Who Owns George Maziarz? Pedro Espada, Apparently

Rus Thompson has a fun series of posts where he goes through the finance disclosures of various local politicians (exclusively Democrats, except Volker), and accuses them of being bought and paid for by their donors.  He always omitted people like State Senator George Maziarz (R-Newfane), mostly because Rus likes Maziarz, so he doesn’t want to embarrass him.

And embarrass him he would, because Maziarz is as bad as the rest of them.

There was much outrage and hubbub a few months ago when Antoine Thompson had Senate President John Sampson in town to help him raise funds at a big-ticket event at the Chophouse.

But Maziarz has out-scumbagged them all.

George Maziarz will be holding a $500/plate fundraiser at the Penn Club on 30 West 44th Street on September 24th at 5:30 pm.  Joining the Senator will be his guests, Republican Leader Dean Skelos and Majority Leader Pedro Espada.

Pedro Espada.

Espada – the guy who has been shown in recent months to be, as Assemblyman Mark Schroeder so aptly put it, a thug.  Espada – the guy who flipped and flopped whom he’d caucus with depending on what was in it for him. Or his kid. Espada has all but become the poster boy for graft and corruption and bad faith in Albany.  He is Maziarz’s friend and fundraiser.

I eagerly await Senator Maziarz’s next verbal bluster about those nasty, horrible downstate interests and downstate Senators.  Will Rus and his merry band of protesters hire a bus to go picket Maziarz’s NYC fundraiser?  Will they caravan (park at the Hippodrome at 44th and 6th)?

No, they won’t.  In fact, I doubt they’ll even mention it.  But make no mistake – there isn’t a single, solitary New York State Senator who isn’t beholden to downstate interests.  There isn’t a single, solitary New York State Senator whose re-election isn’t funded at least in part by powerful special interests who persuade Senators to vote in the best interests of that lobby, regardless of whether it’s in the best interests of constituents-at-large or the state.

The New York State Senate is jam-packed with careerists and hypocrites, and what ought to be your biggest peeve is the fact that we really don’t need them at all.

The Daily News reports, even more oddly, Espada is distancing himself from this event.  Imagine that.  Espada doesn’t want to have his name associated with George Maziarz’s. Coup plotters need to stick together, fellas.

As I said before, abolish the State Senate this instant.  And the Assembly.  And replace them with this.

Golisano Explains

In the New York Post, Golisano explains why a coup will lead to better government. That’s nice. But here’s the truth – it’s not about Golisano. His political team is all about personal aggrandizement, not the good of the people. That’s why the two Senators who decided to caucus with the Republicans are two of the most opportunistic, ethically challenged individuals in a body packed with them.

The rumor now is that Monserrate is upset that more Democrats didn’t sign up with their “coalition” Senate majority, so he’s coming back to the Democrat minority, leaving a 31 – 31 split. As I said before, they should actively bar him and prevent him from having anything to do with them. They should shun him and prohibit him from participating in any meaningful way.

And they should make sure to keep all tableware up where he can’t reach it.

And then they can go about just dissolving the complete, utter waste of time, money, and resources that is the New York State Senate. A useless hellhole of influence-peddling and member items. Anything that renders Dale Volker unemployed is fine by me.

Disgrace

Happily, all of the problems in Albany have been worked out completely, enabling State Senators Monserrate (D-Riker’s) and Espada (D-Somewhere near Boston Post Road) to enjoy a ballgame in seats that cost $650 a pop.

The put-upon citizens of this Godforsaken state are not amused.

UPDATE: Daily Gotham’s take is here.

Cynicism is the Only Appropriate Response

While the Buffalo News’ Editorial Board was busy tsk-tsking the Senate coup, it crossed its fingers and wished that something good might come out of it. When the coup plotters took over, they announced a bunch of rules changes, which are analyzed here by a Brennan Center representative.

More along my line of thinking was the editorial from the Syracuse Post-Standard:

In a hastily arranged ceremony Monday, state Sen. John DeFrancisco swore in an ethically challenged colleague to be a heartbeat away from the governor’s chair.

