My apologies to the dogs. Governor Paterson, Speaker Silver and Majority Leader Smith have struck a deal on NYS’s budget. In a number of ways, read for yourself, it's not great but it is a significant improvement over the rotten Paterson proposals which were aimed entirely at harming lower and moderate income New Yorkers and protecting higher income residents. Robert Harding writing in The Albany Project picked up the press release in full and the State Senate provided hot links to the actual budget bills for those committed to self-abuse (Thanks to Liz Benjamin who posted the link). The negotiations were carried out completely behind closed doors to the disappointment of reform-minded folk who’d hoped for a cleaner process. See Amy Traub's spirited defense of the broad outlines of the budget on the DMI blog (with which I agree). Also check out the NY Times budget critique favors better spending controls.  read more »

While the Three Turds are throwing the entire state into disarray with their ad hoc mixture of petty divaness and open blackmail, Dem Leader Smith is moving ahead. Witness this op-ed from the Buffalo News.

As the leader of the incoming majority in the New York State Senate, I want to send a strong, clear message: Senate Democrats are committed to upstate.

Above all else, Senate Democrats are committed to an open door for new ideas and new approaches. We're committed to a bipartisan, nonideological approach that will allow us to combine the best ideas from Democrats and Republicans, business and labor, farmers and manufacturers. And we're committed to delivering results in the form of new jobs, new opportunity and a new day for upstate - and for all of New York, together.

That's just slightly more forward-looking than "hey hey look at me give me what I want now or I'll hold my breath and turn blue", wouldn't you agree?  read more »

New Yorkers are still in limbo on who will lead the Senate: the victorious Democrats, who captured a majority of votes and seats, rubbing out long-serving republican Senators, or republicans, who are eagerly courting a small group of traitor Democrats. Among these, as ever are Carl Kruger of Brooklyn, a looming target for a primary, and newly elected retread Pedro Espada, best known for narrowly escaping a Federal indictment for corruption some years ago. According to the estimable Liz, Espada and Kruger won't back Malcolm Smith for Leader. Some of the more laughable rumors have it that Espada, a freshman Senator who didn't lift a finger to attain this new majority, would generously settle for being Majority leader himself.

So here's my experience with Malcolm Smith, gained through having consulted with his caucus over the last six months (more on that later).

Malcolm Smith is one of the hardest workers in state politics. He has been working tirelessly for over a year not just to take the majority, but to be able to govern once that majority is attained. If you like and respect hard work, Malcolm is someone you'll get along with and appreciate. Espada, Kruger and Diaz - whose main goal in life seems to be posturing on keeping the queers down - have done nothing, and I mean literally nothing, to get this majority. Now, of course, they're posturing at the expense of the hard labor of others.

On policy, Smith is exactly where New Yorkers want him to be. He has spoken convincingly and consistently, publicly and privately, on reforming the chamber, in line with the Brennan Center's recommendations. I've heard him argue passionately for reform, including campaign finance reform, in closed-door meeting with high-end donors. This is real. The same applies on every Progressive issue you could name: labor, choice, taxation, equality (though, to appease that Bronx Bigot Diaz, we're going to have to be patient until we don't need his vote anymore after the special elections expected next year).

Of course, some people are also making an argument based on race (it was ever thus). With a black President and a black governor, apparently, we can't have a black Majority Leader. This because, I suppose, blacks are generally over-represented at the highest levels of government. Oh, wait, they're not.

As you may gather from this, I like Malcolm Smith. In general terms, that doesn't mean much; there are a lot of likable people who don't belong in public office, let alone the legislative leadership. That said, Malcolm has demonstrated that he has the qualities needed to move this state forward in difficult times. He should be Majority Leader.  read more »

There's an opportunity buried - and I admit it's rather deeply buried at present - in the recent back-and-forth over Malcolm Smith's clearly satirical remarks to lobbyists. That opportunity is a discussion of campaign finance reform. Ironically, that's not a discussion that Dean Skelos and his caucus want to have.

Start out from the premise that our system of campaign finance is a joke. It is. When corporations (and limitless subsidiaries) can contribute to candidates, that should raise red flags in and of itself. When your relatives can give you hundreds of thousands of dollars - witness Mark Green's 2006 campaign - that's a sign that something isn't quite working. When the top donations limit is near the six-figure mark - you can give $94,500 a year to political parties, and an aggregate of $150,000 - you can deduce many things from it, the most glaringly obvious being that such a system gives those who can write checks of that magnitude perhaps larger degrees of influence than they should possess in a healthy democracy.

There are differing approaches to the subject. After his election, for example, former governor Spitzer voluntarily capped donations to his campaign at $10,000. In January, the Brennan Center released a report on the state of discussion. Our own Dan Jacoby, to his great credit, has been banging the drum on Clean Money Clean Elections since, apparently, the dawn of time.

Now, as salient issues go, campaign finance reform isn't top of mind for voters crushed by property taxes, worried about foreclosures, about healthcare costs, their jobs, how to send their kids to college, and any number of other areas where the middle class is confronted with insecurity. But if republicans really want to have a discussion about Smith's attempt at humor, the real issue is that they do not want the present system of paying for elections to change, while the Democrats do.

Location

The Sun reports today on rumors that Malcolm Smith might not necessarily become majority leader when the Democrats take the state Senate. We've heard rumblings to this effect for a while now, though of course nobody's willing to go on the record about it. The Sun's article highlights Bronx Sen. Jeff Klein as a possible replacement for Smith, which isn't surprising, given Klein's fundraising abilities and his effort to win the minority leader post last year. Klein denied any interest in a challenge, but take that for what you will.

According to the Sun, two things in particular may be undermining Smith's position:

[Democratic Senators] question Smith's decision to speak openly about his plans to lure various Senate Republicans to switch parties. No Republican this year has flipped, making Mr. Smith's threat seem premature and empty.

Mr. Smith was also criticized for initially agreeing to support a legislative pay raise bill proposed by Senate Republicans. The move infuriated both the governor and some of Mr. Smith's colleagues, particularly the marginal members, who did not want their names to be attached to the bill.

Under orders from Mr. Spitzer, Mr. Smith ended up opposing and ultimately derailing the pay raise measure, angering Assembly Democrats and Senate Republicans who lost their ability to override the governor.  read more »