New York State has a crazy “fusion” voting system whereby you have something like 6 reasonably major parties (Dems, Reps, Independence Party, Conservative Party, Working Families Party, Green Party), with candidates having the ability to appear on multiple lines. Typically, a Republican appears on the Republican, Conservative, and Independence lines and a Democrat appears on the Democratic, WFP, and sometimes Green lines.
The various lines are listed across the ballot in an order determined by prior election results. Being listed first or second is a big deal. And if Paladino flames out hard enough, Republicans may lose their listing in the second column (the “B” column), since the Conservative party is running Lazio. A friend with close ties to the Conservative Party writes:
Position on the ballot is determined by how many votes the top line candidate receives in the previous election cycle. In off-year elections ballot position is determined by the gubernatorial race. NYS ballots are currently constituted as follows: Democrat, Republican, Independence, Conservative, WFP… With the GOP nominating Carl “Horse Cock” Paladino, there is a very real chance that Rick Lazio, running on the conservative line, might out poll him in November, leading to the Conservative party taking the “B” line for 2012, which is a nightmare for the GOP. Ballot position is key psychologically since voters are lazy and stupid and tend not to venture too far down the ballot when they vote.
But NYS also confers “major party” status to the top two vote receiving lines. This has profound implications since only major parties can have election commissioner and other important patronage appointments. For better or for worse, NYS runs through patronage, so any disruption in the way that structure is organized will have profound impact upon both the GOP and the Conservative Party. For one, the Conservative Party will likely have to fend off the GOP establishment from co-opting their party and maintaining their control over their share of the patronage and other benefits conferred to major parties. Although the Conservaties and Republicans often work together, Conservative (as one could assume) value their independace and won’t appreciate the GOP establishment, that they in fact seek to steer to the right be their very existance, weaseling in and trying to take over what they’ve worked hard to build up.
This is one of the many unique aspects of NYS’s fusion system, and yet another sign that the GOP is a rump party statewide.
Ben Smith covered NYS politics for years. I don’t know why this wasn’t his big take away from last night.
Update. I might add that neither my friend (also a Democrat) nor I regard this as good news. There is a lot of corruption in Albany due to the traditional joint operating agreement between the Senate and Assembly along with weak disclosure laws and minimal effective press oversight (the Time barely covers Albany and no one outside Albany reads the Albany Times-Union), but I think that one party rule could easily make it worse. Maybe the decline of the state Republican party (assuming it happens) will shake up the system and improve things, but it’s more likely that complete Democratic control will lead to even more corruption. Having a viable, moderate (if corrupt) Republican state party is probably a good thing for the state and that may be starting to go out the window.
beltane
I really don’t see this as being good news for New York Republicans. Yes, their base is enthused, but at the price of whittling away that base into a tiny remnant of its former greatness. No more George Patakis in the NY GOP. Paladino will also help downticket Dems by driving Democratic turnout.
Ben Smith seems to have forgotten that there are still a lot of Democrats in New York.
Mark S.
Wait, so both Lazio and Paladino will be on the ballot in the general. How can Cuomo possibly lose this?
mantis
Ben Smith covered NYS politics for years. I don’t know why this wasn’t his big take away from last night.
Sorry to those who like “nice guy” Ben Smith, but he’s a hack like the rest of the Politico squad. “Bad News for Cuomo” was the required meme of the day (and good news for McCain!) for him, and he dutifully obliged.
aimai
Wow! Fascinating! But really, what are the odds of Lazio outpolling Paladino during the election to this extent? I mean are New York Republican voters used to voting the other boxes? Because that is what it would take, isn’t it? Lots of R’s would have to show up and pull the lever, or punch the ticket, or make their wobbly X, for Lazio instead of knee jerking and just punching the Paladino line *because* its after the R. Is that going to happen? I mean, I see that Paladino is going to lose to Cuomo. But is he really going to lose to Lazio?
Still, what a lovely, lovely, little thought experiment.
aimai
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
Ben Smith cannot sell his site for big bucks if it cannot establish a narrative for Republicans. None of what you quoted helps the Republicans in any way, and therefore does not fit the narrative.
Midnight Marauder
Yes, you do.
eric
because obama is black.
really, is there any political question for which this is not the real, true underlying answer?
I am not joking.
