New Republican Blog Seems very Familiar with a Russ Gallo Attack on Orthodox Jewish Activist Joseph Hayon for Pushing Democrats as Republicans

Russell Gallo resumes longtime feud with one of the handful of Orthodox Jewish activists in the Brooklyn GOP  —   Fight over getting the GOP line for Ben Akselrod in 2014 goes back to Brooklyn GOP endorsement meeting  —  Fight with Hayon goes back much further

According to Gallo, “Hayon is and always will be the Jewish Al Sharpton....”

Russell Gallo came out of his corner throwing haymakers like these: “This November there will  be candidates on both the Republican and Democratic lines for the assembly seat in Brooklyn's 45th.  Steven Cymbrowitz (D) will be on the Democratic column and Ben Akselrod (D) will be on the Republican column. ***   How can this be you ask? ***   “...In this instance however, there are a couple of political whores, that claim to be Republican, that helped secure the Republican line for a Democrat through an opportunity to ballot petition that allowed people (about 60 of them...) to write in a candidate's name on primary day. This form of voting is fraught with errors and fraud....” (See “Brooklyn's 45th Assembly District: Two Democrats on the Ballot and a Political Whore Run Amok” by Russell Gallo, 9/28/14, Behind Enemy Lines  —  Blogging-From-Within  [http://www.behindenemylinesradio.us/2014/09/brooklyns-45th-assembly-district-two.html?m=1]).  From there Mr. Gallo went on to discuss the key players in the 45th A.D.: Democrat Assemblyman Steven Cymbrowitz, Democrat Assembly Candidate Ben Akselrod and Orthodox Jewish GOP activist Joseph Hayon  —  all three in caustic terms and  less than laudatory tones. The pinnacle of Gallo’s pugnacious pejorative pasting was preserved for Mr. Hayon — “Joseph Hayon is a RINO and a political whore; among other things....”

The new blog looks a lot like its predecessor the “Brooklyn GOP Radio  -Official- Show Blog” ....

Reached for a comment, about the new blog and Gallo’s post, Mr. Hayon seemed unruffled and actually responded by pointing out, in a matter-of-fact way, that enough good Republican voters voted for Mr. Akselrod for him to win the GOP “write-in” primary in the 45th A.D. However, with all the brouhaha over his failing to get the GOP Wilson-Pakula before petitioning, and his  poor showing in the recent Democratic Primary, it isn’t clear now whether Ben Akselrod will file an acceptance and take the GOP line after all. Another item that Hayon wanted to comment upon was this criticism by Gallo: “Mr. Hayon does not support Congressman Michael Grimm or State Senator Marty Golden; both Republicans running for reelection this year.”  Hayon’s reply was again sort of matter-of-fact, “I thought Gallo didn’t support either one of them himself.”

Ah, it's almost like the old "...Jig is Up Atlas" days.  Good times, good times !

The Big House With Big Secrets: 1306 Albemarle Road

Why it is that Some Murder Mysteries Just Won’t Go Away  —   Sometimes They Tie Into the Local Politics  —   Sometimes Into the Local Geography  —   Sometimes the Local History

10 Rillington Place and 1306 Albemarle Road have a few very interesting parallels   —   both in history and mystery  —   Strange Analogues Between a Not-So-Old Brooklyn Case and a Major Case in Wartime and Post-war London

A little while ago, I discovered a surprising connection between the Hynes-Golden insider attorney Arthur Aidala and a case that just won’t go away, or get put to bed, or manage to be swept under the rug, the 2003 Mark Steven Fisher murder case (See my 9/14/14 post “The Curious Cases of Arthur Aidala, ‘Joe’ Hynes and Marty Golden — Part 3*” below on this blog). That post tripled the normal volume on this blog; and so far, no two posts since have totaled either the number of “hits” or the number of “comments” as has “Curious Cases...  Aidala...  Hynes...  Golden...  Part 3*.”

Also, it should be obvious that many people are not happy with the outcome of the Mark Fisher murder case. Standing out among many other people the most important of those not satisfied with the outcome of that case are Nancy and Michael Fisher, the parents of the deceased Mark Fisher; they still run a blog that includes news, background and other information about their son’s case. Probably next would be Doreen Giuca, mother of John Giuca, one of those convicted of the murder, who still maintains that he is not guilty of the murder, and whose mother Doreen has gone to great lengths to discredit the conduct of the trial that convicted her son and the methods used by the prosecution to secure the conviction. And of course, many journalists have been almost untiring in keeping this story alive with new information and repeated editorial criticism of the prosecution and the judicial system that fostered what has gone on in this case so far; and that, to date, refuses to correct any aspect of it.

It is against that backdrop, that I want to take a moment aside and change the focus.


FOR A CHANGE LET’S TAKE A CLOSE LOOK AT A PLACE   —   AND DRAW SOME PARALLELS WITH ANOTHER PLACE AND ANOTHER FAMOUS CASE, LONG AGO AND FAR AWAY


I want to look at ONE PLACE involved in the Fisher murder case that has not received proper scrutiny to this day.  It has received some scant mention, but it needs much more. That place is 1306 Albemarle Road in Brooklyn, New York.

1306 ALBEMARLE ROAD

Up to now, the address  “1306 Albemarle Road” has only occasionally been mentioned in connection with the Mark Fisher murder case, occasionally but not often. That is because there has been a well orchestrated effort to keep that address out of the story line. It was the home of two key witnesses in the Fisher case, Susan Cleary and her son Albert Cleary. It is also a place, according to some accounts, that the murder victim Mark Fisher might well have expected to have finished off the night of October 11-12, 2003 safely tucked-in before taking his trip home to Sparta, New Jersey, on the morning or later in the day of October 12, 2003. Instead, on the morning of October 12th, 2003, he was found murdered at the foot of a driveway across the street from 1306 Albemarle tucked in a blanket.

The house at 1306 Albemarle Road is located in the Ditmas Park section of Brooklyn and is situated on a corner plot, whose street side is along Argyle Road, directly across the street from the spot near the front of 150 Argyle Road, where the body of Mark Steven Fisher allegedly was found shortly after his murder. It is very interesting that a recent article by Hella Winston that appeared on the front page of the New York Observer contains one of the few photographs of the turreted and gable-roofed Ditmas Park home at 1306 Albemarle Road in Brooklyn ever associated with the Fisher case (See “Did an Ambitious Prosecutor Convict the Wrong Man for the Killing of Mark Fisher?” by Hella Winston, 9/24/14. NY Observer/ News/ observer.com  [http://observer.com/2014/09/the-mark-fisher-murder/]).

The first reason that 1306 Albemarle Road is a place of interest is because it is one of the closest houses to the place where Mark Steven Fisher was murdered, estimated by some as about fifty feet away from where the body was found. Another is that it is also the house where two or three key witnesses in the Fisher murder case were staying at the time and near the place that Fisher was murdered; those witnesses include Albert Clearly and Angel diPietro, who each allegedly gave incredible and false testimony in the joint trials of two defendants found guilty of murdering Mark Fisher. A third reason that 1306 Albemarle Road is a place of interest is that all three of the witnesses there claim to have been asleep inside and not to have heard the shots, noise of a car and the voices of a young man and woman that were heard by others who were near the corner Albemarle and Argyle Roads shortly before Mark Fisher’s body was found across the street from 1306 Albemarle Road, as well as hearing none of the police that were searching on the grounds of all the houses in and around the crime scene for hours after the body was found. The most interesting unknown about 1306 Albemarle Road is whether New York City Police Officers, Detectives, forensic examiners or investigators of the Kings County DA’s Office ever conducted a complete search of the grounds or any part of the interior of 1306 Albemarle Road and what if any evidence they might have found there.

Also very interesting, according to two of the witnesses themselves, those inside 1306 were probably the first witnesses and/or suspects to discuss obtaining legal counsel in connection with the Fisher murder case. Of particular interest, for this post, Albert Cleary, together with the lawyer he selected, discussed Fisher’s murder and various defenses with John Giuca, a man later put on trial for the murder and against whom Albert Cleary testified at trial.

There is something else that makes 1306 Albemarle Road interesting.  It is the parallels that it holds to a long-ago demolished building in London. That building was the infamous 10 Rillington Place, an address whose infamy was raised to fame by a great piece of investigative writing and criminal history by Ludovic Kennedy, and a chilling movie starring Sir [later Baron] Richard Attenborough,

The decrepit terrace-fronted stack of flats that had been located at 10 Rillington Place in Notting Hill, London was never anything like the massive single family home at 1306 Albemarle Road in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn.  However, there are a few things that link the two addresses:  murder victims, murderers, false witnesses in murder trials, falsely convicted alleged murderers and a nearness to two neighborhoods named Kensington, one in Brooklyn and one in London.  Almost every detail that I mentioned as being interesting about 1306 Albemerle Road in connection to the Fisher murder case has a parallel or analogue to the murders that happened at 10 Rillington place between 1943 and 1953,

10 RILLINGTON PLACE

The story of 10 Rillington Place is a far more lurid tale than what happened in and around 1306 Albemarle Road, Brooklyn.  The cases at 10 Rillington Road were much more in character with the historical and literary traditions of mysterious multiple murders in London. The terrace style row house at the far end of Rillington Place was the situs of several sexually perverse murders that began during the Blitz in WW II and ended in the early 1950s.  In that time,  John Reginald Halliday Christie, who started his spree as an auxiliary police constable in wartime London, murdered several women over a ten year span at 10 Rillington Place, in Notting Hill, and buried their remains at that location and at a few other places nearby, like bombed out buildings in the adjoining London neighborhood called Kensington, where on occasion he also stalked his prey.

The first trial in the 10 Rillington  murder cases  was brought five years after the war against Timothy Evans, who was convicted of murder by a concatenation of unscrupulous detectives and prosecutors, and his trial turned on the testimony of the actual murderer, Christie. In the Evans case, neither Scotland Yard nor the rest of the Metropolitan Police bothered to thoroughly search the property where Evans supposedly murdered his wife, Beryl and daughter Geraldine. As a result, they failed to see the bones of Christie's earlier wartime victims, some of which were visible in the garden according to Christie’s later statements.

