Rebel Republican Marching On, With Baggage

By JENNIFER STEINHAUER and JIM RUTENBERG
NYT

DOVER, Del. — In the bright light of Wednesday morning, Christine O’Donnell, whose Republican primary victory upended the calculus for future control of the United State Senate, became quickly known to Americans as the woman who once made dire warnings about the negative impact of masturbation.

But Ms. O’Donnell’s decisive victory over one of the state’s most popular and longest-serving Republicans was also the latest and perhaps most stark example of the chasm between the standard-bearers of the party, whose calling card over a decade of elections has been discipline and unity, and the disenchanted and highly motivated Tea Party movement on the right.

Ms. O’Donnell, 41, who grew up in New Jersey and has lived in Delaware for roughly a half-dozen years, spent the 1990s helping run a sexual morality movement aimed at fellow Gen Xers. But she is largely unknown statewide, in spite of other runs for the Senate.

Even in this woolly primary season, Ms. O’Donnell emerges as a striking departure from the typical Senate candidate. She has struggled for years with personal finance problems — she has reported earnings of only $5,800 between most of this year and last and she has defaulted on her mortgage — and fudged her educational background and past campaign achievement, much of which was dredged up and disseminated by her own party.

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