Welcome to the Capital Connection, a weekly program questioning New York State leaders
on a variety of issues.
Your host is Dr. Alan Shartock, political scientist and professor emeritus at the University
at Albany.
Distribution for the Capital Connection is made possible with the help of New York
State United Teachers, representing professionals in education and healthcare online at nyut.org.
That's the Capital Connection.
Hi, I'm Alan Shartock.
Joining us this week is our friend.
We should name him this sort of almost permanent guest on the show.
Albany Bureau Chief of the New York Daily News.
Ken Love it.
Welcome back, Ken.
Good to be here.
Well, it's great to see you here.
You know, you really do need your own radio show.
I had a predictions column last week in which I predicted, I don't know if you saw, that
you should get the honor of having the top story this year because of the story you
wrote, which I thought was magnificent about how the quote, people were calling in the
plays for their own moral index commission, which was supposed to be independent.
Thank you for that.
You're welcome.
I'm sure because you know, end of grief.
So if you look back on this last year, what jumps into your mind?
I guess I go to the governor who was riding so high for so long.
He had such an extended honeymoon period the first two years.
He went into his 30 years, who was up 70% in the polls, approval ratings.
And he really, this was the first year we saw the cracks, the inevitable cracks.
He started off strong.
He got his safe act, you know, the gun control law following, he wanted it to be the first
one in the nation following the Sandy Hook shootings.
But it also was a turning point for him because it really alienated a lot of gun owners
upstate in particular.
And in a way, it freed the Senate Republicans who really had been doing anything he asked
them to do, including allowing the gun law to make it to the floor, including same
sex marriage in 2011, legalizing it.
But this bill really alienated the Republican base and the relationship between Cuomo and
the Senate Republicans wasn't the same after that.
Let's stay on the gun law.
I find it very interesting.
I have a regular correspondent who excoriates me all the time because I want to use guns,
which are, I think, what the governor did, whatever his political motivations, because he's
a smart guy, was very gutsy.
And he took the heat that came with it.
Now, I think I heard a hint in what you just said that he may have done it in a reactionary
fashion.
In other words, he may have been reacting to the terrible Connecticut.
Oh, he absolutely was in the shooting upstate around Christmas time.
He absolutely was.
And it was very important.
Don't forget it.
As we entered the year, we still didn't know what Hillary Clinton was thinking.
I mean, technically, we still don't know.
Most people think she's going to run in 2016.
So the feeling was he really wanted this in particular, not only because he believes
in it, but because he wanted it first.
He wanted to go out there and say, we were able to respond to this gun tragedy in Connecticut,
faster than Obama, faster than anybody.
And we did it with a bipartisan legislature.
That was very important to him.
And the truth is, he had built his popularity up among Republicans, among upstaters, just
across the state, where, as I said, he was above 70% approval rating.
You do that.
So you have the political power to be able to make, get a tough bill like that past.
Yeah.
If he was in the 50s, there's no way that bill would have passed.
Right.
Now, let's go to the Senate because I'm fascinated by that.
The New York State Senate, of course, should be by the old tradition democratic, but it's
not because the four dissidents led by Jeff Klein of the Bronx attached themselves to
the Republicans.
There was real dissonance between those four and the leadership of the Senate.
And frankly, some of that involved, I think, ethnic politics.
I can't prove it, but it's my sense of that.
And the governor, of course, is in a better spot because those people are there putting
on the brakes in the state Senate.
Now you said before that you thought that he had lost his power over those Republicans,
but those Republicans are in a bad spot, right?
They are in a bad spot.
However, right now they are more afraid of Michael Long, the state party, the state conservative
party chairman, or the Tea Party, or the Tea Party, and the base, the Republican base.
And so what you ended up seeing, they did allow the gun law to get to the floor, but all
the other progressive quote unquote, more liberal legislation, whether it was the
campaign finance, the women's agenda that included a strengthening of the abortion laws,
decriminalization of small amounts of marijuana.
None of that passed.
And that was the governor's main agenda.
