As goes the New York-23 special congressional election, so goes the
direction of the national GOP? Not so fast.
“The national media is making it sound as though there's a civil war
between the RINOs and the conservatives, and they're making it seem as
though the Republican Party is just completely fractured, and I don’t
think that's true,” said Jack P. McGuire, Assistant Professor at
SUNY-Potsdam.
Republicans in upstate New York have been overlooked, said McGuire,
because of the state party system. New York State has political
parties that are stronger than almost anywhere else in the country;
instead of holding primaries, the establishment politicos can simply
install whoever they like – particularly in a special election.
“They did have some town hall meetings where they would say, ‘Well,
who should we have as our nominee?’” said McGuire. “But we know that
those things are kind of rigged, generally.”
As a result, Republicans in the 23rd district ended up with Dede
Scozzafava, someone with high name recognition but very few
conservative credentials.
Republicans in McGuire’s region are “libertarian, secular, Milton
Friendman, Ronald Reagan, get-the-government-off-my-back type of
Republicans…We would've much preferred a real conservative.”
This split also resulted in the severe fracturing within the larger
GOP, with the National Republican Campaign Committee shoveling
millions of dollars – and now, campaign volunteers – towards a
candidate that has been polling more and more poorly against her
Conservative Party counterpart.
Establishment political parties aren’t the only reason for the massive
dissonance occurring within the NY-23 race.
“There are a number of trends,” said Harvey Schantz, professor of
political science
at the State University of New York, Plattsburg. “There is an
underlying pro-Democratic trend, then you have the retirement of the
incumbent, and then you have the division of the Republican Party
vote.”
Schantz says that the general Northeastern gravitation towards
liberalism is the reason upstate New York Republicans are a party
divided.
“In my 31 years living in Plattsburg, this is the first time that the
Democrats have a realistic chance to win a Congressional seat,” he
said. Schantz doesn’t attribute that solely to the divided
conservative ticket. “If you look at presidential votes, you'd see the
pro-Democratic trend for almost 20 years. I think its part of the
larger dynamic where the South moves towards the Republicans and the
Northeast moves towards the Democrats.”
Dr. Michael Ruddy, a political science professor from SUNY-Oswego,
said the same thing.
“When you dissect the [Republican] politics, it has a progressive look
to it,” said Ruddy. “There is an undercurrent of ‘closet
progressivism’ up this way. When you cut through these partisan
facades, you'll find it.”
So, depending on your vantage point, the race could demonstrate a
variety of things: a moderate GOP establishment out of touch with
conservative constituents, Republicans demonstrating their latent
liberal tendencies, or an entrenched political system that doesn’t
reflect any of the district’s political realities.
No matter what your politics, it’s impossible not to see the race as
just more evidence of “what happens” when a longstanding incumbent
leaves his seat and entrenched political parties fight like dogs over
the new unmarked territory. There have been only 4 Congressmen in the
district since the election of 1940.
Ron Seyb, Associate Professor of government at Sidmore College, said
that the entire process was unique no matter what it represented – and
that there was more drama to come even in the last few days leading up
to the election.
“For the Republican candidate to be threatened at all is just
extraordinary. This is going to be something we could’ve never
predicted two weeks ago,” said Seyb. “The dynamics of this race are
fairly nascent at this point.”