The biggest danger to Tom Reed's campaign at the moment is a replay of NY-23, a three-way Republican, Conservative and Democratic race where teabagger Doug Hoffman's challenge helped Democrat Bill Owens squeak out a win.
The Reed campaign has been quietly working to make sure this doesn't happen in NY-29. This week, they announced that Reed has been endorsed by the Chemung County Conservative Party. Reed already has the endorsement of the Monroe County Conservative Party.
By taking the #1 and #4 counties, by 2008 vote, out of play for a Conservative, Reed has gone a long way to insulate himself from a challenge from the right.
Comments
Weird that Reed doesn't list Randy Kuhl among his list of endorsements even though people who have since endorsed are listed. Kuhl heavily supported Reed in his mayoral election and the two openly campaigned together in 2008 on Market Street in Corning and elsewhere. He does list Maggie Brooks and Cathy Young who were rumored to run.
Also, Bill Paxon is rumored to have "Massa" problems as his resignation from Congress was linked at the time to a relationship with male Hill reporter Sandy Hume, son of Brit Hume, who allegedly killed himself due to a break up with the married Paxon.
With all of Randy's issues, it's a surprise that Reed touts Paxon in this atmosphere...
The public story is that Paxon quit because he couldn't overthrow Newt.
Sandy Hume wrote a story about the Paxon coup. There were charges that he got it because of a relationship with Paxon. Those charges were spread by Dick Armey, Newt's Majority Leader.
Joe Scarborough says that he gave Paxon the story.
Who knows what's true, but I don't think this is relevant at all to Bill Paxon being Tom Reed's campaign chair. At worst -- and this is based on a rumor -- he had a consensual, though adulterous, gay relationship. That's a bit like Massa's problem, but it doesn't involve sexual harassment.
Reed meets with the Ontario County Conservatives on the 24th. I haven't heard anything at all about someone rising up here, and would give Reed about a 99.5% chance of securing the endorsement.
Rottenchester,
I know you are a Democrat, but usually your blogs do not lower themselves to such standards as to apply what many consider a derogatory term for someone who has a difference of opinion with you. I may not agree with everything the Tea Partiers stand for, but it destroys the conversation and makes progressives look arrogant when they use such baseless language to describe their fellow Americans.
Oh, and today is national coffee party day. http://coffeepartyusa.com/
What baseless language? Teabagger?
Perhaps you should take it up with the National Review. They can't seem to decide whether to use the term or reject it:
http://nrd.nationalreview.com/article/?q=Mjk1YmRjNzIxNmUwMTI0ZWYxZWU4OWU...
My take is that if I can put up with "Democrat Party" instead of "Democratic Party", the Tea Party movement can handle being called "teabaggers".
I did not realize that "Democrat" invoked any type of degrading image in the mind of the hearer.
From the National Review article you linked too: Wikipedia: “‘Teabagging’ is a slang term for the act of a man placing his scrotum in the mouth or on or around the face (including the top of the head) of another person, often in a repeated in-and-out motion as in irrumatio.
So, is this what you think that the Tea Partiers are doing to the Democratic Party, sticking their collective scrotum in its mouth or around its face (including the top of its head)? If so, then perhaps maybe it's not such a bad thing after all. Maybe the joke is actually on those using the term!
The article was good. Thanks for the laugh. I stand corrected. :)
Its "Democrat" as an adjective ("Democrat Party" instead of "Democratic Party") that's a sly name-calling attempt started by Republicans who thought it was a little bit of fun. It's sort of like the technique of knowingly mispronouncing someone's name.
The difference between "Democrat Party" and "Teabagger" is that the teabaggers started to use that term to refer to themselves, but when it was pointed out that it was slang for a sex act, they stopped using that term to describe themselves and instead began to complain when others used it. Like you did.
I am neither a Democrat or a Republican. I know the history of the Boston Tea Party.
I drink tea and occasionally I invite people to have a cup or two with me. Often, we chat and debate about the events of the day. We don't yell and scream at each other. We don't try to intimidate others and drown out different opinions. We don't claim that our values and patriotism are supreme and preach intolerance of others. We try to form fact-based opinions and try to offer each other correction and criticism civilly. We accept that sometimes we will disagree. We try to stay informed of what our politicians are doing and we vote. Does that make me 'arrogant'?
We don't adorn ourselves with teabags, or dump them in parks. We don't carry signs proclaiming our pride in 'Home Scholing', or call other Americans 'Morans', 'Nazis' or 'Socialists' - (Well, unless of course they are). We don't carry guns to town hall meetings, or demand that our representatives respond to lies about 'Death Panels'. We don't advocate violence, succession or anarchy as the path to 'taking back our country'.
So the groups that do those things - I will continue to call 'Teabaggers' - that's the name they claimed - It's their behavior that is derogatory.
I wonder why Randy is not listed too? He did serve the area for two terms and was a popular senator in the Southern Tier.
You missed one weird element about the Hume/Paxon story, that he killed himself right as the story was unfolding, makes you think something was up.
Might have been, might not. Apparently Hume struggled with alcoholism. It's still a sad story that doesn't have much to do with Tom Reed's campaign.
It's too bad Paxon wasn't able to get rid of Newt. I think the nation, and the Republican Party, would be a hell of a lot better off if he had.
I imagine Randy's name isn't listed simply by an overlook. Watch for it to pop up soon? You don't imagine he would really try to primary ToM Reed come this Fall, do you? Though a lot of us would probably return to him, particularly in light of the Massa debacle.
Randy's going to be on the list, but he's not a real asset to the Reed campaign.
I would never vote for Randy again - and U have been a Republican for over 36 years
So, is part of the deal with these Conservative groups, that Reed and his associates will find other financing for their building in Bath and repay the state for the 1.1 Million dollar grant? Surely, they wouldn't want to support hypocrisy.
A couple of conservatives have commented here earlier that Reed's loan and justification was a real negative to them. It would also be a big issue in the campaign if Reed had some credible opposition. Unfortunately, it isn't looking like the Democrats will have the time to introduce their Rochester-area candidate to the Southern Tier, and Reed will take this thing home with a pretty easy victory.
A couple of questions:
-- Should we assume that Teabagger = conservative?
-- Is there a qualitative difference between adultery with a person of one's own sex and with one of the opposite sex? Morally? Politically?
-- Is it really just a function of line drawn in the media in either case?
Finally: Did you see this?
http://www.colbertnation.com/the-colbert-report-videos/267153/march-11-2...
I don't think Teabagger = conservative at all. I think there are a lot of well-informed, thoughtful conservatives. Teabaggers seem angry and uninformed about basic civics, even though they're constantly referring back to the constitution.
I don't see any difference in the two forms of adultery -- both are lies and betrayal -- but have to face the fact that, politically, a married man who cheats on his wife with a man is going to have a tougher time.
The media hates hypocrisy, so family values candidates (e.g., Sanford) get hit pretty hard.
I preferred the meatgrinding to Rasmussen.
I agree. Teabaggers seem to be expressing what liberals and coservative share: a feeling that we are becoming less free, that the Constitution is being mangled and that the government is failing to govern. That liberals, on paper at least, are in control of two of the three federal branches naturally puts them on the defensive. True liberals and true conservatives have been shown to be able function under the Constiution and to run the country reasonably well.
Massa's story barely registers on the hypocracy scale, but homophobia and his novel behavior seem to have given the story its legs.
Both Colbert and Stewart have done a pretty good job lately of explaining the feedback loop between the media and the polls with respect to HCR. Unfortunately it's hard for politicians to reference it because it's in their own tool chests and suggesting that voters may be gullible is not helpful to them.