CNN

Rep. Bachmann was a main attraction at last week's event on Capitol Hill.

Washington (CNN) - The thousands of restive conservative protesters milling outside the west front of the Capitol last week definitely didn't seem in the mood to listen - but there was at least one voice they wanted to hear.

The chant started from the back of the crowd, and rolled forward like a wave: "We want Michele! We want Michele!"

Michele Bachmann doesn't say she finds GOP leadership irrelevant. But with health care reform gathering momentum as the Democratic bill entered final debate in the House, she took her typical route around, not through them.

The swarms of Tea Partiers who descended on Washington on her week-old call didn't come to see John Boehner and Eric Cantor. The top Republican leaders in Congress were guests at Michele Bachmann's party.

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(CNN) - Much like former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Rep. Michele Bachmann's name has become a kind of cultural shorthand - a conservative rallying cry and a Jon Stewart punch line.

Both women have inspired a range of merchandise that includes mugs, T-shirts and even action figures. (The miniature Palin outsells Bachmann.)

Tina Fey's unforgettable "Saturday Night Live" impersonations of 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate Palin featured exact quotes or close paraphrases. And a recently launched line of Bachmann-inspired comic books features the congresswoman's own words as well.

Bachmann occupies an increasingly familiar political niche: the tough-talking, unapologetic conservative woman. The similarities with Palin go beyond a fiery brand of working-class cultural conservatism delivered in a homey twang. Each cut their teeth in culture war fights at the state level and has experienced a relatively recent meteoric ascent to the national stage.

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Washington (CNN) – Conservatives declaring victory in New York's 23rd congressional district are way off base - and outsiders like himself shouldn't have any say over the local party's decisions, Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele told reporters the morning after the GOP lost the district for the first time in over a century to Democrat Bill Owens.

Steele, celebrating the GOP's twin gubernatorial wins at RNC headquarters in Washington, was defending his own decision to back Dede Scozzafava - the embattled local Republican pick who drew conservative attacks - until she left the race in the campaign's final weekend.

Of course, plenty of other high-profile Republicans did weigh in on the race, including Fred Thompson, Sarah Palin, and Tim Pawlenty, all of whom backed Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman before Scozzafava's exit. The GOP infighting in NY-23 "serves as an important lesson on how we manage an opportunity to win a seat - and how not to..." said Steele, who vowed to "get that seat back" in 2010.

"I don't see a victory in losing seats," said Steele. "…I want more Republicans, I don't buy that we somehow find victory in defeat."

(CNN) – The three-way race in New York's 23rd congressional district ended Tuesday night with a surprise Democratic win - the first for the party in the reliably-Republican district since the 19th century.

Democrat Bill Owens defeated Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman to claim victory in a race where an internal GOP fight drew national attention - and forced the party's candidate, Dede Scozzafava, out of the campaign.

National Democrats, smarting over gubernatorial losses in New Jersey and Virginia, seized on the win, with Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine dubbing it "perhaps the most consequential race of the night."

"This race turned out to be the worst of all possible worlds for Republicans as not only did the Democrat, Bill Owens, win a seat that Democrats have not held in more than 100 years, but what occurred in New York has exposed a war within the Republican Party that will not soon end," said Kaine.

"It played itself out in Pennsylvania earlier this year when longtime Republican Senator Arlen Specter became a Democrat and is playing itself out in House, Senate and Gubernatorial races nationwide. The all out war between Republicans and the far right wing is a disaster for the Republican Party and will dog it well after today," Kaine added.

Earlier this fall, Hoffman was a clear underdog, but as the campaign to replace Rep. John McHugh drew to a close he was considered a solid favorite. He benefitted from decisions made by national Republicans after Scozzafava left the race and also was able to take advantage of decisions made by the national GOP long before it backed his candidacy.

Weeks before endorsing Hoffman's bid, the party ended its attacks on Hoffman and focused its fire solely on Bill Owens - an unusual move when the biggest threat to the Republican candidate, then holding a narrow advantage, was coming from the right.

In the race's final days, Hoffman had the momentum. A Siena survey conducted Sunday and released Monday suggested he'd gained 6 points since Scozzafava's withdrawal, and held a 5-point edge over Owens heading into Election Day.

