so much statements of principle as dogmatic responses to complex issues that may, occasionally, require more than a Sharpie check in a little square.

And the pièce de résistance of Parkeresque evil:

The old elite corps of the conservative movement, men such as William F. Buckley and Russell Kirk, undoubtedly would find this attitude both dangerous and bizarre. When did thinking go out of style? . . .
As Kirk wrote in his own "Ten Conservative Principles," conservatism "possesses no Holy Writ and no Das Kapital to provide dogmata . . . conservatism is the negation of ideology: it is a state of mind, a type of character, a way of looking at the civil social order."

You can be sure that when some latter-day elitist like Kathleen Parker cites Kirk and Buckley, the citation will always be used against conservatives. The elitist versions of Kirk and Buckley are revisionist mannequins, shorn of any unfashionable populism so as to obscure the fact that the conservatism of yore -- when Buckley defended Joe McCarthy and helped inspire the conservative insurgency that made AuH2O the Republican nominee in 1964 -- was thoroughly disdained by the soi-dissant elite of that time.

By the way, it is a myth that Republicans had held the 23rd District seat for more than a century. But Parker's elitist prejudice and her second-hand misperception of the Hoffman campaign derive from the same source: A willingness to accept at face value the spin delivered by the MSM, a gullibility that derives from a belief that conservative media are somehow inferior to their liberal counterparts.

And even though she doesn't mention Sarah Palin in this column, we know who was the target of Parker's ire. It was the hockey mom from Wasilla whose endorsement generated a one-day $116,000 haul for the Hoffman campaign. This is why Parker and other Palin-haters have so vehemently insisted that Hoffman is some sort of far-right extremist.

Parker makes a big point of arguing for intellectual nuance, when she's the one reacting viscerally to even the slightest evidence that the Republican Party might embrace a Palin-style populism.

Well, 2009 is not over yet. At least Charles Manson remains safely behind bars and Ahmadinejad has been quiet lately. Kathleen Parker's evil ranking may require re-appraisal.

(P.S.: If you're wondering why the Gators didn't rate inclusion in my 2009 Evil Top 10, it's because their evil is a transitory phenomenon. If Alabama beats Florida next Saturday, their evil will be vanquished, whereas Auburn is permanently evil.)

Ho-hum: Another day, another 'Doug Hoffman, far-right extremist' spin

Yesterday at Hot Air, I pushed back against this misrepresentation of the Hoffman campaign. And now we see the same misguided claim being promoted by a writer for the Raleigh (N.C.) newspaper:

The N.C. Republican Party has been channeling its inner Jesse Helms lately, and not just because a portrait of the late conservative icon was unveiled last week.
At a GOP banquet Saturday night in North Raleigh, one of the main speakers was to have been Doug Hoffman, the New York conservative congressional candidate who was the favorite of Glenn Beck & Co . . .

Doug Hoffman's stated political positions place him squarely in the conservative mainstream of the Republican Party. The attempt to depict Hoffman and his supporters as rabid fringe fanatics is either (a) liberal propaganda or (b) faulty analysis by people who've been misled by liberal propaganda.

Hoffman did not lose because he was ideologically outside the mainstream. He lost because (a) he started with zero name recognition outside of his Lake Saranac hometown, (b) his campaign was badly underfunded until mid-October, (c) the national GOP wasted nearly $1 million propping up the doomed campaign of Dede Scozzafava, and (d) Scozzafava dropped out and endorsed the Democrat the weekend before Election Day.

Circumstances (c) and (d) are unlikely to occur again anywhere anytime ever, much less in North Carolina. For so many political "experts" to try to extract from the NY23 campaign the lesson that Hoffman was too right-wing, and that conservative Republicans are therefore generally doomed to defeat, is a case of wishful-thinking theory without adequate factual support.

NY23: 'Mischief' by ACORN?

That's what Doug Hoffman says and, while Jude Seymour and Politico are skeptical, I've got a few insights at he American Spectator:

My own source suggested last week that it is unlikely that Hoffman's margin in those absentee ballots would be enough to erase the 3,026-vote gap. However, the need to ensure an accurate count, and to expose any potential illegalities, is still very important. If anyone has committed criminal wrongdoing in this upstate New York district, they need to be identified and prosecuted.
Furthermore, the narrowing of the gap by more than 2,300 votes between the reported results on Election Night and the actual vote tally shows how misreporting can affect political outcomes. If the reported margin had been narrower -- and especially if the tallies in Oswego and Jefferson had been accurately reported -- Hoffman never would have conceded that night.
Most of all, the discovery of the errors (or "mischief") in the vote-count makes it a near-certainty that Hoffman will challenge Owens in NY23 in 2010.

