THE "PORK" IN NEW YORK, Thoughts of an older American on Constitutional Government in the USA Options

[Livyjr]

"STEAMROLLER" SPITZER FOR PRESIDENT!

"STEAMROLLER" SPITZER FOR PRESIDENT!

That was the DRUMBEAT once again this morning ....

On the Dr. Alan Chartock Show ( http://www.alanchartock.com/ ) on WBKK FM up here ( http://www.wmht.org/radio/wbkk.php ) ....

And this time ...

The DRUM was being beaten by New York State Senator Neil Breslin ( http://www.congress.org/congressorg/bio/?i...L&chamber=S ) .....

A New York State Senator from Albany County in the State of New York ....

Who made the prediction ....

That the "STEAMROLLER" ....

Was only going to be in Albany for a short while ....

Before moving on to the White House down there in Washington, D.C. ...

THE WEEKLY STANDARD

"Troopergate, New York-Style - Eliot Spitzer's character problem"

by Michael Goodwin and Fred Siegel

08/20/2007, Volume 012, Issue 46

Even by the scandal-pocked history of New York politics, Eliot Spitzer's fall from grace is extraordinary.

A mere seven months into his term after a landslide victory, the Empire State's brash new governor is openly ridiculed as a liar and worse.

An astonishing 80 percent of respondents tell pollsters they want the governor to testify under oath to prove his claim that he had nothing to do with "troopergate," a dirty-tricks plot to smear Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno, a Republican rival.

His fellow Democratic pols are largely abandoning him.

After two investigations found that his top aides used the state police for a political hit job, and with four more probes gearing up, one of which could bring indictments, Spitzer is suddenly a lonely man.

As one prominent supporter put it, "nobody believes him when he says he didn't know."

Left unsaid was the glee that many feel at Spitzer's comeuppance.

This is not the turn the script was supposed to take.

The boy wonder, elected state attorney general at the tender age of 39, rocketed to fame as the Sheriff of Wall Street.

Following the tech bust on Wall Street, Spitzer emerged as the defender of the little guys who had been bilked by the insiders.

He exposed the double dealing investment advice handed out to small customers by Merrill Lynch, the after-market-hours trade by Canary Capital, and kickback schemes by insurance giant Marsh & McLennan.

That he sometimes was more zealous than fair was, to his supporters, beside the point.

Following the massive Enron, WorldCom, and Global Crossing scandals, and as the Bush administration and the SEC slept, Spitzer stepped into the vacuum.

The field was open for an ambitious young gunslinger with a taste for headlines and scalps--an opening tailor-made for Spitzer.

The political payoff was fast and huge.

For Democrats demoralized by Al Gore's defeat and dismayed by the victories of Republicans Rudy Giuliani and Michael Bloomberg in New York City and Governor George Pataki in Albany, Spitzer was a godsend.

His image as a tough prosecutor fighting the battles of what he called "the investor class," supposedly an emerging GOP constituency, propelled him to stardom.

He was variously described by the national press as the second coming of Theodore Roosevelt, Batman in a three-piece suit, and the new King Arthur.

A New York Times Magazine story in 2005 asked, "Is a prosecutor's zeal what the Democrats need?"

The angry avenger suddenly seemed the party's savior.

Long before the 2006 gubernatorial election, he was the presumed winner, especially after Pataki decided not to seek a fourth term.

Already there was talk that Spitzer had his eye on bigger fish--becoming the first Jewish president of the United States.

The way he was going, it certainly seemed possible.

Ah, but there is a catch.

His admirable argument about how even the big guys have to play by the rules didn't apply to his own conduct.

Eliot Spitzer, it turns out, is a deeply flawed savior.

From the very beginning of his political career, there was evidence of a character problem, one marked by an uneasy relationship with the truth.

He misled the public, the press, and state election officials about how he was financing both his failed 1994 race for attorney general and his successful one in 1998.

Confronted by Michael Goodwin about his repeated lies on the subject just before election day in 1998, Spitzer didn't deny it.

"I had to," he said of his lies, as though it was the most natural thing to do, and therefore acceptable.

His reason, he said, was that his father, who had funded his campaigns to the tune of some $7 million, wanted to keep his role private.

But even that wasn't the whole truth.

As a neophyte with no political base, Spitzer would not have been able to raise the money for his first campaign legitimately, so the candidate himself had reason to keep the source secret.

These were the days before Bloomberg broke the taboo on the ultra-rich running for office, so Spitzer was careful not to advertise that he was the scion to a real estate empire said to be worth $500 million.

Indeed, Spitzer has always been uncomfortable about his background, often suggesting he was a tough guy by saying "I'm from the Bronx" even though he grew up in a mansion in the exclusive Riverdale section.

He never set foot in a public school, going through a series of prestigious private ones: Horace Mann School, Princeton, Harvard Law.

Spitzer still goes to great lengths to hide the extent to which his multimillionaire father supports him.

Few people realize that Spitzer, his wife, and three daughters do not live in the governor's mansion in Albany, but instead live rent-free in a huge apartment overlooking Manhattan's Central Park.

The 25-story building, on Fifth Avenue near the Metropolitan Museum of Art, has just two apartments per floor, and Spitzer lives in a pad that real estate brokers say would easily go for $20,000 a month on the open market.

His father, Eliot Spitzer's office said, pays unspecified gift taxes for his son's use of the apartment in the building, which the father owns.

After quitting the Manhattan DA's office in the early '90s, Spitzer toyed with starting a local think-tank modeled on the centrist Democratic Leadership Council, and, in the days when Giuliani was shaking up Gotham, was a rare Democrat saying nice things about the GOP mayor.

Yet Giuliani, also a former prosecutor, did not return the favor.

He once joked that, after being in a room with Spitzer, "I feel like I need a shower."

Democratic voters might have reached a similar conclusion, for Spitzer's first attempt at elective office was a dud.

In that run for attorney general in 1994, he finished fourth in a field of four Democrats seeking the party's nomination.

Instead of going into the family business--something he said he would have done if all else failed--Spitzer got into his car and drove around upstate New York, making nice with local pols.

He told New York magazine he racked up 70,000 miles in what he called "purgatory."

Others have hinted that he wasn't just spending time--he was buying support with Dad's cash.

Whatever the truth, the turnabout was dramatic.

Spitzer easily rolled through the 1998 primary and was on the verge of ousting Republican incumbent Dennis Vacco when he finally admitted that the millions in loans he had taken out for both races were really being paid off by his father--a no-no under even New York's notoriously lax election laws.

To describe Spitzer's campaign books as convoluted would be an understatement.

Early in the 1994 campaign, Spitzer took out a $4 million loan from a bank, using as collateral eight condominium apartments his father had given him.

The apartments, in 200 Central Park South, a prime location near the Plaza Hotel, had been leased to tenants, with Eliot living off the income stream, probably several hundred thousand dollars annually.

(Spitzer also received $200,000 from his father for "consulting.")

Spitzer then loaned the $4 million to his campaign.

Under state law, however, campaign loans automatically become donations if they are not repaid by election day.

They were not repaid in this case, and, even worse for Spitzer, he lost.

His $4 million loan was now deemed a contribution, and he owed the money to the bank.

Four years later, the public learned how Spitzer repaid the bulk of the loan: He borrowed $3 million from his father, which he then gave to the bank.

Under the terms of the loan, Eliot had 10 years to pay his father back the $3 million, at 7 percent interest.

Early in the '98 race, Spitzer repeated the process.

He got a new bank loan, this time for $4.8 million, again using the eight apartments as collateral, then gave the money to his campaign, again as a personal loan.

When he disclosed the '98 transaction, Vacco complained that no bank would lend anyone that much money based on Spitzer's reported income, and began demanding details on how Spitzer repaid the '94 loan.

Spitzer responded by saying that the $4.8 million loan covered both of his campaigns, a statement he made over and over.

Then suddenly, late in the race, Spitzer confessed that the $4.8 million loan covered only 1998, and that he had repaid the 1994 bank loan by borrowing from his father.

The news hurt him and gave Vacco a lift, but it was not enough to stem the partisan tide in a strong Democratic year that saw Chuck Schumer defeat incumbent senator Al D'Amato by 10 points.

Spitzer won, but he had a new problem: He owed the bank $4.8 million, in addition to owing $3 million to his father.

Of course, technically, the $4.8 million was owed to him by his own campaign.

As for the $3 million, Dad was not exactly a demanding creditor, since his terms did not require any payments for 10 years.

