I am on record repeatedly saying that disaffected conservatives should not agitate for a third party. It truly makes no sense. Ballot access laws in the fifty states make it extremely impractical to mount a third party challenge except in very rare cases. Historically, those cases are premised on individuals who, once off the national stage, see their third party collapse, see e.g. Teddy Roosevelt and Ross Perot.

There are, however, some situations where exceptions must be made in order to pressure the Republican Party of a particular state into doing what is right. The opportunities rarely arise because there are not a lot of viable third parties out there. One state where there is an exception to my “no third parties” rule is New York.

In that state, the local Republican Party did everything possible to screw the national Republican Party because the local party was more interested in taking back the New York Senate than helping the nation as a whole. As a result, it played politics badly and has nominated Dede Scozzafava to replace Congressman McHugh in a special election.

The GOP speculated that the Democrats would nominate the Chairman of the New York Senate Agriculture Committee and they could take back the State Senate in a special election. They played their cards poorly. Now the race in NY-23 pits two liberals against each other in the two major parties. Sadly, the person furthest to the left is the Republican, Dede Scozzafava.

Dede Scozzafava is to the left of the party on abortion, taxes, spending, marriage, guns, everything. She is a terrible candidate. The New York GOP had a chance to do right by the people of NY-23. They failed.

Conservatives and Republicans should rally around Dough Hoffman as a viable alternative to Dede Scozzafava. Hoffman has more in common with the people in NY-23 and is closer to the Republican Party on issues across the board.

We don’t need a third party in this country. And it is too hard to set one up anyway. But there is a viable third party in New York that conservatives can use to remind the GOP what happens when the local Republican Party rejects the Republican platform. Above all else, we must make sure Scozzafava is defeated.

Having a Democrat in that seat would be better than Scozzafava because the media could not resist the story line that the GOP is moving left just when Americans are moving back to the right. Scozzafava would hurt NY-23 and she would hurt the GOP brand nationally.

Doug Hoffman is the guy we should rally around.