Next Tuesday’s off-off-Broadway congressional election in upstate New York has drawn a considerable amount of nationwide interest. This is the type of formerly obscure event to which only a few pointy headed observers would pay heed back in the day.
Today, however, with the infoboobtubez and cable TV creating a massive hunger among Amerikkkan belly button lint pontificators, [projection alert], this seemingly insignificant race for one lousy congressional seat has become household news for a nation of political junkkkies who no longer pay any attention at all to the cultural elite, except perhaps to slap them around a bit and pull down their drawers before hanging them in effigy.
[run-on sentence alert]
The new media plays an increasingly important role, in fact a META role, for in the insistent, restless craving of the political blogs, talk radio and cable news to discover, expound and cajole their constituencies, there is the tendency to confer light and legitimacy on emerging extremes, which are always the news, after all.
The teabag movement is perhaps the most important reactionary movement since Nixon corralled the "silent majority" in the late 1960s to begin forty years of the Right, a period that has coincided with the aging and decline of the post-war Amerikkkan Empire.
The silent majority was a white, conservative reaction to the excesses and mistakes of liberal power and the fear of then-rioting ni**ers and the New Left, which also opposed liberal power in the late 1960s in reaction to the Vietnam War.
The teabaggers, OTOH, are a white, conservative reaction to the failures and mistakes of conservative power. Yes, this seems to be malapropism writ large. It is denial and misplaced anger, except, apparently, that it isn’t entirely misplaced, for the teabag movement, at least in the NY 23rd district, is deadly serious about picking a moderate Republican seat.
The teabaggers, like generations of anti-intellectual plebeians before them, express their real and legitimate anger misguidedly at non-existent "Socialists" and "Communists", for the actual sources of their discomfort were created by the sorcerer’s alchemy of supply side economics, tax cuts for the rich, forced disintegration of the middle class and the hoarding of wealth in fewer and fewer Armani-designed suit pockets.
Conservative rebellion as a result of conservative political economics, in other words. Most teabaggers will freely admit that the Bush Administration was a cause of their current rebelliousness, but what truly has pulled them over the edge and into the streets was the election of a Kenyan-born, communist, islamofascist ni**er named "Hussein."
The Teabag movement has been promoted, formed, shaped and led by the conservative new media provocateurs of right wing agitprop: Limbaugh, Hannity and Beck. When asked who are the leaders of conservatism in the Republikkkan Party these daze, the R sheeple point overwhelmingly to these popular anti-intellectual opinionators rather than their own politicians and intellectuals. Many point to Sarah Palin, who seems to be very much on the verge of unstitching the "R" from her sweater and replacing it with a big fat "T".
And she is the "anti-politician" politician in so many respects, elevated among her supporters by giving up her gubernatorial power base for a far more expansive socio-political role as a facebook blogger.
Where Reagan used his charismatic, sophisticated charm and an effortless ease in front of the camera to advance revolutionary if irrational views into the mainstream, Palin uses sex appeal, photogeneity and otherwise something like the reverse of Reagan’s appeal, a lack of sophisticated charm. She exudes frustration and mocking contempt to connect her with the aspirations of an unsophisticated, frustrated following which identifies with her unprofessionalism rather than scorns it. She is the antithesis of Reagan in terms of her crude mannerisms and inability to express even simple thoughts coherently.
Her amateurishness combined with good looks form the core of her appeal: "She is one of us". Just as the out of shape couch potato begins to feel himself magically more buffed simply by watching others work out on TV [projection alert], so does the average teabagger feel affinity to the gorgeous everywoman Palin, with an identification based on sheer fantasy.
In any event, as Obama has subsumed his glowing campaign personality into the duller confines of an intellectual, technocratic presidit, and as formerly comfortable white people continue to suffer during these times of economic unease, an anti-intellectual movement on the right has suddenly emerged from the tea pot.
Will they win a congressional seat next Tuesday? Are they an immediate threat to the comeback attempts of Republikkkan Party or, as this blogger predicts, are they more threatening to any hope for a longlasting realignment along Demotardic Party lines post-Obama?



20 Comments







Uh, the former holder of the NY23 congressional seat, a ‘moderate’ Republican, resigned to become the Secretary of the Army. There is no incumbent.
The question is, who should feel threatened by a third party of the right, the R’s or the D’s?
At first blush, I would say R, but then again, a Conservative Party seatholder will vote with the Rs anyway….
A couple of points. First, you still have it as the incumbent (but of course, if there were an incumbent, then there would be no need for a special election)
And, in NY, there are large numbers of 3rd, 4th, 5th, 6th, and 7th and more parties that have ballot/voting lines in elections and has been known over the years to elect the occasional non-Republican and non-Democrat (e.g, James Buckley got elected to the Senate from NY as a Conservative).
So, in my perspective, this is maybe an aberration but it will most likely be the Republicans that pay the price.