It was all in the name of reform.

First, following the Republican “coup” in the state Senate, DeFrancisco, R-Syracuse, swore in his good friend, Republican Dean Skelos of Long Island, as majority leader. Then, at Skelos’ bidding, he swore in Democrat Pedro Espada Jr. of the Bronx as temporary Senate president — putting him first in succession if something should happen to Gov. David Paterson.

Espada has been fined tens of thousands of dollars over several years for failing to disclose political contributions. At the moment, state Attorney General Andrew Cuomo is investigating Soundview Health Care Network, a nonprofit organization Espada ran until recently.

Espada’s qualifications for the powerful Senate job? He was willing to throw his vote to the Republicans in return for the post — and an apparent promise of help in next year’s election from billionaire Tom Golisano. Espada was joined in his defection by fellow Democrat Hiram Monseratte of Queens, who has been indicted on felony charges of slashing his girlfriend’s face with a broken glass.

Skelos, DeFrancisco and other Republicans insist they recruited these stalwart public servants to help them reform the Senate. “We were serious about all the good government reforms, the things Democrats said they would do as soon as they got the majority,” DeFrancisco told The Post-Standard.

Republicans controlled the state Senate for decades, but somehow didn’t catch the bug for reform until the Democrats took over in January and claimed the perks — the plum offices and committee assignments, the fawning attention of lobbyists, and control of millions of dollars in pork-barrel grants to hand out to constituents.

Read the whole thing here.

You'd Better Put that Blackberry Away

Let’s make something crystal clear.

I don’t give a crap that the Republicans took over control of the Senate with the help of two opportunistic indictees. There is not a single, solitary person who can convincingly argue that the same crowd that ran the Senate from 1965 – 2008 suddenly, magically found its reformist, small government, lower spending mojo. That is farcical.

That’s also hardly the point.

It’s Albany; the difference between a Republican and a Democrat has to do with which lobby is paying someone under the table to have your yard landscaped or your bathroom tiled.

Democrats should put away any and all notions that this was done illegally or that Malcolm Smith remains majority leader. What’s done is done. Take your lumps, move on, and regroup. What’s happened here procedurally is not the important fight.

The state’s fortunes do not rise and fall on parliamentary procedure. It’s substance that’s important. Unfortunately, procedure has consequences all its own.

What’s disturbing to me is that this is a typical Pigeon/Golisano fit of pique. It was reported and confirmed that Golisano decided on this course of action because Malcolm Smith was fiddling with his Blackberry in a meeting with him. While rude, it’s hardly the sort of thing that merits a coup unless you’re really super sensitive.

This new not-reformist not-coalition is spreading around press releases about how this is really a great victory for reform.

That must be why it all took place behind the scenes, why it had so much to do with the spreading around of member items, why the swearing-in of Espada took place in Skelos’ office, why some Florida billionaire bankrolled a coup, and why there clearly was some sort of massive quid-pro-quo for all this to happen.

If you’re going to preach reform, attaining power by parliamentary trick isn’t an auspicious start.

And what now? If someone hurts Golisano’s feelings or looks at Monica Seleš the wrong way, is he going to flip it back to the Democrats? Shall we just have the majority in the State Senate be subject to the whims of an out-of-state billionaire whose political operation is run by a guy who failed at running the Erie County Democratic Committee?

Seriously, I’m hating New York state right now really hard.

As an epilogue to this post, after the jump I’ve re-printed my open letter to Tom Golisano – the purported reformer who just bought a legislature. Continue reading »

You’d Better Put that Blackberry Away

Let’s make something crystal clear.

I don’t give a crap that the Republicans took over control of the Senate with the help of two opportunistic indictees. There is not a single, solitary person who can convincingly argue that the same crowd that ran the Senate from 1965 – 2008 suddenly, magically found its reformist, small government, lower spending mojo. That is farcical.

That’s also hardly the point.

