Perhaps.
But if you look at this race + the other 2, the incumbent party lost all 3 of them. Hoffman looks like he’ll end up being the closest, and it really looks like her endorsement of Owens on Sunday really tipped the scales.
If she had stayed on the team or even remained silent, Hoffman probably wins.
But I don’t see this as a repudiation or anything. A 3rd party guy got 45% in what has to be close to a record for a conservative party candidate in NY. He was around 20% 10 days ago.
The media will try to paint it as such, but the same people supporting Hoffman by and large also backed McDonnell and Christie and they both won.
Also, Hoffman was a bit of a latecomer, unknown, apparently didn’t debate, had never run for anything or even been involved in politics before etc... Christie and McDonnell were campaigning for months, were known figures involved in their states for years, crossed the state, etc... It’s tough to just show up and win in the last 2 weeks, especially with a fractured party and what happened over the weekend with her backing the dem.
It’s a much bigger repudiation of Obama who actually campaigned heavily for Corzine and put up billboards with him on them and was all over his campaign ads and literature, same in VA to a lesser extent.
For the Obama backed incumbent billionaire to lose in NJ when Obama won it by 15 and VA when the dems had been on a roll there the last few yrs is much bigger than a guy who no one in NY-23 had likely heard of as of Columbus Day losing by a few pts in district Obama carried and one where he was at 20% 10 days before the election.
It’s not like Palin or any of these other conservatives heavily campaigned for him or did rallies or anything(as seen in GA maybe that makes a difference). They basically gave him a boost and made him a viable candidate.
We really have to see the exit polls to get a better idea. If Indys went heavily for Owens maybe something’s there, but until you know why the vote ended up as it did, it’s premature to speculate on the reasons.
“A 3rd party guy got 45%”
I wonder if today Rush will use this example to show that Third Party candidates never win ... even when they are conservatives.
I think a lot of voters do resent third party candidates and simply wish to vote along their straight party line, because they’ve always done that, their fathers have always done that, their grandfathers have always done that ...