Steve
The Conservative Party almost took 2nd place in 1990. I’m not sure if there’s any precedent for this scenario. It would be awesome, but I’m not sure it really has a chance of happening unless Paladino lights himself on fire. One of the basic problems is that I’m not sure anyone loves Rick Lazio other than possibly his mother.
beltane
@aimai: This happens quite often in New York. For example, I know of many Democrats who voted for Giuliani under the Liberal party line because they would not pull the lever for a Republican. NY is weird like that.
mantis
because obama is black.
What question does that answer, again?
really, is there any political question for which this is not the real, true underlying answer?
Umm, yes.
I am not joking.
You sure?
NonyNony
Okay, so since my understanding of NY politics is incredibly superficial:
1) Is “major party status” contingent ONLY on the gubernatorial ballot line? If so, is that only in off-year elections and does the presidential line control the status during presidential elections?
2) If the presidential line does control – if the Conservative Party had the “B” line and nominated the same candidate as the Republican Party in a presidential election year, would they keep the “B” line anyway?
3) Does this mean that the NY state Republican Party is in real danger of becoming an also-ran party, with the Conservative Party establishment becoming the “new” Republican establishment, or is this unlikely?
Because if the Republican Party become also-rans to the Conservative Party in NY, this whole Lazio/Paladino thing might just be a massive ratfuck of epic proportions on the NY Republican Party.
Agoraphobic Kleptomaniac
Everytime I hear that position on the ballot is so important for voting, I get nudged a little closer to never voting again.
Also, too: now we have these fancy electronicmachines that count ballots, why not just randomly generate the order of the ballot?
Martin
I thought it really meant that a surprising number of NY conservatives want more horse-on-girl action in their political campaigns.
Now, the real question is how to square the Paladino win with the O’Donnell win. More campaign porn, but don’t yank off to it? I’m way too mainstream and instinctively prudish (I’m working on it) to be able to wrap my head around this combo.
DougJ
@aimai:
I don’t know how smart the state Conservative party is. If this were the WFP and the Dems had put up a nut like Paladino, they’d know how to go for the jugular and grab a better ballot position. I don’t know if the Conservative party is smart enough to pull this off, but they certainly think they can.
DougJ
@Martin:
Ha!
scav
OT, but Chase bank is still having on-line issues — not to imply that the let’s not maintain infrastructure (digital or humanoid) because it’s too expensive meme is restricted to govt., of course. hee hee (Chase / Paypal / Experian) hee hee hee . . .
Steve
DougJ – speaking of the concept of a moderate Republican Party in NY, curious what you think about this piece.
My own view is that New Yorkers (and New Englanders, for that matter) are still perfectly willing to vote for Rockefeller Republican-type candidates, but the depredations of Bush and the national GOP have made the party name toxic, so the moderates are basically ditching it and leaving no one but the crazies.
Mr Furious
Don’t discount name recognition. Who’s more well-known? Lazio or Paladino? How many voters will see “Lazio” and have their brain just assume he’s the GOP nominee.
Roger Moore
@Agoraphobic Kleptomaniac:
California actually has elaborate rules about how to randomize the order of the candidates on the ballot in order to prevent ballot order from playing too much of a role. IIRC, the candidates are listed in alphabetical order, but with the starting point in the alphabet randomized differently for different areas. I don’t think they make an effort to randomize individual ballots when using electronic machines, but they do avoid worried of the kind we’re talking about in New York.
kth
A non-crazy Republican is simply an oxymoron at this historical moment. Susan Collins and Olympia Snowe are enabling the current madness, so it really matters little that they don’t personally express doubts about Obama’s nationality or religion. In a very important sense, they are no less crazy than the rest.
I agree that the civic space would be more robust and stable with a non-lunatic opposition. But the shortest path to that destination is precisely the implosion of the current GOP at the hands of the TEA party.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Agoraphobic Kleptomaniac: Because then the parties would find out the truth.
I also believe ballots should not have a “Vote for this party” spot either.
DougJ
@NonyNony:
1) It’s on all of them for the next election.
2) No, you vote for a line, not just a candidate. Republicans will get it back for 2014 no matter what (I assume!).
3) I doubt this will severely fuck up the party, but it could fuck them up somewhat.
Martin
@Mr Furious: Well, that didn’t help him in the primary. But there’s probably some merit to this anyway. The general will have larger turnout, and if Paladino either runs the same porn and racism-filled campaign that he has in the past, or if Cuomo fills the airwaves with Paladino’s habits, which I suspect are not yet widely known, then Lazio might just out-draw him among voters that are opposed to Cuomo but get the big ick off of Paladino and recognize the Lazio name.