It’s Albany; the difference between a Republican and a Democrat has to do with which lobby is paying someone under the table to have your yard landscaped or your bathroom tiled.

Democrats should put away any and all notions that this was done illegally or that Malcolm Smith remains majority leader. What’s done is done. Take your lumps, move on, and regroup. What’s happened here procedurally is not the important fight.

The state’s fortunes do not rise and fall on parliamentary procedure. It’s substance that’s important. Unfortunately, procedure has consequences all its own.

What’s disturbing to me is that this is a typical Pigeon/Golisano fit of pique. It was reported and confirmed that Golisano decided on this course of action because Malcolm Smith was fiddling with his Blackberry in a meeting with him. While rude, it’s hardly the sort of thing that merits a coup unless you’re really super sensitive.

This new not-reformist not-coalition is spreading around press releases about how this is really a great victory for reform.

That must be why it all took place behind the scenes, why it had so much to do with the spreading around of member items, why the swearing-in of Espada took place in Skelos’ office, why some Florida billionaire bankrolled a coup, and why there clearly was some sort of massive quid-pro-quo for all this to happen.

If you’re going to preach reform, attaining power by parliamentary trick isn’t an auspicious start.

And what now? If someone hurts Golisano’s feelings or looks at Monica Seleš the wrong way, is he going to flip it back to the Democrats? Shall we just have the majority in the State Senate be subject to the whims of an out-of-state billionaire whose political operation is run by a guy who failed at running the Erie County Democratic Committee?

Seriously, I’m hating New York state right now really hard.

As an epilogue to this post, after the jump I’ve re-printed my open letter to Tom Golisano – the purported reformer who just bought a legislature. Continue reading »

2+30 = Reform Coalition?

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gLr9tQwwCq8[/youtube]

As I watch this first video, I’m struck by the enthusiastic applause from the Republicans in the Senate, completely oblivious to the fact that this entire episode is an embarrassment to the people of the State of New York who sent them there. The people who just want to live their lives and be governed by competent and caring legislators who work hard, listen, think, and generally leave them alone.

I realize that this happened to Republicans before, and it doesn’t make coups less Banana-Republic-y.

My anger isn’t because the Republicans took over control of the Senate. Screw ‘em. Let them put their money where their big mouths were. Let’s see the real reform and fiscal prudence that they bitched about, yet did nothing about for the previous 40 years they had the majority in that chamber. The likelihood of seeing anything meaningful is slim.

My anger is the fact that these jerkoffs are in love with themselves, with their ostensible power and the money they get to spread around, and that they’re happy with what they accomplished yesterday. An embarrassment. Espada calls it a “mid-course correction” because the Dems in the Senate couldn’t get reforms passed? So, if we are to judge the accomplishments of a razor-thin majority by its ability to pass “reforms”, we’ll probably be flipping and flopping back and forth between meaningless Democrats and meaningless Republicans every 6 months.

The fact that Golisano and Pigeon were involved, and the swiftness of this action, merely underscores just how corrupt and corruptible our state legislature/legislators are.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gC337_i9xM[/youtube]

Espada calls it a “coalition government” that will be focused on reform. He calls it a “new beginning” of “bipartisan government” and “new reform”.

One Bronx Democrat and one Queens Democrat deciding to caucus with the 30 Republicans does not a “coalition” make. That’s two opportunists. There’s so much smoke being blown up so many million asses, it’s comical. The last thing New Yorkers needed was to be more cynical about their state government. Congratulations, Albany. You remind us how badly you suck with each passing moment.

When constitutional convention time comes around, it’ll be time to abolish state authorities and to eliminate one legislative chamber. Seeing as how the State Senate is an absolutely useless piece of farcical theater, I don’t see its point.

Congratulations to Senators Espada and Skelos for ascending to the leadership of a completely and utterly useless entity.

UPDATE: Consider this:

The truly pitiable thing about the Skelos/indictee Espada/Slasher Monserrate’s failed coup is this: there are nine days left in the session. The Dems had planned to pass campaign finance reform, rules reform, and budgetary measures. It’s all on the calendar. Not going to happen now, apparently.