Evans, who was of limited intelligence and illiterate, had been tried for the murders of his wife and his unborn daughter. The trial turned on the testimony of John Christie, who had supposedly been a virtual co-conspirator in Evans’ attempts to cover-up the murder of his wife and daughter. Because of Christie’s testimony, all attempts by Evans lawyers to avoid the impact of a vague and garbled confession failed. That confession related to the killing of “his daughter,” which “confession” had been related to a detective who had taken incomprehensible notes (Evans believed that his wife had died during a botched abortion, because that’s what Christie had told him. According to Evans’ lawyers, Evans thought he was confessing to soliciting Christie to perform an abortion on his wife and to trying to cover up his wife’s death as an accomplice to Christie.). As a result of his confession, Evans was found guilty of the murder of the daughter, but not his wife, and executed in 1950.

Within a few years, Christie committed three more murders and eventually was caught and tied to the actual Beryl Evans murder, although he never admitted to murdering the child of Timothy and Beryl Evans.  After confessing to the murders of eight woman, Christie was charged only with the murder of his wife, tried and executed in 1953. Notably, he wasn’t charged with anything that he did during his police service, nor for which he had testified on behalf of the Crown in the Evans case.

For several years, there was resistance to any reopening of the case against Timothy Evans, even thought there was a widespread belief that the conviction and execution of Evans was a gross miscarriage of justice.  Largely due to the research and writing of a well-connected historical author, Ludovic Kennedy,  the Crown accepted the theory that Evans had been framed by Christie, and Timothy Evans was officially pardoned by the Home Secretary in 1966. The Evans case is one of the first major miscarriages of justice known to have been acknowledged by the British Crown in its prosecutions occurring in the aftermath of WW II.

The connotation of “Rillington Place” was so bad that city officials soon changed its name to “Ruston Place.” However when that failed to stop crime tours and just plain ghoulish Nosy Parkers, city and local planners quickly authorized an urban renewal; and eventually wiped it from the street grid, making any observation of the original site of 10 Rillington Place a virtual impossibility.  They formally and practically wiped out th whole small close (dead end street) of about ten houses, even thought there was a separate historical reason to note it as  the birth place of Charlie Chaplin’s father at 15 Rillington Place, in an earlier time when the street included several more residential buildings.

Thanks, in part, to a great book by Ludovic Kennedy, and a very good but very creepy movie by Clive Exton, Richard Fleischer, John Hurt and Richard Attenborough, the man originally and wrongfully convicted of at least one ( but not two, the child but not the mother?) of the Rillington place murders was vindicated and posthumously pardoned.

Similarly, many American writers and movie-makers are presently trying to do the same with Fisher-Giuca-Russo case(s). No doubt, what happened in and near 1306 Albemarle Road, and what the police, prosecutors and their witnesses did or didn’t see, hear or otherwise search for at that location, will be a big part of the telling of that story.

There are many more specific and interesting parallels between John Christie and Albert Cleary, however the purpose of this post was to draw the analogies and parallels between 10 Rillington Place, London -and- 1306 Albemarle Road, Brooklyn. Let’s leave the rest about Christie and Cleary for another day.

Courier Life’s coverage of the Golden-Kemmerer "Great...Debate" not a good thing for Golden Campaign

Courier Life’s Brooklyn Daily Article actually reported on what the candidates said at “The Great Bay Ridge Debate”

Kemmerer shown to hammer at “corruption” issues   —   Golden responds,  “Corruption is a very powerful thing, but you can’t just run on corruption....” 

According to Max Jaeger writing for Courier Life’s Brooklyn Daily, “The Great Bay Ridge Debate between state Sen. Marty Golden (R–Bay Ridge) and Democratic opponent James Kemmerer on Sept. 23 was mired in mud-slinging, with the challenger painting Golden as a corrupt Albany insider, and the incumbent calling Kemmerer a carpet-bagging one-trick pony....”
(See “Bay Ridge Senate race gets muddy” by Max Jaeger, 9/25/14, Courier Life/ Brooklyn Daily [http://www.brooklyndaily.com/stories/2014/39/br-great-debate-bay-ridge-senate-2014-09-26-bk_2014_39.html]).  Mr. Jaeger is certainly correct that the debate did apparently involve some “mud-slinging” back and forth between State Senator Golden and his 2014 opponent.  However, the person responsible for the article’s headline was way off the mark by describing the either the performances or the results of the debate with this: “Bay Ridge Senate race gets muddy.”

Quite to the contrary, Max Jaeger’s 9/25/14 report of the September 23rd debate at Holy Angels Academy  (OLA) is a bit of political reporting of rare clarity, as are the quotes of the candidates; there is nothing muddy about it. This exchange between the candidates that follows is a good example:  “‘Corruption is a very powerful thing, but you can’t just run on corruption,’ Golden said, accusing Kemmerer of having a one-plank platform. ‘You have to know something about the community. You’ve lived in three states in the last seven years. You’ve got no qualifications to be the senator of this great district.’ ***   Kemmerer, who moved to the district in 2009 after living in Chicago for a decade, said five years in Bay Ridge is long enough to qualify him. ***  
‘You don’t have to live here that long to see the problems,’ Kemmerer fired back. ‘Donors control what gets done, so until we solve the problem, it will be hard to make progress on a whole host of issues.’...”  Well-pointed lines — well delivered by the debaters  —  AND  —  well reported !

It didn’t end with that.  Jaeger’s article continued as follows: “...[D]uring the debate, the challenger hammered Golden over his alleged pay-to-play politics. Kemmerer cited legislation Golden authored in 2013 that supposedly rewarded a major donor and Sunset Park tobacco wholesaler, a Borough Park charity for which Golden secured major grants and which was scrutinized by the anti-corruption Moreland Commission, and the state senator’s ties to Bay Ridge Manor, a catering hall his family owns that he frequently patronizes for political events — something pundits say may have caused a major rift in the Brooklyn Republican party. ***
The incumbent flatly denied any wrongdoing, noting the Moreland Commission’s investigation is now itself under investigation for internal bias, and that he was operating within the law when dipping into campaign coffers to rent out his family’s catering hall. ***   ‘We did not funnel any type of money,” Golden said. “We’ve had events in many different locations, and we’ve had events in the Bay Ridge Manor, which we paid for and we did it correctly and by the law.’...”

In spite of the good and accurate reporting on the debate by Max Jaeger and Courier Life, Golden and his crew have to be very unhappy with the Courier Life article about the State Senate part of the “Great Bay Ridge Debate.”   These captions as a synopsis for the whole debate on the 23rd are not complimentary to either Golden or his campaign for re-election: “Golden boy: State Sen. Marty Golden tried to shift focus from his office’s questionable spending to his record serving the district.” and  “James and the giant pol: Democratic upstart James Kemmerer accused State Sen. Martin Golden of questionable ethics, and Golden attacked the newcomer for his lack of political experience.”  Lines like that frame the debate exactly the way Jamie Kemmerer would want it to be framed.

Three different calls — three different corners of the Brooklyn GOP — one sorry story

The word is that some Brooklyn GOP Official failed to timely file the results of the 2014 Kings County Republican Judicial Convention with the Board of Elections   

No Kings County Supreme Court Nominees to appear on the November ballot on the Republican line

After an often contentious Brooklyn GOP Judicial Convention, the GOP Judicial Delegates selected a full slate of Supreme Court Justices to be placed on the Republican line for the 2014 General Election.  The results of the Judicial Convention together with the certified list of the proposed Republican candidates for Justices on the New York State Supreme Court needed to be filed with the BOE by midnight last night. That was not done; as a result, the Republican Party will not have a slate of candidates for Supreme Court Justice in 2014.  Also as a result, the place for such County-wide candidates will be left completely blank on the ballot.

All three calls to me named a single person as the sole responsible individual; which name I am withholding at this time until I can verify that only one person had the duty to perform the act of filing the information about the 2014 Brooklyn Republican Judicial Convention with the Board of Elections.

Bay Ridge Community Council Debate called by some a “Romp” for Republican-Conservative Candidates — Others saw it differently

Some say “Old Pro” Marty Golden repeatedly got the upper hand on neophyte Jamie Kammerer  —   Others think that Jamie Kemmerer more than held his own in this, his first debate  —   And that Marty Golden let Kemmerer’s corruption barbs get under his skin

Former DA Hynes’ operatives show up at debate to root for and help out State Senator Golden

Debates also included Assembly Members Nicole Malliotakis (R-C Staten Island/Bay Ridge) and Alec Brook-Krasny (D Bay Ridge/ Brighton Beach) and their opponents Marty Beth Melendez (D) and Stamatis (Steve) Lilikakis (R-C)

Congressman Grimm, like the cheese, stands alone

Last night there was a gathering of pols and wonks that some have referred to as “The Great Bay Ridge Debate,” hosted last night by the Bay Ridge Community Council at Holy Angels Academy (Our Lady of Angels), a Catholic school located at 74th Street and 4th Avenue in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn.

This was a relatively unpublicized and largely unanticipated event, but it was by most estimates well-attended and it should be well-reported upon.

State Senator Marty Golden and Democratic challenger James Kemmerer, a first-time candidate might well have been the most interesting “pairing” at the debate.

During a rapid fire tit for tat, whenever Jamie Kemmerer, the Democrat nominee,  tried to get into the issue of corruption by using newspaper reports of Golden's questionable campaign financial transactions, Golden fended it all off with moral indignation, even implying that Kemmerer and his sources were irresponsible liars. Then Golden turned the tables on the political newcomer by countering the Democrat’s claim that Kemmerer was the state senate candidate that would best represent local working families. Golden scolded Kemmerer for having moved too many times over the past ten years to adequately represent the people of Bay Ridge. All in all Golden looked like the old pro, who had done his homework; and Jamie Kemmerer looked surprised that Golden didn’t wilt at the first mention of corruption, but instead made Kemmerer look bad for bringing it up in the first place.

Most important, Golden was able to keep his main focus on all the supposed funding he had brought home over the years by delivering a rapid-fire list of appropriations he had brought home to the district. Again, Golden looked like the old pro and Kemmerer the tyro.

Even the clearly Democrat-leaning Kip of the blog “Bay Ridge Journal” thought that the night had obviously gone Marty Golden’s way ( See “Republicans Romp at "The Great Bay Ridge Debate" by Kip, 9/24/14, Bay Ridge Journal/ The View from My Block [http://bayridgejournal.blogspot.com/2014/09/republicans-romp-at-great-bay-ridge.html]).