Read the whole thing. (Hat-tip: Memeorandum.)

Allen West: 'Governed by your inferiors'

In a letter to his supporters, retired Army Lt. Col. Allen West quotes Plato -- "One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics is that you end up being governed by your inferiors" -- and talks about the problem of "impostors" in politics:

We are all quite familiar with the Bernie Madoff case which devastated many people here in South Florida, quite a few in Florida Congressional district 22. So many people placed their trust in what we now know was an elaborate “ponzi scheme”. The life savings of countless individuals was lost.
Just recently we have experienced another such case in the Ft Lauderdale area with a local lawyer named Scott Rothstein. The dollar amounts are not in the same strata as Madoff, only $1Billion, but that is still a pretty substantial number. One would think that we would be more attuned after the realization of what Madoff had executed.
But on an even greater scale we see the future and legacy of our Republic being stolen away by those who truly are our inferiors, impostors. . . .

Read the whole thing. You can also visit the Allen West campaign site. I first interviewed Col. West last year for the American Spectator. Given my notorious Hayekian tendencies, I was a fan as soon as the colonel started quoting Frederic Bastiat.

Last year's failure of the NRCC to spot West as a potential superstar -- they actually tried to recruit other candidates to run against him in the FL22 primary in 2008 -- was a harbinger of the problems that subsequently developed in NY23 this year. Small wonder that West singled out Doug Hoffman for praise:

The candidacy of Doug Hoffman in NY-23 portends the direction the elections of 2010, a true conservative providing an answer to the wasteful, arrogant spending of the Democrats in charge of Congress.

Fortunately, the NRCC has now awakened to the "Go West" phenomenon, so maybe things are moving in the right direction.

(Cross-posted at Hot Air Greenroom.)

If I were Sarah Palin . . .

. . . I'd look good in Manolo pumps, but let's not go there. (These hypotheticals always get me in trouble.)

Seriously, however, if I were Sarah Palin, I'd seek out the advice of Dick Armey. When I was up in New York to cover the Doug Hoffman campaign, I asked Armey -- off-the-record, by my own choice -- what he thought about Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison's GOP primary challenge to Texas Gov. Rick Perry.

Most conservatives have backed Perry, but Armey is supporting Hutchison. Why? Given that it was off-the-record, I'd be breaking the "never burn a source" rule to go into detail, but surely Armey won't mind my sharing this basic summary: Armey admires Hutchison's professionalism as a public servant.

To an outsider, the Hutchison-vs.-Perry matchup appears to be about ideology, and conservatives support Perry because he is perceived as the more "hard core" of the two candidates. To Armey, however, Hutchison is preferred because of her competence and dedication to the arts of statesmanship.

Remember that this is the same Dick Armey whose FreedomWorks organization has backed the Tea Party movement, the same Dick Armey who gave a key endorsement of Doug Hoffman. So it cannot be said that Armey is a snob who disdains populism and "outsider" candidates. Yet in the Texas governor's race, Armey admires certain qualities in Hutchison, qualities in which (we may infer) he finds Perry deficient.

Now, let's look at what Armey recently said about you, Gov. Palin. He praised you as a "self-made woman" but then went on to offer this advice:

"So she's kind having to dig herself out of a hole if she wants to regain standing for consideration for a future nomination. And by all accounts, it doesn't appear she's doing a very effective job of digging herself out of that hole. . . .
"I think she's probably a person of greater ability than what she's given credit to. She probably has more sense than what she's given credit for. But I do think there's this whole perception-is-reality thing right now, and she's got a terribly, terribly rough row to hoe if she's ever going to regain some standing and make her competitive."

