| New York, New York! |
 New York, New York!
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Mar. 30th, 2008 @ 12:49 am 
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I've been busy reading books like crazy, and during my neglect of The Judge Report a number of interesting things have happened relating to New York State politics, or what's left of it, with some national implications.
Now that the self-flagellation has stopped from interim Governor David Paterson, we are suddenly confronted with the news that former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani might be interested in being the Republican candidate for governor if there should be a special election in November. Huh?
Following quickly on that revelation is a Newsweek article theorizing that after she loses the Pennsylvania primary or otherwise drops out of the presidential race, Hillary Clinton might run for Governor if there is a special election in November. Huh?
(Meanwhile Dr. Dean, national chairman of the Democrats, is telling the party to get their act together with a presidential candidate by June).
Now, only a couple of weeks ago we were told that when the Lt. Governor is elevated to the Governor's office, he holds the title for the remainder of the term. The office of Lt. Governor remains vacant and the Senate Majority Leader is next in line of succession and here's where the OOPS comes in: supposedly if Paterson resigns or is removed from office there would be a SPECIAL ELECTION for governor (I haven't looked this up recently, but it sounds like that may be true as that is the way most every other office vacancy in the state is decided; the governor and lt. governor, comptroller and attorney general being excepted because they were elected state wide).
The Hillary! campaign of course laughed hysterically about all this, but who the heck has been feeding the press with all these Paterson stories while the politicos in Albany remain strangely silent? Have reporters suddenly found out how to look things up themselves or is something else going on? Or several somethings?
Now we have reports of a possible problem with improper use of official vehicles involving Paterson (recall we lost a Comptroller not too long ago similarly), the business about his former girlfriend going on campaign trips with him, the hotel rentals in downtown Albany for "early morning meetings" (some of which took place in the afternoon) when his residence is only about an easy twenty minute ride from the capitol (with a state driver and police escort available if necessary) and now his having funneled member items in the hundreds of thousands to a hospital where his wife happened to be on the payroll as a lobbyist.
The Albany Times Union is a house organ for the Democrats:
From a T-U blog:
Asked at a press conference this morning, Gov. David Paterson said he never provided cars to transport people while he was lieutenant governor or Senate minority leader.
“People rode in the car with me from time to time,” he quickly added before leaving the podium. Some reporters have been looking into the possibility of a chauffeurgate involving Paterson.
If Paterson leaves that means that three of the four state-wide elected officials who took office just over a year ago will have left office due to one form of corruption or another, leaving only Attorney General Andy Cuomo who now will be boxed out of his gubernatorial hopes by Hillary Clinton.
Wow.
Read and comment on my novel The Evil Has Landed. Free!
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| From: | ![[info]](http://p-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) meep |
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| Date: |
March 30th, 2008 10:01 am (UTC) |
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Someone mentioned elsewhere that none of the Albany pols are really interested in going after Paterson, not just because he's likable and also one of them (so he may be buddy-buddy with them, as opposed to what Spitzer was like), because Paterson's political sins are the same ones the rest of them would be caught out on.... if Paterson gets the boot for what's SOP for Albany, then the electorate might try to boot out the rest of them, and they can't be kicked off that gravy train.
But if there's a special election involving huge names, I guess that would distract from the endemic corruption in Albany. Imagine a situation where Hillary Clinton is more ethical than most of the pols around..... sheesh.
The flaw in this that I see is that I don't believe that Hillary will quit the race for the White House between now and the Democratic convention. It doesn't matter if she doesn't have the delegates, or if she's ripping the party apart, or if her continued presence merely increases McCain's chances.
From her perspective, even if by staying in she has a slim chance, it beats the zero chance she has if she quits. So why should she "settle" for Albany when she's thinks still got a chance at the White House?
And I think that if she can't win, then she doesn't give a whit who does...so damaging the Democrats in the process of losing doesn't bother her a bit.
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| From: | rgoing |
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| Date: |
April 1st, 2008 04:53 am (UTC) |
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Maybe. But this scenario has until August to play out. By then she'll pretty much know.
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