Standing in line behind Shelly Silver around midnight Saturday night at Kosar's Hot Bialy, I overheard a short exchange between the assembly leader and the guy working the counter.

I couldn't exactly make out what was said over the din of bialy making, but after the speaker left the counter guy volunteered that he had asked Shelly what his intentions were regarding the stadium vote. This is possibly the single most guarded and coveted piece of information in NYS today, but the bagel guy through that a bakers dozen of hot bialys might be able to pry this jucy tidbit loose from Silver.

Ahh, but the speaker demured and would not tip his hand, not even to the bagel guy....

Chris Smith writes in this weeks New York Magazine that Virginia has sort of fallen into her position as possible democratic candidate due to Ferrer's horrible campaigning. Smith raises the question of whether Virginia is ready for the big time...

IMHO she could win the primary, but beating bloomberg is gonna be a tough one when all she seems to offer are more commissions and platitudes. I think we are giong to see a runnoff between Weiner and Fields. And that could turn into an ugly identitty politics battle in october leaving no candidate strong enough to beat bloomberg.

Today's NYT features an article: "On West Coast, a Lesson Plan for Ferrer Bid" in which DIANE CARDWELL and JONATHAN P. HICKS quote Ydanis A. Rodriguez as saying that Freddy has not been able to consolidate the latino vote. It turns out, Hicks used the same source in a May 9th article to demostrate the same point (OFF THE TRAIL; For Ferrer? Not So).

So who is Ydanis? Well he has run for council in 01 and 03 in Harlem, and is a teach and an education activist. But more importantly, his brother Carlos Rodriguez WORKS FOR the Manhattan Borough President, C. Virginia Fields! So they use the same source twice in two weeks and never mention the source's link to Virginia through his brother?

Now the argument that Ferrer does not have strong Latino support may or may not be accurate, but to build it on one source connected with Fields? Puuuleassssse is this the best the NYT can come up with?

It was like platos retreat at the Rye Town Hilton for the NYS Democratic Committee spring meeting last friday. Denny Farrell lavishing praise on Shelly Silver, Shelly Returning the favor. Reggie Lafayette from the Westchester BOE lavishing praise on everyone. Andy Spano, the county exec, taking pot shots left and right at the Governor while trumpeting the wonderfulness of Westchester including an invitation for committee members to go Rye Playland, a county owned amusement park.

A few funny moments included Shelly raising the "Gavel" off the podium only to reveal that it was a claw hammer! To which Shelly commented "This is how Denny keeps us in line!"

Reggie Lafayette took some time to talk about how great it was that Westchester has a Democratic County Executive, but didn't mention how the BOE so terribly botched the November election (misplacing ballots, issuing improper ballots to election workers, not having maps available before the election and not have street finders available on election day) contributing to Andrea Stewart-Cousins' 18 vote loss to incumbent senator Nick Spano (no relation to Andy).

And there was hardly any mention of how the anemic state of the state party has left us with a mediocre Republican in the state house for 11 years! I guess they forgot amidst all the self congratulation and excitment of the day. Hey, next year we have Spitzer and Hillary to save us.  read more »