To the Primary
This article is from the archive of The New York Sun before the launch of its new website in 2022. The Sun has neither altered nor updated such articles but will seek to correct any errors, mis-categorizations or other problems introduced during transfer.
The decision of New York Republicans meeting in Albany Monday not to throw a majority of their support to a candidate for governor opens the door to what should be a lively primary that will attract new members to choose a candidate to take on Eliot Spitzer or Thomas Suozzi. It is a reminder of what could have been in the Senate race, where Governor Pataki clumsily muscled Edward Cox out of the race by prematurely endorsing Jeanine Pirro, who turns out to be a terrible candidate. Lost in the ensuing months was the opportunity for a candidate to raise real money to mount a challenge that had a chance of actually defeating Mrs. Clinton. All the party can really hope for now is for Mrs. Pirro to drop out and for Mr. Cox to get back in and mount an issue-based campaign on taxes and the war on Islamic extremist terrorism that would at least help slow Mrs. Clinton’s momentum on her way to the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination.
The party’s chairman, Stephen Minarik had ambitions to be a kingmaker. But who ever heard of a political leader who thinks his job is to discourage politicians from seeking his party’s nomination. Without contested Republican primaries, Republican-leaning voters often figure they may as well register as Democrats. Maybe they can help Thomas Suozzi beat Eliot Spitzer.
The oft-repeated justification for picking candidates in closed-off back rooms is that it relieves the party of expensive and damaging primaries that would leave Republican candidates spent and Republican voters divided. Well, is what the party did in the case of Ms. Pirro any better? We don’t see many party leaders getting political black eyes like Mr. Minarik just received in states that have real primaries.
In the meantime, we look forward to a vigorous and substantive set of gubernatorial debates among John Faso, William Weld, Randy Daniels, and perhaps even Thos. Golisano and Patrick Manning, who is the country’s tallest elected official. If the Republican gubernatorial candidates outnumber the Democratic gubernatorial candidates, it may bring the party to the point where eventually Republican voters outnumber Democrats.