The governor had tacked a left at the state of the state.
He had run in the middle and he governed in the middle the first two years and some would
say more middle to right the first two years.
This year, this year he definitely tacked the law.
He tacked left and he got very little to show for it as a result.
By the way, for those who don't sell, it means you're moving the boat to the left or the
right.
Okay, he is an interesting factoid I heard.
I'm sure you've heard it too.
That some of the Democrats who have allowed the Republicans to stay in office by organizing
with them those four are worried about their own primaries that they might lose.
Yeah, there's concern.
Look, they took a lot of heat from the governor in recent weeks and they've taken a lot
of heat from the progressive liberal wing of the party.
The bottom line is they are still registered Democrats and they realize they're going to
have to.
They took heat for blocking, for being in power, for being co-leaders of the Senate, but
not being able to get these Democratic achievements through.
Now they would argue they got a lot through.
They would argue that they helped shepherd the gun law through.
They would argue they got some other stuff through.
But the major pieces people were looking for the rest of the session did not get through
despite them claiming to support it.
Now they will argue and rightfully so that even if it got to the fore, there weren't enough
votes even within the Democratic conference to pass a lot of these things.
Now here's something that I have heard from a very, very good top source in New York
state and that Klein is getting so concerned about his own status because he's a Democrat
and the Democratic Bronx and he's gone over to the, he's made a comment cause with Republicans
that we're hearing he may want to run for Congress and get out.
Have you heard that one?
I've heard different things about Jeff Klein.
He's big unraising money.
I've heard Congress.
I've heard Attorney General, but I don't think that would be acceptable.
Well, he's a prime minister.
He's a nomination item and exactly unless he went for the Republican line, which he would,
the Republicans would welcome him, but that would be a real tough run.
We'll see what he does.
I mean, it's been really difficult.
And now you're seen by the things they're coming out with, you know, proposals, they're
rejecting in a lot of ways, Governor Cuomo's calls for tax cuts next year.
And that's something Jeff Klein always talked about, property tax relief, all this tax relief.
But this year they're saying, well, if we have a $2 billion surplus, we should put, you
know, $750 million over the next five years toward middle class affordable housing.
We should allow for six weeks of paid medical and maternity leave, you know, and sick leave.
So they are really on the left side of things right now more to the left than the governor.
The big question is maybe to alleviate, alleviates the pressure on them for now, you know,
Jeff Klein has said he's going to carry Bill DeBlasio, the mayor elective New York City,
his plan to try and raise taxes in the city on the wealthy to pay for expanded pre K.
And these are all things the left wants to hear.
The question is, if he can't deliver it, if he can't get the Senate GOP on board, then
he's right back in the fire going into the election that he was before.
Let's go to something else in this Christmas season.
And that is we are now hearing that Elliott Spitzer is still married, but, you know, obviously
a marriage that's over is now a dating for one of a better word, the FLAQ for Bill DeBlasio.
And it's making the front pages of all the tabs and everything else.
What do you make of this?
Elliott Spitzer is still in the news.
It's a strange story.
Liz Smith, who by all accounts, LIS Smith is by all accounts is a very talented
communications person.
She worked for the Obama 2012 campaign as a rapid response person.
She worked for Elliott Spitzer and his failed run for city club troller.
That's where I guess they started to date.
And now she works for Bill DeBlasio.
Nobody knew they were dating until this week.
And it put DeBlasio in an awkward situation because he's trying to have a drama free
lead up to his inauguration and this certainly is not the press he wants.
Well, frankly, I'm a big Elliott Spitzer fan.
I just can't understand why it's anybody's business, but it certainly has made the front
pages of the tabs.
You know, I think it's people's business because of who they are.
Who Elliott Spitzer is, what happened to his governorship?
Why he had a resign for those who don't remember.
It was a prostitution scandal, which again, you know, you can argue well who cares, but
you know, he broke the laws as governor for doing that.
In this case, you have Bill DeBlasio.
This isn't just anybody.
