COMMENTARY
Kavanaugh vs. Hoyt? The voters all lose
It was the hottest race of the primary season. I live in the district. I did not pull the lever for either candidate.
I vote nearly all the time, even though I know that usually it does not change anything. I did not vote in the battle for the Assembly district that stretches from the West Side to Grand Island. I did not vote because the race nauseated me.
Pulling the lever for Sam Hoyt or for challenger Barbra Kavanaugh would, to my mind, validate the sleazy antics of the incumbent or the slimy campaign of Kavanaugh’s backers. No, thank you. I think both of them showed they are not worthy of the office. Given the sorry state of the State Legislature, that is saying something.
Hoyt ended up winning. Thousands of people voted for one or the other. Fine. But I did not want to take part in politics that insults voters and gnaws at what remains of public faith in the system. Immersing yourself in the back-and-forth of this campaign was like wading into a septic tank. Hand me a hose.
This race did not require a ballot box. It needed a barf bag. It was one of those rare times when not voting struck a blow for democracy.
Although she touts herself as a progressive, Kavanaugh has long been joined at the hip with political operative Steve “Pit Bull” Pigeon. I doubt it was a coincidence that e-mails revealing Hoyt’s affair with a legislative intern surfaced a few weeks ago, on a political blogger’s Web site. A deluge of subsequent mailings from a Pigeon-connected group pounded Hoyt on his infidelities.
The damaging e-mails have circulated among various insiders for more than a year. It was a fuse waiting to be lit.
Kavanaugh denied involvement in the e-mails or in the subsequent attack ads. I would have an easier time believing that if she demanded an end to the ads. I have no proof, but it would not surprise me — based on years of Pigeonwatching— if the e-mail strategy persuaded Kavanaugh to take a run at the 16-year incumbent. The scenario: We will drop the e-mail bomb a few weeks before primary day, and Hoyt either resigns or is politically doomed.
At least with some voters, the tactic backfired.
Mark Schechner of Buffalo said Tuesday he voted for Hoyt “partly because of the ads about his affairs. I wanted nothing to do with that.”
The buzz lately was how badly the extramarital news would hurt Hoyt. The larger issue is the reckless behavior of a guy who took advantage of his position and damaged people’s lives. Among the victims was the intern who, judging by the e-mails, was crushed when she found out he cheated on her.
“What Hoyt did,” Buffalo’s Nettie Hansen said after voting for Kavanaugh, “diminished him in my eyes.”
Aside from Hoyt’s dismal behavior and moves by Kavanaugh’s backers to rub voters’ faces in it, the race was a hothouse of distortions. Each accused the other of exaggerating accomplishments, and they both were right: Hoyt, for instance, had no more to do with taking down the Niagara Thruway tolls than Kavanaugh did with building the Scajaquada bike path. And on and on.
It gets worse. This race was another battle in the war between Mayor Byron Brown and his backers, pro-Kavanaugh, vs. Democratic Party boss Len Lenihan and his allies, pro-Hoyt. The region is dying, and these people have nothing better to do than to go for one another’s throats. If they spent half as much time trying to get us out of our hole as they do attempting to politically destroy one another, they might actually get something done.
The best thing I can say about this race is that it is over. The sad thing is that somebody had to win it.