As the incoming attorney general, Spitzer was in a commanding position to raise the money from contributors to repay himself.

Although the maneuver would have been legal, it would have failed the smell test.

It's one thing for a candidate to solicit contributions during the race, it's quite another for a victorious candidate to do the same thing to repay himself.

The Daily News editorial board recognized the ethical sinkhole and urged Spitzer to make a clean break by declaring the $4.8 million a donation and forgo asking contributors for money.

"If I did that, I'd be a pauper," Spitzer told the paper.

But he did another honorable thing, or so it seemed.

In February 1999, a month after he took office, he sold the eight apartments for $6.1 million to repay the 1998 bank loan and his father some of the money he owed him.

The News asked Spitzer who had bought the apartments.

The answer was shocking, if not surprising: Dad.

Bernard Spitzer paid $6.1 million to buy back the same apartments he had once given his son as a gift.

(Only in late 2004, as he prepared to run for governor, did Spitzer finally finish paying back his father for the 1994 loan. Spitzer told Daily News editorial writer Michael Aronson that he had sold $4 million of municipal bonds to retire the remaining debt, with interest. It's a safe bet that, somewhere along the line, that money had also come from Dad.)

Even now, the family wheeling and dealing hasn't stopped.

Eliot's government salary when he became attorney general in 1999 was about $150,000, not nearly enough to support his lifestyle, even with a free apartment.

The rental stream from the eight condos had been Eliot's main source of income, and now it was gone.

Again, Dad came to the rescue.

Several days after buying the apartments back, he secretly made Eliot and his other two adult children each one-third partners in a real estate firm called Spitzer-Madison.

For his share, which required him to put up no money and allowed him to be a passive investor, Eliot was given the income stream from a block of high-end storefronts on glitzy Madison Avenue that were part of a master lease on an apartment house the father owns.

That made the attorney general, and now the governor of New York, a landlord of such tenants as Church's shoes, Ghurka leather store, and jeweler Georg Jensen.

The rents paid him $949,581 that first year, according to financial filings.

Daily News investigative reporter Douglas Feiden, who unearthed the cozy landlord deal, questioned Spitzer's office in 2006 about the arrangement.

Eliot Spitzer's office said Bernard Spitzer paid a gift tax when he made his three children partners in Spitzer-Madison.

The spokesman wouldn't disclose the gift's value or the amount of tax Bernard paid, saying that Spitzer prefers to keep details of his personal finances private.

That Spitzer is embarrassed by the fact that he is living off his father's money is clear from the way he fought disclosure of his father's role and continued support.

Yet the plutocratic populist seems to want it both ways.

"Money is a cancer in politics," he told an interviewer in 1998.

But it's not a cancer he intends to eliminate.

As Feiden also documented, Spitzer has a questionable relationship with his family's foundation, the Bernard and Anne Spitzer Charitable Trust.

With assets of nearly $26 million, it has given away millions to good causes such as combating juvenile diabetes and battling anti-Semitism.

Eliot, his brother and sister, and parents all serve as unpaid advisers who decide where the money goes.

Reporter Feiden discovered that Spitzer had continued to serve quietly in that role even as attorney general, when he was responsible for regulating charities, a fact that brought criticism from good-government groups.

The dual roles are more than an appearance of conflict, with some of the trust's donations helping Eliot's career.

The trust has donated at least $140,000 to public advocacy groups that have, in turn, endorsed Eliot for political office.

An offshoot of the Working Families Party, a liberal group that has a coveted line on the state election ballot, and a foundation tied to NARAL, the abortion-rights group, have each gotten tens of thousands from the Spitzer trust while endorsing Eliot.

In one remarkable instance, the head of NARAL blasted Spitzer's primary opponent in 2006 for governor as "not trustworthy" even though the opponent and Spitzer had nearly identical records and positions in support of abortion rights.

NARAL has received $101,000 from the Spitzer trust since Eliot became a trustee.

Most of the trust's millions have been invested with hedge funds, whose managers contributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to Eliot's campaigns.

That fact led a Common Cause official to caution that "his private life, family life, and charitable life could all bleed into his public life."

Spitzer dismissed those concerns, and a state ethics panel later allowed him to continue to advise the trust, though he would have to recuse himself if there were to be an investigation.

In terms of raising money for his campaigns, Spitzer has come a long way.

He was such a prohibitive favorite to become governor in 2006 that he had no trouble raising nearly $40 million, with his family giving at least $326,000.

And although he captured 80 percent of the vote in the Democratic primary and 69 percent in the general election, Spitzer pushed the ethical envelope.

Indeed, when victory was his, Spitzer proposed a series of changes to election laws that would have outlawed some of the very practices he used.

For instance, New York state allows individuals to make direct contributions to candidates of $50,100, one of the highest totals in states that have limits.

But a loophole allows individuals to give an endless number of times if they do so under different legal umbrellas.

A favorite tactic is to form limited liability companies, or LLCs, which allows individuals to contribute that $50,100 maximum under each LLC.

One study estimated that Spitzer took in $1.8 million that way, with some of the companies apparently created solely for the purpose of making the extra contributions.

In the "reform" proposals he made in early 2007, Spitzer would have limited the individual contributions to $10,000 and closed the LLC loophole.

Astonishingly, he denounced opponents of the plan as "immoral," even as he was sending out a fundraising letter inviting his supporters to continue to donate up to the $50,100 limit.

He also promised that "bundlers" who raised $1 million from friends and family for his 2010 reelection race would get private time with Spitzer and his family.

About the same time, Spitzer paid $4.6 million for a country home in upstate New York set on about 100 acres.

Spitzer's arch-political enemy Joe Bruno, the Republican state senate majority leader, is a genius at distributing political pork.

Bruno, who is under federal investigation for, among other things, helping a contributor secure state contracts, is a 78-year-old grandfather whose courtly ways and white hair belie this former boxer's toughness.

With Democrats holding a huge edge in the Assembly, and its leader intimidated by Spitzer into submission on virtually every issue, Bruno is all that stands between Spitzer and effective control of all three branches.

Although Bruno's GOP margin has shrunk to two seats in the 62-body Senate, iron-tight leadership control enables him to block any legislation.

He is also in a position to deny Spitzer confirmation of any judicial picks.

Bruno resisted Spitzer's campaign-law changes, arguing that with Spitzer's wealth and with unions giving heavily to mostly Democratic causes, Republicans would soon be extinct.

He accused Spitzer of being "obsessed" with the issue, and denounced the governor for linking it to other issues.

Albany, in effect, was stalled over the governor's stance, so Bruno adjourned his chamber and sent his members home for summer recess.

Spitzer denounced Bruno, calling him a "senile piece of s--" to one lawmaker, and talked openly about trying to replace him with a more compliant Republican.

The result was gridlock, familiar ground in Albany, but one of the things Spitzer had promised to fix.

His campaign motto was "Day One, Everything Changes," and he had cited secret negotiations, higher taxes, and unchecked spending as targets for his new administration.

Yet it was already clear that Spitzer no longer saw those practices as problems.

His first budget, despite repeated promises not to raise taxes, did just that.

He increased spending by close to 8 percent--nearly triple the rate of inflation.

Perhaps most troubling, he continued the discredited practice of meeting with legislative leaders in private to make secret deals on laws and spending.

When Michael Goodwin confronted Spitzer by noting that not a single public hearing had been held on any major issue before the deals were cut, Spitzer responded icily.

"I'm the governor of the state," he said.

"I'll be Lyndon Johnson."

"I'll craft the deals and I'll get the job done."

"You will write and I will do."

"That's why you're there and I'm here."

That confrontational mindset revealed itself in a number of tasteless incidents.

A legislator who had the nerve to gently question Spitzer was speechless when the governor referred to himself as a "f--ing steamroller" who would smash everything in his path.

Another lawmaker described Spitzer in a private meeting as "eyes bulging and neck veins popping."

The target of that attack later said:

"I've never seen an eruption like that, except in a child who's 6 or 7 years old."

"If we'd had a camera, we would have had to have the governor committed."

As temper tantrum reports increased, others from the past took on a new light.

One incident centered on John Whitehead, the former head of Goldman Sachs.

At the time of the incident, in late 2005, Whitehead was serving as the unpaid chairman of the city-state agency guiding the rebuilding of the World Trade Center.

Whitehead had written an op-ed article in the Wall Street Journal that criticized Spitzer's conduct in a case involving Hank Greenberg, head of AIG, the huge insurance company.

