With local elections just a month away, the next political indictments from the Democratic District Attorney's office will be coming shortly. Not today. Today's Friday, and you don't get as good publicity on a Friday. People go out Friday nights; many are too busy on weekends to watch or read the news.
The federal authorities brought their Robutrad indictments many months ago, in the ordinary course of their investigation. The feds identified the people who appear to have committed actual wrongdoing: some county employees who, effectively, stole from taxpayers.
But the ostensibly Robutrad-related indictments from the Monroe County DA's office are election-driven. That imposes a timetable geared to election day, November 3.
So the next indictments can't wait beyond next week -- about as close to the election as County Democratic headquarters can get and still have time to design and print the brochures and mail pieces, and to prepare the broadcast material, that will repeat headlines about the coming indictments to be provided by the party's partner, the Democrat and Chronicle.
Showing a headline saying "Joe Blow Indicted" is much more effective than just saying "Jow Blow's been indicted," since it shows that somebody else is saying it. All just in time to hit mailboxes and airwaves in the weeks before the election.
District Attorney Mike Green has additional reason to move quickly. His farce of an indictment against Republican official Andrew Moore has left Green hanging out there for a month, subject to criticism for abuse of office by Nifonging Mr. Moore.
The Moore indictment makes Green, once respected as a straight-arrow, look more with each passing day like the disgraced and disbarred Duke rape-case prosecutor. Amazing how lust for a lifetime appointment can disfigure conscience and character.
Green needs to obfuscate his disgrace over the Moore matter by bringing quickly some additional indictments bearing claims of wrongdoing that, this time, are at least superficially plausible.
So we have two dynamics at work here, mutually complementary. Democratic Chairman Joe Morelle wants to indict his way to the County Legislature majority that the political process so far has denied him. District Attorney Green, hoping for a federal judicial appointment, wanted to curry favor with his party by bagging a scalp from Republican Party headquarters; hence the indictment of GOP Executive Director Andrew Moore. An indictment described by a professor of criminal law as a joke. Except, as the prof said, for the person who has to go through it.
The next election indictments are coming next week.
Friday, October 2, 2009
The Election Indictments
Thursday, October 1, 2009
Memo to Chairman Reilich
You need to fire the person at County Republican Headquarters who instructed your candidate for County Legislature in Henrietta, John Howland, to refrain from going door-to-door to Independence Party voters in the month before the Independence Party primary, and to stick instead with the door-to-door plan tailored for the general election. We just learned of this today.
Howland followed the advice from Headquarters and lost the Independence line to his Democratic opponent. Knowledgeable political types tell us the Independence line is worth 300 - 600 votes in the general election in that district.
Just a reminder: candidates need to go to where the votes are. In an Independence primary, that means Independence Party voters.
If you lose the County Legislature by losing the Henrietta seat, and if you lose it by fewer than 600 votes or so, you won't really have lost it. Your own side will have thrown it away.
Wednesday, September 30, 2009
Indict First -- Figure Out Why Later
The good folks at Monroe Rising raise an important issue: Democratic District Attorney Mike Green and Assistant DA William Gargan have indicted Andrew Moore, a Republican Party official, on the flimsiest of pretexts, for what we believe to be political purposes and self-interest. But when asked for a bill of particulars -- in other words, precisely what it is that Mr. Moore is alleged to have done -- it's been a month. And they haven't come up with anything yet!
Check out the details at Monroe Rising.
Tuesday, September 29, 2009
A Talent to Annoy
Governor Paterson said on Sunday's Meet the Press that he's "taken on the special interests."
Actually, what he did was to talk about doing things, such as cutting state spending, guaranteed to antagonize the main special interests in New York.
Then he caved in to those same special interests, thereby antagonizing everybody else as well.
That, we think, more than anything else is the principal cause of the Governor's unpopularity.
Monday, September 28, 2009
Trading Judgeships for Political Proscutions?
Smugtown Beacon now asks about the possibility of a connection between the indictment of the Executive Director of the County Republican Party and District Attorney Green's rumored interest in appointment to a federal judgeship. An indictment described by a law professor as a joke, except to the person indicted.
We fault the Smugtown piece only in presenting the proposition to the DA in easily deniable form: "Were you promised a judgeship in exchange for this indictment?"
It never works that crudely, people. At most, an offer to help get the judgeship, a promise to use best efforts -- that kind of thing.
Our take at Mustard Street is that it's bad enough if Green initiated this farce even if it were just to curry favor with his party, to help get the judgeship. That's all we here have had to say about it so far, and it alone is scandal enough.
