Due to neither Republican candidate receiving 50 percent of the vote in the September primary, Bradley Byrne and Dean Young advanced to a special runoff election, held yesterday November 5th, to claim the seat in Alabama’s 1st Congressional District. Young, a tea-party backed candidate, has stirred controversy, in recent weeks, stating that gay rights activists who find themselves in Alabama should, “go back to California or Vermont or wherever they came from” whereas his opponent has been quoted as saying that he believes gay couples feel the same type of emotions for their partners as straight couples. Apparently, homosexuals are not the only transplants (because no way would someone born in Alabama identify themselves as gay) that Young would like to see go back from whence they came. He is also an advocate of sending President Obama back to Kenya, according to an interview given to The Guardian?recently. One may think Young sounds like an ideal candidate for the deep red state of Alabama, but unfortunately for the “gotcha” media, Young was defeated, narrowly mind you (4 percent), by Bradley Byrne.
Byrne ran on a Democratic ticket throughout his career up and until 1997. Do not let the title of Democrat fool you, Byrne has always been a staunch conservative, gaining the support of the US Chamber of Commerce and retired seat holder Republican Jo Bonner in his campaign against Young. However, many do see him as the lesser of the two evils. Political junkies nationwide were eagerly anticipating the outcome of this election, perhaps using it as a yardstick to predict future elections where tea-party candidates will face off against less fanatical career conservatives.
Byrne will now run against Democrat Burton LeFlore in the general election on December 17th this year. Nothing so far suggest LeFlore, or the 2 independent candidates, will stand a chance of taking the seat from a Republican in Alabama.
Edited/Published by: SB