Under the headline "Mr. Spitzer Has Gone Too Far," Whitehead wrote:

"Something has gone seriously awry when a state attorney general can go on television and charge one of America's best CEOs and most generous philanthropists with fraud before any charges have been brought, before the possible defendant has even had a chance to know what he personally is alleged to have done, and while the investigation is still under way."

As Whitehead later recounted in a second Journal piece, Spitzer went ballistic.

"After reading my op-ed piece, Mr. Spitzer tried to phone me," Whitehead wrote.

"I was traveling in Texas but he reached me early in the afternoon."

"After asking me one or two questions about where I got my facts, he came right to the point."

"I was so shocked that I wrote it all down right away so I would be sure to remember it exactly as he said it."

"This is what he said: 'Mr. Whitehead, it's now a war between us and you've fired the first shot.'"

"'I will be coming after you.'"

"'You will pay the price.'"

"'This is only the beginning and you will pay dearly for what you have done.'"

"'You will wish you had never written that letter.'"

Whitehead continued: "I tried to interrupt to say he was doing to me exactly what he'd been doing to others, but he wouldn't be interrupted."

"He went on in the same vein for several more sentences and then abruptly hung up."

"I was astounded."

"No one had ever talked to me like that before."

"It was a little scary."

Such eruptions were so commonplace that people began mocking the governor--riffs on the steamroller incident were a favorite--but by early July, the joking stopped.

That's when the first reports surfaced that Spitzer's office had used the state police to try to gather dirt on Bruno.

As a report by the new attorney general, Andrew Cuomo, later put it, Spitzer's communications director used the pretext of a Freedom of Information request from a newspaper--one was filed only much later--to have the state police track Bruno's use of state aircraft.

The goal was to make it seem that Bruno was breaking the law by taking the planes and helicopters to political meetings instead of on state business, apparently in the hope that a damaged Bruno would agree to Spitzer's campaign proposals or maybe even resign.

Unfortunately for Spitzer, the report by Cuomo, a fellow Democrat and the son of former Gov. Mario Cuomo, found that while no laws were broken, the conduct of Spitzer's aides was so egregious that punishment was warranted.

The narrative of the dirty-tricks plot seemed right out of Richard Nixon's playbook, and almost immediately the questions arose about what Spitzer knew and when he knew it.

He denied any role or even knowledge and said his aides had "misled" him.

He suspended one and transferred another--rather light punishment if indeed he was "misled" about a plot that had caused him such trouble.

Few believed his claims of innocence, and suspicions grew dramatically when it emerged that lawyers from Spitzer's office had blocked two of the main players from talking to Cuomo's investigators and had not turned over all emails, including any to the governor.

Because Cuomo did not have subpoena power for the case, the withholding of testimony and potential evidence was probably not a crime.

But the revelations made a mockery of Spitzer's claim that his office had "cooperated fully," and in the court of public opinion, the verdict was swift: guilty.

More than half of those surveyed in three different polls said the governor was lying.

Bruno and senate Republicans have launched at least two investigations, and the state ethics commission, which Spitzer controls, also said it would try to get to the bottom of the issue.

All three have subpoena power, though Spitzer has hinted he would not testify before the Republican panels, setting up a potential legal showdown.

But after both Mario Cuomo and former New York City mayor Ed Koch, Democrats and Spitzer supporters, publicly urged him to testify under oath to clear his name, Spitzer responded by saying he would "love" to do just that.

It's a promise that will be tested.

The Albany County district attorney announced on August 1 that he will conduct his own investigation to make sure no laws were broken.

The development raised the distinct possibility that the Sheriff of Wall Street and his top team will have to face a grand jury.

The prospect of legal jeopardy for his staff, and maybe even himself, would seem to end any remaining illusions about a glorious future for Spitzer.

He is already damaged politically, perhaps beyond repair.

Any new sordid details could finish him.

With his reputation shredded and his administration under fire, he is now in desperate need of a savior himself.

Michael Goodwin is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and a columnist for the New York Daily News; Fred Siegel is a professor of history at the Cooper Union for Science and Art and the author of The Prince of the City: Giuliani, New York and the Genius of American Life (Encounter Books).

http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Publ...0cljul.asp?pg=1

[Livyjr]

NEW YORK MAGAZINE

Intel

8/13/07 12:48 PM

"Spitzer Brings in PR-Fight Reinforcements"

Embroiled in a dogfight with Joe Bruno over what he knew and when he knew it, Governor Spitzer is ramping up his press offensive in Albany, hoping to turn the tide on a story that hasn't looked good and won't seem to end.

Late last week, the State Democratic Party hired the PR firm that successfully fought to block the Starrett City sale earlier this year to handle Spitzer's wartime press against Bruno and his fellow Republicans in the State Senate.

Jonathan Rosen, a principal of the firm, BerlinRosen, says he spoke with Spitzer chief of staff Richard Baum several times last week before accepting the gig.

Now, though, he's raring to go.

"The Senate investigative hearings are like the legislative equivalent of O.J. Simpson's hunt for the real killer," he told us, taking his new talking points out for a spin.

"They're over the top, they're overplaying their hand badly, and it's going to backfire."

His new client is sure hoping so.

—Geoffrey Gray

http://nymag.com/daily/intel/2007/08/spitz...fight_rein.html

[Livyjr]

"AMD still mulling Malta"

By ERIC ANDERSON , Deputy business editor, Albany, New York Times Union

Last updated: 2:02 p.m., Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Advanced Micro Devices Inc. has completed its initial design review and expects to make a decision by the end of the year on whether to immediately proceed with groundbreaking and construction on a proposed $3.2 billion chip fabrication plant in Malta, or defer it a while longer, an AMD representative said today.

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THE NEW YORK POST

"SPITZ PAL CUTS OUT OF PROBE"

By FREDRIC U. DICKER

August 14, 2007 -- ALBANY - A friend of Gov. Spitzer's has dropped out of the state Ethics Commission probe of the Troopergate scandal involving dirty tricks by Spitzer aides against the state's most powerful Republican, it was revealed yesterday.

Carl "Chip" Loewenson Jr., a partner in the Manhattan law office of Morrison & Foerster, who was appointed to the commission by then-Attorney General Spitzer in 2001, recused himself "because he's a friend of the governor's," said commission spokesman Walter Ayres.

The five-member commission is headed by another Spitzer appointee, former Fordham Law School Dean John Feerick, who will continue to serve along with two appointees of former Gov. Pataki and an appointee of former state Comptroller Alan Hevesi.

The Ethics Commission launched its probe in the wake of Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's report last month that found top aides to Spitzer, along with a top State Police official, conspired to gather and then release information in a smear campaign aimed at Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno (R-Rensselaer.)

http://www.nypost.com/seven/08142007/news/...c_u__dicker.htm

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THE NEW YORK TIMES

"With Spitzer Inquiry, Albany’s Eyes Are on Ethics Panel Just as It Is Changing"

By NICHOLAS CONFESSORE

Published: August 13, 2007

ALBANY, Aug. 10 — In 39 years as a litigator, Herbert Teitelbaum, who became executive director of the State Ethics Commission last month, sued Boston to let college students vote.

He sued school officials in Philadelphia for not providing better English instruction for Hispanic children.

And he took on the cities of White Plains, New Rochelle, Mount Vernon and Yonkers for discriminating against blacks applying for jobs as firefighters.

“I say to clients, ‘I take the case wherever it goes,’ ” Mr. Teitelbaum said recently, sitting in his new office.

“Wherever it takes me, I follow it.”

Even, perhaps, to the inner sanctum of Gov. Eliot Spitzer.

Last month, the commission’s investigators began a preliminary review of whether Mr. Spitzer’s aides violated ethics laws when they asked the State Police to help them gather damaging information on the Senate majority leader, Joseph L. Bruno, the state’s top Republican and Mr. Spitzer’s chief antagonist.

It is perhaps the biggest test that the commission — long criticized by watchdog groups as overly secretive and glacially slow to act — has faced since its creation 20 years ago.

And it comes just before the commission is poised to take on a new, more prominent role on the capital’s ethics beat.

On Sept. 22, the Ethics Commission will absorb another state body, the Lobbying Commission, and become a new Commission on Public Integrity, with jurisdiction over employees of the executive branch and the thousands of lobbyists who work each day to sway them.

The new commission will inherit most of the staffs and continuing investigations of its two precursors.

But it will also have broader powers and a larger, 13-member board.

Most of the new board will be appointed by Mr. Spitzer.