Sunday, September 27, 2009
Primary Punditry
We can't let September slip away without a few notes on the party primaries earlier in the month.
1. Best Performance in a Comedy
Jerri Kaiser, endorsed by the Democratic Party as candidate for County Legislator in the 20th Legislative District, lost the Democratic nomination -- to her incumbent Republican opponent, Robert Colby.
Kaiser is press secretary to Congressman Massa and was a member of the Democrat and Chronicle's editorial board. Her candidacy for County Legislature was important enough to the party that Chairman Joe Morelle carried her nominating petitions himself, with chief errand-boy Vinnie Esposito in tow. A State Assembly staffer working for Morelle, Esposito's also a legislator in Irondequoit.
2. Reversal of Fortune
Speaking of Irondequoit, John DiMarco, Republican Town Justice who lost the Independence Party primary in a previous bid to become a County Court judge, nailed it this time. DiMarco scored a 2-to-1 win to take the Independence line on the November ballot. His Democratic opponent in this year's County Court race is Brian McCarthy, who returned from retirement in Texas for the county judgeship, as we reported back in April.
3. Former Legislators Do Well. Except in Chili.
Former county legislator Pete McCann clinched the GOP nomination for Parma Supervisor with a primary win over incumbent Richard Lemcke. Former legislator Karla Boyce emerged as top vote-getter in the Republican primary for Mendon Town Board.
McCann and Boyce continue an apparent trend. Former legislator Stephanie Aldersley easily transitioned to Irondequoit's Town Board when term-limited from running again for legislature. Former legislator Tony LaFountain seems well on his way to becoming the next Supervisor in Penfield, whose current Supervisor, George Wiedemer, also came from the County Legislature. Wiedemer became Supervisor by defeating then-incumbent Channing Philbrick (no relation) in a primary.
The exception to the rule seems to be in Chili, where former Republican Supervisor (and before that, County Legislator) Tracy Logel lost her party's primary for a Town Council seat. In addition, incumbent Chili Supervisor David Dunning beat a challenge from former legislator John Ferlicca, whose campaign closed with a sorry echo of a tactic in an earlier race that earned attorney Ferlicca a reprimand from the state bar.
4. Biggest Win
The biggest margin on primary day was won in an Independence primary for Pittsford Town Justice, where GOP incumbent John Bernanke whacked Democrat Christopher Ciaccio with 85%. Wins like this are rarely seen outside of staged votes in third-world despotisms. On top of the Kaiser-Colby debacle, it was another cringing embarrassment for county Democrats.
5. Most Significant Win
In Henrietta, Democratic candidate for County Legislature Mike Condello took the Independence line, defeating Republican candidate John Howland by 2-to-1 -- as a write-in candidate, no less. Followers of local politics will recall that in 2007, Carmen Gumina did exactly the same thing, in a milestone step toward ultimately defeating incumbent Republican county legislator Dave Malta.
For Democrats the real prize this year is taking the County Legislature. We'd say they wisely were willing to sustain a primary day embarrassment or two in order to focus their efforts and resources on the one that mattered the most. Had she won her own party's primary, Jerri Kaiser would have lost the Ogden-Riga district to Republican Colby anyway. For county Democrats, getting the Independence line for their candidate for the open legislative seat in Henrietta was Priority "A" for Primary Day. For county Republicans, Robert Colby may have given them the last thing to smile about in regard to the legislature for the foreseeable future.
Little Joe's keeping his eye on the ball.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
Seen and Heard (Especially Heard) in Webster Town Hall Yesterday
A bunch of senior citizens screaming at the clerk over their property taxes. Demanding their tax receipts be stamped "Paid under Protest."
The weary clerk observed, "It's been like this all day."
Way to go, Granny and Grandpa!
Now We Understand How the Liberals Feel About Castro
A foreign leader you like better than most leaders of your own country:
Benjamin Nehtatyahu's majestic denunciation of the United Nations, for giving a forum to Holocaust-denier Ahmadinejad, makes him a moral giant among the Lilliputians of the U.N. Bibi's the Man.
And well done, President Obama, for giving the U.S delegates the nod to walk out on Ahmadinejad's speech. Here's the rest of the honor roll of countries that did the same: Britain, Argentina, Australia, Canada, Costa Rica, Denmark, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy and New Zealand.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Local GOP Bigwigs to Meet With Cox
News has reached Mustard Street that Ed Cox, who seems about to be elected State Republican Chairman, will meet tonight in a private dinner with local Republican movers and shakers. Group to include key GOP financial supporters and influential political insiders.
Monday, September 21, 2009
Mike Green Must Want that Federal Judgeship REALLY Badly
... to curry favor with his party by indicting a man he knows to be innocent.
