The new coalition government running the state Senate has tongues wagging all across the state. With no precedent, it’s worth taking a look at coalition government in England and Israel. … [More]

I’m a Republican and I’m tired.… [More]

A Q&A with Rep. Bob Turner and Mike Long on Hurricane Sandy… [More]

Even as the size of New York’s Congressional delegation shrinks from 29 to 27, there is an opportunity for the number of Republican representatives to grow. Currently there are eight Republican members of the House from New York, though owing to redistricting, Rep. Bob Turner’s seat has been eliminated. Of the remaining seven Peter King, Michael Grimm, Chris Gibson, Richard Hanna and Tom Reed are all in strong positions to win reelection. This leaves only Reps. Nan Hayworth and Ann… [More]

Pundits do a good job of assessing winners and losers after electoral events like the recent congressional primaries. Few are better, for example, than City & State’s First Read on Fridays. Yet while this last primary’s victors have already been determined, I would like to parse the significant factors underlying who won, who lost and why. First, let’s look at the GOP Senate race. In statewide primaries generally the most potent combination a candidate can achieve is being dubbed the… [More]

New York Republicans, especially New York City Republicans, have always looked at Democrats begrudgingly on Primary Day, because they almost always have a reason to go to the polls. But this is no ordinary year, with Republicans having the chance to vote on not one but three primary dates. The exit of Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich before the New York presidential primary on April 24 made the first date a bit of a wet noodle. The third and final… [More]

For Senate candidate and City Councilman Eric Ulrich, gay marriage is both an attack line and a potential liability. During his first week as a candidate for the state Senate, Ulrich, a Queens Republican, repeatedly criticized his opponent, Democratic State Sen. Joe Addabbo, flip-flopping on the issue of gay marriage. In 2009, Addabbo voted against the bill as it went down in lopsided defeat, but in 2011, the Queens senator – after polling constituents in his eastern Queens district on… [More]

From Jon Lentz’s story about renegades within the state Conservative Party, comes this nugget about the electoral fate of Sen. Stephen Saland and the other Senate Republicans who voted “yes” on same-sex marriage. State Sen. Roy McDonald, one of four Republican senators to vote for same-sex marriage, recently won the backing of Conservatives in Columbia County, which was added to his district through redistricting. But McDonald’s district also includes Saratoga County, where local Conservatives are backing a primary challenger, Kathy… [More]

Is Mike Long on a collision course  with the Republican Party? There is a gun hanging over Mike Long’s head. It’s old and dusty and says “Duke” on the handle—a John Wayne replica mounted on the wall of Long’s Bay Ridge office, amid a clutter of political posters, certificates and 9/11 memorabilia. In many ways, Long himself is a replica of the Duke: plainspoken, squinty-eyed, conservative to the core. Wayne played a Marine in several movies; Long played one in… [More]

A look at the 50-year history of New York’s Conservative Party One day in the fall of 1960, a New York lawyer named J. Daniel Mahoney and his brother-in-law, Kieran O’Doherty, met for lunch in the financial district to vent their frustration over the leftward shift of the Republican Party under Gov. Nelson Rockefeller. That day, the two decided the time had come to launch a political party of their own. Over half a century later, the upstart Conservative Party… [More]