Anthony Weiner, former congressional representative for New York's 9th District, failed at using his smartphone in spectacular fashion. With a penchant for taking lewd photographs and sending them off to various women that were not his wife, you think Weiner would have read the instruction manual on that phone twice.
But alas, he took a shot of his own soft-on through the boxer briefs (picture can be found here if you're curious) and instead of texting it, he inadvertently posted it to his Twitter feed. Honestly, I could see myself making that same mistake on my iPhone (as opposed to Mr. Weiner's Blackberry), hastily thinking I had read the different posting options, or accidentally overshooting the SMS Text Button and hitting Twitter... which is why I don't take pictures of my own junk and send them off to various women.
In Chaos Theory, there's something called the butterfly effect. Essentially, the flapping of a butterfly's wings in one part of the world triggers a series of events that lead to some massive change on the other side of the world. In this case, Weiner depressing his Blackberry's button on Twitter instead of Text was the proverbial flapping of the butterfly's wings.
Yesterday, we saw one of the next steps in that series of events that could lead to something massive. New York's 9th District held its special election this week to replace Weiner and gave his old job to republican Bob Turner.
New York Special Election Results: Republican Bob Turner Beats Democrat David Weprin In 9th District
What's interesting here is how the two candidates approached their campaign platform. In typical fashion, Weprin ran on the idea that Republicans want to kill Medicare and Social Security. Turner ran on the idea that electing him would send a message to Obama that he's failed our country and that he's turned his back on Israel. The last point was specifically relevant to the 9th District given its high population of Orthodox Jews.
John Boehner immediately, and not expectedly, took this headline and ran with it, saying
"Tonight New Yorkers have delivered a strong warning to the Democrats who control the levers of power in our federal government," House Speaker John Boehner said in a statement. "It's time to scrap the failed `stimulus' agenda."Now I'm not sure Boehner should interpret the smudge of localized tea leaves to represent the will of the entire nation, but I'm wondering if this "deliver a message" might have some truth to it.
Next year, Obama's going to run for President and there's a good chance that a certain state called Florida might have a big impact on his chance to win. Florida went to Obama in 2008, but check out this picture to see how the state breaks down.
A lot of red scattered around there, but the dense population center down south can tip the entire state. Of course, that population center has a significant Jewish population as well as a significant aged population.
In New York, the Jewish population seemed to turn their back to the Medicare threats and side with social conservatism and Israel. Curious to see if something similar can be achieved by the Republicans in Florida in 2012 if people remain as disgruntled as they are today because of the nonexistent economic recovery. Could the national republican effort take anything away from the 9th District to help it shape its national strategy in 2012?
Could one man's dong change the course of American history? I know, stupid question since it's probably already happened a number of times.
Maybe the Republican strategy to torpedo anything Obama wants to get done is starting to pay some dividends.
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