An "Open Letter" to Ben Akselrod, Russell Gallo, and even Steven Cymbrowitz

Gentlemen:

If there are no significant changes, Ben Akselrod will be the next Assemblyman from the 45th AD. The only real question that remains to be answered is whether Mr. Akselrod will be elected in 2012 or 2014.

Akselrod participated in two primary fights in 2012 -- he narrowly lost the Democratic Party primary to the incumbent Democrat Assemblyman from the 45th AD, Steven Cymbrowitz -- and he was successful in an Independence Party write-in primary against both Cymbrowitz and the Republican-Conservative candidate Russell Gallo. As a result, the November 2012 election will have all three of candidates on the ballot for the position of Member of the Assembly from the 45th Assembly District.

All three present themselves as community-oriented, family values, social conservatives --- both Cymbrowitz and Akselrod are enrolled Democrats and Gallo is an enrolled Republican. Most observers say that Cymbrowitz is only as "conservative" as he needs to be, while both Akselrod and Gallo are both very comfortable with most if not all of the forms and brands of "conservative" that are popular in  2012.

For various reasons, it is my view that Cymbrowitz represents the past way of doing things in the "old 45th AD" ---  Ben Akselrod represents what's happening in the "new 45th AD"  ---  and  Russell Gallo doesn't fit in any 45th AD, new or old.

Ben Akselrod can win this election on the Independence Party line. However, if Ben Akselrod wants to win this election on that line, he needs to take almost all of what might be considered Gallo's votes on the Republican and  Conservative Party lines. Given the ethnic makeup of the new 45th AD, this is difficult but not impossible. What Mr. Akselrod needs to do is completely marginalize the nominal candidate of the Republican and Conservative parties by an open and direct appeal to Republican and Conservative voters.

As has often been said through the early going of the 2012 election cycle, for various reasons Gallo is not the right fit for many of the 45th AD's Republicans. Some of those Republicans would be willing to form the cadre of a "Republicans for Akselrod" operation. A smaller group of Conservative Party enrollees would also seem to be doable.

Using tactics like the above, if Ben Akselrod continues to work as hard in the general election as he did in his two primaries, Ben Akselrod might well be sworn in as the Assemblyman from the 45th AD at the New Year of 2013.

Your faithful Independent Republican servant,

Galewyn Massey