“Obviously this is a tricky situation,” said Russ Haven, the legislative counsel for the New York Public Interest Research Group, referring to the commission’s preliminary inquiry into the governor’s staff, “partly because it’s a big matter, and partly because it will be an early predictor of how the new commission will perform.”

The effort to tarnish Mr. Bruno was detailed in a report last month by Attorney General Andrew M. Cuomo, roiling Albany and leading to calls from Republican officials for a special prosecutor.

Mr. Spitzer rebuffed those calls but said he would gladly testify under oath before the Ethics Commission, which has subpoena power.

But Republicans declared the commission untrustworthy, noting that its new chairman, John D. Feerick, and another member of the five-member board were appointed by Mr. Spitzer.

They have also complained that partners at Mr. Teitelbaum’s former law firm, Bryan Cave, have made campaign contributions to the governor.

“They’re not elected by the people,” Mr. Bruno said of the commission members during a recent radio appearance.

He added, “They’re not unbiased, objective people.”

Even some people without a personal and political stake in the matter have doubts about the commission.

With a staff of 20, the commission currently has jurisdiction over 250,000 executive-branch employees, who submit 26,000 financial disclosure forms a year.

Under state law, it serves in an awkward dual role, both providing confidential advice on ethics to state employees and imposing fines or recommending other punishment in some cases.

Partly for that reason, according to Mr. Teitelbaum and others, the commission’s board is required to meet and deliberate in secret.

Most advisory opinions it issues remain confidential; a smaller number of opinions, typically those on questions that have not previously come before the commission, are made public but redacted of personal information.

All the paperwork is locked away among the ranks of massive dull gray cabinets that dominate the commission’s offices.

“It’s very much like an attorney-client relationship,” said Karl J. Sleight, the previous executive director of the commission, who is now in private practice.

“Enforcement is part of the mission."

"But their primary mission is as counsel to executive-branch employees."

"The goal is to prevent people’s reputations from being destroyed inappropriately.”

When the commission issues an advisory opinion on ethics law, its critics say, it sometimes interprets the law too expansively.

Case in point: During the 1990s, the commission advised the Pataki administration that public officials could use state aircraft on trips that included nonofficial business like fund-raising events, so long as the trips also included at least some official business.

Such trips by Mr. Bruno were what Mr. Spitzer’s aides were hoping to learn more about, Mr. Cuomo found in his report, when they set the scandal in motion by asking officials of the State Police to recreate the senator’s travel itineraries.

“This whole travel issue has arisen because the Ethics Commission has refused to draw a bright-line standard,” Mr. Haven said.

What kind of standard they set for Mr. Spitzer may not be clear for weeks.

The commission does not typically divulge whether an investigation is under way in any particular case, unless the board votes to issue a notice of reasonable cause, indicating that it believes that a violation of state ethics law may have occurred.

Last year, the commission issued five such notices.

One of them went to Alan G. Hevesi, then the state comptroller, making him the only statewide elected official whom the commission has ever found in violation of state ethics laws.

P. David Soares, the Albany County district attorney, used that finding as the basis for a criminal investigation that ended with Mr. Hevesi’s resigning and pleading guilty to charges of fraud.

The commission’s defenders point to the Hevesi case as a model for how any potential investigation of a governor would progress.

That inquiry was completed in less than a month, and a commissioner appointed by Mr. Hevesi recused herself from voting on the final determination.

“I think the biggest criticism might be that it has not taken on the full array of what it governs,” said Barbara Bartoletti, legislative director of the League of Women Voters of New York State.

“But it did undertake Hevesi.”

Ms. Bartoletti and others praised Mr. Feerick, a former dean of the Fordham University School of Law and an acclaimed ethics expert, saying his involvement promised a more aggressive posture by the commission and its successor.

“Perhaps we’re putting all of our eggs in one basket, but certainly with Feerick driving it, we can at least be sure they will follow their mission,” she said.

The commissioners currently serve staggered five-year terms, with the comptroller and attorney general each appointing one member and the governor appointing three.

When the new commission comes into being next month, Mr. Spitzer will appoint 7 of the 13 commissioners, with the rest appointed by the comptroller, the attorney general, and both the minority and majority party in each legislative house.

Mr. Feerick will be reappointed chairman, Mr. Spitzer has said.

Mr. Teitelbaum will need to be reappointed by the new board, as he was by the current board.

Until the new commission is formed, two of Gov. George E. Pataki’s appointees remain on the board, along with Mr. Feerick.

So do Mr. Hevesi’s appointee and one made by Mr. Spitzer when he was still attorney general.

Though the terms of both appointees have expired, neither Mr. Cuomo nor Mr. Hevesi’s successor as comptroller, Thomas P. DiNapoli, has gotten around to naming a replacement.

Mr. Cuomo is still reviewing candidates for the job, according to a spokesman for Mr. Cuomo, Jeffrey Lerner.

Dennis Tompkins, a spokesman for Mr. DiNapoli, said the comptroller was now doing the same, six months after taking office.

“It didn’t seem like a real hot issue at the time,” said Mr. Tompkins.

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/13/nyregion...mp;ref=nyregion

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK TIMES

"Judging Ethics in Albany"

Published: August 12, 2007

As a general rule, the arbiters of ethics in New York State’s capitol are not a particularly energetic bunch.

Despite numerous indictments of legislators in recent years, for example, the Legislative Ethics Committee has seemed asleep most of the time.

And the State Ethics Commission, which has moved into the spotlight as the prime investigator of Gov. Eliot Spitzer, has in the past been a politically cautious group.

Things have changed, at least when it comes to investigating the governor and his staff.

There have already been two investigations into how Mr. Spitzer’s staff got the State Police to release State Senator Joseph Bruno’s travel records (records that should have been in the public domain anyway).

And at least four more inquiries are in the works, including an important one by the Ethics Commission.

At some point soon, the public should know whether this is a real problem for the governor or a case of pure anti-Spitzer venom — of which it turns out there is plenty around.

Republicans take delight in Mr. Spitzer’s troubles because he is a Democrat.

Some investment banking bigwigs are also enjoying what they see as payback for Mr. Spitzer’s earlier investigations of Wall Street.

And legislators in both parties — many of whom have been lying in wait for Mr. Spitzer’s team to do something even slightly wrong — are content because the governor wants to reform a campaign finance system that now gives them easy access to cash, and they figure that if the reformer is sullied then they are safe, at least for a while.

But Albany is also seeing firsthand how difficult it is to find an independent investigator.

Even the Ethics Commission is tied to the governor, who has appointed its chairman and executive director.

And when the commission merges with the Temporary State Commission on Lobbying in September, and becomes the Public Integrity Commission, Mr. Spitzer will choose the majority of the combined commission.

The merger is also likely to cost the state the services of the estimable David Grandeau, the executive director of the lobbying commission.

Mr. Grandeau has even dared to investigate Mr. Bruno, who helped appoint him originally.

As of now, the Ethics Commission is the best place for a review of Mr. Spitzer’s administration.

Three of the five commissioners do not owe their jobs to Mr. Spitzer.

But the main reason this is the right venue is the man Mr. Spitzer picked to be chairman — John Feerick, the former dean of Fordham Law School.

Mr. Spitzer could not have made a better choice.

Now 72, Mr. Feerick is perhaps best known for his chairmanship of a major commission on government integrity in New York in the late 1980s.

The commission’s report was one of the best of its kind, a thorough catalog of why New York’s government has been such a disgrace for so long.

Unfortunately, many of the same problems still exist — like a campaign financing system that is growing more scandalous by the day.

But the question for anyone concerned about good government in New York State is what happens when the person in charge of so much public integrity in Albany is not John Feerick.

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK POST

"POST: OPEN HEARINGS"

By FREDRIC U. DICKER

August 13, 2007 -- ALBANY - Citing an "alleged abuse of power by the office of the governor," the New York Post has formally called on the state Ethics Commission to conduct its Troopergate investigation in public - especially if Gov. Spitzer is called to testify.

On Friday, in a letter to Commission Chairman John Feerick, Post lawyer Michael Cameron wrote, "We contend that the current inquiry is one involving extraordinary circumstances and, as such, should be open to the public, and provisions should be made to allow representatives of the media, including a reporter from The Post, to attend hearings."

