Cenedella out

Wealthy businessman Marc Cenedella, who until Tuesday had his sights set on unseating U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., has dropped his Senate bid.

The New York Times is reporting that Cenedella, a Republican, ended his fledgling campaign because of a "torrent of criticism" over a blog that contained racy remarks. This from the New York Times:

In recent months, Mr. Cenedella had been traveling across the state trying to build support for a campaign to be the Republican nominee to take on Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand, a first-term Democrat.

Mr. Cenedella, 41, the founder of TheLadders.com, a job-search Web site, excited party officials and donors with his Ivy League background, his success in building a business and his promise to tap his wealth in the race.

But last week, The New York Times reported that, until recently, blog entries with titles like “Sexy vs. Skanky,” “Dating Advice for Girly Girls,” “He Stole My Weed” and “High Quality Dope” were on a Web site that bore his photograph and the title “The personal blog of Marc Cenedella.”

You can read the full story here.

Cenedella's exit is good news for Maragos, who is now the sole Republican challenger to Gillibrand. Just yesterday, Maragos picked up the endorsement of a key conservative leader.