One of Kemmerer’s cornermen saw it quite differently, “Kemmerer was calm and composed while debating, which was especially impressive since Jamie was a first-time candidate and this was his first debate. It takes real balls to sit next to Marty and say what he said....”  The partisan Democrat went on to say that  “... Marty was FURIOUS. He thinks he's beyond reproach. After Jamie rattled off every public allegation under the sun [...] Marty basically scolded Jamie and said he wasn't allowed to do that. Whose rule is that Jerry Kassar’s, or did Marty just make it up last night ?”  One of Kemmerer’s top advisers implied that there will be lots more of the same for the rest of the campaign — “This [stuff] really gets under Marty's skin. So he's either totally innocent or really [something ending in “ing”] guilty because he [Golden] takes it very, very personal[ly]....”

Another supporter of the Democratic Party candidate for State Senate said this: “Kemmerer, I thought was excellent and kept honing in on the Moreland commission and the numerous shady deals Golden has made over the years. The audience seemed oblivious ( ‘the auditorium was packed with all Grimm/Golden supporters...’).”

AND IT LOOKS LIKE A LITTLE MORE OF THE HYNES-GOLDEN CONNECTION WAS ON DISPLAY AT THE DEBATE

Also this was quite a relevant observation by one of my key operatives that was at the debate. It is related to other matters that have been discussed on this blog: “Larry Morrish had two of his questions read (Morrish is a key Marty Golden supporter, who has been mentioned in connection with the Hynes “Asset Forfeiture Scandal”) ....   and another Hynes [campaign person] who hung around the [DA’s Office] during the [2013 General Election campaign for DA] also had her question read....  Golden thanked the Hynes [campaign person] by name from the dais after he answered her question.  [Those two Hynes people were there along with] some faces from the infamous Hynes campaign bus that traveled around Brooklyn [during the 2013 General Election campaign for DA].”

"BELL for Congress 2014" to seek new life as a "Write-in Campaign"

The always controversial Staten Island Republican Richard Bell continues to pursue his campaign in opposition to incumbent Republican Congressman Michael Grimm by urging a “Write-In” for “BELL for Congress” on Election Day 2014   —   November  4, 2014

For those not happy with the choice presented by the major parties, incumbent Michael Grimm and challenger Domenic Recchia, Tea Party Patriot and Republican gadfly and firebrand Richard Bell might fit the bill as a protest candidate, but you will have to do it as a “write-in”

Richard Bell has been active in borough politics both with the Tea Party Patriots and as a member of the Staten Island GOP County Committee, and he had talked about a run against Grimm for over a year. Mr. Bell had intended to run as a candidate of the Libertarian Party; and the chairman of the Libertarian Party did speak well of Bell as a congressional candidate for the Staten Island seat held by Grimm ( See “Libertarian Party looking to field a candidate in this year's congressional race” by Tom Wrobleski, 5/24/14, Staten Island Advance/ silive.com [http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2014/05/libertarian_party_looking_to_f.html]). However, Bell was knocked off of the ballot as the Libertarian candidate after filing his petition for that line.

A Willowbrook native, Bell is married with three children and is owner of the Valeda Lieder company, which installs filtration devices for aquariums. There is a “BELL for Congress 2014” site on Facebook (See [https://www.facebook.com/BellForCongress2014]).   Those who read the comments to Tom Wrobleski’s columns mentioning Congressman Michael Grimm should be familiar with many of  Mr. Bell’s opinions about the current Staten Island congressman and other matters.

Also, according to the SI Advance, Green Party candidate Hank Bardel is also on the ballot in the same race against Grimm and Recchia.

Obama’s New Open-ended War in Syria

In spite of Neo-Con urging, President George W. Bush never attacked Syria  —  Obama takes the U.S. Middle East War into Syrian territory along with a hand full of Arab allies, and apparently with Syria’s OK

The Obama Doctrine of using drones armed with Hellfire missiles over various sovereign nations has morfed into deep strikes into Syria against ISIL (ISIS) AND OTHER TARGETS by sea launched Tomahawk cruise missiles, sea based FA-18 Super Hornets and land-based F-22 Raptors  — The Pentagon says  this level of hostilities is open-ended and might go on for years....

According to the Reuters News Service, “ The United States and its Arab allies bombed Syria for the first time on Tuesday, killing scores of Islamic State fighters and members of a separate al Qaeda-linked group, opening a new front against militants by joining Syria's three-year-old civil war...   The United States and its Arab allies bombed Syria for the first time on Tuesday, killing scores of Islamic State fighters and members of a separate al Qaeda-linked group, opening a new front against militants by joining Syria's three-year-old civil war....” ( See “U.S. and Arab allies launch first strikes on fighters in Syria” by Phil Stewart & Tom Perry, 9/23/14, Reuters/ Washington/ Beirut [http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/23/us-syria-crisis-usa-strikes-idUSKCN0HI03A20140923]).

In a sign of how the Islamic State's (ISIL/ISIS) rise has blurred conflict lines, the Syrian government said Washington had informed it hours before the strikes in a letter from Secretary of State John Kerry sent through his Iraqi counterpart.

The Pentagon said the U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, Samantha Power, had informed Syria's envoy in advance but there had been no coordination and no communication between the two countries' armed forces. Only a year ago Washington was on the verge of bombing the Syrian government over the use of chemical weapons, before Obama canceled the strikes at the last minute. Now, Syrian state TV is saying the air strikes did not amount to an act of aggression because the Syrian government had been notified. This does not mean Syria is part of the joint operations or a part of the alliance, however ISIL/ISIS  is viewed as a common enemy.

“Lt. Gen. William Mayville, director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff [J-3], said Monday night's air strikes in Syria ‘are the beginning of a credible and sustainable, persistent campaign to degrade and ultimately destroy ISIL’... Although he refused to comment on future operations, Mayville told reporters, ‘You are seeing the beginnings of a sustained campaign, and strikes like this in the future can be expected....’” (See “Pentagon: U.S. Air Strikes in Syria Are 'Beginning of a...Sustainable, Persistent Campaign'” by Susan Jones, 9/23/14, [http://cnsnews.com/news/article/susan-jones/pentagon-us-air-strikes-syria-are-beginning-asustainable-persistent]). General Mayville also said that the “operational pace, the tempo of this thing, will be dictated by the facts on the ground...  It would be difficult for me today to kind of lay out some sort of very lockstep process. It's driven by the opportunities that we see.”

Earlier, Rear Admiral John Kirby, a U.S. Defense Department spokesman, told reporters, “I can tell you that last night's strikes were only the beginning."  Kirby also said the U.S. military's "immediate tasks" are to "continue the degradation of ISIL in Syria and Iraq; to build and strengthen regional partners and to build a regional coalition; to assist in placing Iraqi Security Forces and (Kurdish) Pershmerga forces on the offensive; to support the broader diplomatic efforts in the region; to implement a Syrian train-and-equip program; and to continue to work with Iraqi Security Forces and ministers."

OBAMA “STRATEGY” REMAINS CONTROVERSIAL

The president’s recent expressions of a strategy vis a vis ISIL/ISIS did not garner broad support either by military professionals or the American people. It remains to be seen if the Commander in Chief and his top generals and admirals at the Pentagon are on the same page when it comes to the newly opened air offensive in Iraq and Syria. So far, on day one, it seems that they are  – sort of....

“President Barack Obama vowed more strikes against extremists in Syria on Tuesday after U.S. forces carried out separate air raids targeting Islamic State militants and an al Qaeda affiliate that Washington said was plotting attacks on America and Europe. ***   "We will not tolerate safe havens for terrorists who threaten our people," Obama said as he left the White House to travel to the United Nations in New York, where he will meet officials from Arab nations that joined in the strikes against the Islamic State group. ***   The White House said U.S. forces made separate strikes on its own against the Khorasan group, an al Qaeda affiliate, in order to disrupt planning for imminent attacks on the west....” (See “Obama vows continued air strikes against extremists in Syria” by Roberta Rampton & Phil Stewart, 9/23/14, Reuters News Service [http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/23/us-syria-crisis-usa-idUSKCN0HI20820140923]).

Huma Abedin, Hillary Clinton’s very close advisor, was literally back in the News this past weekend

The Daily News reports that  “Huma [Abedin] has been an important part of  [former Secretary of State Hillary] Clinton’s work for the past 18 years...  and no matter what the future holds, Huma will remain so.”

Recent feature in the New York Daily News focused on Abedin’s fallout from husband Anthony Weiner’s selfies, but not on her Islamist connections

The Benghazi Committee needs to take a close look into the Hillary Clinton-Huma Abedin Connection vis a vis the Benghazi fiasco

According to last Saturday’s New York Daily News, “When Anthony Weiner’s mayoral campaign imploded last year amid new sexting revelations, the fallout buffeted his wife, longtime Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin. ***   Clinton’s inner circle was furious with Weiner, and Abedin’s role with Hillary was said to be in doubt.  ***   “Huma has a choice to make,” New York magazine quoted a “close associate” of Abedin’s as saying. “Does she go with Anthony, or does she go with Hillary?”  ***   The magazine described Abedin as “traumatized” by the prospect of leaving the inner sanctum. ***   One year later, Abedin’s marriage to Weiner appears intact, and her role in Hillary’s camp is secure. As Clinton’s personal chief of staff, Abedin was constantly at her boss’ side as Clinton toured the country promoting her memoir, “Hard Choices,” over the summer. And there she was again last weekend, standing just behind Clinton as the former First Lady worked the rope line at an Iowa steak fry, a visit widely seen as the first concrete public step by Clinton toward an expected 2016 presidential campaign....” (See ““Huma Abedin remains at Hillary Clinton’s side despite sexting woes with husband Anthony Weiner” by Annie Karni, 9/20/14, NY Daily News [http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/huma-abedin-remains-hillary-clinton-side-woes-anthony-weiner-article-1.1947004]).

Importantly, the News article concludes with this: “For now, Clinton phones informal advisers to help make crucial political decisions. “There’s not one, two or three people that are constantly being consulted by her and giving her advice,” the Clinton source said. ***   Among those ensconced with Clinton are her longtime spokesman Philippe Reines — and Abedin. ***  
“Huma has been an important part of Secretary Clinton’s work for the past 18 years,” Hillary Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill said, “and no matter what the future holds, Huma will remain so.”

It really does seem that for quite some time Hillary Clinton has been to some greater extent than lesser, inexplicably dependent on Huma Abedin. Unfortunately for its readers, the Daily News failed to mention one word about the biggest liability of Hillary Clinton’s unexplained dependence on Huma Abedin.  Abedin’s history of connections to Islamic extremists.

