Veep Vetter

UPDATED:

This is a post from the other day. Obama's campaign just announced the man in charge of vetting the Veep selection, Jim Johnson, has stepped down.

Sometimes you have to look a few layers down to find the players in the political parties and Jim Johnson is one of those up to now obscure power brokers. He served Walter Mondale and John Kerry and now is Barack Obama's Veep Vetter.

But who vetted the vetter? This guy has a relationship with the CEO of Countrywide Financial who is embroiled in the subprime mortgage battle and he is responsible for hefty compensation packages for a variety of CEOs whose compensation committee he sits.

Snippets:

On Saturday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Johnson received at least $7 million worth of home loans from Countrywide through an informal program for friends of company CEO Angelo Mozilo that offered rates below the market average. At least four of the loans were issued while Johnson was employed either as the CEO or an outside consultant for Fannie Mae.

In 2006, five companies where Johnson served on compensation committees came under fire from Institutional Shareholders Services and The Corporate Library, two corporate compensation research companies, for accounting errors and failing to sufficiently tie executive payment to performance.

"There is nothing 'overblown and irrelevant' about millions of Americans facing foreclosure and Barack Obama entrusting his most important decision as a presidential candidate to a man who has accepted millions in special loans from a subprime mortgage lender.”

NYSUT Goes After The Gov

The New York State Teachers Union goes after Governor Paterson on the tax cap. Click on the audio below to listen to their radio commercial.

Hillary's 5 Stages

Candidate's Position on Tax Cap

The race for the 118th Assembly seat and the 48th Senate seat are in the early stages. Candidates should be out introducing themselves to voters and circulating their petitions. The candidates have challenges during this portion of the campaign, they have to meet voters with petitions, but also address the issues as well as set up their organizations.

Voters in either district have yet to hear or read about the positions of the candidates on Tom Suozzi's special commission proposed 4% tax cap supported by the Governor.

118th Assembly Candidates
Addie Jenne Russell
Bobby Cantwell

Senate Candidates
David Renzi
Darrel Aubertine

It is time to issue your position on this important proposal, candidates in other districts are beginning to do so, see here. Candidates cannot make their positions on issues like their decisions on running, they have to be more decisive and show leadership. Senator Aubertine, as the only working member of the legislature should no doubt by now have a position on this issue.

Renzi Meet And Greet

David Renzi, candidate for the 48th Senate, seat held a meet and greet last night at Pete's Restaurant in Watertown and pictured here is Mayor Jeff Graham talking with John Doldo.


(This photo was not submitted by Paul Warneck)

Baby Factor In 48th

This is good enough for a direct lift from Capital Confidential, so hat tip to them.

Baby factor in the 48th?

June 10, 2008 at 2:15 pm by Irene Jay Liu

Democratic Sen. Darrel Aubertine (SD-48) may have less to worry about now that former Sen. Jim Wright isn’t challenging him in November, but he may have to contend with a new factor with his announced challenger Republican David Renzi - babies.

Renzi’s father, Eugene Renzi, is a retired OB-GYN who had his practice in Watertown. Over the years, he’s delivered thousands of babies, confirmed challenger David Renzi.

This may or may not be the tipping factor in the race that spans three counties and has 172,233 voters, but it certainly brings up an interesting question. Would you vote for the son of the doctor who delivered your children? And it doesn’t hurt in for name recognition in some parental quarters.

Renzi is a Watertown attorney who helped with Assemblyman Will Barclay’s campaign against Aubertine in a senate special election in February to replace Wright. For some time there was speculation that Wright would seek to reclaim his office this November (Aubertine’s victory was a huge boon to Democrats - the district has a significant Republican advantage), but he ultimately decided not to run.