State Republicans and others have expressed skepticism at the Ethics Commission's ability to undertake a thorough probe of the scandal because many of its members and senior staffers have ties to Spitzer.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/08132007/news/...c_u__dicker.htm

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK POST

"GOV'S PROBE 'SHHUTDOWN'"

August 13, 2007 -- FAR from cooperating in the Troopergate probe, Gov. Spitzer's aides "moved to shut everyone down" after learning one of their own had unexpectedly confessed his role in the scandal to Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's investigators, The Post has learned.

Spitzer administration sources - including one in the governor's office - said orders were given to block further cooperation with Cuomo's probers after it was learned a few days into the investigation that homeland-security expert William Howard had testified under oath on July 9 or July 10 about his central role in the scandal.

Howard's voluntary testimony with the probers blew open the scandal and led Spitzer's legal advisers to direct Richard Baum, the governor's chief of staff, and now-suspended Communications Director Darren Dopp to refuse to provide any more Troopergate information, the sources said.

"Without Howard, there would have been no scandal for Cuomo to report on, because if it had been up to Spitzer's people, no one, including Howard, would have cooperated," said a source who witnessed the probe unfold.

Spitzer Chief Counsel David Nocenti and First Deputy Secretary Sean Patrick Maloney handled the initial information "shutdown," and Spitzer's policy director, Peter Pope, later joined in the effort, two sources said.

"They immediately moved to shut everybody else down."

"They went crazy when they learned what Bill Howard had done."

"They were in a panic," said the source in Spitzer's office.

"While they were publicly claiming they were cooperating with Cuomo, they were actually trying to control the outflow of the information, to shut it off."

A second source close to Spitzer's office confirmed the account, saying aides to the governor were infuriated when they heard Howard had talked to investigators.

"They were p- - -ed at Cuomo for talking to him without their knowledge, and they were really p- - -ed at Howard for talking to Cuomo," the second source said.

Maloney and Pope, lawyers serving in nonlegal positions, were later designated by Nocenti as "special counsels," preventing Cuomo's probers from questioning them because they could invoke lawyer-client privilege.

Cuomo, in his report, outlined on July 23 a plot by Howard, Dopp and acting State Police Supt. Preston Felton to create information showing Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, Spitzer's foe, improperly used state aircraft for political purposes.

Another bomb was dropped the next day, when it was disclosed that Dopp and Baum, who has been linked to the scandal by e-mails, had refused to be interviewed under oath by Cuomo's investigators.

Spitzer has repeatedly contended his administration cooperated with Cuomo's probers.

fredric.dicker@nypost.com

http://www.nypost.com/seven/08132007/news/...c_u__dicker.htm

[Livyjr]

Poughkeepsie Journal

Sunday, August 12, 2007

"Spitzer enlists philosopher to help him eat crow"

By Jay Gallagher

When he was governor, Mario Cuomo used to muse publicly about the lessons he'd learned from Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, a 20th-century French Jesuit priest and paleontologist who was his intellectual touchstone.

"Teilhard made negativism a sin," Cuomo once said.

"He taught us how the whole universe - even pain and imperfection - is sacred."

Cuomo's successor as governor, George Pataki, was cut from a different cloth.

He never presented himself as a deep thinker, just a postman's son from working-class Peekskill (OK, so he did go to Yale University and Columbia Law School) who happened to also be New York governor.

If he saw a deeper purpose or meaning in life than trying to cut crime and taxes and get himself and other Republicans elected, he never let on during the dozen years he was governor.

Now we have a philosopher-quoting governor again.

Gov. Eliot Spitzer this week for the first time since he took office in January threw around some philosophy in public in an address at the Chautauqua Institution, south of Lake Erie in far western New York.

In a half-hour address on national security and reflecting on his seven months in office, he frequently cited the thinking of Reinhold Niebuhr, a Missouri-born preacher and philosopher, as he talked about what he sees as the proper balance between power and humility.

It's maybe one of the first times the words "Spitzer" and "humility" have been so close to each other.

Spitzer and power?

Yes, those words have meshed since the former prosecutor and son of a Manhattan real-estate baron was elected attorney general in 1998, and quickly became the scourge of Wall Street, suing and humiliating financial titans and making them refund hundreds of millions of dollars to gullible investors.

Reputation led to victory

"Spitzer" and "power" also formed an even closer relationship when he blitzed Republican John Faso in November's gubernatorial election, winning almost 70 percent of the vote - the biggest margin in state history.

He did that largely on the basis of his reputation as "the sheriff of Wall Street."

So he came out with guns blazing when he was sworn in on New Year's Day, vowing "on Day One, everything changes" and blasting Pataki, who was seated a few feet away, for being essentially asleep at the switch during his tenure as governor.

"Now everyone likes to make fun of that," he acknowledged this week, referring to his "everything changes" mantra.

"Every single wrong in New York was not suddenly righted on January first."

In fact, one could argue some new "wrongs" were added, which is, of course, the major reason for his newfound fondness for humility.

He started to eat crow in a serious way on July 23, when a report from Attorney General Andrew Cuomo concluded that members of his staff had abused their power by having the State Police gather records designed to embarrass Spitzer's chief political rival, Republican Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno.

Bruno had used the state helicopter on three occasions earlier this year to travel to New York City to attend political events.

Had he done nothing else, he would have been committing a crime.

But Bruno also had meetings related to his government post on those days in New York City, so he didn't break any laws.

Spitzer apologized, took responsibility, suspended one aide, demoted another and said he had no idea what they had been up to.

But he has let the controversy fester by not ordering some aides who refused to talk to investigators to testify and not making all potentially relevant e-mails (from private as well as government accounts) available to probers.

He has tried to move on, saying "the lawyers are dealing with that" when asked about e-mails.

But he also said he has been chastened by the episode, and, at least implicitly, said he will try to mend his ways.

He quoted Niebuhr as saying, "we need a sense of modesty about the virtue, wisdom and power available to us" and "a sense of contrition about the common human frailties and foibles which lie at the foundation of both the enemy's demonry and our vanities."

A more modest, less self-righteous governor?

That sounds like something New Yorkers could buy into - after he first answers all the questions under oath about the situation and orders his aides to do the same.

Jay Gallagher is chief of the Journal's Albany bureau. Reach him at jgallagh@gannett.com

http://www.poughkeepsiejournal.com/apps/pb...STS%2F708120312

[Livyjr]

STAR-GAZETTE

"Hearings need substance, not sparks - Senate committee must be able to dodge political minefields in Spitzergate"

August 13, 2007

By most media accounts, the first meeting last week of the state Senate committee looking into the scandal that rocked Gov. Eliot Spitzer's office in July could not steer clear of the political strife that led to this investigation in the first place.

If future meetings go as they did on Thursday, Republicans and Democrats on the committee will turn this into a war of words rather than what these hearings should be -- a pursuit of how someone in the governor's office, including possibly Spitzer, had anything to do with using the state police to gather information on Senate Leader Joseph Bruno.

Let's make one thing clear.

Bruno can handle himself politically, so he doesn't need Sen. George H. Winner's Senate Committee on Investigations and Government Operations to fight his battles with the governor.

Meanwhile, Democratic members of Winner's Republican-majority committee ought to want to hear details of how this operation unfolded, even beyond what they and the public learned in Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's report.

But unfortunately, yet not unexpectedly, arguing set in right from the opening.

Democratic Sen. Thomas Duane of Manhattan challenged Winner's ground rules calling for a five-minute opening statement.

Further squabbling during the hearing included Democrats' gripes that GOP members could not participate impartially because they had been appointed by Bruno -- an inane assertion since committee members in the GOP-controlled Senate and Democratic-run Assembly always need the approval of leadership.

If that kind of nit-picking debate continues, this hearing could well end up eroding the credibility of both parties.

Democrats will look as though they are impeding a probe of a Democratic governor.

Republicans will appear that they only want revenge, not the truth and passage of the reform bills they are proposing, including a ban on the use of state aircraft for political purposes.

In his opening statement, Winner listed four areas he believes the hearings should focus on:

•Existing state policies governing the use of state aircraft.

•Existing state policies governing the administration of and adherence to the state's Freedom of Information Law and possible abuses of the law.

•The role and the independence of the inspector general, who is appointed by the governor, in investigations of the executive branch.

•The misuse of the New York State Police.

What complicates this proceeding are investigations by the State Ethics Commission and the Albany County district attorney, David Soares that could lead to charges, which may force some witnesses to be extra cautious with what they tell the Senate committee members.

Winner has pledged more sessions on this volatile matter, but if he is to avoid the bickering that took place last week, he is going to have to keep tempers in check and the inquiry on the high road.

