At the beginning of the summer, most observers expected Republicans to win all three of the big elections on Nov. 3. Two weeks out, it suddenly looks very possible that Republicans will win only one: the Virginia governor’s race. The other two will be lost—not to superior Democratic organizing and messaging, but to the GOP’s own divisions.
By all rights, the special election in New York’s 23rd Congressional District should be a Republican cakewalk. Stretching across the hunting and fishing towns along the Great Lakes and Canadian border, the district contains Fort Drum, base of the 10th Mountain division, and re-elected its Republican congressman in the disaster years of 2006 and 2008 by margins of 60-plus percent.
Yet polls show the Republican candidate in serious trouble. State Republican Party leaders prevented an open primary race and instead engineered the nomination of one of their own, moderate, pro-choice Assemblywoman Deirdre Scozzafava.
Angry conservatives in the 23rd rebelled, rallying to the third-party candidacy of local accountant Doug Hoffman. Hoffman and Scozzafava are splitting the Republican vote between them, allowing Democrat Bill Owen to emerge as the front-runner.
Conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt this week offered a stern condemnation of this fratricide on his popular program, calling the third-party candidate:
…. a wrecker, a selfish “look at me” poser …. It takes an outsized ego to look at poll after poll that puts you behind not one but two candidates by more than 10 points and still declare yourself in the hunt.
Whoops! Sorry, rewind. Fzzzzwwwwvvvvwwwzzzp. That was an editing error. Hugh Hewitt was not blasting Doug Hoffman, the third-party candidate in New York. In fact, Hoffman is the darling of talk radio and Fox News, which have helped to spread Hoffman Fever for the past few weeks.
No, Hewitt was attacking the third-party candidate in New Jersey’s gubernatorial race, an independent named Chris Daggett who has drawn votes from the official Republican standard-bearer, Chris Christie.
From the point of view of most Republican commenters online and on the air, party loyalty is a highly variable principle. As they see it, third-party races by liberal Republicans who want to combine environmental protection with fiscal responsibility are selfish indulgences. But third-party races by conservative Republicans who want to combine pro-life appeals with their economic message? Those are completely different. Those are heroic acts of principle.
I’ve written elsewhere about the fascinating parallels and contrasts between the New Jersey and New York races.
Here I want to look forward.
What lessons will Republicans draw? You might think that the impending defeats in New York and New Jersey would drive home the need to broaden the Republican coalition. A candidate like Hoffman would have been the better candidate for New York’s 23rd CD; a candidate like Daggett the better candidate for suburban New Jersey. Republicans have to find ways to accommodate both types of candidates and both kinds of constituencies.
But the risk is that the party will draw a very different conclusion. From the New York experience, Republicans will be tempted to draw the lesson: Always nominate the more conservative candidate. From New Jersey: We need to drive pro-environmental fiscal moderates out of our party and into the Democratic Party where they belong!
And if the Republicans pick up an Arkansas Senate seat and a dozen blue-dog Democratic House seats in 2010, you can see this “tea party” mentality taking strong hold of the GOP in the run-up to 2012.
But a political formula that encourages Republicans to write off the suburbs, the Northeast, and California is not a formula for a national majority. It’s a formula for a more coherent, better mobilized, but perpetually minority party.
It’s always painful to lose. But defeats can be useful if they lead to wisdom. In this November’s races, however, the risk is real that Republicans will lose much—and learn nothing.
Originally published October 22, 2009 in The Week
6 responses so far
1 Oldskool // Oct 22, 2009 at 10:33 am
Interesting but what were 30 Republicans thinking when they voted against the Franken bill? Talk about a trainwreck, it’s one brain-dead move after another with them.
2 lasoremiht // Oct 22, 2009 at 11:06 am
What a stupid article, Frum. Scozzafava is more left wing than half the Democrats in New York and in fact would not even commit to voting for Boehner as majority leader until recently. In fact there are rumors that she will switch parties if challenged in the primaries in 2 years. That district would be better no worse off with Owens, who could be easily pinned with the disaster known as Obama 2 yrs from now.
You’re such a nitwit contrarian Canadian robot, is it any wonder almost nobody pays attention to you?
3 Jewels // Oct 22, 2009 at 2:28 pm
Interesting take… but I disagree. Scozzafava was thrust on the Republican citizens, she wasn’t elected in a primary. Given the choice, Republicans would never have picked her to be the candidate. They want Hoffman. This isn’t about being non-inclusive, this is about letting the people decide who they want representing them. That Hoffman is doing so well is a clear vote of no confidence against those “leaders” who are more interested in promoting their own interests and the interests of their friends than doing what is right for the people of NY23.
4 TheGlassOnion // Oct 22, 2009 at 8:44 pm
“You’re such a nitwit contrarian Canadian robot, is it any wonder almost nobody pays attention to you?”
And yet, here you are, on his blog, replying to his personal opinions.
5 lasoremiht // Oct 23, 2009 at 4:15 pm
“And yet, here you are”
Yeah. Me, you, and a couple other people, and that’s it. And you have nothing to say of interest or relevance. How pathetic.
6 potan // Oct 24, 2009 at 2:22 pm
lasoremiht said: “You’re such a nitwit contrarian Canadian robot, is it any wonder almost nobody pays attention to you?”
I don’t see what him being a Canadian has to do with him being a “robot”, “contrarian” or a “nitwit”. I think I smell a stinky nativist zealot. You could learn a thing or two from Canadian conservatives, they’ve managed to win elections in a country dominated by socialists and they are well on their way to forming a majority, incrementally, without appearing angry. They’ve even managed to convert some of those socialists. I can’t think of a single leader in the Republican Party with the strategic foresight to do what Stephen Harper has done.
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