And then he said something extremely interesting:

Armey also disputed the notion that Palin stands ready to tap into the energy of the vast crowds that have come out at the kinds of "tea party" protests FreedomWorks and others have helped pull together."You don't tap into that energy unless you join it. You've got to be there, you've got to show up. And you can't remain removed and aloof and send in a memorandum or post something on your blog, and have these folks belief that you're really part of the movement," Armey said.
"You have to really go out and walk and work among them. And I've seen very few people who are willing to do that. The fact is, these folks are saying, 'You know, the problem with all you big-shot politicians is you sit on your pedestals and make your pronouncements. Why don't you join us? Get on the street. And go to work for something. Roll up your sleeves and be involved with us.' "
"And they don't have a lot of time for someone who stands removed and says, 'Right on.' They're not looking for a cheerleader; they're looking for a captain of the team," Armey said.

So, if I were Governor Palin, besides looking good in those Manolo pumps, I'd make a point of seeking out Armey's advice and following it. As a matter of fact, if I were Palin, I'd try to enlist Armey as my political sensei. (With one caveat: Armey's kind of a squish on immigration; don't let him talk you into the Cato/WSJ libertarian open-borders nonsense; "agree to disagree agreeably" on that.)

Note especially, governor, what Armey says about "rolling up your sleeves" and getting involved in the Tea Party movement. When your book tour is finished, you ought to do that. You'll make enough money on paid speaking gigs that you can afford to do a dozen or more gratis appearances at Tea Parties in 2010.

Think back to your days playing basketball, 'Cuda: Pick your shots, and make every shot count.

Don't just book the big-city major events on the Tea Party circuit. Every once in while, you should make a late RSVP to a small-town rally -- let's say, in Iowa, New Hampshire or South Carolina, nudge, nudge -- so that three to five days before the event, the local newspaper headline reads: "PALIN TO SPEAK HERE SATURDAY." And then call in to the local talk-radio show and do a 15-minute interview with the friendly conservative host. (There is a tremendous synergy between Tea Parties and local talk radio.)

Also, governor, you should always pay attention to whatever Dan Riehl says. Dan's a straight-shooter and, whether you agree with his opinion or not, you can be sure he's not b.s.-ing you. Note his comment about your Reaganesque use of Facebook:

Reagan didn't fight with the media. The usual descriptor for what he did is, he went over the media's head directly to the American people. Is Sarah Palin really doing anything different, except for having Facebook, blogs and a great many other New Media resources today to which Reagan didn't have access? Just imagine how even more effective his communication strategy would have been if he had?
Because of media advances made in the last several years, Sarah Palin doesn't have to go over the media's head. She can go right through them.

Exactly. If you were to link and quote Dan's blog in some future Facebook posting, I'm sure he'd be grateful. That's what we call "Rule 2." You've already got Rule 5 down cold.

NY23 recount: What it really means

A source with the Doug Hoffman campaign called this morning to tell me that the official ballot count in the NY23 special election had narrowed the margin.

Michelle Malkin asks, "Did Doug Hoffman concede too early?" Well, there are still about 10,000 absentee and military ballots that won't be added to the count until next week. While my source doesn't expect there to be enough votes to change the outcome, there is encouragement for Hoffman supporters in discovering that the official count shows a closer result than the unofficial 5,000-vote margin on Election Night.

Furthermore, my source points out, the fact that Democrat Bill Owens was sworn in -- and voted for ObamaCare -- before the official result was certified by New York election officials, demonstrates the fundamental lawlessness of Nancy Pelosi's regime in Washington.

And, yes, according to my source, Hoffman is currently "leaning toward" challenging Owens in 2010. The backstabbing RINO Dede Scozzafava won't be around to screw things up next November. In two words:

HOFFMANIA LIVES!

Dede, the moderate victim?

Gag me with a Washington Post puff-piece:

Violet semicircles hung below her teary eyes as she recounted how Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck and other conservative leaders excoriated her for less-than-orthodox positions on gay rights, abortion and organized labor. Her nose reddened as she recalled her abrupt exit from the special election to replace John M. McHugh, whom President Obama had appointed as secretary of the Army earlier in the year.
The conservative movement's third-party candidate, Doug Hoffman, expected her support but, she said, the newcomer accountant "had no integrity." Plus, the Democrats were so nice! They called. They sympathized. They made her feel good about tossing her support to Bill Owens, who -- with her help -- became the area's first Democratic representative in more than a century. . . .

Dede Scozzafava says Doug Hoffman lacks "integrity"? Make me laugh. As to her victim status, her salary as an assemblywoman is more than $100,000. Nice work victimhood if you can get it.

