An ACORN-Friendly, Big Labor-Backing, Tax-and-Spend Radical in GOP Clothing – by Michelle Malkin

dede

Here’s the dirty little secret about political candidates and officeholders labeled by the mainstream media as “moderate Republicans”: There’s usually nothing moderate about them. Consider the case of “moderate Republican” Dede Scozzafava, the GOP nominee in the New York 23rd congressional district’s special election.

Handpicked by local party pooh-bahs and supported by Beltway GOP leaders, Scozzafava is vying to replace former GOP Rep. John McHugh, who abandoned his seat to accept President Obama’s nomination as Army Secretary. There’s certainly no urgency to tack left. The upstate New York district is as safe a Republican district as they come. The GOP has triumphed in every election there since 1871. Obama eked out a victory in the district last fall, but the Democrats have no real traction on the ground.

And the mood of the electorate near and far is far from electric blue. It’s not just Tea Party activists and health care town hall protesters displaying discontent with Big Government in Washington. A recent Gallup Poll reported that self-identified conservatives now outnumber self-identified liberals in all 50 states — and that more Americans nationwide now say they are conservative than have made that claim in any of the last four years.

Scozzafava is an abortion rights advocate who favors gay marriage. It would be one thing if Scozzafava balanced that social liberalism with fiscal conservatism. But as a state assemblywoman, she voted for massive tax increases, Democratic budgets and a $180 million state bank bailout. She also supported the trillion-dollar federal stimulus package — which every House Republican voted against.

More troubling, Scozzafava in past elections has embraced the ballot line of the Working Families Party — a socialist outfit whose political DNA is intertwined with scandal-ridden ACORN. ACORN and the WFP have shared office space in New York City, Arkansas and Illinois. ACORN head Bertha Lewis, a close Scozzafava friend and political supporter, wears a second hat as vice chairman of the WFP. The WFP has been listed in ACORN documents dating back to 2000 as an “affiliate.”

Under fire for her cozy relations with organizations that have shown lifelong hostility toward the Republican Party, Scozzafava now claims she would have voted to de-fund ACORN in the wake of the multiple BigGovernment.com sting videos showing ACORN employees advising undercover journalists on how to evade tax laws, lie on housing applications and smuggle underage illegal alien prostitutes.

But there’s another inextricably linked ACORN and WFP affiliate that Scozzafava would not likely disavow: Big Labor.

Refresher: The Service Employees International Union is co-located with several key ACORN offices across the country.

ACORN founder Wade Rathke founded influential SEIU Local 100. As John Wilson reported in the New York Post this spring, the WFP’s largest donors are the SEIU, which pitched in more than $300,000, and the teachers union, which donated $200,000. These organizations have worked together to increase left-wing political clout, undermine capitalism and ensure “social justice” on the public’s dime.

Scozzafava’s husband is a leading upstate New York union organizer. She supports the federal “card-check” legislation that would massively boost union rolls — and Democratic voting rolls — at the expense of rank-and-file workers’ free choice. And for that matter, at the expense of Republican electoral prospects. Card check is the key to a Democratic majority in perpetuity. Big Labor bosses have said as much.

Movement conservatives and limited government activists are battling the establishment GOP over its endorsement of Scozzafava’s candidacy. The Club for Growth, former GOP presidential candidate Fred Thompson and others have lined up behind a truly mainstream and viable candidate — Conservative Party nominee Doug Hoffman.

Meanwhile, “moderate Republican” Scozzafava has earned the enthusiastic endorsement of far-left blog entrepreneur and political strategist Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, who runs the Daily Kos website. He enthused that Scozzafava has “been willing to raise taxes when budgets require it, and is to the left of most Democrats on social issues.”

That’s not moderation. That’s extremist fringe. This race isn’t a fight over the heart and soul of the Republican Party. It’s a battle over its brain.

  • Bellerophon

    Obviously, the Republicans are grooming her for a 2012 presidential run. She's their perfect candidate, a female Alf Landon.

