Staten Island Primary Pitting Conservative Emanuel-Backed Semi-Democrat Against Progressive Steve Harrison, Heating Up

Chuck Schumer is all about change

The New York State primary is September 9. There aren't many contests we're watching aside from Jon Powers battle against kooky Republican-in-Democratic-clothes, Jack Davis in NY-26, a district stretching from the Buffalo city limits to the Rochester city limits. But there is one more congressional district where the primary is crucial, the Staten Island/Brooklyn district where corrupt Republican Vito Fossella was forced to retire after being caught with two families. I was born in the Brooklyn part of the district and my sister currently lives in the Staten Island part.

In 2006, Brooklyn attorney Steve Harrison challenged Fossella and drew an impressive 43% of the vote. It's the best any Democrat has ever done against Fossella-- and Harrison had no institutional help whatsoever. Fossella spent $1,639,598 on the raise. Harrison spent less than $5,000. Perhaps if brain surgeon Rahm Emanuel had given Harrison a tenth of that $4,556,495 he wasted on Tammy Duckworth in Illinois Steve would have made up the 13,250 vote deficit and won. In any case he seems to have impressed a number of Democrats so much that when he declared he would run against Fossella again, there was a great deal of support. Even NY's senior senator, Chuck Schumer endorsed him, telling his constituents, "I want Stephen Harrison in Washington with me, to fight for the people of Staten Island and Brooklyn. He will not be a rubberstamp, rather he will truly represent his constituents’ interests, on everything from protecting our country to protecting the rights of working families."

But then Fossella got sloppy and got caught and... well, got read out of the GOP. And the race got interesting. Suddenly Democratic Party bosses saw an opportunity to pick up a seat-- and if there was a chance for an actual victory... well the hell with Schumer's happy talk about no rubberstamps. They wanted one-- one who they could count on to not go off and think for himself and work for his constituents' interests instead of the special interests that fund the political racket Inside the Beltway. In steps Emanuel and his team and suddenly Harrison is pushed aside and the inevitable winner is... ultra conservative Staten Island City Councilman, Michael McMahon, the ultimate hack. The Staten Island Conservative Party, which endorses his City Council races, was so impressed with his bellicose pro-war rhetoric that they wanted to endorse him over the Republican. The state party cracked the whip and they didn't.

Monday the NY Times followed the lead of Emanuel, the DCCC and the whole rotten political Insider Establishment and endorsed McMahon. Hillary endorsed McMahon the week before. And somewhere along the way, so did... Schumer. But Harrison-- like John Hall, Carol Shea-Porter, Jerry McNerney, Jon Tester in 2006-- is not buying into the "inevitability" meme the Insiders have sold to the media. He's staying in the race. He's been relying on grassroots organizations-- rather than party bosses-- for endorsements. Both the local and the national Progressive Democrats of America picked him, as did the 504 Democratic Club and the Stonewall Democratic Club of NYC and several Democratic clubs in both Brooklyn and Staten Island. So did Democrats.com and the Democratic Advancement PAC, both of which, like Blue America, work to elect progressives to office. But today Steve's campaign has a major announcement-- an endorsement from the National Organization for Women (NOW). It was an easy endorsement. The conservative McMahon is anti-choice. "NOW PAC is pleased to endorse Steve Harrison for the U.S. House of Representatives from New York," said NOW Political Action Committee Chair Kim Gandy. "We look forward to voters in Staten Island and Brooklyn sending a strong supporter of women's rights to Washington. Steve has the values we need to improve the lives of women and families in this country."

When discussing why NOW didn't follow along with all the other outfits that allow Emanuel to call the shots, Shirley Ranz, chair of the local NOW PAC, said “We were impressed with Steve Harrison’s grasp of and support of our core issues:  constitutional equality for women, reproductive rights, equal economic opportunity, stopping violence against women and ending gender and sexual orientation discrimination.” The NOW endorsement follows an endorsement from Gloria Steinem.

The Secretary of the local NOW chapter explained that “McMahon is a political conservative who opposed choice when his vote counted in NYC Council. We cannot support someone who waivers in his support of our issues to placate his RTL constituency. They have the Republicans for that. Who will speak for women; Steve Harrison!”

Last month a Times story pointed out the stark contrast between the right-wing McMahon from the Republican wing of the Democratic Party and the progressive Harrison. If voters want more of the kinds of corporatist Bush agenda McMahon is the man; for real change, only Harrison fits the bill.

Political labels aside, there are stark differences between the two. Mr. Harrison opposes capital punishment, while Mr. McMahon supports it. The councilman favors nearly all means of addressing the nation’s energy problems, including offshore drilling, something Mr. Harrison opposes. Mr. McMahon supported Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s ultimately unsuccessful congestion pricing plan, while Mr. Harrison opposed it.

On the Iraq war, Mr. Harrison has demanded an immediate withdrawal of American troops, while Mr. McMahon said he supported “a responsible redeployment of our troops in Iraq.”

Mr. Harrison described his opponent as a Johnny-come-lately who entered the race only after Mr. Fossella announced that he would not run for re-election. “I’ve been doing this for the better part of two years,” Mr. Harrison added.

“We have some real differences between us,” Mr. Harrison said in an interview on Friday. “We have a real grass-roots campaign going on and he has support mainly from party officials. He has more money. But most of it came from PACs in Washington.”

Despite Mr. Harrison’s strong showing in 2006, virtually all of the Democratic establishment has endorsed Mr. McMahon, from local officials to Senator Charles E. Schumer and the Democratic members of Congress from New York City. And Representative Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, broke with a longstanding tradition of not taking sides in a primary and also endorsed Mr. McMahon.

"Longstanding tradition?" Emanuel controls the Democratic congressional caucus' media efforts. You can imagine him getting away with that with some hick in bumfuck. But Jonathan P. Hicks bought it for the NY Times. Congratulations Mr. Hick, you win a free subscription to DownWithTyranny.