Politico news flash: Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann don't count as 'women'

More twisted interpretation of NY23:

Conservatives say they pushed Dede Scozzafava out of the House race in New York's 23rd District a week ago because of her left-of-Republican social views -- and not because she is a woman.
But the growing schism between the Republican Party's ascendant right wing and its shrinking moderate core has clear gender undertones -- and Scozzafava's departure raises fresh questions about the GOP's ability to recruit, elect and even tolerate the sort of moderate women who used to be part of its ruling mainstream.
While Republicans scored a pair of impressive electoral victories in New Jersey and Virginia with solid support among female voters, the events of the last week offer harbingers of serious trouble ahead with the largest swing voter bloc in the country -- women. . . .

Why is it that only pro-choice liberals count as "women"? It's as if Phyllis Schlafly, Bay Buchanan, Ann Coulter, Laura Ingrham and Michelle Malkin were un-persons.

Debunking Frank Rich's NY23 fantasies

He never set foot on the ground in the upstate New York district during the campaign, but previously interpreted it as Republicans "re-enacting Stalinism," and now the former New York Times theater critic knows exactly what the result means:

This race was a damaging setback for the hard right. Hoffman had the energetic support of Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh and Fox as well as big bucks from their political auxiliaries. Furthermore, Hoffman was running not only in a district that Rove himself described as "very Republican" but one that fits the demographics of the incredibly shrinking G.O.P. The 23rd is far whiter than America as a whole -- 93 percent versus 74 -- with tiny sprinklings of blacks, Hispanics and Asians. It has few immigrants. It's rural. Its income and education levels are below the norm. Only if the district were situated in Dixie -- or Utah -- could it be a more perfect fit for the narrow American demographic where the McCain-Palin ticket had its sole romps last year.
If the tea party right can't win there, imagine how it might fare in the nation where most Americans live. . . .

Blah, blah, blah. Hoffman began the campaign with near-zero name-ID in the district and, by his own admission, was not the sort of "poised" and "polished" candidate who attracts voters by the telegenic force of his personal charisma.

Frank Rich didn't bother talking to the Hoffman campaign staff who, the day after the election, explained to me how the GOP establishment candidate Dede Scozzafava's dropping out (and endorsing the Democrat, Bill Owens) hurt their candidate.

Once Hoffman established himself as the conservative choice, this left Dede with a rump vote of liberals, personal friends, labor allies, etc., who amounted to less than 20% of the electorate, whereas Hoffman had more than 40%, and Owens was in the vicinity of 35% -- the usual Democratic vote in the 23rd District.

Until the morning of Oct. 31, then, Hoffman was set to win with something like a 44% plurality. Dede's withdrawal and endorsement of Owens, however, threw that calculus into disarray. It also created havoc with the Hoffman campaign's messaging effort. As of Sunday, there were still ads running on TV bashing Dede and depicting the election as a three-way contest. The Hoffman campaign was unable to get those ads stopped and replaced with new ads; meanwhile, the DCCC dumped $1 million in negative attack ads -- depicting Hoffman as a callous greedhead who wanted to ship jobs overseas -- into the local TV market in the final days of the campaign.

All of which is to say that there were unique factors at play in the final days of the NY23 campaign that argue against Frank Rich's claim that Hoffman's narrow loss represents an emphatic, decisive and final failure of the "tea party right."

Rich's biggest error is his mistaken impression of the Hoffman campaign as representing a narrow ideological sect. Anyone who spent much time at all talking to Hoffman supporters in the 23rd District -- you could ask John McCormack or Dave Weigel about this -- would tell you that his candidacy drew strong support from every component of the conservative movement.

The lessons of NY23 are really more tactical than ideological. There were about a dozen top people on Team Hoffman who are privy to the inner rationale of the campaign, its methods and strategies. This esoteric understanding of NY23 will be missed or misunderstood by those who view the campaign in a superficial way.

Hoffman's candidacy provides a template for a different style of Republican campaign, one that bases its appeal on a grassroots "outsider" argument, effectively employs online messaging and fundraising, and draws on the Tea Party volunteers for organizational "boots on the ground" support.

What was learned from the NY23 experience will be applied first in a series of GOP primaries -- including the Florida Senate primary -- and subsequently in the 2010 general election. If the GOP stages a comeback in next year's mid-terms, the Hoffman campaign will be seen in retrospect as a turning point.