It won't be easy.

http://www.stargazette.com/apps/pbcs.dll/a...F1004%2FOpinion

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK SUN

"It's Your Move Now, Eliot"

By JACOB GERSHMAN

August 13, 2007

The bottom keeps getting deeper for Governor Spitzer.

"Even by the scandal-pocked history of New York politics, Eliot Spitzer's fall from grace is extraordinary," write Fred Siegel and Michael Goodwin in the latest issue of the Weekly Standard.

While there may be no simple road to political recovery for Mr. Spitzer to pursue, there are steps that would at least reverse his descent.

Among them:

1) STOP APOLOGIZING: Ever since the state police scandal erupted, Mr. Spitzer has tried to have it both ways.

He has apologized without really apologizing.

His goal has been to earn credit for his humble admissions of failure in his administration without taking responsibility for the charges of misconduct.

The result has been a narcissistic muddle.

"We were fighting so hard for what we believed was right that we let down our guard and allowed our passion to get the best of us," Mr. Spitzer said in his speech before the Chautauqua Institution last week.

If he must discuss the scandal, two other approaches would work better.

One would be to deny having anything to do with the errors of judgment committed by his senior staff.

The other would be to stand his ground and shift attention to Joseph Bruno.

"Look, voters have entrusted me with the responsibility to protect state resources," the governor could say.

"We wanted to make sure that Senator Bruno wasn't wasting state money by using state helicopters as his personal chauffeur service."

"I'm not going to apologize for wanting to protect taxpayer money."

The smartest approach would be to stop talking about the scandal altogether, wait for the ongoing investigations to run their course, and turn the political conversation toward policy, which brings us to the next point.

2) CONFOUND THE REPUBLICANS: Senate Republicans like to say Mr. Spitzer obsesses with bringing them down while neglecting the concerns of regular New Yorkers.

Mr. Spitzer could prove them wrong with one press conference.

He could, for example, announce that his next budget will include a major tax cut in the form of an exemption of the first $50,000 of income for married couples or $25,000 for single taxpayers.

That's what Mr. Spitzer's Republican challenger, John Faso, proposed last year.

Mr. Spitzer could steal the idea and catch Senate Republicans off guard.

Better yet, he could construct a tax cut on marginal rates of income -- on the next dollar earned.

Either way, he would upstage the GOP.

3) SPLIT THE LEGISLATURE: As for the other legislative chamber, the Democrat-controlled Assembly, Mr. Spitzer's objective is to win it over -- with access, money, respect, and, if possible, charm.

For starters, a pay raise for lawmakers would go a long way toward healing bruised feelings.

Such a move might raise voter hackles, but New Yorkers are more likely to tolerate a salary increase if it's accompanied by a deep tax cut.

The next step would be to directly dial up individual Democratic lawmakers and ask them what they want to get accomplished during next year's legislative session.

The Spitzer administration has had the tendency to exclude lawmakers from the process of developing policy, costing the governor significant goodwill among would-be allies.

Mr. Spitzer could give lawmakers a larger role by soliciting their advice on issues of common concern and involve them in the crafting of policy.

The governor wouldn't be yielding his authority but would be delegating to lawmakers who are hungry for responsibility.

Granted more respect, Assembly legislators would be more likely to side with Mr. Spitzer rather than unite with Senate Republicans during next year's budget showdown.

4) SIDELINE CUOMO: With the Legislature giving him less grief, Mr. Spitzer can focus on dealing with the greatest danger in his path: Attorney General Cuomo.

Mr. Cuomo is determined to take up the mantle of crusader against public corruption, with the governor playing the role that Mr. Greenberg of AIG played for Attorney General Spitzer.

After all, by battling public malfeasance, Mr. Cuomo is able to win plaudits from New Yorkers and torture his chief political rival, Mr. Spitzer, thus setting the stage for a gubernatorial run in three years.

One way to steal Mr. Cuomo's thunder would be to force the attorney general to compete for attention against another ethics crusader.

The ideal choice for that role would be the head of the state's Lobbying Commission, David Grandeau, whose enthusiastic enforcement of lobbying laws has made him enemies with every powerful person on State Street.

Mr. Spitzer's instinct was to make Mr. Grandeau disappear.

Next month, he'll be out of a job when the Lobbying Commission merges with the Ethics Commission to form the super Commission on Public Integrity, which will probably be run by someone other than Mr. Grandeau.

Mr. Grandeau has been described as a loose cannon but his ammunition is aimed at everybody.

Under his vigorous and independent leadership, the new integrity commission would force Mr. Cuomo to share the anti-corruption stage and would also keep an eye on the ambitious attorney general, who would like nothing more than to see Mr. Spitzer sink further.

http://www.nysun.com/article/60386

[Livyjr]

"'Subprime' credit card bank settles marketing complaint in NY"

By GEORGE M. WALSH, Associated Press

Last updated: 4:53 p.m., Wednesday, August 15, 2007

ALBANY -- New York consumers will get as much as $4.5 million in refunds from a South Dakota bank under a settlement of claims it used deceptive and illegal tactics marketing credit cards to people with poor credit ratings, according to the New York Attorney General's office.

First Premier Bank will also pay a $100,000 civil penalty, $5,000 in costs and change the way it markets and charges for credit cards, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said in a press release Wednesday.

The bank responded with a statement acknowledging the settlement, but contesting Cuomo's description of its current business practices and saying it expects few claims for a share of the refund pool because "our policy already is to offer a full refund of all fees upon request to customers who are not satisfied with the credit card."

Any of the $4.5 million not paid to consumers will be kept by the state to cover the costs of the investigation, according to the settlement agreement signed July 23.

The probe was prompted by complaints from consumers who responded to offers of a $2,000 credit limit, a 9.9 percent fixed interest rate and no processing fee.

"In reality, most consumers received a $250-$300 credit line at a 9.9 percent interest rate that could more than double without notice," Cuomo said.

"Even before consumers had a chance to activate or use their credit card, First Premier billed $178 upfront fees for processing the credit card application."

The processing fee was followed by a variety of other hidden costs that drove up consumers' balances anywhere from $20 to $400 in a matter of months.

Mel Neilsen, a 63-year-old Saratoga Springs resident, told the attorney general's office that he took the First Premier deal to rebuild a weak credit rating, but found himself with a $1,000 balance despite canceling his two cards almost immediately.

He was hit with fees, finance charges, "harassing calls" from a collection agency and a negative report to credit rating agencies.

"Subprime lenders like First Premier are luring financially vulnerable borrowers into unaffordable high-cost cards, trapping individuals and families in a cycle of mounting debt," Cuomo said.

Miles Beacom, president and CEO of Premier Bankcard, replied in a prepared statement that, "Our industry is highly regulated and we have operated our business with the highest level of integrity.

"The majority of the issues raised in the Attorney General's news release were addressed by our own company nearly six years ago," he said.

"These were common business practices within the industry and we discontinued these practices on our own initiative a number of years ago."

Premier Bankcard operates along with First Premier under the Sioux Falls holding company United National Corp.

Cuomo said thousands of consumers are eligible for refunds, but an exact count was not available.

Consumers must submit claims for the refunds within 120 days of July 23, the day the agreement was signed.

Information is available by calling 1-800-771-7755 (Option 3) and on the attorney general's Web site.

------

On the Net:

New York Attorney General: http://www.oag.state.ny.us

[Livyjr]

"Spitzer gives $2 million to help upstate bus company"

Associated Press

Last updated: 12:03 p.m., Wednesday, August 15, 2007

ORISKANY, N.Y. -- New York will give $2 million in state aid to help Orion Bus Industries expand its upstate New York manufacturing plant, Gov. Eliot Spitzer said Wednesday.

The money will be used to renovate the factory, acquire new machinery and equipment and pay for expenses related to the company's health insurance costs for new employees, said Andreas Strecker, president of DaimlerChrysler Commercial Buses of North America, which owns Orion.

Spitzer said $945,000 in aid would come from the Empire State Development Corp., while another $750,000 would come from the state's Office for Small Cities.

The state labor department will provide $350,000 for employee training, the governor said.

Strecker said the assistance will help Orion retain its 500 jobs in Oriskany and create nearly 60 new jobs.

Additionally, DaimlerChrysler was selected by the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority for a $500,000 contract to develop an updated version of its successful diesel-electric hybrid transit bus powertrain, Spitzer said.

Orion is a leading manufacturer of transit buses.

In the past five years, it has built more than 1,000 buses for the New York City metropolitan area.

