Sarah Palin’s intervention backfires for Republicans

So much for Sarah Palin and the plans to rebuild the Republican party in her image. The former vice-presidential candidate’s intervention in the choosing of a candidate for yesterday’s special congressional election in northern New York state has backfired. As a result, the staunch conservative Douglas L Hoffman, backed by Palin and other right-wingers including the TV personalities Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh, had to concede defeat this morning to Democrat Bill Owens.

With 88 per cent of the vote counted in New York congressional district 23 – an area abutting the Canadian border - Owens was leading with 49 per cent and Hoffman trailing on 45.5 per cent.

There has been no comment so far from the original Republican candidate, Dierdre Scozzafava, who would have been Owens’s contender had Palin and others not stuck their oar in and demanded a less liberal candidate.

Scozzafava supports abortion rights and gay marriage - two bugbears for Palin and Co - and has even backed President Obama's stimulus package. In short, she was considered by some Republicans to be far too close in her politics to Owens. Proving their point, Scozzafava eventually pulled out of the race on Saturday and threw her weight behind the Democrat.

Hoffman, as well as getting Palin's support, and being egged on by Beck and Limbaugh, was backed to the tune of $1m by the so-called Club for Growth, a group that promotes limited government and lower taxes.

The NY23 seat became vacant after President Obama appointed the long-serving Republican congressman John M McHugh as secretary of the army.

Bill Owens's win provided a rare moment of pleasure yesterday for the Democratic party, which suffered defeat in other key local elections being held a year on from Barack Obama’s presidential victory.

BLOOMBERG WINS AGAIN
New York City mayor Mike Bloomberg won a third term, but only just. Having poured $90m of his own considerable fortune into the campaign, he and the media had expected a landslide. Instead he beat the Democrat William C Thompson by a tight margin. "Everybody was shocked," a Bloomberg aide told the New York Times.

It appears voters were turned off by Bloomberg's "heavy-handed" and "self-serving" re-writing of the law that would have limited him to two terms. Bloomberg was too arrogant and too smug, according to some voters interviewed yesterday.

CHRISTIE TAKES NEW JERSEY
In the day’s biggest blow for the Democrats, Christopher J Christie won the race for Governor of New Jersey against the unpopular incumbent Jon S Corzine. The Republican overcame a massive Democratic voter advantage to win.

The 47-year-old former federal prosecutor, who heightened his profile this summer when he took on a corruption case which resulted in a series of arrests of politicians and others, said afterwards: "We are in a crisis; the times are extraordinarily difficult, but I stand here tonight full of hope for the future. Tomorrow begins the task of fixing a broken state."