Almost a Quarter Century Later, Is a Cuomo & Long Conspiracy To Annihilate The Republican Party Rearing Its Ugly Head, Again In 2014

For a very long time, the relationship between the Republican Party and the New York State Conservative Party, together with its local affiliate the Kings County Conservative Party has been an abusive one

Does Carl Paladino’s remark about “...making a move to upset the apple cart...” show that the love-hate relationship between the Republican Party and the New York State Conservative Party has reached the point of “Life and Death”  —  “It’s Us or Them” ?

There was an interesting item that came through my window wrapped around a brick last night. According to Jimmy Vielkind, this is what Carl Paladino said about the 2014 race for governor after talking to Mike Long at a recent Conservative party event: “At this point, I think everybody's just focused on this current election. Maybe shortly after that there will be some focus put on the type of person we would want [for Governor of New York]. Let's see who's making a move to upset the apple cart after Election Day.” (See  “Paladino on the possibility of a Conservative disruption for governor” by Jimmy Vielkind, 10/11/13, This Is How New York Works Capital  [http://capitalnewyork.com/article/politics/2013/10/8534565/paladino-possibility-conservative-disruption-governor]). In case people don’t have a sense of history about all of this, Jimmy Vielkind pointed out that “Conservatives still cite 1990 as a rallying cry, when Herb London nearly squeaked past anemic Republican nominee Pierre Rinfret.”

Make no mistake about it  --  in 1990 while the GOP and the Conservatives had an enlarged hissy fit over the pecking order on the lines lower than Row "A" --  the direct beneficiary was Mario Cuomo. After that confrontation, the Conservatives have had the upper hand in their attempts to manipulate the NYS GOP. In 1994, Mike Long and the Conservatives tried to force George Marlin on the GOP as its candidate for NYS Comptroller. After a bitter convention fight, Herb London was settled upon as the compromise candidate for Comptroller on both the GOP and Conservative lines. Interestingly, as Republican Candidate for Governor George Pataki closed in on Governor Mario Cuomo, Herb London, Mike Long's former hand-picked candidate in 1990 and his compromise candidate in 1994, switched his endorsement from Pataki to Cuomo. People are still asking what that was all about. Regardless of what else might result form any of this, without a doubt this Mike Long -- Carl Paladino gambit will directly benefit Mario Cuomo's son Andrew in 2014. And people need to ask what this is really all about.

So let's do a quick review, okay !

About a month ago, a couple of guys had started talking about something kinda funky, but not a lot of people paid much attention. I wrote about it then on this blog, and it got little more than a yawn (sure it hurt a little, but a month has passed and I’ve gotten over it), now that Mike Long is also doing some of his 2014 congressional endorsements early to smack around certain Long Island  Republicans and Conservatives, maybe people will start to pay some more attention to some of the other things that he is trying to pull on the GOP.

Back in September around primary day, according to a guy named Ken Hall, Mike Long and the New York State Conservatives might have been up to a little more than shooting off their shared mouth when Long brought up Carl Paladino. You see, there should have been more of a buzz caused by a report that Mike Long, Der Uberfuehrer of the New York State Conservative Party, has mentioned running Carl Paladino on the Conservative Line if the Republicans don’t run somebody acceptable to Long. Well, add to that Mr. Hall’s buying into the notion that  “If Paladino runs as a Conservative while Republicans back another in their long line of nondescript candidates, the second most popular party in New York might no longer be the GOP [ instead it will be Long’s Conservatives]” and you are halfway home to Hall’s conclusion, which is succinctly expressed in the title to his mini-opus (See “Ken Hall: Conservatives could shift NY GOP left” by Ken Hall, [9/12/13]., TimesHerald [http://m.recordonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20130912/NEWS/309120335&templat]). Unfortunately, the rest of Hall’s article was about as succinct as one of my longer efforts on this blog. By the time I was done reading it, it felt like had rubbed my eyes with a Hall’s Mentholyptus (don’t do it, you won’t like it) instead of reading a Hall’s opinion item about Mike Long and Carl Paladino. Which probably explains why it didn’t get much of an echo since then.

Hall’s piece in the Times Herald was published in response to an article by Kenneth Lovett in the NY Daily News, which was the earlier iteration of Long’s deadly threat (or was it just blather?) about Paladino and the Republicans choice for governor in 2014 ( See “Conservative Party open to 'Crazy Carl' Paladino running for governor in 2014” by Kenneth Lovett, 9/9/13, NY Daily News [http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/conservative-party-open-paladino-running-govenor-article-1.1449465]). Once you’ve read the Hall and Lovett treatments of the material, give a quick glance back at my gem-like nugget sub-titled  “Massive Conservative Party threat to the GOP: ‘THE CONSERVATIVE  PARTY COMEBACK OF “CRAZY CARL PALADINO”'  —   AS THREATENED BY MIKE LONG EDITION’ ” ( See my  9/9/13 post  “Anybody voting in the Brooklyn Republican Party Primary...” below on this blog).