Chris Gibson HQ live blog (including Tedisco on Murphy)

Gibson thanking "10 county chairs," including "Independence Party chairs." Mentions the 2nd Brigade Combat Team of the 82nd Airborne Division, which he commanded in Haiti and on two tours of Iraq. "Every day they're on point for us" -- big cheer. "USA" chant. Wishes "very best" to Scott Murphy and his family, as a small businessman. Gets applause, but one guy chants "Hey, hey, good-bye," which gets a laugh, but Gibson again wishes him the best. Then said Congress must "alter the environment" to promote growth of small business. Balance budget not by raising taxes (applause). Protect our freedoms, "bring a rapid and successful conclusion" to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. "Stay storng on the Second Amendment, you can guarantee that." Global Foundries. "We're going to work hard for farmers." Notes 2012 farm bill coming up. "This year we have no budget." Need to rebuild infrastructure, balance energy needs, environment and the economy. Invest in nuclear power. Tourism. Bring back Olympics here to district. Last time we had a Democratic president and a Republican Congress we got a lot done, balanced the budget and passed welfare reform. Last line (at 11:40) "Our best days are still in front of us."

11:30, thanking volunteers. Grass roots, yadda yadda.

11:27: Gibson is visible, waves, cheers. "What an incredible sight," he says twice. Then thanks voters, family, staff.  

11:25: finally, the candidate/winner shows up -- or I think he does, but now they're showing some expletive-deleted video.

11:15: "Murphy just conceded," someone announces, to cheers, applause. "Murphy, you're fired," someone else yells, proving not everyone is as gracious as Jim Tedisco. 

 11 o'clock, news time, then Gibson chant starts again, then hand clapping; lights dim. Then nothing happens.

10:54: Re-elected Sen. Roy McDonald gets a big cheer. Another Vietnam veteran, he always graciously inquires about my Army daughter, and has a good environmental record, so I probably shouldn't tell him and his guys that I wrote in Susan B. Anthony as a protest vote against the two pro-choice candidates in that Senate district.

10:50: Biggest cheer for Jim Tedisco's speech is for the line "turn Obamacare around." But he also says more than once that the Republican Party is "compassionate."

10:30 or so, Jasper Nolan says something or other, but it looks to me like they're just waiting for Gibson to go live on the 11 o'clock news. 

JIm Thompson, Sen. Roy McDonald's director of operations says the Greenwich guy is Lou Leone, who served two tours in Vietnam in Vietnam. McDonald's spokesman, Kris Thompson, is 45 pounds lighter than when he had the same job for Sen. Joe Bruno, who continues in legal limbo as a federal judge is taking an uncommonly long time to review a Supreme Court decision that is apparently favorable to the former Senate majority leader (not that a reversal would exactly restore Bruno's reputation after being convicted on two federal corruption charges).

10:00: A guy from Greenwich who served in the 173rd Airborne (which my son-in-law served with in Afghanistan) and I think said he was a veterans coordinator for Gibson (himself of course a veteran) has gone to get me a beer. I give him two dollars and then add one, realizing I can't live in the past (update/newsflash: still not enough, but we let it ride. Thanks Lou). It'll be my first and maybe last drink of the evening. I've spent much of the time, as one does at these events, chatting with reporters I know and an old friend I hadn't seen in years, who used to be my son's foreman at Finch paper mill.

9:40: I ask Jim Tedisco for his reaction to Gibson's victory, and he begins with conventional GOP jubilation about how it's "fantastic" and Gibson "stood for all the right issues," but then adds something about Murphy, the man who has just lost to Gibson but who narrowly beat Tedisco last year. "I wish him well," Tedisco said. "It's always tough to lose an election. No one knows that better than I do." He said he hopes Murphy and his family will get though this and find ways to continue to contribute. (Tedisco himself is waiting for the result of his Assembly re-election race, which he is likely to win.)

9:35. Fox News called race for Gibson, according to Jasper Nolan, Saratoga County GOP chairman, prompting long roar/cheer. "Gibson" chants the crowd briefly.

If Scott Murphy and the Democrats don't want to be tagged as elitists, they shouldn't have their campaign headquarters every election night at the ritzy Gideon Putnam Hotel in Saratoga Springs, where in 2006 I saw Kirsten Gillibrand bask in her first victory. Also that night, I saw the end of John Sweeney's political career at the Holiday Inn in Saratoga Springs, where I also was last year when Jim Tedisco lost to Murphy (although on that March night, Tedisco still thought he could pull it off through absentee ballots). Now I'm back at the Holiday Inn seeing if Chris Gibson can defeat Murphy, despite (or because of) Murphy's mendacious TV ads alleging, for example, that Gibson supports privatizing Social Security, which this particular Republican has specifically denied and separated himself from the party position. Not that Gibson's ads were much better, and, as usual, most people will be relieved when all the politicians are off the airwaves and telephone lines, and out of the mailbox.

Comments

[bethany]

Bob,
Ritzy? How about pro-labor? It's one of only a few hotels where the hotel workers are unionized upstate, which means they get paid a living wage, unlike most hotels. Sorry, but you're off base on this one.

[Bob Conner]

Good point.

[Brian]

Interesting... no comment on the annihilation of hard core social conservative Carl Paladino? This, on the heels of the annihilation in 2006 of hard core social conservative John Faso...