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If at First You Don’t Succeed….

NY-23. You remember NY-23. You know, the place where the nascent Tea Party movement first spread its political wings and flexed it’s political muscle. The place where 11 GOP county chairman sat behind closed doors and anointed a candidate so liberal that the Democrat candidate actually positioned himself as the conservative in the race.

NY-23. The place where prominent conservative Republicans bucked the “Establishment” and endorsed a little known Conservative nominee named Doug Hoffman while “Establishmentarian” Newt Gingrich took to the airwaves to castigate said conservative Republicans for having the temerity to buck the “Establishment” all while bemoaning the narrow-mindedness and lack of team play of said endorsement.

It’s where the relentless exposure of Dede Scozzafava’s liberal voting record caused her poll numbers to drop faster than the stock market following an Obama economic speech.

NY-23, where those cratering poll numbers caused Dede to withdraw the weekend before the election whereupon, in the true spirit of the ‘big tent’ philosophy that RINO/liberal Republicans promulgate ad nauseum, she promptly endorsed the Democrat nominee.

Yeah, that NY-23.

So, that debacle having played out on the national stage, now that the 2010 elections have rolled around, one would have thought that the chastened, egg-encrusted GOP leaders in northern New York who foisted this disaster upon the Republican Party would realize the error of their way and look to the guy who despite this fiasco lost the election by only 4%, right?

Wrong!

In a recently conducted series of votes, 9 of the 11 GOP County Executive Committees in NY-23 have endorsed not Doug Hoffman but a candidate who sits firmly to the left of Doug, especially on social issues, and who has been endorsed by the populist Independence Party which, among other things, is pro-choice, pro-gay marriage, believes in public financing of elections and has endorsed Andrew Cuomo for governor.

Initially, one’s ire is drawn inexorably toward these 9 GOP Executive Committees and their chairmen. So, what’s the deal, guys? Having not succeeded in getting a moderate/liberal GOPer elected last time, are you bound and determined to try, try again?

But then reality sets in. Why would anyone expect a different outcome? By what rule of logic would one expect the same people who endorsed a liberal for the last election to suddenly endorse a conservative this time? Maybe they’re not the problem. Maybe, ahem, we’re the problem.

You see, those moderate/liberal Executive Committeemen were elected by moderate/liberal precinct committeemen. And if NY-23 is anything like the rest of the country, over half of it’s precinct committeemen slots are filled with….no one. That’s right. No. One.

Now, imagine what might have happened had movement conservatives taken the time and effort these past 8 months to fill those slots with…conservatives. That’s right. Imagine if we were the Party.

Think that’s a pipe dream? Think it’ll never happen? Think that’s it’s too hard… or you have to be ‘connected’… or it takes too much time? Wrong, wrong and wrong. Need proof? It’s already happened in Maricopa and Clark counties, the largest, most populated counties in Arizona and Nevada, respectively.

Take too much time and effort and connections? Suggestion – head on over to the Precinct Project and see just how incredibly simple it is to become part of “The Party’s” infrastructure. Got the time to write a letter to your CongressCritter, or take in a ballgame? Becoming “The Party” takes about the same amount of time and you don’t even have to pay for parking.

NY-23? It serves as a beacon in the war against Establishmentarians who believe that this fight between the forces of freedom and the tentacles of an all-consuming government will be won by compromising, who continually snatch defeat from the jaws of victory, who are more enamored by the DC cocktail circuit than they are conservative values, and who seemingly never tire of worshiping at the altar of bi-partisanship.

Tired of the NY-23′s? Fed up with “The Party” promising to fight to the last man and then meekly succumbing to the ‘inevitable’? Weary of having to vote between a Democrat and “The Party’s” Dem-lite candidate? Exhausted from writing seemingly endless letters to the leadership of “The Party” only to see the same old cave-ins?

There is a solution.Become “The Party”! Be The Party!!

Originally posted at www.73wire.com

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COMMENTS

  • penguin2

    So, the GOP chooses their candidate in a backroom? Set in stone already? I thought they’d have a primary. If the GOP has once again chosen someone to the left of the Dem (Owens), who already holds the seat, the seat is certainly not going to turn over. The people will stick with the Dem Owens, no reason to go with a Republican who advocates the same Dem stuff.

  • pilgrim

    I agree with most of what you have written here, but I would suggest that the local GOP did make a change of sorts. Dede was well known for her voting record in NY State Assembly. Matt is an investment banker who has not been elected to any office, and therefore we have no voting record to refer to. I accept your research that Doug is the more conservative of the two, but I do not have enough proof that Matt is exactly the same as Dede.

  • eburke

    He’s got the Conservative Party line and then he and Matt Doheny are squaring off in the GOP primary. Doheny received the endorsement of 9 of the 11 County GOP Executive Committees (2 remained neutral)

    This started out to be a post contrasting the 2 of them and as I got madder and madder about the lame brain idiots who refused to endorse the guy who almost won last time it struck me that maybe I was directing my ire in the wrong direction.

    CW’s Precinct Project (which he’s mentioned, oh, once or twice) popped into my mind and…well, ya got what ya got :-)

  • eburke

    (of course, there’s not many who are). That’s why I referred to him as the ‘more liberal’ candidate so my apologies if that distinction didn’t come through. (Although Matt *was* a candidate last time and they chose Dede over him so they do have a pattern of choosing whoever the more liberal candidate is)

    As I noted to penguin, I’ll be doing a contrast between Doug and Matt sometime in the near future but my larger point was that once again a bunch of GOP establishment types endorsed not the logical heir-to-be (which they always seem to do when it’s a moderate next in line) but chose to go out of their way to endorse the pro-choice, pro-gay marriage guy who already had received the endorsement of the same Party that found Andrew Cuomo enough to their liking to endorse him.

    If we’re tired of that kind of stuff, then as ColdWarrior has said ad infinitum, we need to *become* the party.

  • pilgrim

    If Matt wins then it’s another example to me of support the conservative in the primary and support the Republican in the general cause Matt is NOT Dede.

  • eburke

    Doug in the primary (actually, I’ve donated to his campaign) and if he didn’t wint I’d be ok w/voting for Matt in November because he is certainly to the right of Owens. whereas Dede was actually to his left (I got beyond tired of hearing the MSM refer to her as a ‘moderate’)

    Like I said, I got irked that the same folks who so often play by the ‘he’s the next in line/he’s paid his dues (cf. Bush 1, Dole, and McCain) didn’t endorse the logical next guy in line, they went for the more liberal candidate, just like they chose Dede over Matt the last time.

    If we want to change that…we need to *become* the party. But I get where you’re coming from.