On the ground

This just in! Republicans are so worried about their chances in New York that they are starting to go pretty far afield to recruit candidates:

(Photo courtesy of the eagle-eyed Regina Baker.)

We’ve already introduced you to David Sager, the Republican-turned-Democrat who is challenging Senator John Bonacic for the 42nd Senate District seat.

The DCDC was the first committee to endorse David, back in April. He is such a great candidate that you wouldn’t think we’d have had any trouble at all getting the relevant county chairs to give the nod that would allow him to run as a Democrat.

In fact, he did have some trouble with that, precisely because he is such a terrific candidate.

Confused?

Let me step aside and allow Fritz Mayer of the River Reporter (Narrowsburg, NY) tell the tale (I’d just link to the story but it doesn’t seem to be archived anywhere on the River Reporter web site):

Now it seems likely that he will be the Democratic candidate, but that is not certain. Sager changed his party registration from Republican to Democrat last month and, because the change won’t officially take place until January 1, he needs a special authorization known as a Wilson Pakula from the county Democratic committees.

Even though the committees have voted for him, it is possible for two committee chairmen to block the nomination. Steve Wilkinson, chairman of the committee in Sullivan County, did not return an email asking if he would support Sager’s nomination.

Pressure to prevent the nomination has reportedly been strong over the past couple of weeks. According to multiple sources, various elected Democrats in the state have been contacted by Langdon Chapman, who works in Bonacic’s office and who is also a regional chairman of the Independence Party. Chapman has reportedly told the Democrats that if they support Sager’s candidacy or if he gains the nomination, the Democrats risk losing their place on the Independence Party line this fall.

In an email, Chapman did not directly deny the allegation but he did say this: “The type of rumor you are inquiring about, has been and is put out every single year—by candidates from both parties who think they will not receive the Independence Party endorsement, so they start rumors.” Independence Party endorsements come from the executive committee, which is made up of 22 people from across the state, including Chapman.

The only thing I’ll say about this setup — Chapman working for Bonacic, who allegedly uses the connection to attempt to dictate which candidate the Democrats field to challenge him — is that it is just about as slimy as what you’d expect from a 20 year veteran of Albany politics.

Delaware led the way (yay us!), but Sager won the approval of Ulster, his native Sullivan and, earlier this week, Orange. Assuming that none of those chairs will ignore the will of their respective committees, and given that the lone possible challenger withdrew, it looks like the 42nd SD Democratic candidate is ready to rock and roll.

In a couple of weeks, we will be carrying those Sager petitions. Taking bets on whether our buddy, Bonacic, will be spitting nails or chewing on them?

Last weekend, members of the NY State Democratic Committee’s Rural Conference (including Chair Cindy and two of the state committee members from Delaware County) met in Niagara Falls for our annual conference and straw poll.

A good time was had by all and the straw poll acted as a sort of opening salvo in the feverish campaign season that will be 2010, with an unusually large number of offices up for grabs: governor, lt. governor, attorney general, comptroller, U.S. Senator (both of them), U.S. Representative, plus all members of both the State Assembly and the State Senate.

It’s unfortunate that we haven’t been able to find candidates to challenge either Pete Lopez in the 127th Assembly District or Cliff Crouch in the 107th Assembly District — which brings me to the real topic of this post.

Meet David Sager.

David is a Sullivan County legislator, a former Republican and the probable Democratic candidate to challenge Senator John Bonacic this year for his Senate seat here in the 42nd District.

Sager was endorsed by the DCDC at our last meeting on April 28th but has not yet received the similar nod from the other counties in the district: Sullivan, Ulster and Orange.

So, while we wait for that, let me tell you a little about David.

He is, as I said, a member of the Sullivan County Legislature representing District 1, which includes the towns of Bethel, Cochecton, Delaware and Tusten. Before that, he was twice elected Sullivan County Coroner (in 2000 and in 2004). In fact, he was the youngest person in history to be elected to that office.

I won’t venture to guess how old he is but I will say simply that he is youthful but not inexperienced. Best of both worlds, in fact.

The issues he is most concerned about are gas drilling (”It must be safe, legal, economically beneficial to all, and subject to local control.”), watershed flood mitigation, the environment, local agriculture, and accountability in government.

“I will meet with the people and talk with them about what-ever issues they have,” Sager told us. “I want the people to know that I care, and that I will fight like a dog for you.”

As of this writing, David’s web site isn’t live yet. As soon as it is, it will be added to the candidate web sites in the side bar.

If you scroll down the page, you can’t help thinking about how much has changed since those entries were posted, huh?

Cindy may luv the gov, but that wasn’t enough to overcome the unfortunate scandal that chased Governor Paterson out of the race. It’s too bad, too, because it has pretty much completely overshadowed the courage and integrity he has shown in tackling the state’s fiscal and economic problems head on, rather than sucking up to core constituencies and leaving the shambles for somebody else to solve.

At this point, everybody is being incredibly coy about it — almost reminds one of “he-who-shall-not-be-named” Voldemort — but we’re all pretty sure that our Democratic candidate for governor will be Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.

Mr. Cuomo is expected to make his announcement later this month and we are not suffering from any lack of individuals longing to take his place as Attorney General.

The other big change from what is reflected below is that Harold Ford seems to have slithered back out of the lime light and withdrawn his prospective primary challenge to Senator Kirsten Gillibrand. This leaves her (a) without a primary challenge to face and (b) at the moment, without a Republican opponent, either.

It’s been interesting to note how little enthusiasm there seems to be from the state GOP to take on Kirsten the Dragon Slayer. Not that I blame them. She’s a great campaigner, raising buckets of money and really terrific when she’s live, and she works her tail off for her constituents once she’s in office, too.

As for the issues with the new voting machines … you’ll be hearing a lot more from us about that in the near future.

Here at the DCDC, we’re gearing up for this year’s campaigns, looking to elect and re-elect good Democrats to all levels of government. Everything from governor down to members of the NY State Democratic Committee will be on the ballot. It’ll be exciting and it’ll probably be a lot of fun, besides.

So, yeah … a lot has changed but it’s all good.

We’re not supposed to be taking sides yet and so we’re not. But, I’ll admit, sometimes it gets kind of fun when other people do.