Even though this was written over year ago it is still quite relevant and on point.  In July 2013,  former U.S. Attorney and Fox News national security contributor Andrew McCarthy wrote this about Huma Abedin  in the National Review: “...[I]t is amazing, as we speculate about Ms. Abedin’s political future, that the elephant in the room goes unnoticed, or at least studiously unmentioned.... [... T]o  recap, Ms. Abedin worked for many years at a journal that promotes Islamic-supremacist ideology that was founded by a top al-Qaeda financier, Abdullah Omar Naseef. Naseef ran the Rabita Trust, a formally designated foreign terrorist organization under American law. Ms. Abedin and Naseef overlapped at the Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs (JMMA) for at least seven years. Throughout that time (1996–2003), Ms. Abdein worked for Hillary Clinton in various capacities....  Ms. Abedin served as one of Secretary of State Clinton’s top staffers and advisers at the State Department. ...during that time, the State Department strongly supported abandoning the federal government’s prior policy against official dealings with the Muslim Brotherhood. State, furthermore, embraced a number of Muslim Brotherhood positions that undermine both American constitutional rights and our alliance with Israel....” (See “The Huma Unmentionables” by Andrew C. McCarthy, 7/24/13,   National Review/ The Corner [http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/354351/huma-unmentionables-andrew-c-mccarthy]).  McCarthy’s concluding observation is succinct and presciently anticipated last Saturday’s Daily News article:   “What a racket. The marriage to Huma Abedin, a Clinton insider, enable[d] Anthony Weiner to resurrect a debased career and deflect attention from his psychotic antics even as he continue[d] them. The marriage to Anthony Weiner, a prominent Jewish progressive, enable[d] Huma Abedin to deflect attention from her associations with various Islamic supremacists even as, during her tenure as a top State Department official, American policy embrace[d] Islamic supremacists. ***   But let’s not discuss that.”

IS THERE A HUMA ABEDIN BENGHAZI CONNECTION ?

One national security expert has asked, “What was Huma Abedin’s advice when her boss responded to the proverbial ‘3 o’clock call’ on the evening of September 11, 2012 ?”  (See “The Women of Benghazigate” by Frank Gaffney, 5/13/14, Center for Security Policy/ OpEds/  | Counterterrorism, The Arab Spring [http://www.centerforsecuritypolicy.org/2013/05/13/the-women-of-benghazigate/]). Gaffney added this insight, “It strains credulity that Ms. Abedin would not be involved in this crisis, given the important role she has played in Mrs. Clinton’s world for over twelve years (Note: even if figured at the time of Benghazi, does not jibe with News' '18 years' estimate of the length of the Clinton-Abedin relationship).”

It is very interesting that Huma Abedin might not “formally” have been part Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s staff at the time of the Benghazi attack on 9/11/12   —   oddly, Abedin’s problematic step down from her State Department post to take on a consulting job with a Clinton -funded foundation was not disclosed until AFTER the whole Benghazi blow-up ( See “Did Huma Abedin Quietly  Step Down as Deputy Chief of Staff in Same Month Bachmann Letter Sent to IG ?” by Shoebat Foundation, 5/17/13, shoebat.com [http://shoebat.com/2013/05/17/did-huma-abedin-quietly-step-down-as-deputy-chief-of-staff-in-same-month-bachmann-letter-sent-to-ig/]).

In any case,  Trey Gowdy’s Select Committee on Benghazi needs to investigate what part, if any,  Huma Abedin might have had in the evolution of  Hillary Clinton's shifting Benghazi scenario(s), before, during and after the events of September 11, 2012.  According to a recent article,  “With Hillary having escaped meaningful examination by Congress regarding her 5-year long string of policy failures, especially the precise role she played relating to Benghazi while still at the State Department, we trust that Trey Gowdy's Select Committee won't be as abstemious regarding Hillary's delicate sensibilities as have previous investigations in both the House and Senate. ***  As a necessary component in holding Mrs. Clinton accountable, the actions and guidance provided her by long time de-facto Chief of Staff Huma Abedin simply can't be avoided. This woman, to our knowledge has never really been vetted with any degree of vigor[,] a very odd thing considering her extraordinarily close relationship with the woman who now is seeking the presidency and Ms. Abedin's many troubling associations....” (See “The Huma Abedin Question Must Be Revisited As Part Of Benghazi Investigation” by Pipe Line News Staff, 5/14/14,
[http://www.pipelinenews.org/2014/may/13/The-Huma-Abedin-Question-Must-Be-Revisited-As-Part-Of-Benghazi.html]).

Why is Marty Golden’s Chief of Staff Taking Shots at one of the GOP Leaders of the 46th AD, Lucretia Regina-Potter — Maybe, it’s the first round of the 2015 GOP wars

This is another symptom of the growing culture of corruption surrounding State Senator Martin Golden, because there is a real problem about the Brooklyn Conservative Party leadership getting involved in internal Republican Party Politics

Maybe, it was because in the beginning of 2014, L R-P talked about running against Marty Golden in the 2014 Republican Primary  —   But what Kassar doesn't get  —   that's still INTERNAL Brooklyn Republican politics

As usual, Kassar is switching hats faster than an old  novelty juggling act on the Ed Sullivan Show.  While ACTING IN HIS ROLE as a columnist for the Home Reporter, Common Sense Jerry Kassar took a nasty turn and veered straight into the GOP’s internal politics in the wheel house district, the 46th AD, taking a personal swipe at its Female State Committee Person, Lucretia Regina-Potter. Even though the offending paragraph was physically buried in a feature that was oddly named for some of its content, “...Remembering the Heroes” ( See “Common Sense: Remember the Heroes” by Jerry Kassar, 9/16/14, Home Reporter/ Spectator [http://www.homereporternews.com/opinion/common-sense-remember-the-heroes/article_95f80a76-3d00-11e4-9654-ebe074073492.html]). Here’s what Kassar had to say, “On the Republican side, Stamatis Lilikakis easily defeated perennial candidate Lucretia Regina-Potter in the 46th Assembly District. I guess, considering that Regina-Potter is the Republican district leader, Republicans will consider Lilikakis’s victory a sign that she has lost the support of the rank-and-file party members in the district.”

Seriously, Mr Kassar, I mean SERIOUSLY !

KASSAR TRIES TO CONVERT LUCRETIA POTTER’S MORAL VICTORY INTO A RHETORICAL DEFEAT

This blog previously reported the results of the 2014 Republican Primary in the 46th AD ( See this blog’s September 10, 2014 post, “Brooklyn GOP Primary Results Reflect ... Nothing !” below). The succinct report of the vote was this:  "The New York Times reports that Stamatis Lilikakis with 540 votes (58.5%) defeated Lucretia Regina-Potter with 383 votes (41.5%)".  Compare that to the result in the 2012 Republican Primary in the 46th AD, when Thomas McCarthy defeated Ms. Potter with 890 votes to Potter’s 367; that was  a better than 2-to-1 win of 71% to 29%; or even the 2010 primary in the 49th AD between Peter Cipriano and Potter, won by Cipriano 59% to 41%.  First, Lucretia Regina-Potter did better in the 2014 Republican primary for the assembly  than she ever did before in a GOP Primary for the Assembly  —  Lucretia did significantly better this year than she did she did two years ago against Tom McCarthy. It is noteworthy that Lucretia Regina-Potter came back in 2011 and 2013 to win the GOP post of Female Leader, first in the old 49th AD, then in the new 46th AD, by very significant margins for that  GOP office.  So not only is Kassar's whack at Potter gratuitous, when he snipes, "...she has lost the support of the rank-and-file party members in the district...." he is just plain WRONG.

Through all of the last five years Kassar's boss, Marty Golden, opposed Lucretia Regina-Potter at every turn, openly supporting Ms. Potter’s opponents in 2010, 2011, 2012, 2013 and 2014  —   that’s FIVE STRAIGHT YEARS and FIVE STRAIGHT ELECTIONS.....    It’s no wonder that when there had been talk about running a GOP candidate against Marty Golden in 2014, Lucretia Regina-Potter told many in the Brooklyn GOP that she hadn’t ruled out running against her nemesis, Mr. Golden. Eventually, the Brooklyn GOP couldn't agree on a single candidate to oppose Golden, and the weak-kneed passive-aggressive counselors of the Brooklyn GOP won the day for not running anybody against the increasingly unpopular GOP incumbent.

What Kassar failed to mention in his most recent column, or ever as far as I know,  is that in 2014 L R-P ran a minimalist campaign against Steve Lilikakis, while Kassar’s side, or rather, Marty Golden’s side, ran a full-scale campaign with multiple mailings, including one that FEATURED Kassar’s boss on his other hat day job, STATE SENATOR MARTIN GOLDEN, including a week-long robo-call bombardment, again featuring a couple of calls from STATE SENATOR MARTIN GOLDEN. However, unlike two years earlier, the Golden-oriented campaign did not achieve a 2-to-1 success. In fact, Potter’s vote went up both in total votes and by percentage.

GOLDEN AGAINST REPUBLICANS  —  REPUBLICANS AGAINST GOLDEN...

Golden has been at war with the Republican establishment for more than two years now. He has been losing ground inside the party for that whole period. Nonetheless, Golden keeps listening to his cadre of  “insiders,” including people like Kassar, Liam McCabe and Mike Long  who aren’t even Republicans.

Since Marty Golden still has a 2014 general election in from of him, it seems clear that is where the GOP’s first line of defense against his 2015 intra-party attacks needs to form. The time has come for an open “Republicans against Golden and for Kemmerer” campaign. It’s name needs to look exactly that  —   primarily, AGAINST GOLDEN  —  secondarily, FOR KEMMERER, only because he is the only candidate now running against Marty Golden.

BENGHAZI AND HILLARY ! BENGHAZI AND CLINTON ! BENGHAZI AND THE SECRETARY OF STATE ! — AND OMG ! WHAT'S UP WITH FOX NEWS ?

The mere mention of the word “Benghazi” now makes almost all Democrat office holders and activists break into hives and start frothing at the mouth

Now, as  Fox News breaks a new “Benghazi” revelation, tying an aspect of the “Benghazi” cover-up directly to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s inner circle   —  The mainstream media largely ignores the story and instead reports on the Fox News  “ Obsession with ‘Benghazi’ ”

To counter the kick-off of Congressman Trey Gowdy’s Select Committee on “Benghazi,” Democrats in Congress roll-out a website of all that is "already known” [by Democrats] about “Benghazi”

Just read the comments on any liberal-progressive blog when the word “Benghazi” is mentioned —   the verbal gymnastics look like Curly Howard of the Three Stooges dropping to the ground and spinning around, yelling, “Whup ! Whup ! Whup ! Whup ! ....”  The subject then quickly shifts to why can’t Republicans, conservatives and sheeple of all other ignorant stripe just give up the ghost and admit that Benghazi was  “...an unfortunate tragedy but not a scandal.” Now, exposing the latest attempts to revive the “Benghazi story” the mainstream media is breathing new life into one its favorite bete noires   —   It’s all because of Fox News.

