OMFG, thank god the GOP endoresed candidate endores this piece of shit...

the conservative peopole of america will rebel in 2010 and although there will be more liberals elected for it the better we will do in 2012.

Congressman-elect Bill Owens was sworn in at noon today.

Owens indicated in a press release released shortly afterwards that he was now in favor of the the "Affordable Healthcare for America Act" bill in direct contrast to his earlier position during the election campaign.

According to Politico.com, Mr. Owens assured voters that he felt the public option had no place in the health care reform bill. Contrary to that position, Mr. Owens now indicates that he intends to vote in favor of the bill even though it now contains a public option.

UPDATED: A spokesman for Congressman Owens indicated correctly that Mr. Owens had recanted his solid position against public option later in the campaign, clarifying that he did not wish public option to be a 'litmus test' for the Health Reform bill and that on Oct. 30th, several days prior to the election, in a debate had stated that he generally supported the public option as it was now written (at that time.)

Mr. Owens also indicated during his campaign that he was firmly opposed to cutting Medicare benefits, taxing health care benefits, and increased taxes on the middle class in any way as you can see clearly in the screenshot below, taken directly from Mr. Owens' campaign website.

See the rest here

http://www.gouverneurtimes.com/index...ews&Itemid=175

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Obama is a man who could deliver a snap judgment about a Boston police officer who arrested an "obstreperous" Harvard professor-friend, but would warn Americans against "jumping to conclusions" about a mass murderer at Fort Hood who shouted "Allahu Akbar."

Well he definitely voted for the Pelosi bill. If voters thought he was a moderate or something they got a rude awakening.

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Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys. ---P. J. O'Rourke

This single small house seat vote, is going to hurt supposed moderates.

This seat is temp in owens hands and hoffman will take it in 2010.. by a landslide.

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Obama is a man who could deliver a snap judgment about a Boston police officer who arrested an "obstreperous" Harvard professor-friend, but would warn Americans against "jumping to conclusions" about a mass murderer at Fort Hood who shouted "Allahu Akbar."

well this was a special election to fill a term, he runs agan in 2010, and I suspect things may be just as tough.

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"The captain has turned off the `No Dubbing' sign. You are free to speak any language you choose."

Things will always be tough for him there given the district's dynamics. My guess is that he needs to triangulate enough Blue Dog aspects (guns, etc) with Dem things (health care) to keep enough of the moderates and 'one chancers' who didn't like what they saw had happened and minority of liberals happy enough to come out and vote for him--plus some good groundpounding on local issues in courting and pork on all the bread and butter issues there--to keep that seat. Inasmuch as some brought up the Clintonian technical truths of NY-23 to say it has not always been held by the GOP (redistrictings over the years), that area in which it sits now has not been in Dem hands since the Civil War times, and before that the Dems were the conservatives in mindset. It's a blood red area and should ordinarily be amongst the safest seats for the GOP in any time and any setback period.

Those angles are his only hope of keeping it, because the seat is ordinarily so red that the GOP candidate runs unopposed or wins by huge margins even in the best Dem winds, even in Obama 2008 where McHugh walloped his opponent. The odds are that it will go back by natural course of events unless all the winds go favourably to the Dems in the next year (health care reform is seen as a positive, economy turns, other breaks and good fortunes, etc).

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It won't be Hoffman IMO given the stunts he did and overplayings that lost that seat. I'd expect a GOP candidate getting the endorsement and/or winning the GOP primary that is more centre-right where he/she is more conservative than Scozza but not to the extent of being a hardcore Rushbeck like Hoffman, given such a person works to diffuse the hard edges and sour notes and themes that set so many people off across the spectrums that caused all the factions and fissions.

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I think Hoffman would have very good shot. Had he been the nominee of the GOP from the start, and not Scozzafava, he would have won handily given the national environment; in part, because he would have been able to run a campaign more like those of McDonnel and Christie, focusing totally on economic conservative positions. In a three was race, running against a republican standard bearer, he was left having to highlight every possible difference between himself and both candidates in order to be competitive...and he was.