It's Bill DeBlasio's chief flack, you know, who is up to become the communications director.
There is argument of public interest in it.
Now they could have handled it.
I think better.
You know, Elliott Spitzer had to do it say, look, you know, I'm separated from my wife.
We're not married anymore.
We're heading toward divorce and who I date is nobody's business.
I agree.
But he didn't do that.
Yeah.
No, I agree.
And when we see what went on, the personal life of Robert Murdoch was during his various
marriages, you know, I just think it's hypocrisy of the worst guy.
Let's go to Donald Trump, you know, he's blowing off his mouth as usual saying he could
build bridges better than the president governor could for far less money.
He might run for governor.
He might run for president.
I think it's all a lot of bushu, but I don't know what you think.
I think the man likes publicity.
Yeah.
Which is no, I don't think that's front page news either, frankly, but, uh, no, I mean,
he couldn't get elected anything.
Could he, you know, in the culture we live in today, we're celebrity Trump's pardon the
pun, Trump's everything.
Who knows?
But I don't think he'll run.
He'll have to, you know, put out his finances.
He'll have to, you know, he doesn't want to do that.
He likes the lifestyle he has, but certainly he grabs headlines.
He's a name.
He has name recognition.
He's a money.
If he did want to run, he would certainly give Andrew Cuomo a run for his money, but
I just don't see it happening though.
People close to him say he is considering it.
He's meeting with a more than 30 state GO peers in the second week of January.
What I found interesting was though, you know, again, nobody thinks he's going to run.
Yet he took a poke at Rob Astorino.
The one guy the Republicans are hoping is running the Westchester County executive, who
he says is a nice guy and a good guy, but can't he'll never beat Andrew Cuomo.
Now Alan Chartox says the following thing, speaking for himself, never for the station
that he works in, but I say, I hope he does run.
That would be very good.
Trump or Astorino?
Trump.
Because I think he'll get his come up and as a taboo and reporter, I hope he runs
too.
Right.
Right.
Right.
Right.
Okay.
So let's talk about the speaker silver.
Whatever it is, the speaker maintains his control over his house.
There's not a hint that he's going to be kicked out as speaker.
He's going to be the longest serving of he keeps his up.
It would be the longest serving speaker ever.
And he could stay as long as he wants.
But now comes another little scandal.
Let's put it that way up in Buffalo.
So tell us about that.
Yeah.
There's a Buffalo area, some women who apparently at least five of his staffers, very crass
commands, very crass comments to them.
And they filed a lawsuit complaining about sexual harassment.
Shelley Silver says he knew nothing about it until he read about the lawsuit.
And then he immediately referred it to the state to the legislative or the assembly, excuse
me, the assembly ethics committee.
Silver, which is a lot different than how we handle previous cases.
But now Silver says he won't deal with these cases at all.
He'll just immediately push it off to the ethics committee, which is what he did here.
Well, he learned something from the last time.
Yeah.
From the Vito Lopez scandal, from the microcosm scandal.
Yeah, I think he had to learn that lesson.
The question is, there always seems to be, he's weakened, but still strong.
But there's always something hanging over him.
You always feel like if one more shoe drops, that's going to be it.
I don't think this is necessarily the shoe unless they prove that you knew something.
You've got the William Rap Vogel situation going on down in the system.
That's the husband of his chief of staff who turns out to be a bit of a crook.
A crook, he stole the mastermind, or is part of a five million dollar scheme to defraud
the charity he worked for, of which he pocketed a million dollars and directed the contribution
to campaigns that were friendly to this charity with the rest or some of the rest of the
money.
I'm assuming he goes to the big house.
Yeah, I'm assuming too.
And the question is, did Silver know anything again right now?
There's no evidence to show that he did, but that could be the one that blows up if it
does.
I want to go back to the state senate for a moment, if I can.
I've heard a rumor that the governor, as you indicated before, doesn't have the state
senate doing what he wants anymore.
