Cuomo "Source" Criticizing De Blasio Appears To Be Cuomo Himself

Tell me who this sounds like?

ALBANY — After 18 months in office, Mayor de Blasio still is clueless in his dealings with Albany, a top Cuomo administration official said Wednesday.

"He is more politically oriented in terms of his approach ... and then he makes it almost impossible for him to achieve success," the Cuomo official said.

On mayoral control, De Blasio initially sought to make the law permanent even while knowing the Senate Republicans, who have been feuding with the mayor, had made it clear they were not considering a long-term extender, the source said.

"He kept banging at it and now it's going to be seen as a loss," the Cuomo administration official said.

It didn't help that the mayor misread the support on the issue from the Assembly Democrats, who did not expend much political capital on the issue.

"How did the mayor think he was going to get mayoral control? 'Well the Assembly will support me.' They didn't," the Cuomo source said. "I think he puts himself in these situations."

And on the 421-a tax program:

"He's Mr. Progressive (yet) you just leave out labor. And labor organized in a way that was so effective that even the Republicans sided with organized labor, which I've never seen," the Cuomo official said.

The Cuomo source denied that the governor has gone out of his way to embarrass the mayor at times. Earlier this year, a Cuomo spokeswoman immediately shot down an affordable housing plan the mayor put forward in his state-of-the-city address.

The source said the governor needs to make it clear quickly when a plan is unworkable. “Otherwise you're the one who winds up with the blame" when it doesn't go through, he said.

Check out the rest of the quotes from the Cuomo "source" in the Ken Lovett piece in the Daily News.

The wording, the structure of the sentences, the language used - sure sounds like, well...

@klnynews The "Cuomo source" sounds suspiciously like Cuomo himself.

— rbe (@perdidostschool) June 24, 2015

Something that Capitol Confidential echoed:

Anti-@deBlasioNYC comments appear to come from a source very, very, very, very close to the governor: http://t.co/1H3gMTBq9O @klnynews

— Capitol Confidential (@TUCapCon) June 24, 2015

As did the Capital NY Morning Email:

-- An unnamed Cuomo official, with an eerily familiar tendency to ask himself questions and then answer them, told the Daily News that de Blasio doesn’t quite get Albany.

Cuomo supposedly called a bunch of reporters after the "framework" announcement for end-of-the-session business to tout the success of the agreement (which actually hasn't been finalized yet.)

It sounds to me like one of those calls went to Ken Lovett and the governor got very, very, very, very critical of his "friend" Bill de Blasio in the conversation.

It was just 13 months ago that de Blasio secured the Working Families Party nomination for Cuomo, helping the governor avoid a third party challenge in the general election in November 2014.

Cuomo has paid de Blasio back by slapping him at every turn, at times grandstanding over him publicly, at other times leaking negative items to the press anonymously.

In addition, Cuomo has gone out of his way to make sure that de Blasio's political agenda was defeated - and thus de Blasio himself was "defeated" during the legislative session.

It is extraordinary that Cuomo was so open in his criticism of de Blasio, so naked about the "source" of it.

The message from Cuomo to de Blasio is quite clear:

"You thought you had the upper hand last May when you "helped" me with WFP?

@#$% you, Bill.  I have the upper hand always - and I will use it to drive you into the dirt anytime I want."

Cuomo In Hiding For Eight Straight Days And Counting

Where oh where has Governor Cuomo gone?

Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie told reporters on Monday morning he had a “nice conversation” with Gov. Andrew and his Republican counterpart in the Senate, Majority Leader John Flanagan.

But agreements on an extension of rent control laws for New York City, as well as mayoral control of New York City schools and a real-estate tax abatement remain elusive.

“We’re talking, the governor, Senator Flanagan and I, we had a nice conversation this morning,” Heastie said after the hour-long meeting. “There’s no agreement, so for me to tell you something now, it could change.”

...

Heastie said he was unsure whether the Legislature would have to stay here for the rest of the week in order to secure a deal.

As for the governor, Cuomo has not been seen in a public venue since June 14, when he appeared at a news conference in Yonkers unveiling a $100 million struggling schools fund.

“That’s for you to ask him,” Heastie said when asked about Cuomo’s lack of visibility. “I have to represent the interests of the conference and that’s what I’ve been doing.”

Why's Cuomo in hiding these past eight days?

He was so visible for a while there, hammering home the education tax credit issue.

Then came the Yonkers PR set piece where he introduced the $100 million for "struggling" schools above NYC fund, a fund that he said was not linked to his tax credit, and he hasn't been seen since.

Weird.

Anybody got any idea why he's in hiding?

Leonard Litwin "Thanks" Andrew Cuomo For His Support

From the Observer:

The Alliance for Tenant Power, a left-leaning pro-tenant group, is circulating a meme and quote parodying Mr. Cuomo’s ties to scandal-scarred Glenwood Management. The meme portrays Glenwood’s 100-year-old founder, Leonard Litwin, raising a martini glass and smiling like Leonardo DiCaprio in the 2013 film The Great Gatsby.

Mr. Litwin is “thanking” Mr. Cuomo for calling for the straight renewal of a controversial real estate tax break known as 421a. Many progressives, including Mayor Bill de Blasio, want 421a reformed or scrapped altogether.

“The world’s upper class can sigh in relief. A straight extender on 421-a is exactly what we paid for. We know that billionaires want a 50’ lap pool and their tax break as well. Thanks to the Governor we will deliver nothing less,” reads the parody quote from Mr. Litwin. Alliance for Tenant Power noted the quote was delivered “from the stone whirlpool spa in his main penthouse.”

The meme arrived in the form of a press release from a fake gmail account for Charles Dorego, CharlesDoregoNY@gmail.com. Mr. Dorego is Glenwood’s senior vice president.

Dorego is "cooperating witness-1" in the corruption case against former state Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos and his son Adam.

This is a parody, but like all good jokes, it's got truth at the center of it.

Cuomo's making as if the deadline for getting 421-a reforms snuck up on him, but the truth is, he and the legislature knew this was coming and chose not to do anything about it.

So now Sheriff Andy says a straight extender of the tax giveaway is the best way to go - and of course that benefits Leonard Litwin and all of Cuomo's real estate donors and buddies.

You bet Litwin and Company will be happy if they get a straight extender to the 421-a program with no changes - and they'll "thank" Governor Cuomo and the legislators who give them that straight extender.