Two days ago another Benghazi story broke: “A former State Department official has told lawmakers that Hillary Clinton allies privately removed politically damaging documents before turning over files to the supposedly independent board investigating the Benghazi terror attack. ***  The account from Raymond Maxwell, former head of the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs (NEA), was first published in The Daily Signal. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, confirmed to FoxNews.com on Monday that Maxwell told him and other lawmakers the same story when they privately interviewed him last year about the attacks and their aftermath. ***  Chaffetz said that Maxwell claimed Clinton's chief of staff and deputy chief of staff were overseeing the document operation, which allegedly took place on a weekend in a basement office of the State Department....”  (See “Ex-official claims Clinton allies scrubbed Benghazi documents in secret session” by Staff, 9/15/14, Fox News/ foxnews.com [http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/15/damage-control-ex-official-claims-clinton-allies-scrubbed-benghazi-documents-in/]).

Locally, in the New York area, that story was picked up in the New York Daily News ( See “Staffers loyal to Hillary Clinton covered up potentially damaging Benghazi documents: former official” by Dan Friedman, 9/16/14, NY Daily News [http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/hillary-clinton-staffers-covered-benghazi-files-ex-official-article-1.1941046]). According to the News, “Raymond Maxwell, former head of the Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs, reportedly claims he discovered an 'after hours' meeting in the basement of State Department headquarters where officials separated Benghazi documents that might put anyone in the front office 'in a bad light’.”

Generally, the main stream media responded with a collective yawn, however there were some notable exceptions  —   in those cases, the main story was the Fox News Network’s obsession with all things “Benghazi” ( See  “REPORT: Fox's Benghazi Obsession By The Numbers” by Hannah Groch-Begley & Rob Savillo, 9/16/14, Media Matters [http://mediamatters.org/research/2014/09/16/report-foxs-benghazi-obsession-by-the-numbers/200694] ; see also  “Fox News Aired Nearly 1,100 Benghazi Segments Across 5 Programs, Study Finds” by Michael Calderone, 9/16/14, The Huffington Post [https://www.google.com/search?q=benghazi+news&oq=Benghazi+news&aqs=chrome.0.69i59j0l5.9677j0j7&sourceid=chrome&es_sm=93&ie=UTF-8] picking up and amplifying the Media Matters article). The Washington Post went in slightly different direction in a “Book Review” by focusing on Fox’s coverage of a Benghazi-based book (See “Fox News, Benghazi and ’13 Hours’: A critical look” by Erik Wemple, 9/16/14, Washington Post/ washingtonpost.com [http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2014/09/16/fox-news-benghazi-and-13-hours-a-critical-look/]).

Meanwhile, the Washington Times reports that “Ahead of the House Select Committee on Benghazi’s highly-anticipated first public hearing Wednesday, Democrats offered some of their own answers to questions surrounding the terrorist attack while Republicans urged them not to prejudge the investigation before it starts.... ***  Rep. Elijah E. Cummings, Maryland Democrat and the panel’s ranking member, said Tuesday a newly-launched online clearinghouse with information about the attack and subsequent response is meant to help the committee avoid duplicative efforts from a handful of other congressional investigations and contradict false claims....” (See “Democrats launch Benghazi website ahead of committee hearing” by By David Sherfinski, 9/16/14, Washington Times [http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/sep/16/democrats-launch-benghazi-website-ahead-hearing/] [@washtimes on Twitter]).

Even with 44-40% Lead Over Recchia — Early Poll is NOT Good News for Grimm

With a plus/minus factor of 4% poll is a statistical “Dead Heat” between Grimm and Recchia

Sienna Poll says that 21% of Grimm’s Republican supporters are less likely to vote for him because of the federal indictment  —   that percentage grows to 54% of “All Voters”

Congressman Michael Grimm  viewed unfavorably by 49 % of voters  —  When last re-elected, Grimm had only a 32% unfavorable rating

Cuomo leads Astorino 60% to 28% in the same district

The Staten Island Advance’s Tom Wrobleski writes that “GOP Rep. Michael Grimm leads Democratic challenger Domenic M. Recchia Jr., 44 to 40 percent, in a "neck and neck battle" for Congress, according to a new independent poll out Tuesday that also shows the incumbent with high unfavorable ratings. ***   The poll, conducted by Siena Research Institute, NY1 and Capital New York, showed Green Party candidate Henry Bardel with 4 percent, and said that 12 percent of those surveyed were undecided....” (See “Poll: In 'dogfight,' GOP Rep. Michael Grimm has 4-point lead over Democrat Recchia, but incumbent's unfavorable ratings are high” by Tom Wrobleski, Staten Island Advance/ silive.com [http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2014/09/poll_in_dogfight_gop_rep_micha.html#incart_related_stories][ wrobleski@siadvance.com / Follow on Twitter]).

"What we're seeing is that this is a dogfight right from the word go," said Siena pollster Steven Greenberg,  "With only four points separating the candidates, these next seven weeks look to be a major battle..."

In this first independent poll done in the critical contested congressional district that spans the Verrazano Bridge and which is being watched across the country, Grimm held a 9% lead on the Staten Island side of the 11th Congressional District, while Recchia had a 7% lead at the Brooklyn end.

The same poll indicated that among voters in the Grimm-Recchia district —  in the gubernatorial race, Democratic Governor Andrew Cuomo has a commanding  60-28 % lead over Republican Rob Astorino.

What did State Senator Marty Golden do to piss-off Zephyr Teachout ? Somehow, alone among state senators, Golden got on Teachout’s Radar for “public corruption” !

Former Democratic Party Candidate for Governor Says State Senator Golden is “someone who has some serious issues with public corruption”

Back to being a Fordham Law Professor specializing in political corruption cases,  Teachout says that she wants to jump in to help out in the Brooklyn senate contest because, “Jamie Kemmerer’s race is an important race [and] he’s fighting an uphill battle ...”

Yesterday, Jamie Kemmerer’s “Little Engine That Could Campaign” got the news that it’s getting an unexpected “boost” from somebody that knows what it is to be “a poorly funded long-shot opponent to a powerful incumbent...” —   Zephyr Teachout, the former Democratic Candidate for Governor and  Fordham University Law School Prof ( See “Zephyr Teachout Wants to Campaign for Two Senate Democrats” by Will Bredderman,  09/15/14, NY Observer [http://observer.com/2014/09/zephyr-teachout-wants-to-campaign-for-two-senate-democrats/]
[@newyorkobserver on Twitter &  newyorkobserver on Facebook]). What is especially interesting about this is that out of all the GOP state senators, Teachout singled out Marty Golden to specifically call out for “public corruption.”

Will Bredderman also noted that “[t]he academic [Law Professor Teachout] –whose area of expertise is political corruption– alluded to Mr. Golden’s history of spending campaign money at his family’s catering hall and allocating funding to suspect Orthodox Jewish non-profits....”

If I, Galewyn Massey,  weren’t such a humble guy, I’d almost begin to think that Zephyr Teachout had been reading my blog; but then again, all that stuff has been widely reported and commented upon  —  most recently, in Jamie Kemmerer’s campaign postings.  —   Excuse me, now that would be in Zephyr Teachout’s comments yesterday.

The Curious Cases of Arthur Aidala, “Joe” Hynes and Marty Golden — Part 3*

Two different Baker Street Irregulars have provided leads that indicated Arthur Aidala did have a very significant connection to the Mark Fisher murder case, which took place on October 12,  2003, but which was not “solved” by the NYPD and prosecuted by the Brooklyn DA’s Office for over a year; resulting in two questionable convictions for the murder a year after that 

Arthur Aidala was a lawyer with a client involved in the case less than a week after Fisher was killed on Argyle Road in Ditmas Park, Brooklyn  — In fact, Aidala’s client was the first person arrested after being rounded up for questioning in connection with the Fisher case  —  Jessie Wenzel

____________________________

*Originally, it had been intended that this series would have two installments, because it had been thought that there were two significant cases that tied Aidala, Hynes and Golden together  —  It turns out that there are three such cases —  the third is the Mark Fisher murder case, which actually was the first of the three to happen

____________________________


Thanks to extensive research by one of my newest Baker Street Irregulars for their own projected exposition on the subject in another context than blogging,  I was given a link to an early report on the Fisher murder case that appeared in the New York Times. That article in the Times discussed an early police lead that came from an unidentified source indicating that the gun that probably had been used to shoot Mark Fisher had been likely supplied by somebody named Jessie Wenzel, who lived on 86th Street in the Bensonhurst-Bath Beach section of Brooklyn (See “Gun Charges in Case of Slain Student” by Michael Wilson 10/18/03, NY Times [http://www.nytimes.com/2003/10/18/nyregion/gun-charges-in-case-of-slain-student.html]).

According to the October 2003 Times report, “The man arrested yesterday, Jessie Wenzel, 22, was not charged in the shooting of Mark S. Fisher early Sunday morning in Prospect Park South. In the course of investigating the killing, detectives were told that the person who shot Mr. Fisher might have obtained a gun from Mr. Wenzel, officials said. ***  They began investigating him, and learned that he had three unregistered handguns and a sawed-off shotgun at his home in Bath Beach, Brooklyn, a police official said....  He was arrested on three weapons charges....”

Another report of the Wenzel arrest in connection with the Fisher case appeared in the New York Post, and in pertinent part it said this: “Cops are pursuing all leads, including a tip from a confidential informant who gave them a man’s name and suggested that if someone at the party had a gun, maybe he got it from him, police said yesterday. ***  On Wednesday, cops armed with a search warrant went to the home of Jessie Wenzel, 21, at 1661 86th Street and found four illegal weapons – two .380-caliber handguns, a .45 handgun and a sawed-off shotgun, police said....” (See “Tears for Mark; Kin’s Anguish at Party-slay Victim’s  Funeral” by Perry Chiaramonte, 10/18/03, NY Post [http://nypost.com/2003/10/18/tears-for-mark-kins-anguish-at-party-slay-victims-funeral/]).