Albany Asplodes

Two prominent Western New Yorkers teamed together with a couple of discontented and/or power-hungry New York City-area Democratic State Senators to engineer and execute a Republican takeover of the State Senate.

That didn’t take very long.

To upstaters who were upset at how downstate-centric the State Senate had become under Queens’ Malcolm Smith will certainly have their boo-boos salved by the upstate sensibilities of the two guys who’ll run the show from here on in – a fellow denizen of the Island of Long, Dean Skelos, will become Senate Majority Leader, and Bronx Democrat Pedro Espada, Jr. will become the Senate President.

Espada was joined by fellow Democrat Hiram Monseratte in deciding to caucus with the Republicans, and the entire deal was brokered by a billionaire resident of Florida.

Monseratte is notable for the fact that he was recently arrested for slashing his girlfriend with a broken wine glass, requiring 20 stitches. Republicans continually called for his resignation. Until they needed him, in which case they welcomed him with open arms. With long sleeves, one would imagine.

Also backing the effort was Mr. Golisano, the founder of Responsible New York, a political action committee that gave thousands of dollars to Senate Democrats last year to help them take control of the Senate. He has become increasingly critical of the party.

Mr. Golisano recently announced that he was moving his legal residence to Florida out of anger about the budget deal reached in April by Democratic leaders in Albany, which included an increase in taxes on high earners.

Mr. Golisano played a role in negotiating the original deal under which Mr. Espada and other recalcitrant Democrats gave their support to Mr. Smith.

Steve Pigeon, an aide to Mr. Golisano, said Mr. Golisano felt betrayed by Mr. Smith because the leader had not delivered on the overhaul of Senate rules he had promised upon taking power.

“He feels very strongly that he backed Malcolm Smith, and Smith didn’t keep his word, and didn’t make the changes he said he would,” Mr. Pigeon said. “What you will see now is power-sharing, real reform.”

Hey, this is how you orchestrate a tea party. Not by speechifying in the town square. You engineer a coup ensuring that some sort of vague political power be transferred from one set of mediocre legislators to another.

I have no doubt that the targeting of Senator Bill Stachowski will now promptly end since he has become again a minority party irrelevant in the State Senate. No doubt, fiscal sanity and a veritable container-ship-load of good government innovations and ideas will come from the principled visionaries Dale Volker or George Maziarz. Shining stars of the WNY political scene.

And what will become of poor Joe Mesi? Judging by what’s been written above, Golisano and Pigeon are going out of their way to play a game of make-believe called “bipartisan” or “coalition”, so no doubt Mesi’s job is safer than a Zurich vault.

Naturally, everything comes back to the fact that we don’t really have any practical use whatsoever for a state senate in the first place, and this entire body is a complete and utter hive of irrelevancy and redundancy. Albany shouldn’t exist for our amusement about coup plotters and the like. It should exist to work for our best interests.

I look forward to Golisano’s Christmastime coup when he realizes that this group of cretins is no better than the last group of cretins.

Because that’s what we have in Albany. A merry-go-round of cretins, mostly .

Brown's Camp Expels Garrett, Hoyt Responds

I briefly touched upon the story that Harvey Garrett had been unceremoniously ousted from the board of West Side Neighborhood Housing Services by a junta’s worth of Brown loyalists.

Remember – during Masiello’s administration, thugs fire-bombed Garrett’s home. Now, the inability of local politicians to be criticized or made to look like they’re not the sole answer to questions posed by weary, struggling western New Yorkers has led to another blow against Garrett, who doesn’t make any politician look good.

Never one to let a dumb Brown-camp deed go un-responded-to, Sam Hoyt pulls WSNHS’s funding made via his office and the Assembly.

37 people—many of whom had joined on the last day they could join and still vote, and who also happen live outside of the west side and work for the City of Buffalo—submitted absentee ballots to remove Mr. Garrett from the board. It is this politicization that troubles me most of all.

Hoyt’s entire letter after the jump. Continue reading »