TODAY'S NEWS HEADLINES FOR INDEPENDENT VOTERS 9/17/10

INDEPENDENT VOTERS

• The Backlash Myth (By DAVID BROOKS, NY Times) Most voters want a radical change in government but not a radical change in policy.
• PUNDIT RIGHT & O'Reilly: Independents Are Key to November Races? (by SodaHead Politic) The truth is there are not enough Tea Party people to put any candidate into office. As we said, Independents will make the call."
• Tea Party Puts GOP on Road to Disaster (By Morton M. Kondracke, Roll Call Executive Editor, CQ Politics)

OPEN PRIMARIES

• King: Open primaries would give edge to moderates (By BILL KING, Houston Chronicle)
• Edith Sylvester: Our primary method disenfranchises us (LETTER Wisconsin State Journal) There is no explanation good enough to mandate that in primary elections, voters must vote for one party only.

THIRD PARTY & INDEPENDENT CANDIDATES

• Time for a Third Party? (Rhodes Cook, Wall Street Journal/Capital Journal) And it is why the spotlight might shine again on the wealthy New Yorker in the year ahead. If he ran for the White House, Mr. Bloomberg – like Mr. Perot - would almost certainly be seen as a spear-carrier for the disgruntled center.
• Politics blog: The Daily Show features "NOT the 'whiteman's bitch'" candidate (By MARY SPICUZZA, Wisconsin State Journal)

DEMOCRATS

• Democrats, the Brand (Nancy Scola, Personal Democracy Forum/techPresident) The Democratic National Committee's new media team is making the case that the new Democrats.org is more than just a new website. Or is it the Democrats' new media team?

CALIFORNIA

• Third party’s over (By Cosmo Garvin, Sacramento News Review) It should be noted that the law doesn’t prohibit third parties from fielding candidates for president in November. But because those parties depend on November votes for statewide office to qualify for the ballot, including the primary ballot, third parties may soon be purged from our election system altogether.
• Changing the political climate (By Linda Piera-Avila, Santa Monica Daily Press) California took a backwards step with the passage of Proposition 14, which would raise the cost of elections and limit voter choice. But Proposition 14 was also a frustrated response to the under-representative nature of government via winner-take-all, single-seat districts. NOTE: Linda Piera-Avila is currently running as the Green Party candidate for the 41st Assembly District.
• American Independent Party's numbers growing (By Alayna Shulman, Redding Record Searchlight) But some believe the trend may be a result of voter misinterpretation of the word “independent.”

NEW YORK

• Why so many dogs didn't bark: Paladino and Rangel prevailed, despite attacks from pundits and press (ERROL LOUIS, NY Daily News) Voters, in other words, made up their minds without paying much attention to polls, pundits and the press. The biggest dog that didn't bark was the simplistic notion that the public is furious with all incumbents, everywhere, and ready to toss them all out.
• Cuomo and Schneiderman, Together? (By David Freedlander, NY Observer) There have been reports that the campaign of Republican attorney general candidate Dan Donovan has been angling for a Cuomo endorsement, and earlier Harry Wilson suggested that he and Cuomo are ticket-mates as well since they are both running on the Independence Party line.
• Political Action: Padavan says hard work leads to successes in political arena (By William Lewis, Your Nabe Queens) There is strong opposition to the Independence Party state leadership from the city party organization. They would be expected to oppose the present leadership, but MacKay seems to have a strong hold on the party organizational structure outside the city. It remains to be seen if he can maintain that hold considering the present situation.
• Charter Commission proposes two-term limits (By Sabrina Smith, the ticker - Baruch College) The referendum regarding the term limits would amend the city charter to “reduce from three to two maximum number of consecutive full terms that can be served by elected city officials; make this change in term limits applicable only to those city officials who were first elected at or after the 2010 general election; and prohibit the City Council from altering the term limits of elected city officials then serving in office,” according to the Commission's website.
• NY GOP: Gang that can't vote straight (By DAN MCLAUGHLIN, NY Post) The party has neither the strong bosses needed to force a candidate like Lazio into the right race, nor the open primaries and vibrant grassroots that might have headed off disastrous nominations like Tedisco and Scozzavafa.

ESPADA

• Primary Night: Pedro Espada Keeps the Faith (By Ricardo Bilton, NY Observer) "Because believe it or not this man Espada did so much for the community. He was for the people. I believe he was for the people."
• Riverdale voters pick Rivera over Espada, Espaillat over Levine (Kate Pastor, Riverdale Press)
• Bummed out: Albany hacks must deliver on pledges of major reforms (EDITORIALS NY Daily News) And then, as Koch so rightly tags him, there is Enemy of Reform No. 1, Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver. Insulated by a supermajority of Democrats and immune to challenge in his own hand-drawn district, Silver is the man who inters reform.