However, even though Wenzel’s  October 2003 arrest was made as a result of the Fisher murder investigation, Timesman Michael Wilson made this interesting note about it, “...detectives concluded that Mr. Wenzel had no connection with the [Fisher] killing...” And, Perry Chiaramonte in the Post said this: “Wenzel was arrested on a weapons charge, and cops have determined that none of the guns was the murder weapon, that he was not at the party, and had nothing at all to do with the homicide, police said.”  (The oddness of this[these] statement[s] by police officials after questioning Jessie Wenzel for less than one day will become apparent, because of what follows.)

The cops rounded-up Wenzel on October 17, 2003 during their very early investigations in the Fisher case; that was about five days after the murder of Mark Fisher on October 12, 2003. As a result of Jessie Wenzel’s arrest, Arthur Aidala turned up very early in the investigation of the Fisher murder, appearing  as the attorney for Wenzel in October 2003.

Jessie Wenzel was arrested again in connection with the Fisher murder case on a Friday night in March of 2004; this time along with his younger brother, William Wenzel, age twenty (20). The New York Post gave this account of those arrests: “Police are putting the squeeze on local toughs who may have information in the killing of Mark Fisher – a popular sophomore at a Connecticut college who was murdered on his first foray into Brooklyn last year. ***  Cops swooped on several men this weekend, who are either suspects in the murder of the strapping college football star, or friends of those who police think had a hand in the 19-year-old’s death last October....”  (See “Twist in  Grid Slay” by Larry Celona, 3/24/04, NY Post [http://nypost.com/2004/03/24/twist-in-grid-slay/]).

Larry Celona’s report in the Post went on to say that another person involved in the Fisher case was also arrested  —   “John Guica, 20 – who hosted the party where Fisher was last seen alive – got hit with a summons Friday night for drinking. ***  The same night, an acquaintance of Guica’s, Jessie Wenzel, 22, and his brother, William, 20, were pinched with drugs near their home in Bensonhurst, police said. ***  Jessie Wenzel is already awaiting trial on charges of possession of four handguns found in his home last October. Both Wenzels were caught with marijuana, while the younger brother also had cocaine and Xanax, a criminal complaint charges....”  In the same article, the reporter noted that  “...[a] lawyer for the Wenzel brothers, Arthur Aidala, argued the arrests were a desperate attempt to get more information on the Fisher murder. ‘I guess the Police Department must be somewhat frustrated because they haven’t been able to make an arrest....  However, you would think at this point they would understand that no one in the Wenzel family had anything to do with the Mark Fisher tragedy.’....”   However, it should be noted that Celona's article ended with these provocative lines: “Neither of the Wenzel brothers was at the party the night Fisher [w]as killed. Cops have described them as core members of Guica’s social circle.”

There was a follow-up story in the New York Post about a week later than Celona’s article, which again mentioned John Giuca as a suspect and the Wenzels, as “Giuca friends...”  —  “The investigation has recently begun to focus on John Guica, 20, whom Fisher met while out drinking in Manhattan last October with classmates from Fairfield University in Connecticut....   [Police Commissioner] Kelly said again yesterday the people who partied with Fisher continue to stymie the probe. ***  ‘We’re making some progress in the investigation but it is slow progress hamstrung by an extraordinary lack of cooperation,’ he said. ‘We believe there is more than one person who knows who murdered Mark Fisher.’ ***  Police cracked down on the neighborhood toughs last week, hitting several with summonses – including slapping Guica, who hosted the party where Fisher was last seen alive, with a fine for underage drinking..(See “Kelly Hits Wall of Silence in B’klyn Slay” by Patrick Gallahue, 3/21/04, NY Post [http://nypost.com/2004/03/31/kelly-hits-wall-of-silence-in-bklyn-slay/]). In that article by Pat Gallahue, Aidala was again quoted, as follows in the following passage: “A lawyer for Guica friends Jessie Wenzel and his brother William – who were both arrested on drug charges more than a week ago – said, ‘We just don’t want the Wenzel family harassed any further.’ *** ‘If they had useful information, they wouldn’t pass up a $100,000 reward but you can’t make up something that’s not there,’ said the lawyer, Arthur Aidala.”

Some might ask, Galewyn, where’s the connection of any of this to Hynes and Golden ?

Okay, starting with Golden —

Remember the county-wide and city-wide politics in play between October 2003 and in the early part of 2004, then into 2005.  Golden was in an election year and needed the good graces of Hynes and other top Democrats to avoid a hotly contested election for his Brooklyn state senate seat in 2004, or possibly any election for that seat in 2004 at all. It is widely known that Brooklyn DA Hynes, several key Hynes supporters and several other key Brooklyn Democrats were helping Golden with all of that.

In 2004 both DA Hynes and Mayor Bloomberg were in their pre-election year, and at the same time, Bloomberg’s cops and Hynes’ DDAs and ADAs were having a very tough time putting together any kind of case in a very high profile Mark Fisher murder case, involving a well-to-do out-of-towner  —  that was getting almost continuous coverage across the full spectrum of  media outlets.

This was all  —   VERY BAD PR FOR THE NYPD ...   VERY BAD PR FOR NYC...   VERY BAD PR FOR MAYOR BLOOMBERG...  VERY BAD PR FOR BROOKLYN DA HYNES  AND THE BROOKLYN DA'S OFFICE... The NYC Police Commisioner, Ray Kelly, even had to do repeated press conferences on the Fisher Case; and after a well publicized meeting with Mark Fisher's parents, DA Hynes had to change the whole Brooklyn DA team working on the Fisher case, putting his Rackets Chief Michael Vecchione in charge of the new team.

What Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights-Bath Beach-etc.- etc.- etc. State Senator was closely identified with all of the above political interests suffering from bad PR from the Fisher Murder case?  What Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights-Bath Beach-etc.- etc.- etc. State Senator had  Jessie Wenzel, the one named by “a confidential informant who gave [the police Wenzel’s] name and suggested that if someone at the party [where Fisher was killed] had a gun, maybe he got it from [Wenzel]...” in the middle of his State Senate District ?  What Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights-Bath Beach-etc.- etc.- etc. State Senator already was aligned closely with DA Hynes and already had interacted many times with Attorney Aidala since 1997 ?  What Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights-Bath Beach-etc.- etc.- etc. State Senator was Mayor Bloomberg’s go-to-guy for any political-PR problems in or near Marty Golden’s bailiwick in Brooklyn ?   What Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights-Bath Beach-etc.- etc.- etc. State Senator was Brooklyn DA Hynes’ go-to-guy for any political problems inside the Brooklyn GOP that might interfere with any Wilson-Pakula GOP designation for Hynes in 2005 (especially as a trap-door escape-hatch if there was a problem winning the Democratic Primary in 2005) ?  What Bay Ridge-Dyker Heights-Bath Beach-etc.- etc.- etc. State Senator very well knew Susan Cleary, Brooklyn GOP Vice Chairperson, who was herself up to her knees with her son, Albert Cleary, who was himself up to his ears in the Fisher murder case ?  (There is more, but I’m tired of this trope —  and I don’t want to chime in with something more about Jerry Kassar, Golden’s Chief of Staff and Phillip Smallman, Albert Cleary's attorney at this time.)

Suffice it to say, from a political (and even a somewhat personal) standpoint, if there ever was a murder case in Brooklyn that State Senator Marty Golden did have a personal interest in and having it "solved" or "resolved" more than the Mark Fisher murder case  —   then I, and a lot of other people, would sure like to know what that case might be (and I would surely be writing about that one too). Admittedly, Marty Golden’s connection to the Fisher murder case is quite tangential. However, like everything else in this bizarre Alice in Wonderland case, because of Golden’s interactions with several others having far more skin in the game than Marty, himself, Golden’s active connivance in this or that having to do with the case cannot be ruled out.

Now, finishing off with Hynes and Aidala  —

2003-2004-2005 were in the middle of the “good old days” for Hynes and Aidala  —  even though Hynes was facing a tough primary challenge, upcoming in 2005, from myriad candidates from various communities, from all parts of the political spectrum and with a variety of very impressive professional credentials. Artie Aidala was one of Hynes’ “insiders” and the Hynes team, including Aidala, was still confident of victory if everybody did their part; and one part of that was insuring that Haynes did get the GOP and Conservative Party lines in 2005.

Also remember, that the continuation of Hynes being the Brooklyn DA after 2006 was almost as important to Aidala and several other members of the Brooklyn Defense Bar, as it was to Hynes himself.

So, there it is.  A third major case with a certain proven connection between DA Hynes and Attorney Aidala; and with a highly probable connection to State Senator Martin Golden through Brooklyn GOP Vice Chairperson Susan Cleary, as well as through her son Albert Cleary's attorney Phillip Smallman.

What next on this blog about the Fisher murder case ?

Among other matters that might come up in due course, this blog will follow-up to try to determine what part, if any, Arthur Aidala played in the solid wall of attorneys that was built around all the material witnesses and key suspects in the Fisher murder case. Several of these attorneys' names have been mentioned in earlier posts and comments on this blog.

At its high water mark the key witnesses and prime suspects in the case totaled about nine to twelve people, virtually all with legal representation  retained or readily available; and in the end, by the time of the jointly conducted trials in this case, that number necked down to about four, five or six, all with lawyers advising them what to do and say every step of the way. Whether and how that might have been coordinated, by whom and why will also be explored in future posts, or possibly even in comments that might soon follow this very post.

There are also pending motions and/or appeals by at least one of those already convicted in the case; there are writers working on at least one more book and at least one movie or TV-movie project that is in development and being pushed by a star player in a current TV hit legal drama, both are about the Fisher murder case; and of course, several journalists are continuing their inquiries into the case. If any of that discloses any new information for those writing posts on this blog, or contributing to it in any way, that will be passed along to those following this blog as soon as it is obtained, analyzed and processed.

In short, the search for justice in the Mark Fisher murder case is still a work in progress.

SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT: The Brooklyn Young Republican Club gives “Official Unofficial” Notice that it is hosting a meeting of the Brooklyn Tea Party!

ATTENTION: To all Tea Party Members, Young Republicans, Old Republicans. Libertarians, Conservatives, and Ladies, Gentlemen and Children of All Ages just fed-up about Obama and his dismantling of the American system of government

Come visit with the Brooklyn Young Republican Club, as BYRC President Glenn P. Nocera hosts ABC Radio Personality and President of the Brooklyn Tea Party Frankie “The Kid” Russo. Seating and space is limited (so, please, make every effort to R.S.V.P. as indicated below).  Kosher pizza and refreshments will be provided compliments of the Brooklyn Tea Party.