The stats on SD-48: Incumbent: Democratic Sen. Darrel Aubertine

• Republican: Watertown attorney David Renzi.
• Enrollment stats: 47,737 Democrats and 78,429 Republicans
• Record: In a stunning upset, Aubertine beat Republican Assemblyman Will Barclay in a special election in February. The race would have been considered highly competitive, given the significant Republican enrollment advantage, if Wright or Scozzafava decided to run; with both of them out, the Republicans will have a tougher time overcoming Aubertine’s name recognition and incumbency.

Some Things Never Change

Then Assemblyman and now Senator Aubertine and his office staff are notorious for not responding to people when they contact his office. One of the biggest complaints heard is about people contacting Aubertine's office and not getting a response.

This is a snippet from a letter in today's Watertown Daily Times that illustrates his office inaptitude.

On April 15, I wrote to state Sen. Darrel Aubertine regarding the following. To date, I have not had a reply even after talking to someone in his office. Perhaps he can answer it in the paper.

The letter was written by Frank Lent, Dexter

NYS Senate GOP Push School Accountability

Taxpayer Empowerment and Accountability, "TEA" plan is making its way through the New York State Senate.

The plan would require disclosure on school administrator salaries and pension benefits. This plan would require the salaries to be posted on the school's websites and put in place reforms to prevent school lawyers from receiving health and pension benefits which has been a target of AG Cuomo.

“This far-reaching proposal will prevent excessive and wasteful spending, and mitigate problems that have resulted from school districts paying exorbitant salaries and generous pensions to school superintendents,” Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno said.

A measure like this will add accountability; with salaries, school boards and more scrutiny for budgets. It might even bring some attention to consolidation of smaller school districts or the very least centralizing administrative functions.

UPDATE: Click to read the Senate PRESS RELEASE and the Empire Center's new NY Public Payroll Watch website details the plan (here) and makes the claim this does not go far enough.

Meanwhile, Democrats continue fighting finally proving Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver cannot get along with anyone. Silver fought with Spitzer when Spitzer first came to town, now Silver is fighting with Paterson, Silver is an obstructionist. The New York Post reported on the rift.

Our Deepest Sympathy

Tyler Pickett was killed Sunday in an attack while on duty in Iraq. Tyler is the husband of Republican Deputy Election Commissioner Kristy Pickett.

WWNY TV is reporting the story here.

Kristy is a dedicated office member and dedicated GOP worker, but regardless of your political affiliation, leave your thoughts and prayers here, it would be appreciated for Kristy and her family.


(NOTE: Anti-war rhetoric or anything less than a thoughtful expression of your sympathy for the Pickett family will be removed, this is not the time or the post to debate the war. Thank You)

Morphing News

The Editor's Weblog (that would be blog for short, hmmmm that would be old media participating in a new media forum) published results from the Newsroom Barometer survey conducted a while back by Zogby International. Here are small of the results:

- 86% believe integrated print and online newsrooms will become the norm, and 83% believe journalists will be expected to be able to produce content for all media within five years.

- A plurality - 44% - believe on-line will be the most common platform for reading news in the future, compared with 41% last year. Thirty-one cited print (down from 35% last year), 12% mobile and 7% e-paper. The rest were unsure.

- Two-thirds of respondents believe the importance of opinion and analysis pages will increase.

Looking 10 years into the future, what do you think will be the most common way of reading the news in your country?

If provided resources to invest in editorial quality, what would you do first within the newsroom?
Across all categories, the responses illustrated two clear concerns for editors, which superceded all others: their staff needs to be attuned to new media (36% of the respondents would first train their staff in new media), and they need more journalists to produce quality coverage (30%, up from 22% last year). As more newsrooms face layoffs and tight budgets, editors are increasingly seeking to safeguard one of the main conditions to quality journalism: a team of qualified journalists.

One of the Editors at the Watertown Daily Times actively participates in blogging, and being an editor gives him access to reporter's raw notes and that information appears in the anonymously authored Northern New York Follies. That would be a good blog for the paper "Reporter's Notebook" not real original but it is at least a launch into the new media.