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS DAILY POLITICS BLOG:

Posted by Slow Hands: The Spitzer folks are going through all this trouble to hide what they've done but they haven't even tried to conceal the fact that this is a cover-up.

JOHN GALT RESPONDS: Slow Hands, they can't conceal the fact that this is a cover-up, now, because the cover-up is blown!

BIG TIME!

And each day, the cover-up gets ripped open a little wider ....

All the SPITZER-ITES can do now is to run and hide in the corner and keep their heads down in the hopes that it will all soon blow over ...

Or they can do like the "STEAMROLLER" is doing and ignore it, as that NEW YORK SUN dude, JACOB GERSHMAN is advising the "STEAMROLLER" to do in his recent article "It's Your Move Now, Eliot"

http://www.nysun.com/article/60386

And so ...

As they say, the cover-up is always worse than the original "crime" ...

And so ...

I personally think that part of the SPITZER-ITES problems now stem from past successes at covering up the use of state employees and the NYSP for political purposes in federal District Court for the Northern District of New York when the "STEAMROLLER" was still state AG and Nelson "SHINY" Sheingold was his in-house "MASTER OF THE ART OF THE GOVERNMENT COVER-UP" ...

And so ...

The dudes got spoiled by success, Slow Hands ...

They got cocky ...

And then, they got sloppy ...

And it all slipped away from them in a hurry ...

And so ...

Posted by: John Galt | August 15, 2007 5:07 PM

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypoli...8.html#comments

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK POST

"LET THE SUN SHINE IN, CONT'D - SPITZER-GATE"

August 14, 2007 -- Gov. Spitzer continued to insist yesterday that he's been "totally forthright" about Spitzergate - even as The Post's Fredric U. Dicker reported that the gov's aides scrambled to block a probe into the affair, contradicting his claims that his office cooperated fully.

It's yet another reason why the state Ethics Commission, which is looking into the matter, must - at the very least - conduct its deliberations in public.

In a letter Friday to commission chairman John Feerick, The Post formally requested that "all proceedings in relation to this inquiry" be open to everyone.

"Provisions should be made to allow representatives of the media, including a reporter from The Post, to attend hearings," the letter - from Post lawyer Michael Cameron - said.

As this page has noted, New Yorkers need to know just who said what to whom - what orders Spitzer's aides, and maybe the governor himself, gave - in the plot to use State Police to smear his foe, Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno.

Given all the stonewalling and apparent covering up, the public simply can't trust the word of a panel whose members and staff have ties to Spitzer himself.

One member, Carl "Chip" Loewenson, recused himself yesterday.

But other ties remain: Feerick, for example, who was tapped by Spitzer, explicitly refused to step aside.

Unless New Yorkers have access to all relevant documents and the testimony of everyone interviewed - including, perhaps, Spitzer himself - suspicions will linger, casting a pall over his tenure.

The apparent efforts by Spitzer's office to withhold information from Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, who probed the affair and found abuse by at least two key aides, are alarming enough.

Chief of Staff Richard Baum and now-suspended spokesman Darren Dopp both refused to answer Cuomo's questions.

And now, it seems, aides moved quickly to hush up staffers after they learned that Spitzer homeland-security expert Bill Howard had talked to Cuomo.

"They were in a panic," a source told Dicker.

Spitzer's Chief Counsel David Nocenti, First Deputy Secretary Sean Patrick Maloney and, later, Policy Director Peter Pope "immediately moved to shut everybody else down," a source in the governor's office said.

Maloney and Pope were later given status as "special counsels," which shielded them from questioning, thanks to lawyer-client privilege.

In a report some years ago, a panel on government integrity - ironically, chaired by Feerick himself - wrote:

"Every time a citizen sees a closed meeting as a cloak for misconduct, democracy suffers."

Feerick shouldn't make matters worse than they already are by closing the doors to his Spitzergate probe, even in its preliminary stages.

Nothing is more important than that full sunshine fall on any meetings held, or documents gathered, in the search for truth.

http://www.nypost.com/seven/08142007/posto...editorials_.htm

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK POST

"ELIOT'S NEW LOW IN HIS EMPIRE STATE OF DENIAL"

By FREDRIC U. DICKER State Editor

July 27, 2007 -- ALBANY - Gov. Spitzer continued to stonewall reporters yesterday as he refused to explain why his two top aides wouldn't answer questions under oath from Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's investigators.

Democrat Spitzer, at a confrontational press conference in which he initially refused to answer questions about the efforts of his aides to use the State Police to destroy the political career of Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno (R-Rensselaer), also repeatedly made claims about his staff's alleged cooperation with Cuomo, which Cuomo himself has rejected as false.

The Post was the first to pose the tough questions of Spitzer, asking the governor, "Was it appropriate for your aides including your secretary [Richard Baum] to refuse to answer questions" from Cuomo's investigators?

"They were asked for information and they provided sworn statements and the Attorney General's Office closed the investigation," said Spitzer, referring to Baum, his chief of staff, and Darren Dopp, his now-suspended communications director.

"Let me make it very clear, the Attorney General's Office received the information and they closed the investigation," he continued.

Cuomo, who issued a bombshell report Monday concluding that Dopp, Spitzer aide William Howard and acting State Police Superintendent Preston Felton conspired to provide damaging information on Bruno, has repeatedly said through aides that Baum and Dopp would not cooperate with his investigation.

Cuomo's aides also said his investigators rejected the last-minute "sworn statements" provided by Baum and Dopp, because they were not responsive to investigators' questions and were submitted on Sunday - only hours before Cuomo's report became public.

In addition, Cuomo's aides have said that the claims made in the statements submitted by Baum and Dopp were not even included in the investigation because the information was not subject to cross-examination.

Spitzer, meanwhile, also sought to take credit for Cuomo's investigation, claiming it was his office that had requested it.

But Spitzer's office only sought an attorney general's investigation of initial claims that Bruno may have misused state aircraft by attending political events - a story published by the Albany Times Union, which received allegedly incriminating information generated as a result of what Cuomo's report concluded was a Spitzer-administration plot.

Cuomo agreed to investigate the possible misuse of the State Police in response to a request from Bruno, triggered by an exclusive report in The Post disclosing the existence of a Spitzer-administration conspiracy to use the State Police against him.

fredric.dicker@nypost.com

http://www.nypost.com/seven/07272007/news/...tate_editor.htm

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Bill Hammond

"How do you spell ethics hipocrisy? B-r-u-n-o"

Tuesday, August 14th 2007, 4:00 AM

Of all the hypocritical statements Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno has made about the Eliot Mess, his attack on the state Ethics Commission is the most laughable.

As a politician who is under investigation by the FBI, who saw nothing wrong with having his son work as a high-paid lobbyist in the state Legislature, who exploits every fund-raising loophole in the book and who, most recently, got caught flying to political fund-raisers on state police helicopters, Bruno is hardly in a position to judge anyone's integrity.

But his trashing of the Ethics Commission represents a new low in shamelessness.

In an op-ed piece for the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle last week, Bruno claimed that the watchdog panel is unfit to probe Gov. Spitzer and his staff for three reasons: because its members "are all gubernatorial appointees," because some members "contributed heavily" to Spitzer's campaign and because their investigation would be "limited to violations of the Public Officer's Law, not potential criminal violations."

Wrong, wrong and wrong.

In fact, Spitzer appointed only one of the five current members - John Feerick, a former Fordham Law School dean who literally wrote the book on ethics in New York State government.

The other four are holdovers from Republican Gov. George Pataki.

Spitzer nominated one commissioner in his former role as attorney general - Carl Loewenson, who should probably recuse himself from this case.

But the remaining three, two Republicans and an independent nominated by former Controller Alan Hevesi, owe Spitzer nothing.

Bruno also distorts the truth on campaign contributions.

Apart from Loewenson, the only commission member who donated to Spitzer's campaign is Robert Giuffra, a Republican.

That was in 2002, when Spitzer was running for a second term as AG.

In last year's governor's race, Giuffra backed John Faso.

Yes, the commission's executive director, Herbert Teitelbaum, did chip in thousands to Spitzer through his former law firm.

But now he answers to the commission and to Feerick - an unpaid volunteer with a well-earned reputation for probity.

Nothing prevents the commission from following the evidence wherever it leads.

It can and does refer criminal matters to the appropriate prosecutor for followup.

This is exactly what happened with Hevesi, who ultimately pleaded guilty to misusing a state employee as a chauffeur and companion for his ailing wife.