But there were underlying signs that Hoffman couldn't count on a win, even in the heavily Republican district.

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(CNN) - Republican Chris Christie defeated incumbent Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine Tuesday, giving the GOP a rare Northeast win and a sweep of the night's gubernatorial races.

The former New Jersey attorney general became the first Republican governor of the state since 1997, and the first challenger to defeat an incumbent governor since Christie Todd Whitman defeated Democrat Jim Florio in 1993.

Corzine, who trailed Christie by double digits in several summer surveys, battled his way back to a statistical tie with his GOP challenger for much of the race's final weeks.

Despite Corzine's dismal poll numbers, he came into the race with a solid structural advantage. The former swing state has turned blue in recent years, with a majority-Democratic congressional delegation, two Democratic senators, and a Democratic hold on the governor's mansion for more than a decade.

President Obama, who won the state by a double-digit margin last fall and remains popular in the Garden State, visited several times to campaign on the governor's behalf.

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Washington (CNN) - If Democrats suffer a loss in an upstate New York congressional race Tuesday, it could well spark an uneasy celebration among Republican leaders.

The party establishment, still in rebuilding mode heading into next year's midterm elections, watched helplessly this weekend as Republican nominee Dede Scozzafava was driven from the race by grass-roots activists in favor of a more conservative candidate.

Finding out whether Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman wins or loses won't resolve the race's biggest mystery: What does the successful inner-party insurgency in the race mean for the GOP in the Tea Party era?

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"As a matter of fact, only Republicans have offered solutions to lower health-care costs and make it easier to obtain quality, affordable coverage without imposing a massive burden on the American people," Boehner said in the weekly Republican radio and Web address.

"We first released our health-care plan in June, and over the last six months, we have introduced at least eight bills that, taken together, would implement this blueprint," he said.

The GOP released the guiding principles of its health-care agenda in June, but did not release a comprehensive legislative blueprint at that point. Republican congressional leaders have said the party is in the process of crafting a substitute.

On the official GOP Web site, to which Boehner referred, the party pledges to formally offer its own plan during upcoming floor debate on the bill introduced by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

The site says the Republican proposal will incorporate all or part of the elements of health-care bills introduced by individual members, and a health-care plan introduced by the Republican Study Committee.

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(CNN) – San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom announced Friday that he was ending his gubernatorial bid.

"It is with great regret I announce today that I am withdrawing from the race for governor of California," he said in a statement. "With a young family and responsibilities at city hall, I have found it impossible to commit the time required to complete this effort the way it needs to – and should be – done."

Earlier this month, former President Bill Clinton had endorsed Newsom, running against California Attorney General Jerry Brown. Brown and Clinton were themselves primary rivals in the 1992 presidential campaign, when Clinton defeated the former governor in California's presidential primary.

Clinton weighed in on another Democratic primary race earlier this year, when he backed former Democratic National Committee Chairman Terry McAuliffe's unsuccessful bid for the party's gubernatorial nomination in Virginia.

(CNN) - Nearly $1.8 million worth of ad spending has flooded the airwaves in New York's 23rd congressional district in the runup to next week's special election to fill that seat.

Democrat Bill Owens, the SEIU, and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee have spent more than $822,000 so far, with the majority of that money coming from Owens, according to an analysis by TNSMI-CMAG, CNN's consultant on political advertising. Embattled Republican Dede Scozzafava's campaign, the state party and the National Republican Congressional Committee have laid out $536,072 in support of her bid - but just under $67,000 has come from the state assemblywoman's cash-poor campaign.

And roughly $429,000 worth of ads have aired on Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman's behalf, with the majority of those funds coming from the fiscally conservative Club for Growth.

When the Club for Growth's $287,000 in TV ads aimed at swaying conservative-leaning voters on Hoffman's behalf first hit the airwaves a few weeks ago, Scozzafava enjoyed a slim but statistically significant edge in this Republican-leaning district: A Siena survey released earlier this month, before the Club for Growth and Hoffman ads hit the airwaves, found she held a 7-point edge over Owens, 35-28 percent. Hoffman registered 16 percent – despite the fact that roughly 7 in 10 of those polled didn't know who he was. The seat's previous occupant, former GOP Rep. John McHugh – who left office to serve as President Obama's Secretary of the Army – won re-election in 2008 by nearly 2-to-1 over his Democratic challenger.

