The chatter about Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos and Albany's plague of corruption investigations went on all day, everywhere. In the state capitol's corridors, in the restaurants where the pols and the lobbyists eat lunch.
I hear Dean might be indicted Thursday.
Is this one of Dean's last days as Senate majority leader?
Who's next?
...
"We've seen a lot of strange things in Albany," a veteran government operative says. "But we've never seen the indictment of two leaders of the legislature."
It hasn't happened. And maybe it never will. But the talk of the town has already moved on:
Will Bharara go for a trifecta?
A Skelos indictment is an almost near certainty - there's no way Bharara's office leaked the story of the Skelos scandal, complete with tales of subpoenas to Skelos' fellow Long Island Republican Senators and the empaneled grand jury looking into the State Senate Majority Leader, to the NY Times without an indictment coming down.
What comes after that will be most interesting.
Tom Libous, Skelos' deputy, is currently under indictment for lying to the FBI and has said he is dying from cancer.
Who takes over afterward, what exactly gets done in the waning days of the legislative session and what future leaks come from US Attorney Preet Bharara's office will be most interesting.
I know many readers on the blog are skeptical that Bharara is going to go for the trifecta and take down Cuomo too.
It seems almost unfathomable that the feds would take out all three men in the room in the New York government.
And yet, there is just enough smoke around Cuomo, his donors, the "pulled back" subpoenas, the Moreland Commission tampering and the like that, well, you never know...
Did anyone hear about Senator John Flanagan's outrageous comments today about mayoral control of NYC schools? Flanagan came right out and admitted he and the Senate GOP is screwing around with continued control because the mayor campaigned for Democratic Party control of the Senate. I think it's an outrageous admission and would be shocked if deBlasio's people do not retaliate in some way.
ReplyDeleteYes, am reading it now. Will have a piece on it later.
DeleteCuomo won't go down. For what? The dude's MO is always to go to the limits of legality and stay legal....souring everybody in the world on him, but he always moves ahead. What is the list of illegal things he did or potentially did with real likelihood?
ReplyDeleteWell let me amend that: Cuomo can go down if a) he actually did illegal shit somewhere along the line and b) Silver and Skelos totally roll on Cuomo and start singing long and loud. #2 would be real vital. So then the question becomes: would Silver and Skelos have any good on Cuomo or would Cuomo be slicker then to allow any of his potential illegalities known to those two?
DeleteThe subpoena to his donors that got pulled back becomes a problem if the feds pick up that string of he investigation.
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