Posted on 10/31/2009 7:58:47 AM PDT by Grunthor
With Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman running neck and neck with the Democrat in Tuesday’s special election in New York, some other disaffected Republicans are seeing the third-party route as more viable.
And it could hurt the Republicans in those races.
In Virginia’s 5th district, state Sen. Robert Hurt’s entry into the GOP primary has spurred little-known candidate Bradley Rees to switch to the Virginia Conservative Party. And in Ohio, another GOP primary contender said this week that he’ll run as a Constitution Party candidate.
Both will go at the GOP nominees from their right flanks and try to expose some unhappiness in conservative ranks. They might not be as well-funded as Hoffman or be filling quite as big a vacuum as the one left by Republican Dede Scozzafava’s left-leaning politcs, but they could steal valuable votes.
Rees isn’t afraid of playing spoiler to the establishment-favorite Hurt. He even suggested his third-party candidacy could help freshman Rep. Tom Perriello (D-Va.) stay in Congress.
“It may amount to only drawing enough votes from the Republican candidate to ensure Tom Perriello a second term,” Rees told the Lynchburg News and Advance.
“If so, so be it. Maybe then the party will understand that we are trying to save the GOP from its worst enemy — not the Democrats, but themselves.”
A similar situation occurred in Rep. Mary Jo Kilroy’s (D-Ohio) district last year, when Republican Steve Stivers lost enough of the vote to conservative third-party candidates to allow Kilroy to win.
And now Stivers, who supports abortion rights, could again be ceding support to his right, in the form of Ron Paul supporter David Ryon. Ryon switched from the GOP to the Constitution Party this week.
It should be noted that Kilroy and Perriello each won by less than 1 percent in 2008, making them among the closest races in the country. In fact, both races were drawn out past Election Day because they were so close.
Those are the races where third-party candidates can make a difference.
It should be noted that neither Ryon nor Rees appears to have cited Hoffman in his announcement, so any connection to the New York race appears to be indirect. But even if they were unaware, the underlying factors that led to their decisions — and Hoffman's — could be troubling for the GOP.
OBE.
I’m REALLY rooting for Hoffman. And if the others win it would be gravy. At the very least, it may push some “moderate” GOPers back to a more conservative stance.
Good News if they are running against Leftist RINOS, bad new if they are pay for play Democrats pretending to be “Conservatives” only to aid the Democrats in tough districts.
Nam Vet
The third parties will never be a political force unto themselves. They can, however, be a check against the Republicans being too cute, picking “moderate” (which always means pro-abort) candidates. The threat is empty if it is never exercised.
IMHO, if they could leave that stance from the getgo, they have to go. If we continue to allow moderates to eat at whatever trough they feel expedient, we will be fighting this battle every election and the battles we fight every day to get them to listen to us once elected. We have to go rino hunting and finish the job. We gotta bag ‘em. No more chasing the ship after it has sailed, and no more compromise. Ask McCain how many fingers he has left after reaching across the aisle so many times.....
Hoffmans race is a special election;the races referred to here are primaries;if the third party candidate were to prevail,wouldn’t they still have to win in the general?If that candidate is a conservative,hopefully the RNC would support then as they were belatedly forced to with Hoffman.
This WOULD be bad IF it happened in a general election and caused a blood bath election night. BUT it is NOT bad but rather a GOOD thing because it seems to have rudely awakened the GOP establishment in Washington as to what COULD happen and what DID happen if they don’t start running conservative candidates. This is a BIG “GOOD!”
People could also run as conservative Democrats and split that vote. Overall that could pull the whole process back towards the right side. The lunatics running the Democratic party right now have been allowed to get away with positioning themselves as the “normals” somehow.
As African-American voters are to the DNC, Conservative voters are to the RNC. The Conservatives are waking up. Let us pray that the African-American voters also wake up.
If conservatives energize PRIMARIES to overthrow leftist weasels within the republican party, it will be a great advance for the cause.
If a conservative party gains prominence nationwide, and takes away a significant number of votes from Republicans, it will be a huge gain for leftists. George Soros would write a big check to help it along.
The Hoffman race was a special case, because there was NO primary, the candidate was chosen by party officials according to a special case of election law there.
“As African-American voters are to the DNC, Conservative voters are to the RNC.”
During the election I coined the phrase “Battered Wife Republican” but I like yours better.
I would have supported the Conservative in the primary and then refused to pick the least socialist out of Scuzzie and the Dem.
Don't know the candidates so can't say. But it is certain some of these will be leftist plants or funded by leftists. Going to be quite a job figuring out who is real and who is not. For instance, here in CT, we now have 5 "GOP" candidates running against Dodd. One, Linda McMahon, is an Obama plant in my opinion. Going to be up to the grass roots to vet all these newbies and third party people. Which is as it should be.
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