Oh, and: we can haz Senate?

[womzilla]

Since it was apparently hard to find these results in 2004 and 2006, here are links to the Newsday state legislature results for NY:

NY State Senate Results

NY State Assembly Results

The bottom line: At a minimum, the Democrats have a tie in the Senate (which would apparently give them control, because the Lt. Governor has a tie-breaking vote--paging kent_allard_jr for more details); depending on the late results in Nassau County, they might have an outright majority. The Democrats have not controlled the NY State Senate in 43 years. In 2006, as the Bush backlash pushed Republicans out of legislatures nationwide, the NY State Democrats only managed to pick up one Senate seat--the one for my district. Apparently the party didn't put much effort in trying to take seats away.

Well, they have now. w00t!

(Update, 12:30 AM 11/5/08: WNYC radio is announcing that the Dems took a clear majority in the state Senate. w0000000t!)

Comments

[kalimac.livejournal.com]

As Paterson got, um, promoted, how does NY fill the vacant Lt Govship?

[cantkeepsilent.livejournal.com]

It's very ugly. The LG pro tem is the (Republican) current head of the Senate. So, in theory, an evenly divided State Senate would tie in the vote for Majority Leader, and then the current majority leader would put on his Lieutenant Governor hat and cast a second vote to break the tie and entrench himself. Then the lawsuits will start.

I can tell you that the Democrats in Rochester didn't do our part -- despite the promise of a close campaign, Joe Robach beat Rick Dollanger by double digits. Grrrr.

[kent-allard-jr.livejournal.com]

Yeah, it would have been ugly. Thank God we didn't get a tie!

My only fear is that the GOP may convince a Dem -- I'm looking at you, Pedro Espada -- to caucus with them.

(Actually, my REAL fear is that we're all gonna get a promotion and I'm gonna have a lot of work to do in the next few years...)