DETAILS:

Date:  Sunday, September 14, 2014  —   Time:  5:00 P.M. -- 6:30 P.M.

Location:  616 East 4th Street Brooklyn, NY 11218-4922. [The event will be held in the Back Yard

Directions: East 4th Street between Cortelyou Road and Ditmas Avenue  —   Take the F Train to the Ditmas Avenue Station in Brooklyn, then go toward East 4th Street].

The Brooklyn Young Republican Club asks that you please RSVP us on their Facebook Invitation page at [https://www.facebook.com/events/1558143501075765/].

Kassar is leaning way forward on his skis — His local column “Common Sense: End Game” is a premature victory lap — Going so far as to predict “what could be, in several cases, landslide Republican-Conservative victories....”

Not so fast, Jerry ! ! !  —   Flap happens after Golden is endorsed by Koch Brothers’ backed by NFIB and his opponent Jay Kemmerer slammed it  —   confusion on Golden’s  “staff” shown by Ray Riley’s bungled response to announcement of NFIB endorsement

NFIB endorses some Bay Ridge Republican Conservatives but not Stamatis “Steve” Lilikakis  —    Does political endorsement by any group that has “FIB” in its name mean it will always lead to trouble ? 

Is the emergence of the Koch brothers in the Golden-Grimm-Grimm-Golden joint campaign(s) a signal of new level of closed-circle systematic corruption crossing the boundaries of state and federal campaign laws

Jerry Kassar is the Chairman of the Brooklyn Conservative Party and is State Senator Martin Golden’s Chief of Staff. He also writes a weekly column for a local paper. In his latest published material, Mr. Kassar betrayed a degree of hubris that is almost heroic or even titanic by classical standards. In short he seems to be declaring a GOP-Conservative Party victory in the November elections “on a local level and national level ” before any votes have been cast, much less counted ( See “Common Sense: End Game” by Jerry Kassar, 9/8/14, Home Reporter / Spectator [http://www.homereporternews.com/news/government/common-sense-end-game/article_7130a31e-376b-11e4-bc48-001a4bcf887a.html]).

Here is exactly what Kassar said about it: “[Local Republican-Conservative candidates] are running very active campaign efforts in our community which I think is evidenced by the many lawn signs and posters throughout Southwest Brooklyn. In contrast, the local Democrats seem almost asleep, not being able to guess the winners as well as they did last year. ***   I doubt anyone in Bay Ridge or Dyker Heights could tell you who comprises most of  the local Democratic slate. And it remains to be seen if the few local elected Democrats are willing to put their name on the line by actively campaigning in print for what could be, in several cases, landslide Republican-Conservative victories. ***   It does take money and the most recent candidate financial reports filed with the New York State Board of Elections show that people are not contributing to the local Democratic candidates. It must be why so many Democrats want taxpayer-funded elections. And I guess, when you really come down to it, President Obama and Mayor de Blasio have not really helped out the local Democratic brand much these past few months. ***  In football, it’s the two minute warning to remind all sides that the game is near the end.  In politics, it is the two-month warning that comes with the passing of the primaries. The 2014 political contests are coming to an end, and it seems that on a local level and national level the Republicans are holding the ball with a definite advantage....”

WHILE KASSAR FIDDLES, GOLDEN’S LOCAL CAMPAIGN STUMBLES AND MUMBLES

The Albany headquarters of a trade group calling itself the “National Federation of  Independent Business” today released a letter from its NFIB/NY State Director Mike Durant entitled “Small Business Endorses Full Slate of State Legislative Candidates” (See “NFIB Issues Its Endorsements” by Nick Reisman, 9/12/14, State of Politics/ NY
[http://www.nystateofpolitics.com/2014/09/nfib-issues-its-endorsements/?utm_source=twitterfeed&utm_medium=twitter] [ with a pdf Documents/Downloads link: 239443835-2014-NFIB-Full-Slate-Endorsement-Release.pdf]). Nick Reisman led off his article about these endorsements with this: “The National Federation of Independent Business on Thursday released its slate of candidate endorsements, backing Republicans in key Senate swing districts....”

Reisman’s report included this quote from Durant, NFIB/NY's State Director: “This election is critical to the economic present and future of New York.... Broadly addressing the complicated issues that small businesses face is essential and each of these candidates has shown a commitment to advocating strongly on behalf of small business.”  State Senator Martin Golden’s name did appear on the accompanying list of NFIB endorsees; and the release also went on to say this: “And NFIB is supporting Republican incumbents in danger of losing their seats....”

Interestingly, NFIB endorsed Republican-Conservative Nicole Malliotakis in the 64th AD, but it did not endorse Stamatis Lilikakis in the 46th. (Maybe, if their AD numbers were reversed... ?)

It seems that the NFIB endorsement and Democrat Jay Kemmerer’s rapid response to it (See “Marty Golden Endorsed by the Koch Brothers” by James Kemmerer for State Senate 2014, 9/12/14 [https://jameskemmerer.com/index.php?flow=emr&tray=content&tid=12jktop4&cid=147jk14&ebid=147jkmin75&ebp=13brdper839]) caused some consternation among those involved in Marty Golden’s re-election campaign and/or State Senator Golden’s State Senate Staff headed by Jerry Kassar. At the top of the list is Ray Riley, who earlier in the day in his social media postings disputed that the Koch-related NFIB endorsement had occurred.

BIGGER CORRUPTION AHEAD ?

An even more important issue has been raised by the Democratic nominee, given the joint entry of State Senator Marty Golden and Congressman Mike Grimm as co-campaigners in the 2014 race. Is there a possibility that another level of corruption can easily be reached ?  With the appearance of the Koch brothers and their mammoth national PAC money, isn’t there a real possibility that a closed-circle funding scheme, like the illegal one used by Tom DeLay in Texas several years ago, crop up in the Golden-Grimm-Grimm-Golden campaign(s). Don't overlook the fact that there has already been a guilty plea in a case involving Congressman Grimm's prior campaign financing in a recent race involving almost all of Grimm's current supporters.

How can anybody support any aspect of Obama’s plan to expand his failed Iraq policy into Syria — Especially, truly patriotic conservative Republicans

“Obama’s [complete lack of] strategy on Islamic State revives tensions over Syria"  —  Washington Post

The Neo-con “Bush Doctrine” has been replaced by a half-hearted, half-assed Neo-con “Obama Doctrine”

For now, the only responsible position for any solid Republican or any other patriotic American is to shout “Hell No !  We Won’t Go !”  —   to Iraq or Syria  —  Now is the time to build up the arsenals and walls of “Fortress America” against any and all threats just like was done in the late 1930s

A key piece of the new oppositionist thinking appeared in the Washington Post today; it pointed out the main flaw in the Obama “strategy” vis a vis ISIS and/or ISIL, as Obama likes to call it ( See “Obama’s strategy on Islamic State revives tensions over Syria” by Liz Sly, 9/11/14, Washington Post [http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/obamas-strategy-on-islamic-state-revives-tensions-over-syria/2014/09/11/6a118349-4aee-4377-bd55-b1b672954b4f_story.html#] [Liz Sly is the Post’s Beirut bureau chief. She has spent more than 15 years covering the Middle East, including the Iraq war. Other postings include Africa, China and Afghanistan]).

Here’s what Liz Sly had to say in her WP article, “The prospect of deeper American involvement in Syria is reopening the stark global divide that fueled the escalation of the conflict three years ago, underscoring the challenges confronting President Obama in his first real foray into the morass of Syria’s war. ***  The moderate Syrian opposition welcomed Obama’s pledges of accelerated support as well as possible airstrikes against Islamic State militants, which could potentially reverse more than a year of defeats on the battlefield inflicted both by the militants and by the government of President Bashar al-Assad....”

RISKING DIRECT CONFLICT WITH SYRIA, RUSSIA AND IRAN AND/OR INDEFINITE QUAGMIRE WORSE THAT BUSH’S INVASION OF IRAQ  OR JOHNSON’S WAR IN VIET NAM

Here’s the rub: “Syria’s main allies, Russia and Iran, expressed dismay that the United States apparently plans to intervene without their approval in the conflict that Assad had until recently appeared to be winning....”  An America led by Barack Obama simply cannot stand up to either Russia or Iran.

“In media interviews, Syrian officials made it clear they are unhappy that Assad’s regime has been excluded from Obama’s calculations. ***  ‘If any strike is carried out without our coordination, we will consider it an aggression,’ Bouthaina Shaaban, a close adviser to Assad, told CNN. ‘President Obama would be very much ill-advised to carry on with what he said’....”

More important than that according to the Sly piece in the WaPost, “As Secretary of State John F. Kerry wooed America’s traditional Sunni allies in Saudi Arabia on Thursday, Iran questioned his motives. ***  ‘Some of the countries in the coalition are among the financial and military supporters of terrorists [including ISIS]  in Iraq and Syria,’ [Iranian] Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Marzieh Afkham told reporters in Tehran on Thursday.

When one gets a more accurate and fundamentally more truthful assessment from an Iranian minister than you do from the President of the United States or any member of his administration, as an American you have a major problem.

How many times are the same mistakes going to be repeated. —   “Iraqi Freedom” — Viet Nam —  these were major blunders by Presidents George W. Bush and Lyndon B. Johnson

Hence, the only sensible response to what Obama’s now proposing is for good Republicans and true patriots to shout as loud as they can, “HELL NO, WE WON’T GO ! ! !”

Instead of appropriating any funds for any aspect of Obama's Iraq--Syria non-strategy,  American needs to rebuild its greatly eroded and rapidly hollowing military machine;  putting intelligence and other special operations operatives on the front line for truly secret missions, including completely decapitating all actually threatening organizations. In addition, our borders and international ports of entry need to be made virtually impregnable by full manning with technically superior and properly trained and led border agents.