We've been looking at the story behind the indictment of Monroe County GOP Executive Director Andrew Moore.
It's well known in political circles that Democratic District Attorney Michael Green badly wants the federal judgeship that's open in Rochester. He's campaigned for the position with both U.S. Senators.Green's a former Republican who flipped parties when he couldn't get the GOP nomination for DA. He's always been somewhat suspect among Democrats in the party heirarchy, on "Not really one of us" grounds. He lives in that most Republican of places, Pittsford, where his wife is a Republican member of Town Council. To his new party, Green still had something to prove.
Consider:
The Robutrad investigation is a case of federal origins. It was a federal complaint that was filed against former county employee Robert Morone.
The feds, being professionals, had no interest in Andrew Moore. They said so. Here's their complaint against Robert Morone. Look at page 27, where they allege it was Morone who pressured fellow-worker Chris Gorman into signing an endorsement letter. Not Andrew Moore. Moore is mentioned in the federal charge against Morone only as an afterthought, as a campaign volunteer who wrote a draft of an endorsement letter.
That's why the feds indicted Morone -- not Moore. As the feds said on page 27 of their indictment of Morone: it was Morone who pressured another County empoloyee into signing an endorsement letter. Not Moore. The feds recognized Moore was innocent of wrongdoing.
Yet now -- months after the feds left Moore alone because he had done nothing wrong -- our Democratic District Attorney indicts Mr. Moore. An indictment described by a former prosecutor teaching criminal law at John Jay College of Criminal Justice -- in the Democrat and Chronicle no less -- as not fitting the charge brought against Moore, and as " ... funny, except for the fact that the person indicted has to go through this ordeal."
The charge brought against Moore is a local claim, originating in the County DA's office. Not federal. The feds knew better.
According to the Democrat and Chronicle article, Moore took a polygraph test. It showed he was telling the truth. He said he hadn't pressured anyone to sign any letter. (The DA's case against Moore is based on an allegation of such pressure.) The polygraph backed Moore up completely. District Attorney Green, and the Assistant DA involved in the case, William Gargan, who's looking to become a City Court judge and needs the Democratic nomination, didn't want to hear about it.
Trivialities like truthfulness and innocence are irrelevant to a couple of ethically flexible prosecutors on the make. Their job was to provide the pretext for Joe Morelle to be able to say that Robutrad wasn't just the brainchild of one low-level county employee like Robert Morone, but an act of the Republican organization itself. They delivered.
Up to this point, Robutrad had been a bust for the Monroe County Democratic Party. Some rogue County employees who stole from taxpayers were indicted. But there was no link to Republican headquarters.
In this regard there would have been no more potent symbol than an indictment of the man who built the GOP organization here, Steve Minarik. But Minarik managed one last time to poke the County Democratic organization in the eye, by dying before the DA got around to contriving an indictment against him.
Minarik's successor as GOP chairman, Bill Reilich, had only recently become GOP chairman. Nothing to indict there. The feds, it is rumored, might be interested in a former GOP staffer, but any federal charges might not come before this November's elections, in which Democrats are making their big push to take over the County Legislature.
That left only Andrew Moore. If Moore had held any job in the world except Executive Director of the Monroe County GOP, Mike Green never would have sought to indict him. He, better than anyone else, knows Moore to be innocent.District Attorney Green's Democratic Party credentials are now stamped "Paid in Full." Maybe he'll get his judgeship, as reward for an act of corruption.
Whether he does or not, for the rest of his days may his conscience ask him, "For what shall it profit a man, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?"
Sunday, September 20, 2009
Thursday, September 17, 2009
Penfield Post Supports Victim of Political Prosecution
The Penfield Post, a reliably liberal voice, devoted the lead editorial in its issue of September 16 to supporting Andrew Moore remaining on the Penfield Town Council:
Moore ... is innocent until proven guilty. That's why we hope residents will give him the opportunity to continue to serve.Moore, you may recall, is the person wrongfully indicted by corrupt prosecutor Michael Green as a political offering to the local Democratic Party, whose favor Green seeks in order to obtain appointment as a federal judge.. . .
... Moore has repeatedly spoken publicly and has made himself available to the people he is answering to, which includes talking to the media.
For that we commend him. Too often, when public officials find themselves faced with tough questions, they dodge the spotlight and prefer to remain elusive in hopes the furor will subside.
The editorial quotes Moore addressing a meeting of residents and officials:
"I choose to defend my character and my integrity against these false allegations."Good for him.
We'll have more about the whole story in a report to appear shortly.