So therefore, I've heard a rumor that he is going to support candidates from the Democrats
who are running for the state senate, pick up a few more seats, then his credentials
with the Democrats will be raised because after all, there's a lot of people whose the
specties kept the Republicans in power.
I think the governor is in an interesting situation.
I don't know if he'll come out and say I want a Democratic senate because it is so
close.
And if he loses out, he's in trouble.
What his MO has been is to get involved in races that are kind of easy races to get
involved with.
So I wouldn't be surprised if he endorses a bunch of Democrats, but they're not going to
be in races that are up for grabs and all likelihood.
He won't go all out for that.
But he's certainly in a different situation than he's been.
He has had at best a tenuous relationship with the left of the party, even though he's
done some things that they love.
No, there's no question.
He's got the courage and the guns.
But he's had a tenuous relationship with the left.
However, they had nowhere to go because other than a pocket of lawmakers here and some
groups and good government groups there, there was no real organized opposition to what
he wanted to do.
But now you have a mayor coming in, Bill DeBlasio, the mayor of one of the most powerful cities
in the world who is, by all accounts, very liberal, very progressive.
And then he said he's going to push a progressive agenda.
Now he gives a face and a very powerful voice to the issues that everyone else was complaining
were being ignored.
Does he pull Andrew Cuomo to the left or does Cuomo end up getting some tension with
him as he tries to stay in the center?
Tom DiNapoli, the controller of New York, I'm a big fan of his.
But there are those people who have suggested that things are not good between the governor
and DiNapoli.
And then one of the issues is that DiNapoli has this huge pension fund and all that money
to invest.
And that Andrew Cuomo is the kind of guy who doesn't like other people to have power.
So therefore, the Cuomo may be coming after that board.
What have you heard about that?
Well, I mean, this goes back to Cuomo's days as Attorney General when he was investigating
the State Comptroller's office because of pay-to-play scandals under DiNapoli's predecessor
Alan Hevicy.
Don't forget Alan Hevicy went to jail over this issue.
But Cuomo didn't feel DiNapoli was acting quickly enough.
He also doesn't like the idea that it's a single person in charge of one of the largest
public pension funds in the world.
So he has pushed for a board as Attorney General.
He hasn't done so as much since becoming governor.
But the tensions between the two offices are there, particularly the governor toward DiNapoli.
Anytime DiNapoli comes out with a critical audit, you know, the blowback is unbelievable.
Oh, the state agency.
Yeah, of a state agency.
But it's like someone throwing a rock and then, you know, the governor's office taking
a bazooka and shooting back.
So who is Ben Loskey?
Ben Loskey, who some people derisively call the Comptroller General.
He was Andrew Cuomo's Tifa staff in the Attorney General's office.
He's now the head of the Department of Financial Services, which now is auditing aspects of
the Comptroller's office.
It's gotten involved in issues previously only involved by the Attorney General.
So, you know, people jokingly refer to him as the Comptroller General.
It's almost like the shadow executive branch, but he's done some good things.
He's a powerful man.
He's taken on the bank.
He's some people consider him a future statewide candidate.
He's kind of an Andrew Cuomo con and I don't know all that in tell.
Well, I don't see him as a future statewide candidate, but one of the things you said before
really is interesting to me.
And that is if Cuomo is making, if he does, says it should be a board and not a single
individual.
Now, we all know Danapoli doesn't make each of these investments.
He's surrounded by people who give him advice.
But if Cuomo has a board, he'll appoint the board and really he'll be the Comptroller General.
Well, look, you know, Andrew Cuomo is a very hands-on kind of guy.
I think Danapoli is in a stronger footing than he was for years ago.
He won, he won election of two-of-full term.
Now he's going up.
He's got the unions on his side.
The economy's in a better place than it was four years ago.
So the pension fund is in a better place than it was four years ago, terms of value.
So I think even some Republicans, top Republicans have said to me, they don't view him as vulnerable
as they do someone like Attorney General Eric Schneider.
And why Schneider bin vulnerable?
I think they feel of all the state.