Bizarre news from Washington, D.C.

Sources tell me that a flock of ravens -- hundreds of them -- have taken up roost at 320 First Street, SE. The big black birds are said to be menacing passersby, causing a foul stench with their malodorous droppings, and startling schoolchildren who come to Capitol Hill for field trips.

The weirdest thing -- and this is a rumor so disturbing that I wouldn't pass it along if it didn't come from a source who has previously been proven reliable -- is that these scary ravens are croaking something that sounds an awful lot like, "Guy! Guy! Guy! "

Furthermore, congressional staffers tell me they noticed in late July that some of these ravens built a nest in the window of 2233 Rayburn House Office Building, and that when the eggs recently hatched, the baby birds were heard to chirp, "Pete! Pete! Pete!"

NY23 Farewell: Final deadline in the Buffalo airport; final wisdom to come

The National Desk is about to head south, toward home, where I'm awaited by a wife, six kids, two dogs and innumerable cats who haven't seen me in a week. I just filed 1,400 words for the December print edition of The American Spectator -- subscribe now! -- and three weeks of campaign-trail frenzy are over.

Just another hour or so to decompress and pack up the rented Nissan, and I'll be rolling down the highway, dodging the state police radar traps. Heaven knows what the rental agency will say when they see the (minor, superficial) damage to the Nissan caused by my low-speed collision with a deer when I made the mistake of slowing down in Tupper Lake.

That was six days ago. Seems like forever. Please hit the tip jar. And pray.

UPDATE: OK, I've now sent the photos and the editors are talking about how many pages the article will run in the December issue -- subscribe now! -- but it was impossible to summarize in a mere 1,400 words what has happened in NY23. The people involved in the Hoffman campaign were all aware that they were working to develop a new model for connecting Republican candidates to the conservative grassroots.

As I was lashing together my article, it seemed to me that the tipping-point of the Hoffmania momentum shift was Oct. 16, when the Siena poll showed Hoffman surging while Scozzafava had fallen behind the Democrat. That was the same day Michelle Malkin's column called Scozzafava "An ACORN-Friendly, Big Labor-Backing, Tax-and-Spend Radical in GOP Clothing."

Two weeks later, the final Siena poll confirmed what the Hoffman people had known for some time: Dede was heading for a weak third-place finish. So the RINO quit and repaid the GOP Establishment by endorsing Democrat Bill Owens. Exposing RINOs as untrustworthy creatures was worth whatever damage might be suffered by having Owens in Congress -- until next year, when the freshman Democrat will face a re-energized GOP grassroots in NY23.

Go back and read my "Memo to the Grassroots." I didn't know it at the time, but that Hot Air Green Room post was written the same day that Yates Walker decided to hire on as manager of the Plattsburgh office of the Hoffman campaign. Yates was just one of several people who helped turn the Hoffman campaign into such a stunning dynamo of grassroots energy.

Yesterday morning in Saranac Lake, Hoffman spokesman Rob Ryan -- whose insights appeared here more than once, attributed to a "campaign source" -- told me to make sure to say some kind words about the Hoffman staffers. The campaign managers, Dan Tripp and Matt Moran, were in charge of organizing and directing the campaign.

Pollster John McLaughlin and press aide Sandy Caligiore did important work, as did HQ press man Sean Kennedy and logistics operative Sean Mahoney. Tripp's key aides O'Brien Murray and Jake Menges were important, as was Rick Ahearn, who learned to do advance work with Ronald Reagan. Bob Adney ran the Watertown office, while local Tea Party activists Jill Bernstone and Sil Johnson ran the operations in Madison and Oswego counties.

Just got off the phone with Dan Tripp, who would no doubt laugh at the idiocy of Rachel Maddow:

This wasn't about a bunch of extremists purging a moderate. To begin with, Dede Scozzafava is no "moderate" and the people who made the Hoffman campaign such a dynamo were no more "extremist" than that dangerous right-winger, Ronald Reagan.

Dan Tripp says the basic problem is that the GOP establishment has gotten used to outsourcing campaign work to high-priced consultants, to the neglect of old-fashioned "boots on the ground" volunteer organizing. And who can disagree? The Republican Party has some analogs of perennial Democratic loser Bob Shrum -- the overpaid "expert" who knows everything except how to win elections -- and these professional losers have been collecting fat fees for failure.

