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: Outside Counsel

By Bill Altreuter

What did yesterday's primary tell us? Well, starting with the 144th Assembly District, maybe people are telling the truth when they say that they don't care about the sex lives of their elected officials. When Barbara Kavanagh announced that she was running against Sam Hoyt I was puzzled. Hoyt had supported Barbara when she ran for City Council, and there really didn't seem to be any substantive difference in their policy positions. This turned out to be a situation where inside information led to poor decision making. Everybody in politics knew about Hoyt's infidelities, but you didn't have to be too far outside to be in the dark-- I didn't know about it until about six months ago, which is still before the story broke wide, but not by much. When the story did break it became clear that Barbara was either taking advantage of Hoyt's personal life, or was being used as a catspaw by others who were. It was an ugly campaign, and it didn't work.

We also learned that name recognition counts for a lot. Frank Sedita III unquestionably benefited from the fact that people have been voting for the Sedita brand for three generations. Good luck to him-- the District Attorney's Office needs work.

Nice to see that Darth Volker's act is wearing thin. I've never understood his appeal. He came into the office as a former State Trooper who promised to restore capital punishment (motto: "Kill, kill, kill them all!"). His death penalty law turned out to be about as lethal as a cap pistol-- more felons died of aspirin poisoning than were executed in New York*, and a good thing, since the law turned out to be unconstitutional. It may be that we will have to abolish the New York State Senate to get rid of Volker. Both would be fine with me.

Finally, congratulations to Alice Kryzan. With my congressperson, Louise Slaughter, this has the potential of being the best Western New York congressional delegation in history. Negative didn't work in the 26th, and that makes me a little more optimistic about the democratic process than I usually am.

* New York did not execute anyone under Volker's law.

Full post as published by Outside Counsel on September 10, 2008 (boomark / email).