Very Important! DailyKos lipris diary: New York State GOP died last night!

[HamdenRice]

This may be some of the most important political news to come out of New York State in over a century.

As some of you know, New York has an incredibly dysfuctional legislature that is perennially split between a Democratic State Assembly and a Republican State Senate.

But the State Senate is kept Republican largely through gerrymandering and other "incumbent protection" measures according to lipris.

Lipris reports that as a result of a special election, the Republican Senate majority was narrowed to one senator:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/2/26/222245/311/1009/464771

Breaking: The NY GOP Died Tonight

by lipris

Tue Feb 26, 2008 at 07:46:58 PM PST

...

As many of you know, the GOP controls our state Senate. For those that didn't know this, I'm not making it up. They have a majority in the New York state Senate and have had it for essentially the last century or better. Through ridiculous gerrymandering and various other incumbent protection schemes, they control our upper chamber, even though we have a 5-3 registration advantage, an advantage that grows everyday. Tonight, their advantage dwindled from two seats to one.

The seat at issue tonight has been in republican hands since, get this 1880. The seat opened up when the incumbent retired, but did so in a manner that prevented our governor, Eliot Spitzer, from piggybacking the special election to replace him on the same date as our Super Tuesday primary. Lot of good that did them.

...

Tonight, he and a people powered army handed the GOP their asses on a silver platter and, in the process, essentially killed the New York Republican Party. No joke.

Our chances of retaking our state Senate just went from "possible/probable" to "dead freaking certain." And they know it. They also know that once their majority disappears, it's not likely to come back for a generation or three.

It's hard for me to overstate what happened tonight. First, we were never supposed to win this thing. It was never supposed to be close. Second, we won it rather handily, showing the rest of the state (and, more specifically, the rest of the GOP caucus in our state Senate) that their days are over. There isn't a GOP Senator in New York who has ever spent a day in the minority. I suspect most them would never want to. I imagine there could be a rash of retirements on their side in the coming days, making their slim one seat majority all the more tenuous.

[gratuitous]

1. Registration in this district was heavily Republican

Daily Kos has a follow up on this, and registration is something like 49R, 29D and 22I in this District, which has been a Republican seat since time immemorial - 1880.

And apparently some dopes at the SEIU persuaded the union to endorse the Republican, who is throwing a predictable hissy fit about unspecified "underhanded" tactics. If the New York Senate goes Democratic, along with the State Assembly and the governorship, the Democrats would hold all the power in drawing the lines for the 2010 redistricting. Can you say "Good-bye Peter King, you miserable piece of shit"? I knew you could!

[HamdenRice]

2. "Good-bye Peter King, you miserable piece of shit"

For non-New Yorkers, they may not realize how utterly, wonderously important that objective is! Him and the entire Republican gummed up legislative system.

That's the whole ballgame!

[Jim Lane]

10. I'm dubious about getting rid of King...

His district is fairly conservative, and I don't know if there's all that much opportunity for gerrymandering without endangering neighboring seats.

I think the main target is Vito Fossella. His current district is Staten Island (the only Republican borough) and part of Brooklyn. They could draw a new district line right across the middle of Staten Island, and put each part of it into a district with a Dem who's used to winning with 80% of the vote or more.

Yes, King is more repulsive, but Fossella is more vulnerable.

Oh, and let's not forget the Tom DeLay Rule. The Supreme Court upheld the Texas redistricting that fell between censuses. If we get the State Senate majority, we don't have to wait until the 2012 election to redraw district lines. I expect that the Democrats' redistricting experts study the Supreme Court decision very carefully. Anything the Republicans were allowed to get away with in Texas, we can do. Thank you kindly, Tom!

[HamdenRice]

12. I was thinking Joe Bruno

He doesn't have to lose his seat, but he can be finally overthrown as Senate Majority leader, where he has blocked every good idea for over 10 years.

[HamdenRice]

3. Six recs and only one reply? What's up with that?

especially youse felloh Noo Yawkuhs.

[KoKo]

4. What's this about a "special election" to replace Spitzer?

Who wants him out and why? :shrug: Good news about the Repug Senate Majority shrinking!

[HamdenRice]

5. Followup -- more properly, it's down to one election, not one Senator

According to local radio, the Republicans have a 2 senator majority now, so if one Republican senator loses to a Democrat, the Senate will be tied.

So they have a two senator majority, but are one race away from losing control.

[hedgehog]

6. The best news I've had all day. As near as I can make out, Barclay

owns an enormous amount of land in the district and runs the local Republican Party. He gave the State Assembly seat to his son, the State Senatorial seat to his chief of staff and the local Congressional seat to another staffer. It's supposed to be upstate New York, but the politics was putrid.

[HamdenRice]

7. Wow, sounds like the tradition of upstate Dutch patroons hasn't changed in 400 years

That kind of handing out offices reminds me of what upstate was allegedly like during the Dutch colonial period -- European feudalism transported to the Hudson River valley.

[hedgehog]

8. You took the words right out of my mouth. Dutch patroon system is exactly right!

I don't have the details, but Barclay's ads were boasting about how his family has lived here for 8 generations. A lot of the land around here was handed out to veterans of the Revolutionary War in lieu of cash payment. The Barclay estate straddles a good portion of the Salmon River. A few years back, the Barclay family went into State Court and got a ruling that since they owned both sides of the river, no one could set anchor in the river itself without their permission. The Salmon River is stocked by the State Department of COnservation, but to fish it you have to pay a $25 fee to the Barclays. I suspect that an ad focusing on this issue may have been the critical component in this victory.

[HamdenRice]

11. Being a very old New York family often is nothing to brag about

I live on the NYC-Long Island border, and briefly met the acquaintance of a woman from eastern Nassau County. We usually think of Long Island as first or second generation suburbanites -- the people from Brooklyn and the Bronx who fled to Levitown and the like.

This lady said that she was from one of those old Long Island families that got swamped by the "white ethnic" influx of the 40s and 50s, and claimed that she was from an old Yankee family.

But the family history was that they were a Mayflower era family and were driven from Boston because they were accused of witchcraft during the Salem witch trials, which she says, according to family history, they actually were guilty of (LOL!). They fled across the Sound to Long Island, where they became farmers, but because of sparse population and snobbishness, they interbred (lots of cousin marraiges) for like 400s years.

She says that she is the only member of her family who is not developmentally disabled, because one of her grandfathers was an Italian immigrant who introduced some "hybrid vigor" into her branch.

[marmar]

9. As someone who lived in New York for four years, I'd love to see Peter King get D'Amatoed......

..... He is an Empire State Building-sized asshole.