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Conservative Club for Growth, which is backing third-party candidate Doug Hoffman, calls Republican Dede Scozzafava and Democrat Bill Owens 'two liberals'.

(CNN) – If Democrat Bill Owens manages to claim victory in next month's special congressional election in upstate New York, he'll have some unlikely benefactors to thank.

In an echo of the Sen. Arlen Specter-Pat Toomey fight that prompted the Pennsylvania senator to abandon the GOP - many of the toughest attacks on the Republican nominee, state assemblywoman Dede Scozzafava, are coming from voters who identify themselves as conservatives. The catcalls from the right became a chorus Thursday, with simultaneous noon editorials from major conservative media outlets - including the National Review, Washington Times, and RedState.com - all calling on Scozzafava to withdraw from the race, citing a run-in earlier this week with a conservative journalist.

The GOP candidate, said the Washington Examiner, "should withdraw from the special election campaign for New York's 23rd congressional district. And donors to the Republican National Committee (RNC) and the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), which funded Scozzafava, should demand their money back."

The national party re-affirmed its support for Scozzafava. "The NRCC supports Dede in this race," said National Republican Congressional Committee spokesman Paul Lindsay. "We will continue to remind central and northern New Yorkers that a vote for Doug Hoffman or Bill Owens is a vote for Nancy Pelosi and her far left, radical agenda."

Both Owens and Scozzafava - but particularly the Republican candidate - have been hit hard by conservatives backing third-party candidate Doug Hoffman, who has now pulled within single digits of the GOP's pick in the most recent survey of district voters.

The campaign for this House seat is the latest display of disaffection from the conservative base over the national GOP's recent candidate recruitment efforts. Hoffman has nabbed the backing of New York's Conservative Party, which generally supports Republican nominees – a nod that, in a state where candidates can run under multiple party lines, can often provide the edge in narrow races.

(Update after the jump: Sarah Palin weighs in)

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Romney hits New Jersey tonight, Pennsylvania tomorrow.

(CNN) – Mitt Romney, continuing to lay the groundwork for a possible 2012 presidential run, will officially endorse Pennsylvania Senate candidate Pat Toomey Tuesday in Philadelphia.

It's a move that marks the progress Romney has made in shoring up bonds with some key conservative constituencies. Just over two years ago, with Romney's presidential effort in full swing, Toomey raised questions about the former Massachusetts governor's record on fiscal issues.

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Obama to be keynote speaker at HRC dinner.

WASHINGTON (CNN ) – President Obama will speak at the Human Rights Campaign's annual dinner in Washington this weekend, the White House said Monday.

The president, who has faced complaints from liberals over his administration's failure thus far to end the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy that prohibits openly gay men and lesbians from serving in the military, will be the second president to address the nation's largest gay rights group - Bill Clinton was the first, in 1997. Obama's comments will come the day before a major rally in Washington by critics of that policy.

Also appearing at the dinner: Lady Gaga, the cast of Glee, and Broadway star Gavin Creel.

The DNC spot slamming Kyl hits the airwaves Monday.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – Democrats are planning to hit Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl in his home state next week with a new television ad that accuses the Arizona Republican of being out of touch on health care issues - a pitch aimed squarely at women voters.

The 30-second commercial features video of a Senate exchange between Kyl and Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Michigan. In the clip, Kyl says he doesn't need maternity care, and requiring that coverage in his insurance policy would be unnecessary and expensive. Asked whether he thinks insurance policies should be required to cover pre-natal health care, Kyl's response included an offhand remark that "over 60 years ago, my mom did."

"TELL JON KYL: COVERING MATERNITY CARE ISN'T A JOKE FOR WOMEN," reads the ad's on-screen text.

The TV ad, which is the latest element of the Democratic National Committee's "Call 'em Out" campaign, will begin airing Monday in Tucson and Phoenix. A DNC spokesman calls the buy "open-ended."

