The 2006 Senate Race

The 2006 New York Senatorial Race

The new york senate race between former Yonkers Republican mayor John D. Spencer and current new york senator Hillary R. Clinton is a spicy one.

Senator Clinton is the front runner fro several reasons, she is the current senator she has done a good job and new york is a democratic state. Her television ads all are positive saying how she is for the people of new york and interviewing common new yorkers who agree with this statement, one of her ads start off with her saying how the government was wrong for saying the air was clean in new york after 9/11. but although Hillary is a clear front runner for the senate position she has her sights set on something bigger ….. her 2008 presidential election so now on top of pleasing the democrats of new york state she has to please the other parties of the state also. So although she is the front runner of this election (the polls clearly show Election Polls 2006: New York Senate) she has to win a lot more than the democratic vote for this to be a complete success for her.

While her Hillary has taking the positive road her opponent John Spencer has taken the utterly negative one. Spencer looks for any opportunity to bash his opponent. He as Leighley states in chap 8 goes on the attack version of negative advertisement. The majority of his television ads(The Spencer Blog :: Multimedia) are against Hillary saying how she is pro terrorism and doesn’t care for new york. In a recent radio interview he spent the whole time bashing his rival. Another thing he did was raise the issue that Hillary wouldn’t debate him but this went away after she agreed to do it (oct 20th). He also says that since he won the mayor position of Yonkers which is a Democratic city and new York’s third largest while he is a republican it isn’t so far fetched to say that he will win new York’s senate position.

So the question is how does Hillary respond to all this negativity ? quite well she in fact belittles it by putting it on her website(HillaryClinton.com - Press Releases - View Release)
her theory is that if the best Spencer can do is negativity than he can’t do much. Negativity is only good until a certain point then it looks pathetic which is the point that Spencer reached when he started to bash the fact the Hillary’s husband former president Bill dodged the draft unlike him who is a Viet Nam vet.

This election has been over since the day it started John Spencer has a slim chance and he knows it. Hillary will likely win and then start campaigning for the 2008 presidential elections.

This election is election is a perfect example of why negative campaigning is only good to a certain point because only saying badly about someone else shows you have nothing good to say about you.