Doug Hoffman was willing to stand up and fight, and by doing so, helped awaken the Ordinary American to the possibility of what can be done if people will take on an active role as citizens, becoming involved with the political process and refusing to let the "experts" boss them around.

As Yates Walker told me over breakfast Wednesday morning at the Blue Moon Cafe on Main Street in Saranac Lake: "I couldn't be prouder." So I'm heading south with my head held high, and with hope in my heart.

The NY23 National Desk is now closed, and the next stop is home. Thanks for your prayers.

HOFFMANIA LIVES!

Dear James Wolcott: Blow me

Perhaps "blow me" is not the kind of commentary that would make me popular with Vanity Fair readers, who are used to such lofty intellectual matter as Gisele Bundchen nude. But dig the cluelessness of the world's most pretentious dropout from Frostburg (Md.) State University:

Nobody nowhere no way no how is going to buy a "book" by defeated tea bagger Doug Hoffman, who will now recede into the woodwork of irrelevancy to spend more time with his hanging ferns. . . .
If Sarah Palin's emancipation proclamation is being shoveled out to the rabid faithful as a loss leader, a cheap giveaway, how much additional landfill would be needed to accommodate the return copies of the political testament of an obscure guy whose loss handed the Congressional seat to a Democrat for the first time since dinosaurs walked with Jesus? . . .

Wolcott is recycling second-hand memes poached from the liberal blogosphere. He has nothing original to say, and throws less traffic than Sadly No or Crooks and Liars. He is a has-been pop-culture critic whose employment by Graydon Carter seems to be chiefly due to Wolcott's marriage to a Vanity Fair contributing editor.

Wolcott knows as much about politics as such a person might be expected to know. Wolcott seems incapable of doing any actual reporting. There was never any chance of him trundling his obese corpus up to the Adirondacks to cover this election. He will, however, sneer at any journalist who actually works for a living.

So while I've logged thousands of miles and hundreds of hours covering NY23 -- and have spent a few years studying the conservative book market from a perspective of economic self-interest -- I know nothing about nothing, and James Wolcott knows everything.

Excuse me for wasting more than two words on Wolcott. I'm on deadline, and the distraction was annoying.

Message from NY23

Ali Akbar and I just dropped by the luxurious Best Western Carriage House Inn in Watertown, N.Y., on our way to Buffalo. This morning, we went by Hoffman HQ in Saranac Lake, where "Dougie" -- as his childhood friends call him -- was thanking supporters who dropped in. The phone kept ringing as well-wishers called in from everywhere to encourage him to keep up the fight. One call came from Silver City, N.M., another from an American working in Japan as an English teacher.

Hoffman said one of his neighbors told him today that this amazing campaign was "target practice." One of his old friends stopped by and mentioned the yard signs she had distributed. "Keep 'em for next year," Hoffman said.

While one staffer had told me immediately after the concession speech that Hoffman had been "crushed" by the narrow defeat, the candidate was feeling decidedly more encouraged by the time his wife, Carol, came by to take him to lunch (their first lunch together in three months, he said).

Hoffman said Tuesday evening, when it became clear that he'd fallen 4,000 votes short of victory, he was disappointed not so much for himself, but on behalf of all the many people who had lent their support to his campaign. Wednesday morning, however, dozens of those supporters had already contacted him -- both in person, and through the Hoffman campaign Web site -- to tell him how proud they were of his effort, and to urge him to keep fighting.

What does it mean? We'll let Michelle Malkin answer that question for now.

Ali's flight leaves Buffalo at 7 p.m., and we'll have to drive hard to get to the airport in time. But I just felt I needed to take a minute to pass along this message:

HOFFMANIA LIVES!

UPDATE (Smitty): Fred Thompson's winners and losers mentions Hoffman.

UPDATE II (Smitty): American Glob embeds Rush Limbaugh, and here is some more Fred Thompson analysis.

No backing down

From my American Spectator article today:

Even while the Hoffman campaign's early-evening "cautious optimism" gave way to concern -- with staffers huddling in the "war room" here at the Hotel Saranac -- one official of New York's Conservative Party was already in a celebratory mood, laughing as he yelled into his cell phone: "Guess who will not be representing the 23rd District? Dede Scozzafava!"
The liberal Republican Scozzafava suspended her campaign four days before Election Day, but still got about 7,000 votes -- a number greater than the margin of victory for the Democrat she endorsed, Bill Owens. Her defeat was victory enough for some conservatives, on a night when the GOP swept the off-off-year gubernatorial elections in Virginia and New Jersey. And the candidate who drove Scozzafava out of the race struck a defiant tone in conceding his narrow loss to Owens.
"This one was worth the fight . . . And this is only one fight in the battle," said Hoffman . . .

