[EM] To Marquette, to Marquette ...

[Dave Ketchum]

On Thu, 30 Jan 2003 13:26:31 -0800 (PST) Alex Small wrote:

 > Dave Ketchum said:
 >
 >>general  elections.  While primaries often have several candidates, we
 >>had eight  parties last year, and about 10 candidates for governor in
 >>the general  election.
 >>
 >
 > How many of those candidates were actual contenders?  I know that NY has a
 > stronger 3rd party tradition than most states, and I heard that one 3rd
 > party gubernatorial candidate was actually polling double digits or
 > better.
 >
Usually 2 actual; sometimes 3.


NY race for governor is actually 2 races:
       Who shall get to be governor.  Here, as in all races, NY's fusion
law applies so the winner does not have to get the most votes on any one
line - in 1994 George Pataki had to add Republican and Conservative votes
to beat Mario Cuomo's Democrat votes (Pataki was also on as an
independent, and Cuomo as a Liberal, but those votes were too trivial to
matter except as to ballot status).
       What parties shall have ballot status for the next 4 years - no
fusion here, but a party or independent candidate has to get 50,000 votes
(about 1%).  In 2002 5 of existing 8 parties kept ballot status; the
couple wannabes did not make it.

In 2002 Pataki's greed got him indigestion and turned a 2 contender race
into 3 contenders:
       Pataki had won on Republican plus Conservative twice, and could have
run on those two lines again.  ASSUMING he could also be the Independence
candidate, he would be on 3 of the top 4 ballot lines (with the Democrats
on only one of those lines).
       As a member of the Independence State Committee I started getting
LOTS of regular mail and email assuring me that 90% of our votes were (and
should be) going to Pataki, meaning that our SC meeting would make Pataki
our nominee (carrying petitions to add a candidate after the SC meeting is
theoretically possible, but normally not practical - need petition
signatures from 5% of party members).
       Pataki did not get the 90%.  Over 30% of us voted for Tom Golisano,
a SUCCESSFUL businessman (Paychex) who was part of starting our party in
1994 and had been our candidate twice.  Getting over 25% did not
automatically place him on the primary ballot, but gave him the right if
he chose.  He chose, and talked of $75 million being an affordable
campaign fund - indigestion for Pataki, who then lost the primary.
      If Pataki could invade foreign territory, so could Golisano.  He
forced a Conservative primary (being that Conservative leadership was not
willing to cooperate and Golisano was not a party member, best he could do
was be a write-in candidate).
      Golisano talked of also being an independent candidate, but decided
this was not worth the effort (certainly affordable with his budget and,
this plus winning the two primaries would have placed him on three lines
while restricting Pataki to one).
       So, Golisano came in a strong third, and those of us who voted for
him can make nasty comments about those who voted for Pataki - who has
just filed an __UGLY__ budget based on the deficits he has set us up with
over the last 8 years.  Democrat McCall came in second.  Some suggest that
he, having been Comptroller for 8 years, ran for governor as an exit from
that job, but knew enough about state finances to not REALLY want to be
governor.

 >
 >
 > Alex

-- 
   davek at clarityconnect.com    http://www.clarityconnect.com/webpages3/davek
    Dave Ketchum    108 Halstead Ave, Owego, NY  13827-1708    607-687-5026
               Do to no one what you would not want done to you.
                     If you want peace, work for justice.


----
For more information about this list (subscribe, unsubscribe, FAQ, etc), 
please see http://www.eskimo.com/~robla/em