  • Proxywar

    They are going to do whatever they want to do.

    We need a Revolution and posting your concerns over the internet is not getting it done.

  • carlstoll

    At least she's a change from the usual Repugnican wackos.

  • A J Southard

    If you or anyone you know lives in the N Y 23rd Congressional District I strongly
    urge you to write letters to the editor to inform the voters in your district who Rep. Dede Scozzafava really is. A extreme liberal posing as a Republican.
    These Republican politicians who support left leaning agendas must be exposed.

  • Walt

    Why do Republicans expect any public support when the offer someone no better, or perhaps worse, than a regular Democrat?

  • coyote3

    The mistake that is made is that Republicans are somehow conservative, or will advocate constitutional limitations on government, i.e., “if we don't have the power to do it, 'no' we may not do it, because it is illegal.” Some Republicans are better than others, but that is like saying John Dillinger was okay, because he only robbed smaller banks. It has been Republicans who have given us some of the biggest social giveaways in history, not to mention “portions” of the Patriot Act.

  • AL.

    Take a look to the new adventures of Mr Ziegler :
    http://www.mediaite.com/online/why-david-keene-

  • koolaidsyndrome

    You are right and that is what the Tea Parties are all about. We are Democrats, Republicans and Independents, young and old, White, Black, Hispanic and Asian all coming together for a common cause. Preserving our Constitution and taking back control of our government. Party does not matter.
    We consider ourselves Americans. And if it is not good for America it is not good for any of us. We will only support candidates that will protect and defend our Constitution and give us back our rights, stop taxing and spending us into a third world country, protect our freedoms at home and abroad, protect our 1st amendment right to free speech and our 2nd amendment right to bear arms. We are of one mind. America First

  • WFB2

    Is the RNC backing this obvious liberal in GOP clothing? Too many of these eastern seaboard “Republicans” are RINO's and need to be set adrift. It starts with the RNC and until and unless that organization is purged of its RINO dominance the GOP will continue being sabotaged by the likes of Snowe, Collins, Specter, Graham and McCain. We do not have a true two-party system in this country.

  • Alan

    Looks like a Pig to me.

  • Bellerophon

    New Gingrich is supporting Scozzafava.

    Can anyone in their right mind support Newt now?

    Supporting Scozzafava shouldn't come as a surprise to anyone who read Gingrich's book after the 1994 “Republican Revolution”. Can you guess which president Gingrich praised the most? Franklin Delano Roosevelt!

  • Bellerophon

    Don't you know that you must choose the lesser of two evils?

    When you vote remember to vote for the Cholera Party because at least it's not Smallpox.

  • jerrell

    With party selections like Scozzafava, one has to consider which side the Republican leadership is working for.

    A Hoffman win in the NY 23rd will send a loud message for 2010.

  • JeromefromLayton

    According to Michael Medved, there is a Conservative in the race. (For the outsiders, that's a real NY State party.) Normally, the smart thing to do is to avoid “third parties” like the plague. But, these are not normal times and the “mainstream” choices are both flaming liberals. Meanwhile, the NY Conservative Party has actually scored in the big leagues with Senator Buckley. No too shabby. So, check out the Conservative candidate and see if it will work. This time, there is nothing to lose…….

  • Fritz Becker

    Oh boy! Yet another closet socialist foil. I am so sick of these people, if you want to be a leftest run join the Democrats.

  • richrd0001

    Clearly a Dem who made a choice to put on Repubic feathers a long time ago.

  • koolaidsyndrome

    ENERGY INDEPENDENCE FOR WHOM?
    President Obama Has:
    Given 2B to Brazil for off shore oil drilling
    Given 500+M to Al Gore to build hybrid cars in Finland
    Suspended oil and natural gas exploration in Utah
    Has TAKEN 200 acres of land in Alaska (rich oil deposits there) to protect the Polar bears even though their numbers have increased 5 times in the last few years.
    I ask you, Energy Independence For Whom? Not the USA