So the commission has all the independence and authority it needs to probe the Spitzer administration for using the state police to snoop on Bruno's political travels and leaking details to the press.

It's funny.

Bruno didn't seem so concerned about conflicts of interest last year, when he announced the FBI was looking into connections between his official actions and his private business affairs.

"My interests outside the Legislature have all been cleared and approved by the Legislative Ethics Committee," he said then, with a straight face.

What he didn't say was that he personally appoints three of the six members of that panel, that the chairman receives a $6,250 stipend and that the committee has never punished anybody for anything.

Now that's an ethics watchdog Bruno can be comfortable with.

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2007/0...risy_bruno.html

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK DAILY NEWS DAILY POLITICS BLOG:

Posted by Slow Hands: The Spitzer folks are going through all this trouble to hide what they've done but they haven't even tried to conceal the fact that this is a cover-up.

JOHN GALT RESPONDS: Slow Hands, they can't conceal the fact that this is a cover-up, now, because the cover-up is blown!

BIG TIME!

And each day, the cover-up gets ripped open a little wider ....

All the SPITZER-ITES can do now is to run and hide in the corner and keep their heads down in the hopes that it will all soon blow over ...

Or they can do like the "STEAMROLLER" is doing and ignore it, as that NEW YORK SUN dude, JACOB GERSHMAN is advising the "STEAMROLLER" to do in his recent article "It's Your Move Now, Eliot"

http://www.nysun.com/article/60386

And so ...

Posted by: John Galt | August 15, 2007 5:07 PM

http://www.nydailynews.com/blogs/dailypoli...8.html#comments

THE NEW YORK SUN

"Spitzer Shifts to Silence on Scandal"

By JACOB GERSHMAN, Staff Reporter of the Sun

August 14, 2007

Expect no more apologies from Governor Spitzer.

After weeks of expressing remorse over his administration's improper use of state police, Governor Spitzer today signaled a major shift in dealing with the aftermath of the scandal, deflecting questions from reporters while defending the effort by senior officials to retrieve and leak to the press private travel records of the Republican majority leader of the Senate, Joseph Bruno.

"I'm not answering those questions anymore, except to say that the uncontested, unambiguous conclusion is that the information that was revealed in the article should have been public information ... and that no laws were broken," Mr. Spitzer said, referring to an article published on July 1 in the Times Union of Albany about Mr. Bruno's use of state aircraft to travel to fundraisers.

Attorney General Cuomo's office issued a report last month that found that the travel records provided to the Times Union were leaked to the newspaper by senior administration officials who conspired with the state police to publicly damage Mr. Bruno.

After Mr. Cuomo released the report, Mr. Spitzer suspended his communications director, Darren Dopp, and his liaison to state police, William Howard.

"If judgments were made improperly," Mr. Spitzer said, "I have acted upon that and reacted to that appropriately."

Asked about a newspaper report alleging that Mr. Spitzer sought to silence his staff after learning that Mr. Howard testified before state investigators in Mr. Cuomo's office, Mr. Spitzer said:

"I'm simply not saying anything more on that stuff."

"I have ... answered every question and have been totally forthright, and so now we're back to governing the state."

Mr. Spitzer also refused to answer a question about the status of his chief of staff, Richard Baum, whom Republicans accuse of playing a role in the scheme against Mr. Bruno.

"I'm not answering those questions anymore," the governor said.

The governor is assuming a defensive posture after repeatedly apologizing for his administration's actions against Mr. Bruno.

"It is crystal clear that what members of my administration did was wrong," Mr. Spitzer wrote in an op-ed piece in the New York Times on July 29.

The governor, a former two-term attorney general, said he would consider granting Mr. Cuomo's request for new investigative powers to tackle public corruption but said he needed first to see the specifics of Mr. Cuomo's proposal.

"When I was attorney general for eight years, we did fine with the powers we had ..."

"If the attorney general thinks he needs more investigative powers, all the better," Mr. Spitzer said.

Mr. Spitzer, whose schedule recently has been filled with retail politics, tried aggressively to change the subject to his economic policies, touting childcare tax credits and expansion of the state's food stamp program among other policies for lower income families in a speech at a job training facility in Harlem.

He then drove to an industrial park in East New York, Brooklyn, where in the hot summer heat he toured on foot a fluorescent lighting factory, an architectural molding manufacturer, and an auto parts exporter.

Dressed in a sweaty, white dress shirt, pinstripe pants, and cap-toe oxfords, the governor peppered the owners of each business with questions about their factory: inquiring about how long they've been operating, the square-footage, and the number of employees.

Mr. Spitzer advised each owner to get in contact with the president of the Empire State Development Corporation, Avi Schick, who accompanied the governor on the walking tour with business cards in hand.

The manager of Adriatic Wood Products, John Grbic, told Mr. Spitzer that his business could supply the state with free sawdust for flowerbeds, or to absorb oil spills and other leaks.

"Our drainage system is perfect," Mr. Spitzer said in a sarcastic reference to last week's flooding of the subway system.

http://www.nysun.com/article/60424?page_no=1

[Livyjr]

THE NEW YORK SUN

"Spitzer Shifts to Silence on Scandal"

By JACOB GERSHMAN, Staff Reporter of the Sun

August 14, 2007

He then drove to an industrial park in East New York, Brooklyn, where in the hot summer heat he toured on foot a fluorescent lighting factory, an architectural molding manufacturer, and an auto parts exporter.

Mr. Spitzer advised each owner to get in contact with the president of the Empire State Development Corporation, Avi Schick, who accompanied the governor on the walking tour with business cards in hand.

http://www.nysun.com/article/60424?page_no=1

THE ALBANY, NEW YORK TIMES UNION CAPITAL CONFIDENTIAL BLOG:

Tell the folks true, Dr. Cannon …

Eliot “STEAMROLLER” Spitzer aspires to be the PRESIDENT of the USA ….

He doesn’t want to be NYS governor ….

For him and for people like you who carry his water for him, this is just a STEPPING STONE ….

And with effective control of ALL THREE BRANCHES of OUR state government …

Eliot “STEAMROLLER” Spitzer can lay this state prostrate and he can then bleed it dry to finance his RUN for the US presidency ….

And so …

Being of a compassionate nature, all I can say is GOOD LUCK to him and you in your endeavors, Dr. Cannon ….

But dude ….

I’m going to tell you ….

I don’t think real people are as blind and stupid as you think they are …

And as you in fact need them to be …

To succeed with this PLAN of yours to take over New York State government …

As though it were merely a PRIZE in a Cracker-Jacks box, and we were all chattel …

And so …

Comment by John Galt — August 14, 2007 @ 5:40 pm

http://blogs.timesunion.com/capitol/?p=5211#comments

[Livyjr]

NEWSDAY

"Editorial: Albany should tighten aircraft rules"

August 14, 2007

Call it Choppergate or Troopergate.

Call the Republican hearings into the Spitzer administration's manipulation of State Police a political sideshow or a serious ethics probe.

This scandal isn't going away, at least not until Gov. Eliot Spitzer testifies under oath and the Albany district attorney determines whether criminal laws may have been broken.

But some more immediate good could come from the bad damage this has done to Albany's image and ability to get meaningful business done: Lawmakers should approve changes in the rules governing the use of state aircraft.

Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno (R-Brunswick) is certainly a victim of an administration that was fighting him over its legislative agenda.

Key aides apparently tricked the State Police into compiling potentially damaging information about Bruno's use of state helicopters.

But Bruno also played fast and loose with the spirit of existing laws by sprinkling very little government business in between political events.

Tightening the law is where the legislature should step in.

Sometimes, however, the line between government and politics is fairly blurry, so it may not be practical to ban the use of state aircraft for all political activity.

But government work must not be just the primary reason for the trip - it must be the overwhelming reason.

Meanwhile, the Senate is continuing its investigation.

This page believes the State Ethics Commission and Albany district attorney are best suited to do that job.

But the Senate hearings last week did reveal something new - the troubling reality that the state inspector general, who was appointed by Spitzer, did a weak job of trying to get to the bottom of the scandal.

The inspector general, it was shown, decided she had a conflict of interest because she reported to one of the figures under investigation, Richard Baum.

Then she all but stopped her probe while Attorney General Andrew Cuomo finished his.

Too bad.

She should have transferred her subpoena power to Cuomo, so he could have compelled more sworn testimony and the release of personal e-mails between key administration figures.

Until that information comes out, the "gate" of this scandal won't close.

http://www.newsday.com/news/opinion/ny-vpa...0,2545475.story