DougJ
@Steve:
Your impression is right. If the NYS GOP goes tea party, they’re done for.
NonyNony
@DougJ:
Ah thanks.
So I guess I’m not sure what the Conservative Party is so happy about with this, unless they have some plan to move forward to crush the Republican Party once they move them to the sidelines.
And I’m seriously wondering how, if Lazio and Paladino are both running against each other in the general election again, and Cuomo has the other side of the ballot lines locked up, anyone could think that he’s going to lose this one (without a major scandal erupting on his part, I guess).
Bob L
New York sounds like California; the GOP is so useless the Democrats can pretty much have their fun in Sacramento. This is the real problem with the tea-tards is they are undermining good government.
Suppose this parallels the late 19th Century, were the Democrats were the one in disarray over the Civil War so the Republicans could be corrupt as they wanted.
TXP
@NonyNony:
Ballot position in New York is entirely contingent on how many votes your party received in the last gubernatorial election, so it wouldn’t matter who the Conservative Party endorsed for president in 2012. It’s unlikely that the state GOP will fade away even if it drops down to third place, although there is a minimum threshold for getting kicked off the ballot entirely.
And DougJ, I’m pretty sure that if the Republicans drop down to third, they’re stuck there in 2014. I believe it would only change after that election.
Martin
@Roger Moore: It’s state law that the sample ballot needs to match the one the voter sees, so printed and machine need to match, and the printed needs to always be available in case of mechanical failure so the current system always applies.
IIRC, the parties are opposed to a fully randomized ballot because there’s a lot more room to monkey with the definition of ‘random’ then. At least with the starting letter randomization, it’s pretty easy to work out if anyone is dicking with it and to control for that.
IOW, there’s no benefit to greater randomization than the current system, and a lot more risk that trickery could get masked in the process.
celticdragonchick
Charles at LGF is the go-to source for the racist bullshit from Paladino.
Charles has declared he will never vote for a Republican again because of this shit.
Martin
@Bob L: The GOP is far from useless here in CA. Thanks to all the ⅔ restrictions, they never need more than 34% of the seats to completely fuck over the state. It’s a permanent filibuster here and they’ve still got enough seats to keep it going.
Mr Furious
@Martin: Agreed. But everyone keeps making the mistake of treating the primary voters as a representative section of the Election Day voters. It’s not. Anywhere.
The “majority” of Republican primary voters that came out to nominate the Teatard are surely not even half of the general population of Republican voters. But they were motivated, and maxed it out. How many more Tea Party freaks are out there to rustle up? None. Rank and file Republicans might vote for their nominee on Election Day, but it will more accidental than a deliberate endorsement of his policies.And it will not be sufficient to win the day. Certainly not over Cuomo, and possibly not over Lazio.
NonyNony
More faction war fodder.
I can’t say that I’d be sad if Rove became toxic for Republicans, but this is really Tea Partiers gang up on the Establishment stuff. I wonder how it’s going to all turn out – I don’t think that the establishment types expected anything like this when they started their plan of amping up the crazy for votes…
Roger Moore
@Bob L:
This sounds like a very different Sacramento from the one I’m familiar with. In my universe’s California, the Democrats can do a lot, but wind up spending way too much time on the budget because of the stupid 2/3 majority rule. They also have to contend with a Republican Governator, who is more than happy to veto bills that he nominally supports just to try to get more leverage on the budget. The Democrats don’t seem to be having much fun in Sacramento.
Martin
@Mr Furious: The biggest effect is with closed primaries – as both DE and NY have. In a closed primary, independents are largely shut out, and they’re usually about ⅓ of the electorate. When they show up for the general, all bets are off, particularly for candidates like Paladino and O’Donnell.
In states with open primaries, independents usually have the opposite effect. They tend to choose the primary race with the worst downside and vote against that. My guess is that if DE was open, Castle would have won handily as independents turned out to eliminate the risk of O’Donnell on the ticket – even if they were considering voting for Coons. There aren’t nearly as many ratfuckers out there as partisans think.
eric
@mantis: I am sure.
Here are the questions:
(1) why did the GOP pols and base go bat$hit crazy starting even before the inauguration?
(2) why did the GOP pols cultivate the Crazy base?
(3) why was the Crazy base so willing to be “whipped” into a frothing frenzy?
(4) why has the media refused to point out the racist nature of the Crazy from day one?
The media is looking for any narrative that does not mean calling conservatives out for their racism, which would creating a letter writing and whining $hitstorm of epic proportions.
