[YaYa123]

And I would ask someone to explain to me how bad it would be for Democrats if they don't finish second in the race. I can't remember what I heard people discussing when faced with the real possibility that Democrat McCall might finish behind Independent Golisono (sp). Real bad political implications for the Clintons, but even worse for the New York Democrat Party in the long term too.

[adingdangdoo]

And I would ask someone to explain to me how bad it would be for Democrats if they don't finish second in the race.

First, the Democratic party would be listed THIRD on ballots for the next four years. This would not only be embarrassing, but may cost a few votes, as some folks don't look past the top two candidates. These are the people who look to "be on the winning team", and they figure only the top two have a shot at winning.

Additionally, it may cost them some patronage jobs...

[governsleastgovernsbest]

Every county has two government employee Board of Election Commissioners, who have responsibility for registrations, running elections, etc. The two commissioners are appointed by the top two finishing parties in the gubernatorial race. If the Dems finish second they lose all their Board of Election Commissioners - this would be a disaster for them in terms of the patronage and their ability to manipulate elections.

[NativeNewYorker]

NY's arcane election laws punish the party of anyone who doesn't finish first or second. The top two parties get to staff and run lots of the election machinery, and future ballot position is determined by the last election cycles, so Dems would drop to the THIRD spot on the ballot, making it even harder for their, ahem, intellectually challenged partisans to locate them.

[Rome2000]

Real bad political implications for the Clintons, but even worse for the New York Democrat Party in the long term too

New York is a socialist hellhole.

Recent unprecedented events like 9/11, the Klintons derailment of Cuomo and an insane billionaire spending no more than 5% of his total net worth on campaign commercials for the last 6 months may cause the rats to finish third this time around but make no mistake about it, Andy Coumo will be Governor in 2006.