Again, the message for Republicans is:
1. Nominate conservatives or at least solidly right of center candidates
2. Focuse on economic conservativism. Candidates should not run on social conservative issues, but neither do they need to apologize for or run from their social conservative roots.
3. Unity matters, but unity behind the right candidate from the start!

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"It's a good feeling to shoot a bad guy. Something you democrats would never understand. Americans are homesteaders, we want a safe home, keep the money we make, and shoot bad guys!"

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I think he would have easily won had he been the GOP candidate given the district being an ordinarily very safe GOP seat, but what he did and how he conducted himself makes him personally a political liability. After all, if he was electable there, he would have won this race, and one has to really be repugnant to be a social and fiscal conservative and lose in NY-23. If Donald Duck was the formal GOP candidate there, the GOP straight ticket pullers and/or big majority conservatives there would have made him a House Rep.


Yes, I think he would have won, partly because of the national environment, but most particularly because of the district's leanings. But the voters wouldn't have been able to spot him as a purger, and that is the lesson the GOP must learn from. It's better to learn that now than later given this was one House race in a special election in an off year and in a recoverable seat given the Dem got it on a fluke of GOP self-immolation and self-sabotage.

The message IMO is to keep an eye on campaigning on the issues where advantages can be taken. McDonnell and Christie did that. Hoffman was so fractious and pimping in the demagoguery that he lost one of the most safe seats of the GOP. So, a key lesson is that any candidate cannot be obnoxious, dismissive, abrasive and look like a whackjob and/or caricature.

Moreover, a guy like him, even if he was the GOP candidate, is not a fit as a general template, and neither is a social and economic conservative. All politics is local. Remember, the other two won by running left, not right.

As for Christie, he had unusual factors to his advantage particular to NJ, and he was to the left of Scozza. There was clearly no tea party uproar against him. But if he was Doug Hoffman on the social issues or even somewhat Hoffman on them, Corzine would have won that race. No GOP NJ governors win by being socially conservative, and they are issues they cannot hide. They must be of the Christie/Whitman/Kean type or they will lose big time like social conservative Steve Lonegan did in his own GOP primary, never mind would have gotten creamed in the general race. Other than the House seats in the Piedmont upper Northwest, shore points and Burlington area, the GOP in NJ must run Rockefeller Reps, and probably only the Cape May (furthest south) and Warren and Sussex (furthest northwest) areas desire a social conservative in full.

VA is a purple state now given increasing Dem leaning population changes, but it still leans more red overall for the time being. Obama only won it after the last Dem did in 1964 and that's when the Dems there were Dixiecrat conservatives. Those people are GOPers today there. He won with a Cat 5 storm blowing against the GOP and he was a black candidate that could elevate black voter turnout, It's in play today, but politics is going to be local there. The GOP can run more conservatively in the safe GOP districts, but needs to run more moderately in the NOVA regions and other divided and Dem-leaning pockets. It can seek a more conservative candidate in them only to the degree it can get away with it, and that depends on the local district demographics and who is running against them (a wounded duck Dem might allow such an opening for a more conservative candidate in a split district).

So yes, the right candidates matter, but it must be based on the demographics in each area and the issues at hand in an election. This is nothing new, but it's a lesson that the passionate left and right leaning people in each party often forget, and they let their wishful thinkings and dislikes for other views get the better of them. Each time they prevail, they usually only win the ones they'd win anyway, namely the most liberal or conservative districts. Overall, that spells minority status.

They will get more results, though, by picking their strongest liberals or conservatives respectively for their safest seats and stockpile them there, and then use the Blue Dog/Rockefeller Rep method for the fights each party must fight the most. Once a party gets a majority status, then they can control the agendas procedurally, and that is where the compromises become internally controlled and the issues and results shift left-centre or right-centre overall.

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SURPRISE!

Not...