Read the rest. Also read Michelle Malkin's post about her determination to keep fighting.

Like I said, "This isn't over."

Prediction: Hoffmania will continue

OK, so Doug Hoffman fell 4,000 votes short of a House seat. But ask yourself this: What will Regnery pay him as a book advance?

The basic idea of the Hoffman campaign -- an ordinary citizen taking a wild gamble on a political campaign, waging an against-all-odds underdog battle against the Establishment -- is nothing less than the epitome of the American Dream.

Hell's bells, it's a Disney movie starring Rick Moranis!

The peculiar circumstances of the NY23 special election put Hoffman in the glare of the national spotlight and, given his admitted lack of political "rock star" credentials, he did a lot better than any of the experts might have expected. As he said in his concession speech:

"This one was worth the fight. And it’s only one fight in the battle, and we have to keep fighting."

It was Hoffman's willingness to fight that made him an inspirational figure, and Erick Erickson says the fight must go on.

If the Republican bosses think they're going to pick another candidate in NY23 for 2010, they'd better think again. The grassroots conservatives -- the Tea Party people, the pro-lifers, the Club for Growth, Fred and Jeri Thompson, Sarah Palin -- who backed Doug Hoffman aren't going to forget his courageous example.

By the way, some campaign sources tell me that Mr. Hoffman was very emotionally bruised by Tuesday night's result. In recent days, he had come to believe -- like a lot of us believed -- that he was about to win an upset victory. If you'd like to send Mr. Hoffman a note of encouragement, please go to the contact" page at his Web site.

This isn't over.

HOFFMANIA LIVES!

Recalling Ronald Reagan

by Smitty

From the FaceBook page that drives legislation:

The race for New York's 23rd District is not over, just postponed until 2010. The issues of this election have always centered on the economy – on the need for fiscal restraint, smaller government, and policies that encourage jobs. In 2010, these issues will be even more crucial to the electorate. I commend Doug Hoffman and all the other under-dog candidates who have the courage to put themselves out there and run against the odds.

To the tireless grassroots patriots who worked so hard in that race and to future citizen-candidates like Doug, please remember Reagan’s words of encouragement after his defeat in 1976:

"The cause goes on. Don't get cynical because look at yourselves and what you were willing to do, and recognize that there are millions and millions of Americans out there that want what you want, that want it to be that way, that want it to be a shining city on a hill."

Recall that, had nothing been done, an even more leftist candidate than Owens may have taken the one-year seat. Owens wins, but understands that, if he's running in 2010, he can't ignore the Hoffman voters, any more than Bill Clinton to ignore fiscal conservatives who voted Perot.

The Conservative Party and the Tea Party are undeniably a force with which to reckon. This blog recommends a strong buy on stock in all cotton undergarment manufacturers. After these election results, the Left will be stocking up, that is certain.

Keep fighting the good fight people, and the country may yet be restored.

P.S. Obviously, the Hoffman campaign needed to trick BHO into campaigning for Owens...

NY23 Election Results HQ; UPDATE: Team Hoffman predicts 'close' victory; UPDATE II: Numbers in the war room; UPDATE III: HOFFMAN CONCEDES

12:35 a.m. WED. 12/4: "This one was worth the fight," Doug Hoffman said in his concession speech. "This is only one fight in the battle."

Now all the pundits -- who, as Michelle Malkin observes, claimed that tonight didn't mean anything -- will tell us what it means. Nice work if you can get it.

I'm on deadline for the American Spectator, so not a complete wrap-up just yet, but when Hoffman's speech was over, one of his supporters said two words that struck me: "Twelve months."

Exactly. And only four months until . . .

Well, it's cold in upstate New York in November. But it's warm in Florida in August. Hit the tip jar.

12:05 a.m.: HOFFMAN EXPECTED TO CONCEDE IN STATEMENT.