Most definitely, not joking.
DougJ
@NonyNony:
These parties have their own logic. Mostly they just want more power and more power comes from more votes. If you get an extra 5% one year being in the B position, it might mean more members, it might mean all kinds of things.
JGabriel
aimai:
Yes, maybe. As a left-leaning Dem, I frequently vote for Dems on the Working Families Party line, just so they’ll know that vote came from the left side of the party.
I would imagine a fair number of rightwing Republicans vote for GOP candidates on the Conservative Party line for much the same reason.
.
Paris
Its clear that Cuomo is going to win anyway so should I be voting for Paladino or Lazio? Sounds like a Lazio vote screws the Repugs worse so I’m leaning that way.
Belafon (formerly anonevent)
@Paris: Vote for Cuomo. Anything other than an outright win by Dems gives Republicans all the more reason to support Teabaggers the next time around.
Funkhauser
Who are you calling lazy and stupid?
Oh, us? Yeah, whatever, oh nevermind….
JimF
That’s what I tend to do as well. I like the current system in NY, at least it lets the voters give some feedback to the major parties.
mantis
@eric:
This is what you asked:
really, is there any political question for which this (racism) is not the real, true underlying answer?
The answer is yes, there are political questions for which racism is not the real, true underlying answer. Your follow up talks mostly about the “crazy base” of the rightwing, of which I’m sure we can agree racism is a big driver, but that’s not what you asked originally.
cleek
i count 12 instances of the phrase “tea party” on MSNBC.com’s front page right now.
the media just can’t get enough
Shalimar
@NonyNony: What in the world could possibly be considered a major scandal when you’re running against someone who likes watching horses fuck young women? It seems like the bar is already set pretty high by Cuomo’s opposition.
Nick
Andy Cuomo’s dad had the same experience in 1990 when Republicans nominated Pierre Rinfret, who was essentially a Democrat, and Conservatives ran Herbert London. London nearly outpolled Rinfret, and Cuomo, who was considered vulnerable, won big.
shirt
TBOGG nailed it. The republican party in New York just fucked a cow..
NonyNony
@Shalimar: You are forgetting IOIYAR. If Cuomo has a Client Number Nine thing in his background that comes out, he’ll lose. Unless someone catches Paladino in the act of getting to know a horse a little bit better. Then, I imagine, the voters of NY would just start to wonder WTF is wrong with their state.
Not that I think that Cuomo is stupid enough to run with something like that lurking in his background after the last governor’s experience. But then who would have thought that John Edwards was as dumb as he was after Clinton’s experience? I never underestimate the outright idiocy of people running for elected office.
WereBear
@NonyNony: It’s not idiocy. It’s arrogance.
burnspbesq
DougJ:
” no one outside Albany reads the Albany Times-Union”
Not true. Union, RPI and Siena alums read it online to check the sports scores.
burnspbesq
@Bob L:
“New York sounds like California; the GOP is so useless the Democrats can pretty much have their fun in Sacramento”
Say what, now? If that’s true, how is it that we don’t have a budget two and a half months into the fiscal year?
California may be governable in some parallel universe, but not in this one.
Bruuuuce
Paladino is “inviting” Lazio to withdraw from the race now. I hope Lazio tells him to go piss up a rope, with the inevitable consequences. (More: even if Lazio didn’t campaign, he’d draw some percentage of votes, just by being on the ballot.)
Also in NY, the best news of the night: both scumballs who gridlocked the NY State Senate last year lost their races. Pedro Espada, the leader of the coup who can’t even be arsed to live in his district (and who’s under several criminal investigations) got trounced, and Hiram Monserrate (unfortunately my one-time Senator who was pitched for attacking his girlfriend) got bounced from trying for a lower-level seat in the Assembly. The Better Half and I had a champagne — okay, Diet Coke — toast at those results, with a big dollop of schadenfreude on the side.
David in NY
@eric:
You’re partially right, eric. This is the answer only to those questions about American politics not answered by the more general proposition, of which it is a corollary, to wit: “It’s because of race, that’s why.”
David in NY
Oh, but really, eric said that himself. and he was right. Sorry.
forked tongue
Can I just say, as a New Yorker who remembers Lazio’s doltish Senate run against Hilary, how gratifying it is to see him get beaten 2-to-1 by a guy who sent around bestiality e-mails?
I said it once, but it feels so right to say it again:
‘Bye, Schmuck.