Every now and then there is a a surprising result in politics:
Nine months after Hurricane Katrina swamped his city and transformed him from virtual shoo-in to ripe target, New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin surged to a second term Saturday, besting Lt. Gov. Mitch Landrieu to maintain leadership of a city still languishing in ruin…
With all precincts reporting, Nagin had 52 percent of the vote, compared with Landrieu’s 48 percent. It was the narrowest margin of victory for a sitting mayor in the city’s modern history…
Returns showed that 113,591 people cast a ballot for mayor, or about 38 percent of the city’s 298,512 eligible voters. Nearly 25,000 people — almost one-fourth of those who cast ballots — mailed or faxed in an absentee ballot or voted in person at one of 10 balloting centers set up around the state for early voting. Turnout was 1 percent higher than in the primary.
