NY-20 Special Election

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Wonder how the Bruno business might impact here; IIRC his district was mostly inside this one (unless I'm misremembering. Which is possible).

Anyway.

Fact is that this is a by-election in a marginal district. Which is far more of a concern for the Democrats than their weak bench here; Republican voters (or enough of them) will turn out no matter what because that's the way these things work (have a look at recent by-elections to state legislatures).

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Demographic information (all %'s and all 2005-2007 ACS unless otherwise stated...) part one of two...

White 93.5
Black 2.7
Hisp. 2.7
Born abroad 4.0
Anglophone 94.1
Median Age 40 (compares with around 36 nationally)
Over 65 14.1 ('' '' 12.5 '' '')

With Degree 27.8 (pretty much bang on average)
Renting 25.1 (that's rather low)
Median home value $186,600 (about average)
Median hh income $54,941 (slightly above average)
Families in official poverty 5.4 (not far off half the national average)
Individuals in official poverty 8.5 (not quite ditto, but almost)

Note also that there's an unusually high number of vacant houses here, that household sizes are slightly smaller than average, that vet population is slightly higher than average and that the disabled population is basically average sized.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Employment rate 60.9 (presumably somewhat lower now)
Managerial-Professional occupations 36.1
Office and etc occupations 24.3
Classic blue collar occupations - low order service sector jobs 38.8
Employed in Agriculture 1.9
Employed in Manufacturing 9.7
Employed in Education, Healthcare, etc (the largest industry group in the district, by miles) 24.2
Public sector workers 18.9
Uni students 5.8
Households on under $25k a year 20.1
Households on under $35k a year 30.7
Households on between $35k and $75k a year 35.0
Households on over $75k a year 34.8
Households on over $100k a year 20.3

Largest ancestry groups;

Irish 23.6
German 19.5
Italian 16.0
English 14.0
French-French Canadian 12.0

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I think people need to remember that while special elections are unpredictable, they inherently favor the Republicans. 

And, more to the point, they almost always favour the party viewed as being the opposition party. That is why the Democrats should be worried about this seat.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Do we have a date? When can we expect one? (as if I care... some elderly Italianate politico, unless he's far right on economic issues, is almost more appealing than this businessman... still, will be interesting to watch.)

I saw 6th of May someplace else, but may have misread.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

I think Eraserhead lives in the district, so it's not quite the same as just another vote in the House for the enemy...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

There are usually some third-party nutters on the ballot. Vote for one of them instead.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

No matter who wins, this race means little to nothing.

Ah. Tedisco is struggling then...

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Hilarious

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Let's do some math, shall we? Number of absentees submitted by party:

Democrat: 2,105

Republican: 2,863

Other: 904(includes Independents, Conservative Party, Independence Party, Working Families party)

Let's say Tedisco wins 70% of the Rep vote(reasonable), and Murphy gets 90% of the Dem vote(reasonable), and the "other" splits 50/50(again reasonable), Tedisco wins by 100 votes.

But a hundred votes is practically nowt when over a hundred thousand have been cast in total.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

But a hundred votes is practically nowt when over a hundred thousand have been cast in total.

All Murphy or Tedisco needs to do is win by 1 vote.  Winning by 100 votes would be gravy.

Not my point though. More a question of, er, margin of error.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Hilarious.