11:32 p.m.: Neither the Owens campaign nor the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee is declaring victory. As Ryan told me shortly after 11 p.m., "You don't see the Owens people jumping for joy. . . . They know the same thing we know" -- namely the uncertainty of unreported precincts and uncounted absentee ballots.

11:25 p.m.: "I think it's very premature," Hoffman campaign spokesman Rob Ryan said of the report that NBC News had called the race for Democrat Owens. "There's a buncn of big question marks out there." With many thousands of military absentee ballots and key precincts not reporting, the Hoffman campaign is ready for a long night.

11:20 p.m.: Hoffman campaign sources report that only 50 percent of the votes in Oswego County have been counted.

11:15 p.m: NBC has reportedly crawled out on a limb and called Democrat Bill Owens a winner. Beware of that.

10:51 p.m.: Clinton County is more than 75% counted, and the numbers there project well for Hoffman. A campaign source just said, "We're doing good in Oneida and St. Lawrence [counties], but we don't know if that's being reflect in the numbers" being reported on TV.

The top command of the Hoffman campaign is in a private banquet room dubbed "the war room," where they are crunching the numbers precinct by precinct. It's already been a longer night than most expected and guests at the party upstairs are getting restless.

Problems are reported with a total of 11 voting machines (4 in St. Lawrence County and 7 in Fulton County). With 63% of precincts reporting, Owens leads 49% to Hoffman's 44%, a margin of about 3,400 votes, with 5% for Dede Scozzafava. Many military absentee ballots (Fort Drum is in the district) are yet to be counted.

10:29 p.m.: Reports of voting machine malfunctions in St. Lawrence and Fulton Counties. National Review is a bit worried. The Hoffman campaign is still optimistic, but this long delay is stressful. As the percentage of returns increases an early lead for Democrat Bill Owens is shrinking. Whereas Owens led by 8 points with 21% reporting, it's now 5 points with 39% reporting. Stay tuned.

10:11 p.m.: At this point, with about 20% of precincts reporting, it appears that Democrat Bill Owens is returning very strong numbers -- indeed, suspiciously strong numbers -- in Dede Scozzafava's home territory of Jefferson County.

10:05 p.m.: There have been reports of problems with voting machines in the district. However, early returns from Clinton County -- home territory for Democrat Bill Owens -- indicate a Hoffman victory. Total turnout for Republicans was stronger than for Democrats in that key county.

In a conference call with bloggers, Susan B. Anthony List President Marjorie Dannenfelser just described the apparent conservative surge as "an organic movement that is rising up." SBA list put more than 200 volunteers into the 23rd District and distributed more than 100,000 pieces of literature on behalf of the Hoffman campaign.

9:20 p.m.: Watertown office of Hoffman campaign reports "strong" Republican turnout. GOP turnout in Plattsburgh also reported strong, lower turnout for Democrats.

9:15 p.m.: Hoffman press aide Sandy Caligiore: "We will win a close election." Conservative Party official Jim Kelly said he expects Hoffman to win a 42%-45 plurality in the three-way race. Remember that, even though Dede Scozzafava suspended her campaign on Sunday, her name is still on the ballot.

9 p.m.: Polls just closed. The Watertown (N.Y.) Daily Times is planning to livestream the vote count. Will update frequently with the vote count, related news, and reports here from Hoffman campaign headquarters in Saranac Lake.

NY23: 'cautiously optimistic'

That quote is from Doug Hoffman campaign manager Dan Tripp, who says, "I know it's a cliche."

I spoke to Dan just now in the ballroom of the historic Hotel Saranac, about 15 minutes before the polls close here in New York. Of the eagerly awaited results, Dan says that Jefferson, Clinton, Madison and Oswego counties will decide the election.

Press corps pinup idol John McCormack is now here. Shhh! Don't tell anyone.

NY23: 'Revolution'

At the American Spectator:

Doug Hoffman campaign spokesman Rob Ryan just said the off-year congressional election in this sprawling upstate district represents a political "revolution."
"People have just stepped up to the plate," Ryan said, describing the surge of grassroots volunteer support for Hoffamn. "They're sick and tired of politics as usual. They're sick and tired of the culture of corruption in Washington. They're sick and tired of sending all their money to the IRS." . . .

Read the rest.

UPDATE: Drew M. of Ace of Spades HQ is in town! Somebody tell him to find me at the hotel restaurant. We'll have a mini-Ace-o-Palooza.