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The conservative Club for Growth is taking aim at both the Democratic and Republican candidates running in the special election.

(CNN) – The conservative Club for Growth is taking aim at both the Democratic and Republican candidates running in the special election to fill former New York Rep. John McHugh's seat.

The group, which has already backed third-party candidate Doug Hoffman, is spending $250,000 on radio and TV ads targeting Democrat Bill Owens and Republican Dede Scozzafava.

Hoffman registered 16 percent in the Siena poll released Thursday. Scozzafava draws 35 percent in the same survey, and the well-funded Owens takes 28 percent.

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Gingrich group withdraws invite to adult entertainment exec.

(CNN) - For the second time this month, Newt Gingrich's 527 has decided that it made a mistake inviting an adult entertainment industry entrepreneur to attend a "private dinner" with the former House Speaker.

Dawn Rizos, owner of Dallas topless club The Lodge, received a letter earlier this month from Gingrich's American Solutions inviting her to dine with Gingrich at a Capitol Hill club next week. She was also told she had been selected to receive an Entrepreneur of the Year Award. "Dawn - Newt is looking forward to finally meeting you face to face" to talk policy, read a handwritten note on the missive.

Lodge spokesman Michael Precker says they were told the group would need $5,000 to confirm her attendance, which they promptly paid.

On Tuesday, Rizos - who Precker said had laid out the funds for her own travel to the event - was informed by a marketing company working for American Solutions that the invite had been mistakenly extended, and was being rescinded.

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Menendez: GOP's August gains will translate to 2010 losses.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - A Senate Democratic leader acknowledged Tuesday his party failed to move quickly enough to counter Republican critics over the summer, but predicted that GOP gains based on town hall pushback to President Obama's health care plan would cost Republicans at the polls next November.

"To be honest, we needed to be more aggressive in August," New Jersey Sen. Robert Menendez, chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, told reporters. "We saw Republicans led by extremists in their party mobilize and make a lot of noise. There's no question some momentum was lost during that period of time.

"But the Republican strategy is for the president and the Congress is to be defeated in policy... It may seem like a strategy, but it is a strategy that's going to backfire on them" in the long term, he predicted.

Menendez is responsible for the Senate Democratic campaign operation and his job has been complicated by primary battles in Colorado, Kentucky and Pennsylvania.

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Mike Huckabee took nearly a third of the votes in the straw poll.

WASHINGTON (CNN) - Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee won the Values Voter Summit's 2012 presidential straw poll Saturday, grabbing nearly 29 percent of the vote in a crowded field.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and Indiana Rep. Mike Pence each won roughly 12 percent of the 597 votes cast.

Four of the top five candidates addressed religious conservatives at the three-day Values Voter conference in Washington this week - the kind of attendance seen as a significant gesture by activists here, especially in an off-election year. Palin did not make an appearance.

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Romney is considered an early frontrunner for the White House race in 2012, according to recent polls.

WASHINGTON (CNN) – A day after former Baptist minister and likely presidential rival Mike Huckabee offered a withering critique of Mitt Romney's record, Romney made his pitch to the same group of religious conservatives – a voting bloc that could be key to any future White House bid.

The former Massachusetts governor appealed to attendees at the Values Voters Summit in Washington Saturday, using a speech that drew heavily from his address to social conservatives at the same hotel earlier this year. "Putting such a spirit-crushing, back-breaking debt burden on our children is unworthy of our national character," he said. "That is why I believe that this spending and borrowing is not just economically irresponsible, it is morally wrong."

He blasted the Obama administration's financial track record, and its decision to consider prosecuting intelligence agents who violated government protocols on the interrogation of prisoners. "(Obama) can spin a speech, but he can't spin his record," said Romney. "And I'll bet you never dreamed you'd look back at Jimmy Carter as the good old days."

Despite the makeup of the crowd, the speech was relatively light on social issues, focusing instead on economic and security policy.

The former Republican presidential candidate, widely considered a likely 2012 contender, is on the ballot for the gathering's 2012 presidential straw poll, along with former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Texas Rep. Ron Paul, Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, Indiana Rep. Mike Pence, and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum.

(Updated with DNC response after the jump)

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