There is an old saying that you should always listen to your mother and so when my 76 year-old mother said the week before the Democratic primary for New York's 26th congressional district that Alice Kryzan would defeat Jon Powers and Jack Davis, I listened. I just did not believe her.

For those of you who don't follow congressional elections in your spare time, I will give a brief overview of the race and how it turned out. The 26th district covers seven counties including Erie, Monroe and Orleans. Over a year ago, a young Iraq War veteran, Jon Powers, declares his candidacy for the Democratic nomination. Powers is young and bright and stands in stark contrast to the former Democratic nominee for the seat, Jack Davis.
Since congressional elections occur very two years, many Democrats remembered Davis as the guy who did not beat Tom Reynolds when Reynolds was wrapped up in a scandal involving a Republican congressman who was sending explicit text messages to congressional pages. As we were reading news accounts about when Reynolds found out about that one of his fellow Republicans didn’t realize that not all young boys like to be chased by members of congress,Democrats are licking their chops in anticipation of ousting Reynolds.

Unfortunately, Davis-a multimillionaire who financed his own campaign-decided that victory was his and thus limited his campaign to a series of TV commercials, which he figured would be a suitable substitute for getting out in the community and meeting the voters. Reynolds winds up getting a gift from the heavens, literally, as a freak October snowstorm gives him the opportunity to ride in on a white horse throughout his district, handing out federal disaster funds. While Reynolds doles out fistfuls of cash, Davis sits in his warm mansion, the same mansion where he will stay because Reynolds wins the election against Davis, for a second time.

Democrats are still licking their wounds a little over a year later as Powers quietly garners the endorsement of all of the Democratic committees in the 26th congressional district. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Tom Reynolds decides to retire-rumor has it that Mr. Reynolds will wind up with a job at a local college- and suddenly the 26th seat looks attractive. Davis then decides to come back into the picture, hoping to match the Buffalo Bills record of getting to the Super Bowl four times in a row, only to lose the big game. (To be fair, this would only have been his third loss in a row had he won the nomination)
Over the next few months, Davis gets the dirt on Powers and starts running ads scrutinizing the charity that Powers started and finds out that Powers was issued a ticket for being in a college town with a bunch of drunken college students. Davis spins the arrest and the charity startup, and makes it look like Powers committed the Manson murders and robbed small children of their lollipops. The local news media is more than happy to help Davis spread his perverted message, even though Davis does not need free media attention.
In fact, it turns out that Davis pays for just about everything, including "consulting" fees to people who should not be consulting anyone. At this point, the Powers campaign has to decide whether to go after Davis like Davis has gone after Powers, or take the high road. They go after Davis and it gets ugly. This is when my mother calls me and says Alice Kryzan is going to win because of a TV ad portraying Powers and Davis fighting over a seat on a public bench while Kryzan tells voters to reject the infighting and vote for her.
While I have been paying attention to Powers and Davis- to be more specific I was a volunteer for the Powers campaign-Kryzan quietly does what my mother said she would, she wins.

The moral of the story is simple; you should always listen to your mother instead of political pundits and consultants, especially when she tells you to play nice.