I think he's done a good job.
Well, I think they feel he hasn't made a name for himself.
Like Cuomo did as Attorney General, like Elliot Spitzer did before him as Attorney General.
He hasn't made his big a name for himself.
Certainly he's done some big things.
He's this mortgage settlement, the $1 billion that the state's going to be getting.
13 billion settlement overall, he was a big part of.
He's gone after racial profiling at some of the high end department stores in the city.
So I think he's getting there.
He's had a much better year this year.
But he hasn't made a name for himself.
The Republicans feel they can tame him or tar him as a Western, an upper west side
or who only cares about those issues.
So they see him as the most vulnerable.
We'll see.
I think it's going to be tough.
It's a heavily democratic state.
Fracking.
We're going to see it or not.
Is that a prediction you're asking or not anytime soon?
You're not going to see it.
Well, the governor is being sued by one of the pro-frakers who says, get off the can
and let us know what's going to happen here and stop stalling.
This governor, as far as I'm concerned, has no good reason to support fracking right
now in New York.
I think most people when he came in thought that it was inevitable.
And I think the governor himself was surprised by two things.
One was the volume, both the number and the voice of the actual volume of opposition,
the high profile opposition that's been there.
And they really made their case out there.
Whereas the oil company said they hadn't been able to compete.
The other thing I think has been hard on the governor.
He says he's not poll driven, but others might suggest otherwise.
And this is an issue that has split New Yorkers.
And right now, I would say there's a plurality against fracking, but it's not overwhelming.
But it's passionate.
But it's passionate.
I think he just doesn't know what to do on the issue.
It really of covering him now for three years as governor.
That's the one issue that he's really did their not like he hasn't taken a position on
that he really doesn't know what to do.
And the feeling is he just doesn't want to make a decision until after the election.
Because you know, is he more likely to support fracking after the election?
I don't know.
I really don't know where his head is at on this.
My guess is it's going down, but you know, Andrew Cuomo can surprise you.
Let's talk a little bit about the moral index commission.
We only have a minute.
But he appoints this commission to follow the money no matter where.
Just not to him.
Well, he's got 30 million in the bank.
Well, right.
Good point.
Will we get any surprises out of this commission?
They've done put out a lot of subpoenas.
They put out that report and there weren't a whole lot of surprises.
It was maybe at a 97 page report, maybe two things that hadn't been already reported by
the media.
It was a report that a lot of people, especially legislators, say they could have put together
by just putting together media clips.
You didn't need hundreds of subpoenas in all the investigations.
We'll see.
And the thinking is that the governor and the commission really want to deal on ethics
reform.
The governor's already seen to be walking away, even though he didn't eyes it from, you
know, that I won't accept an ethics reform package that does not include public financing
of campaigns.
People feel that he will jettison that if he can get an ethics reform package and wrap
this up.
He doesn't want to go in an election year, worrying with the legislature.
He's had a whole bunch of ethics reforms before and they turned out to be anything but
really substantial.
You know, the reality is, and the governor has said that.
At some point, you blame the people who are being elected.
You know, you can't legislate morality and you can have all the laws on the books and
certainly there needs to be tidal laws and there should be more schools.
Well, those states have tidal laws.
Right.
And there should be more disclosure and you can argue various things.
But you also need quality of people and for whatever reason, we have just seen so many
lawmakers willing to break the law.
And that's an issue that has to be dealt with.
Always amazing.
And well, we're at a time our guest has been one of our favorites.
Conor list and Albany Bureau Chief for the New York Daily News.
Can love it?
Can as always, thanks for coming back and letting us know what's going on and we really appreciate
it.
Thank you.
Happy holidays.
And happy holidays to everyone.
The capital connection is distributed with the cooperation of the public radio stations
of New York State.
David Castina is the producer of the capital connection.
A production of WAMC Northeast Public Radio in Albany.
Support for the capital connection comes from New York State United Teachers, representing
professionals in education and healthcare.
Online at nysut.org.
Thank you.
Thank you.
