Bilbray Wins

The San Diego Union-Tribune is reporting that Brian Bilbray has won the special election to fill the seat vacated by Duke Cunningham. It looks like it was a fairly close victory, but it was a victory nonetheless. Now let the spin begin!

Regardless of how the Democrats try to spin this one, there are going to be a lot of strategists kicking their cats right now. This race had complete party focus and national money behind the Democratic challenger, Francine Busby. They could not win it even with very low turnout. That hurts.

Regardless of how the Republicans try to spin this, they just had a squeaker in a heavily Republican district, despite throwing national resources behind Bilbray. That should be scaring their strategists.

We haven't heard the end of it quite yet, either. The same two candidates will face off again in November for the regular elections (wasn't it kind of dumb to hold a special election to fill only six months? Seems odd). I doubt Busby will be getting as much national support this time, though. Frankly her remark about not needing papers to vote probably sank her. It certainly showed she is not ready for prime time, so to speak.

UPDATE: Texas Rainmaker also has a very valid point here.

UPDATE: Bruce Kesler says this win is MUCH bigger than it looks. It's his home district, so he knows the day-to-day stuff more than a lot of pundits commenting on this. You might want to take a look at his write-up.