True enough. Its a Republikkkan seat to be picked, tho.
Correction duly noted and made in the text.
Its an open seat thats been held by Republikkans for what, a century?
I think that accurately qualifies it as a Republican seat.
What makes you think the Rs will pay the price? I thot so too, until this latest news (just in) that Scozzafava has dropped out of the race.
In that district, it probably won’t make a difference at all. The difference will be watching all the Rs run further and further to the right (and yes, further and further from the so-called middle).
Just as for years and years, the Democrats were hammered for being too leftist and being in thrall to the “evul libruls”, so will the Republicans be shown to be in thrall to the right wing.
The bottomline to me, is that this election really won’t tell diddly squat about the rest of the country. As you note, this has been a Republican seat since the Civil War.
Well, I hope you’re correct, that its an aberration meaning diddly, but watching supposedly MOR Republikkkans in the northeast stampede to a Palin-endorsed teabagger in a supposedly moderate district seems to portend something going on.
If more people continue to become disaffected from the two parties, as seems likely given the economic situation, they could drift into the welcoming arms of the far(ther) right.
Something like this happened with Perot, who attracted many moderates and even some pwoggies, although Perot is personally about as far right as you can go without goosestepping.
Now, Perot cost Bush Sr. the ’92 election, and no doubt a successful teabagger challenge by Palin will deliver 2012 to Obama, but the ramifications on Congress are much less clear, especially in the blue dog districts.
But that’s the thing, it’s NOT that moderate a district, even though it was represented by a somewhat moderate Republican in McHugh. Most all of upstate NY is still more conservative than the rest of the state, even though there have been Dems elected to upstate CDs in the last few elections.
As a friend pointed out, the primary result of this is that the NYS Conservative Party will be “approving” the Republican candidates in NYS. Since candidates can already appear on multiple ballot lines in NY, it just reinforces this.
Yes, well in muhc of the country off the coasts, conservative northeasterners are considered moderates.
And I think you are quite likely missing the rolling log while tweezing at the sliver.
I doubt very much that Sarah Palin, Dick Armey and Newt Gingrich are involved in this race simply to shore up the NYS Conservative Party.
Methinks they see this type of event recurring well outside NY in 2010.
I also find it rather odd that the R candidate would decide to quite three days before the election, regardless of her declining chances. Unusual, to say the least. It would seem she made the move at least in part to help elect the Conservative, since her chances were nullfied.
Actually, Gingrich had originally endorsed Scozzafava and has only now endorsed Hoffman with Scozzafava having suspended her campaign. And realistically, Scozzafava was probably the more liberal of the three candidates (I believe she is pro-choice, pro-union and actually willing to raise taxes when necessary)
And notice what you are saying. This is not at all to do with the Conservative Party of NY but has far more to do with the future of the Republican Party (with Gingrich and Palin both having made noises about running in ’12).
Don’t you read too many tea leaves in this either. Scozzafava has suspended her campaign but will remain on the ballot. And she has NOT endorsed Hoffman or Owens either one.
I see your distinctions, dakine. I had been hearing that she quit her campaign which gives an entirely different shading than
suspending her campaign, remaining on the ballot and “NOT endorsing Hoffman or Owens either one.”
hmmmm.
I think a lot of headlines (NY Times being an exception) have used “quit” but at this stage, with the election on Tuesday, the ballots are printed and her name is on it.
Of course. The point is Gingrich isn’t involved in this race simply because he takes a keen interest in upstate New York congressional politics. He’s involved, like Palin and Armey and a host of other national figures for a purpose that transcends one congressional race.
Reading tea leaves is, uh, why I wrote this. It could just be about personal presidential aspirations of GOP 2012 aspirants, but we’ll see won’t we?
“Thats why they play the game”
And “suspends” rather than “quits”. Three days before the election. I guess she simply decided it would be more worthwhile to have a long weekend and let it come what may on Tuesday.
Like I said earlier, slivers versus logs.
All well and good. Have a nice weekend.
great diary, dt! thanks!
Your welcome. I’m new here. First dairy, although I’ve been around the liberal blogs for years. Also like to post some memoirs from time to time. Don’t know if that fits at all, or if so, where, but I like to toss a few change-ups into the mix.
Just potsed one called “Apple Asia.”
This line is full of win.
Nice
Thanks.
What everybody in the Country should be worried about is that there are people who still are Republicans, and would support either of their candidates.
It’s amazing how the gutter slime of the Republican party, is again showing it’s self, and being fluffed about the Media for doing it.
What amazes me is how forgiving the media and the public are of the 8 prior years. I would expect a lot more critical probing of the Bush Administration by now. Maybe they are waiting for 2010???
The Media is supposed to be our watch dogs. They are chewing on the Republicans bone, letting the burglers of the country do as they may.
Then papers wonder why people aren’t reading them. Cable is fighting for viewers, and talk radio rules the day.