Scozzafava endorses Democrat

Amazing how that party loyalty meme always goes. I remember the primaries last year, with every rhetorical utterance from the moderate GOP building the case for nominating a moderate – any moderate – if the party were to maintain its electibility. The moderate got nominated, push came to shove, and many of these supposed stalwarts of party loyalty jumped ship to Obama precisely when it did the most political damage.

Dede Scozzafava, the Republican nominee in the special election for NY-23 in the U.S. Congress is forced to drop out. A moderate – some even call a leftist – candidate drove much of the district’s Republicans to a third party. What’s Scozzafava to do? Again, a moderate had a choice at “party loyalty,” this time Dede endorses the Democratic candidate.

Ideologically it makes sense, I guess, if she feels Owens is a better endorsement for her beliefs and policies. If that’s the case, it should send a message to the GOP party bosses in the district that nominated her in the first place. It should also be a slap in the face. It won’t be, many party leaders across the country will perpetuate the same mistake next year in 2010. For an increasing plurality of conservatives, the Republican party appears to be at war with its own base.

Keep in mind, I’m all for a big tent – majorities win power, not minorities. But it should be said that these moderate forces aren’t so much of mind to expand the base, as to purge those from it. Be it a David Frum at the top, a Little Green Footballs over here, or even a Meghan McCain on Twitter, these are people trying to remake the party, not to increase its outreach. They preach tolerance for the middle while wanting to toss out all apostates – in other words they are exactly what they label conservatives.

Some of the criticism heaped on Scozzafava was a bit unfair. Michelle Malkin repeatedly called her a radical leftist. In New York politics, she was nothing of the sort, and the GOP had ran similar candidates in those circles during recent special elections. She was far from a conservative and far from the party’s base of support, and an extremely bad choice to make in coming elections when the key issues will be debt, union overreach and control, and overspending – in fact she was a nightmare candidate. Those are rhetorically fair arguments to make, especially when the third party candidate has to take personal attacks because he likes to collect cars.

The election is two days away – maybe Scozzafava’s endorsement does enough damage and wounds Hoffman, maybe it doesn’t. But this proves the abject lesson, the biggest difference between Republicans and Democrats is Democrats treat their base with respect. Conservatives are now on to the GOP. If it wants to continue being a viable political party, things need to change.

Share on Facebook