SALON

Monday, Sep 13, 2010 8:30 PM UTC

New York primaries: Which anti-Islam Republican will win?

Tomorrow, voters will decide which GOP nominee for governor of the Empire State hates Muslims enough to win

By

Topics: 2010 Elections, War Room, 9/11, Charlie Rangel, D-N.Y., Islam, New York, New York City, Park51, Tea Parties,

New York primaries: Which anti-Islam Republican will win?Carl Paladino and Rick Lazio

The race for the GOP nomination for governor of New York has been a weird, depressing affair, with longtime loser Rick Lazio running on a platform of intensely hating Muslims and blaming them, collectively, for 9/11 — and he’s the establishment candidate. His upstart “tea party” challenger, currently in a dead heat with Lazio in the polls, is millionaire Buffalo developer Carl Paladino, who is known primarily for finding blatantly racist emails hilarious enough to forward to all his friends.

New York’s primaries are tomorrow, and despite invoking some of that 9/11 footage magic in a shockingly tasteless ad, Lazio may yet lose the chance to lose to Andrew Cuomo in November. (He is, depressingly, not the only one jumping on the 9/11 bandwagon.)

In a state paralyzed by a completely dysfunctional Democratic party-run legislature, Republicans across the state are primarily running on hating Islam — though some also hate public employees and teachers. The Democrats are running mostly on hating the other Democrats — especially the ones currently in Albany or Washington.

The race for the Attorney General nomination is a fight between Eric Schneiderman, the Times-endorsed liberal (who, in a car driven by Elena Kagan’s niece, crashed into a reporter’s parked car outside the studios of a local 24-hour news channel) and Kathleen Rice, the former front-runner tacitly endorsed by Cuomo, under fire for being a Republican until very recently. The attack ads are getting brutal.

Elsewhere, Resha Saujani’s dishonest and pointless primary challenge against Carolyn Maloney looks as doomed to failure as Adam Clayton Powell IV’s petty but more justified challenge against Charlie Rangel. Both Rangel and Maloney should cruise to reelection.

(And some races are of purely local interest. Like the State Senate race between corrupt incumbent Pedro Espada — whose spokesman waves away the fact that Espada doesn’t live in his district, and whose campaign is nakedly buying votes with vague promises of jobs at his office — and challenger Gustavo Rivera, who is, well, not Pedro Espada.)

A shockingly tiny number of voters are expected to head to the polls tomorrow, only to struggle with New York’s horrible new federally mandated electronic ballots. There are no serious challenges to either of New York’s sitting U.S. senators.

Alex Pareene

Alex Pareene writes about politics for Salon and is the author of "The Rude Guide to Mitt." Email him at apareene@salon.com and follow him on Twitter @pareene More Alex Pareene.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 9 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: So long, Sookie Stackhouse

Recommendations