The Associated Press (AP) is claiming the loss of NY Congressional District 9 is due to “voter frustration over the sour economy and President Barack Obama’s policies”; or maybe it’s because former Congressman Anthony Weiner took pictures of his unit and sent the images to woman and twittered it?
I think there’s a need in punditry today to attach national reasons for elections in Congressional districts, especially in these special elections. I think they need to remember the political maxim of former House Speaker Tip O’Neill that, “all politics are local”.
To claim this election “portends challenge for Obama” is trying to stir the political pot in order to make the 2012 elections more exciting, and it’s not very accurate.
Another claim is that the predominantly Jewish district chose a Roman Catholic Republican over an Orthodox Jewish Democrat to send the President a message on Israel; OK, I guess that makes sense if you forget the fact most Jewish neighborhoods aren’t very politically friendly to the Catholic Church, or to the idea a Roman Catholic will better serve the needs of Israel than a Jew will, ever since the whole Vatican turning a blind eye to the Holocaust thing. Please, you’re really going to run with that idea? Once again, maybe the District was reacting to Weiner, and had nothing to do with anything else?
However, when your GOTP opponent runs ads claiming you support Osama Bin Laden because you support the construction of a “Ground Zero Mosque” in a race for a New York City District maybe that bit of demagoguery had something to do with it; but, of course, that’s politics in America, but sooner or later American voters will begin to refuse the fear and gloom and doom politics of the right.
But please, let’s stop trying to tie every election a Democrat loses to the President, and start looking for the “local” reasons.
By-the-by, one of the fun facts is the NY 9th has been eliminated due to redistricting, which means this is a very short lived victory for the GOTP.
The Liberty Tree 