On Sep 14, 2011, at 1:23 PM, Ferenc Molnar wrote:
> DH wrote: "Ah Brooklyn."
>
> FM: The district straddles both Queens and Brooklyn.
It does, but Turner got a lot of votes from the Brooklyn side, which is heavily Orthodox.
Mike Allen:
> THE NARRATIVE -- "For Democrats, It's 2010 All Over Again," by Nate Silver, NYT's "FiveThirtyEight" guru: "There are good reasons to think that local issues may have loomed especially large in [the Weiner district ] ... Obama had significantly underperformed his Democratic predecessors in the district in 2008, and the large split in voting between the Brooklyn and Queens portions of the district - the Brooklyn parts are more heavily Jewish - implies that Israel-related issues may have played a role. ... [T]he [past] four special elections, taken as a whole, suggest that Democrats may still be locked in a 2010-type political environment. Democrats might not lose many more seats in the House if that were the case, since most of their vulnerable targets have already been picked off, but it would limit their potential for any gains. And it could produce dire results for the Democrats in the U.S. Senate, where they have twice as many seats up for re-election." http://bit.ly/qXD3Ln
>
> PUNDIT PREP -- "Voters rebuke Obama in special House elections," by Dan Hirschhorn and Alex Isenstadt, with Ben Smith and Maggie Haberman: "Democrats suffered a major blow in two special House election losses, leaving the party at a political low point as it gears up for 2012. Republicans pulled off an upset in New York's 9th Congressional District ... And the GOP cruised to an easy win as Mark Amodei won Nevada's Republican-friendly 2nd District [over Kate Marshall]. The outcome in New York ... was particularly crushing. ... 'We have been told this is a referendum,' [Republican Bob] Turner said. 'And we're ready to say, 'Mr. President, we are on the wrong track.' ... We are unhappy, I am telling you. I am the messenger ... Heed us. ... We've lit one candle today and there's going to be a bonfire pretty soon.' ...
>
> "[Democrat David] Weprin ... refused to concede.. ... The night broke a string of special election losses for Republicans, and in a particularly sweet way: Democratic Medicare attacks never caught on as an issue for elderly voters in Nevada like they did in an upstate New York special election earlier this year ... Turner's star rose in part because of unrest with Obama's Israel policy among Jewish voters. 'It was all Obama - not even a thought of anything else,' Turner consultant Steve Goldberg said." http://bit.ly/r6UHYH
>
> --AP's Beth Fouhy, on the district: "Democrats have a 3-1 registration edge and have held office for nearly a century."
>
> --HuffPost banner, "NEW YORK KNOCKOUT: GOP Candidate Scores Upset In Heavily Democratic District" ... ABCNews.com lead, "OBAMA REFERENDUM?" ... Drudge banner, "REVENGE OF THE JEWS; DEM SEAT TURNS IN NYC."