With six weeks left before voters go to the polls,  New York candidates are hitting the streets and the airwaves. Democrats are trying to hold onto their control of the state Senate. Last year, their narrow majority temporarily slipped away and gave the Republicans a fleeting new lease on life, for a while anyway. Eventually dissident Democrats came back to the fold, but  the chaos only complicated an already dysfunctional budget process.

Now, Democrats think they can tilt the Albany math in their favor with women challengers in a few key legislative races - and by capturing voters put off by Republican gubernatorial nominee Carl Paladino.

A wave of fiscal conservativism and pent up frustration with the political establishment helped propel first-time candidate Carl Paladino to the Republican gubernatorial nomination. Since that surprise victory over former Rep. Rick Lazio, many have ascribed Paladino’s victory to the Tea Party movement, which also fueled the unexpected victories of underdog candidates in Maryland and Nevada.

But Paladino, technically, isn’t a Tea Party candidate. And Steve Cohn finds that assumption a little irksome.

"We speak English here!" is often the answer I get at Republican or Tea Party gatherings whenever I skim the crowd looking for a Spanish speaker that can produce a soundbite for my television story. I wonder if they are the same people who cringe when an automated machine tells them to "press one for English, para español, oprima el dos."

Until four years ago, New York's 19th House District in the lower Hudson Valley was considered Republican territory. But in 2006, former rock star John Hall of the band Orleans used a grassroots coalition of environmental and peace groups to beat the six-term Republican incumbent. Now, he faces a well-financed challenger in Nan Hayworth, who is campaigning for votes with a message of fiscal restraint and small government. 

Have we all gone loco in the media? Whether we like it or not Carl Paladino received 62.09% of the primary votes casted by Republicans on September 14^th.  The more widely known Rick Lazio, the presumed “sane” candidate received only 37.91% of Republican votes. Call me nuts, but as much as it may sicken us, we should acknowledge that Carl Paladino’s in-your-face ways, his candid vocabulary, political incorrectness and even his racist tinge may connect and reflect millions of New York State voters.

Depressed. That certainly describes Luzerne County, Pennsylvania, a former coal-area that now, as one local once explained it to me, “scratches to get by. Where I’ll sell you pizza, if you buy my tires.” But it also describes the mood of the voters, who, less than two years after “Yes, We Can” swept the nation, pretty much believe, “No, We Can’t.”

According to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, seven incumbent House Democrats face formidable Republican challengers in New York. For the Republicans, one of their best prospects for a pick-up is New York's 1st Congressional District that includes Long Island's Hamptons and Eastern Suffolk County.

Federal investigators are looking into how a Nebraska firm, Election Systems Software, won a $50 million contract to provide the city with new optical-scan voting machines, a law enforcement source confirms.

Welcome to It's A Free Country's The Mix, where we take some of the notable Politics Bites clips and other voices found on WNYC this week and mix 'em up. Here's what we've got on tap. Voices are in blue, connections are in bold.

It was Primary Day in New York, and in NYC one of the big stories was the new paper ballots and voting machines -- designers Milton Glaser (the man behind the I [[heart]] NY logo) and Charles Blow of the New York Times were not fans...but by the time all those ballots were counted, the winners were decided, including a defiant Charlie Rangel, Democratic Attorney General nominee Eric Schneiderman, and the new kid on the block, Carl Paladino. Paladino was part of a big night for the Tea Party, which notched victories across the country. That movement is the subject of a new book by New York Times National Correspondent Kate Zernike, who sees parallels in the movement to the 2008 Obama/Biden campaign. Joe Biden was quick to remind his '08 supporters that they would need to be active in what looks to be like a very interesting fall contest.

On a day when his once-safe race was downgraded by a political handicapper to a "toss up," U. S. Senate candidate Richard Blumenthal had the delicate task of thanking a fellow Democrat who came to raise needed dollars, while maintaining some distance.

That's not easy when the visitor is the ...

As we launched the It's A Free Country project, we had a number of guiding questions in our mind. What's broken in our current political system, if anything? What exactly does "It's A Free Country" mean? What can a new political hub add to civil conversation? We put this question not just to the professionals on our line-up of reporters and producers, but to you as well. Here are some highlights. You can see the full set of responses here, and continue to add your voice here. Here are some responses to the question What does the phrase "It's A Free Country" mean to you?

After watching how we all comported ourselves during the primaries, I guess the biggest question we should be asking is “have you no shame?” But, that’s a rhetorical question at this point, right? It seems the only thing we’re all actually able to agree on is that our national political and cultural conversation is as dangerously dopey as it’s ever been.

Many of the questions State Sen. Eric Schneiderman will have to answer as he emerges from the Democratic attorney general primary are ones that were put to him by his fellow Democratic candidates, and have now been taken up Staten Island District Attorney Dan Donovan, the Republican nominee. He dismissed them as issues so far, but whether the New York general electorate—which is much larger and more diverse than the interest-group driven base Schneiderman successfully mobilized in an ultra-low turn-out primary—will let him may decide who becomes the next attorney general of the state.

On Tuesday night, Carl Paladino, a Tea Party-backed millionaire from Buffalo, NY, won the Republican nomination for governor.  A month ago, New York State Senator Ruben Díaz Sr., (who is also a pentecostal minister and a Democrat) invited Paladino to a breakfast with more than

The Conservative Party was founded as a response to the liberal Republicanism of Gov. Nelson Rockefeller. Now, ironically, it's providing a ballot line refuge to Rick Lazio, a pro-choice candidate rejected by Republicans for not being conservative enough. To keep its ballot line, the party must receive at least 50,000 votes for governor on Election Day.