NOW THIS IS REALLY SERIOUS — RAY RICE SPIT AT HIS FIANCEE TWICE BEFORE HE KNOCKED HER OUT COLD — AND BEFORE HE MARRIED HER

Security employees at the bankrupt Revel Hotel report repeated disgusting, anti-social, un-hygienic acts by NFL star prior to his domestic knockout game with his future wife

According to ESPN “Outside the Lines”  —   “One former staffer said Rice, the former Baltimore Ravens running back, spat in his then-fiancée's face twice, "once outside the elevator and once inside," prompting her to retaliate with movements that were ultimately countered with a knockout punch. According to the men, as Rice punched Palmer, the elevator the couple rode was rapidly approaching the hotel lobby just two floors above the casino floor. A security staffer, dispatched from his lobby post, saw Rice starting to drag his fiancée, who appeared to still be unconscious, out of the elevator....” ( See “Sources: Ray Rice spat at fiancee” by John Barr and Greg Amante, 9/11/14, ESPN/ Between the Lines/ ESPN.com [http://espn.go.com/espn/otl/story/_/id/11503496/ray-rice-spat-face-fiancee-twice-punch-line]).

Any fence-straddlers out there now have to see why this story is more important than whether President Obama is willing to lead this country into a war with ISIS, or is that ISIL.

Brooklyn GOP Primary Results Reflect ... Nothing !

Many meanings of “nothing” reflected in Brooklyn Republican Primary Vote

“Steve for New York” overcomes minimalist effort by and on behalf of Lucretia Regina-Potter —   with a chunk of potential “support” for either side sitting on the sidelines

Mysterious 45th AD has Cymbrowitz winning over Akselrod on the Dem’s line and nothing to show for the GOP OTB

The New York Times reports that Stamatis Lilikakis with 540 votes (58.5%) defeated Lucretia Regina-Potter with 383 votes (41.5%)

—   Hmmm !   What does it mean, what does it mean ?  Well, probably whatever you want it to mean.  All of the GOP factions that were involved or not very involved in this race can take whatever “credit” and in some cases self-aggrandizing kudos from this outcome. To me, they look a lot like the 46th AD GOP primary results from 2012 — with L R-P not working nearly as hard as she did in 2012, and a very big effort put forward by “Steve” Lilikakis, Marty Golden and the rest of that faction making a real push for the relatively unknown Stamatis Lilikakis. The “difference” in this race might have been due to several key Brooklyn GOP organization types sitting this one out on the sidelines.

The Lilikakis campaign clearly showed that it was top heavy with paid consultants, who obviously could not deliver the BIG victory over the embattled GOP District Leader Lucretia Potter that State Senator Marty Golden was really hoping for. Former District Leader Clorinda Annarummo has to be one person that is none to happy with the 2014 Primary results in the 46th AD. Let’s spell it out with these numbers 2010-2011, 2012-2013, 2014-.......... (fill in the blank).

In the 45th AD, Ben Akselrod seems to have lost some ground to Steve Cymbrowitz on the Democratic side, with nothing being reported about any GOP opportunity to ballot.

There seems to be some very good news from across the Narrows on Staten Island, with Republican Joseph Tirone taking the Conservative Party line away from incumbent Michael Cusick, a Democrat and former Conservative Party endorsee for the so-called Mid-island Richmond County Assembly District (See “Tirone: Upset victory over Cusick in primary battle a 'vindication' for Conservative Party voters” by Tom Wrobleski, 9/10/14, SI Advance/ silive.com [http://www.silive.com/news/index.ssf/2014/09/tirone_upset_victory_over_cusi.html]).  The two candidates had  completely different views about Tirone’s OTB victory.  Needless to say, “Joe” Tirone saw his “two-to-one” victory as a major stepping stone to winning the assembly seat now held by Mr. Cusick.  On the other hand, Assemblyman Cusick said that the Conservative Party OTB primary was never viewed as the election that would re-elect him to the assembly — that one certainly would be the election held in November.

Video of Governor Cuomo’s cold shoulder of Zephyr Teachout goes viral — “Visual” of Governor shows tremendous a lack of class

Pre-adolescent behavior of Cuomo and Hochull, and Mayor DeBlasio  at “Labor Day Parade” is a major unforced error for Cuomo Campaign

What was the problem ?   Did Andrew Cuomo think Zephyr Teachout had Cooties ?  —   Cuomo, Hochull and DeBlasio sure acted like she did  —  Postings on social media call the exchange “awkward” and “cringeworthy”

GOP candidate Rob Astorino needs to leverage Cuomo's ill treatment of Teachout ASAP while it still is fresh  —  then it will be the gift that keeps on giving for the whole campaign 

Politico said it this way: “New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo greeted participants in New York City’s Labor Day Parade on Saturday, but one person didn’t get a warm welcome: his primary opponent. ***   A video posted on NewYorkTrue.com shows Zephyr Teachout, who is challenging Cuomo in the state’s Democratic primary, approaching the governor at the parade. She tries several times to get his attention, but first an aide asks everyone to step back, and then Cuomo turns away from Teachout, shouting instead to New York Mayor Bill de Blasio. De Blasio moves through the crowd and hugs Cuomo, but neither acknowledges Teachout in the minute-long clip....” (See “Andrew Cuomo, Zephyr Teachout parade video goes viral” by Adam Sneed, 9/6/14, Politico [http://www.politico.com/story/2014/09/andrew-cuomo-zephyr-teachout-parade-video-110669.html][with video link of the incident]).

New York Magazine contained  this in its devastating report of the incident: “...[Y]ou'd think that Cuomo had no idea who Teachout was, because he completely ignored her as she stood directly in front of him. ***  In a hilariously awkward video posted to New York True, a smiling Teachout maneuvers around paradegoers, aides, and journalists until she is less than an arm's length away from Cuomo and his running mate, Kathy Hochul. The pair quickly turns their backs toward Teachout, who then taps Hochul on the arm. Hochul does not respond. Then, with Teachout still standing right there, Cuomo shouts, "Where's the mayor?" at an approaching Bill de Blasio. "Where's the mayor when you need him? We need the mayor!" Cuomo continues, his jokey tone failing to mask what sounds like genuine desperation. While also ignoring Teachout, de Blasio physically embraces Hochul and Cuomo....”  (See “Watch Governor Cuomo and Mayor de Blasio Completely Ignore Zephyr Teachout” by Caroline Bankoff, 9/6/14, NY Magazine/ Daily Intelligencer [http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/09/watch-cuomo-and-de-blasio-ignore-teachout.html][with video link of the incident]).

The Daily News and NY Times also mentioned the incident giving the Governor negative marks in his handling of the whole thing.

The Republican Gubernatorial candidate should immediately take Governor Cuomo to task for his rudeness and brutish bad manners.  If Astorino does so while the whole thing is still news, he can go back to it over and over during the campaign all the way to November.

Congressman Marty Golden — The story behind his push to re-elect Michael Grimm

What is the real deal behind Golden’s letter and fund raiser for Grimm ?

Why else would Golden be NATIONALIZING  himself during his race for State Senator ?

Golden wants to be the Congressman after Grimm gets the Bum’s Rush

I think that the usually astute Ross Barkan, writing in the New York Observer, and the pair of reporters, doing the same in the Post all missed their real leads by not asking these rather obvious questions  –   What’s really going on here ?  Why is Marty Golden doing this, right now ? ( See “Democrat Blasts Golden’s Grimm Fund-Raiser” by Ross Barkan, 9/4/14, NY Observer [http://observer.com/2014/09/democrat-blasts-goldens-grimm-fund-raiser/][@newyorkobserver on Twitter | newyorkobserver on Facebook] [with Scribd. download of Marty Golden’s Letter]; “Prominent Republican aiding indicted Rep. Grimm” by Rich Calder & Carl Campanile. 9/4/14, NY Post [http://nypost.com/2014/09/04/prominent-republican-aiding-indicted-rep-grimm/])

Instead of sniffing out the real story, Barkan followed the leads of Jamie Kemmerer, who after all has every interest in keeping things focused on his race for Golden’s  State Senate seat, and a cooperative State Senate staffer Ray Riley, whose boss Marty Golden needs to keep his federal ambitions under wraps, for now.

On the other hand, Golden's man Riley’s words might actually be the signal for a complete pivot away from Golden’s State Senate campaign toward one that is oriented toward the Brooklyn-Staten Island congressional seat  —  “[Talking about Jamie Kammerer] Our opponent is about as relevant in this community as a haberdashery,” said Ray Riley, Golden’s staffer quoted in Ross Barkan’s article, “Since he can’t raise money, or get anyone to take him seriously, he is now grasping at straws. We will no longer be responding to his shameless attempts to save a campaign that never got off the ground.”

Showing that he is far from being the great white shark in Golden’s small state senate pool, Democrat Jamie Kemmerer went for the bait and missed the boat. Quotes like this miss the point because they are just too “small ball” and too local: “Marty Golden likes to bring up President Obama who he perceives as unpopular in the district....  But if you want true guilt by association look no further than Golden who is actively attaching himself to indicted-on-twenty-counts Grimm. Marty is parading [Grimm] around not in a perp walk like he deserves but like he’s the second coming of Fiorello LaGuardia....  In fact, no matter if you are a Democrat or a Republican you can see that his alignment with indicted Congressman Grimm is proof that Marty Golden clearly doesn’t have the best interests of the district in mind.”

Well, everybody that reads this blog knows that Marty Golden clearly doesn’t have the best interests of his state senate district in mind, but that doesn’t answer why he is working so hard for a shipwreck like Grimm [whose legal woes, not mentioned by Golden in his letter, go from bad to worse with each passing day].

According to the report in the Post, “...Golden told supporters he’s all in to re-elect Grimm to help beat back “the very liberal policies of the Obama administration....”  However, do these remarks by Golden sound like somebody running for a New York State legislative position ?  —  “Liberal policies have spelled failure. So their tactic is to change the subject, talk about something else, avoid the real issue of an America on the wrong track. I believe the voters of our district [THE CONGRESSIONAL DISTRICT ! ! ! ] are much too savvy to fall for any such trickery. However, they also know that such trickery does have to be countered, and that doing so does cost money.... [blah, blah, blah for what’s his name, oh yeah, Grimm]”  Read the whole “Dear Friends”  letter formally from “Marty Golden,” but oddly signed “Martin J. Golden” [What’s that all about ?]  —  see if you agree that it sounds like “Marty Golden” is ESPECIALLY INTERESTED in Grimm’s congressional seat this time around ( See Sribd. Download [238647910-Golden-for-Grimm-2.pdf]).

Tell Staten Islanders that they soon will have a “Brooklyn Congressman” no matter what !

By the way, now that Golden his running against Domenic Recchia, by name as his virtual co-opponent for congress  —  Recchia needs to run against Golden as the real GOP candidate for Member of Congress from Brooklyn and Staten Island.

Jamie Kemmerer needs to bring up the very same issue in the state senate race as well.