Albany Times Union: Another state senator is heading to prison, but will it shape the next elections cycle?
Republicans are certainly claiming the sudden resignation of Sen. Carl Kruger, a Brooklyn Democrat who pleaded guilty this week to accepting bribes in return for official favors, will help their efforts to keep control of the legislative chamber even in deep blue New York…
…For Republicans, who have also had members fall to federal prosecutors, Kruger is not just an albatross, but more evidence in a narrative of Democratic dysfunction. They'll contrast their accomplishments this year as the majority, when they played ball with Gov. Andrew Cuomo, even somersaulting on taxes this month to back a Cuomo-brokered restructuring, to the turmoil of 2009 and 2010, when Democrats were in control.
"This is the latest in a series of ethical and fiscal missteps that show Democrats haven't learned any lessons from their two disastrous years in the majority," said Scott Reif, a spokesman for Senate Republicans.
City Hall News: John Sampson – The state Senate minority leader took another hit over his questionable pick for the new state ethics commission, Ravi Batra, when it was revealed that the two had an undisclosed business connection. Soon after, the guilty plea by Sen. Carl Kruger once again tarnished Sampson’s Democratic caucus. And now, Sampson’s Republican adversaries are feeling energized as they prepare to mount a strong campaign to steal Kruger’s old seat.
Back in the ancient days of March, when Carl Kruger was indicated, State GOP Chair Fast Eddie Cox was heard to opine that Albany corruption is “definitely a Democratic problem.” Called on the matter of Joe Bruno, Cox alluded to problems with the constitutionality of Bruno’s conviction.
But, as Jim Dwyer has noted, the problems with the Joe Bruno (whose conviction is on appeal) and the culture which he still embodies, are not merely about allegations of illegality (upon which, as always, I will refrain from comment), but about the crimes which have been found to be legal, and the press's insane coverage of them.
JIM DWYER: …In the Senate, thanks to this tax-financed payroll, Mr. Bruno had hot-and-cold-running lawyers, drivers, secretaries, gofers.
Meanwhile, he also ran a private consulting business out of his office suite in the Capitol. The people who employed him sent his personal paychecks directly to his government office. So the $100,000-a-year secretary on the public payroll took care of $3.2 million in personal checks paid to Mr. Bruno, and all the attendant paperwork. The lawyers on that same public payroll had to meet with Mr. Bruno’s clients. All this has emerged at a federal trial under way in Albany.
The court case may describe crimes, or lawful greed or, as Mr. Bruno maintains, the ordinary, ethical practice of a part-time legislator, full-time businessman. Yet the Bruno story is about more than a trial, and more than one man’s lack of boundaries.
As a legislator, Mr. Bruno led a party that is in the minority in New York State but was in the majority in the State Senate, weaving the protective web of incumbency and gerrymandering. Major banks paid to keep Mr. Bruno and his people in place, casually writing checks of $50,000 or so for seasonal campaign galas. Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg transferred hundreds of thousands of dollars from his personal fortune to Bruno-run political funds, hoping to fortify Mr. Bruno’s shaky hold on power.
And two years ago, when the public was afforded a glimpse of Mr. Bruno’s sense of entitlement — he was being flown in state helicopters to political fund-raisers and meetings at racetracks — nearly all of Albany rose to his defense.
Like a few other senior public officials, Mr. Bruno could whistle up a state helicopter and State Police pilots pretty much anytime he wanted. In 2007, the logs of these trips were requested under the Freedom of Information Law by James Odato, a reporter with The Times Union of Albany. Drawing on the records, the paper published an article about Mr. Bruno’s frequent use of the helicopters when he had political fund-raisers and about police drivers taking him around when he landed.
At first, the story had a modest impact. Then Mr. Bruno complained he was the victim of police surveillance. A series of articles and editorials in The New York Post took up the theme that the revelations about Mr. Bruno’s travels were an evisceration of his civil liberties that bordered on Stalinism.
After all, who would want to live in a country where a politician can’t command state helicopters and police for what are essentially political fund-raising junkets?
Finally, the state’s attorney general, Andrew M. Cuomo, began an investigation. His report quickly disposed of any questions about the legitimacy of Mr. Bruno’s helicopter travels; under the rules in place, even a modest fig leaf of official business could justify them. The vast bulk of Mr. Cuomo’s report was devoted to the question of how the Bruno flight logs were disclosed. It turns out, unsurprisingly, that they were leaked by the office of Mr. Bruno’s bitter adversary, Eliot Spitzer, who was then governor. The governor’s staff pretty much issued a gold-plated invitation to the Times Union reporter to ask for the documents.
So The Times Union was cast as a stooge for reporting the information about the trips. Now, though, with the hindsight about Mr. Bruno’s sense of entitlement afforded by the federal trial, the helicopter saga is particularly revealing. The scandal was defined not as the possible abuse of public resources by Mr. Bruno, but as malignant leaks by the governor’s office. The truth of the matter was not the problem, but telling the truth was."
Of course, as always, I made many of these points far, far earlier.
Mr. Bruno was the architect of a completely corrupt, but thoroughly legal system, which robbed the voters of the state not only of their tax revenues and the benefits for which they were supposed to pay, but of democracy itself in any meaningful form. The fact that he may or may not have attempted to enrich himself (whether in a legal manner, or not) is almost incidental.
It is a system so replete with Bruno’s fingerprints that he can be personally found at the roots of what was possibly (at least until the Kruger indictment), the rankest stench involving the Senate Democrats.
After all, it was not John “Nucky” Sampson who put into place the process for choosing which lucky company would get to implement “Racetrack Empire.”
It was “Commodore” Joe Bruno.
And, just to be clear, the depraved culture and unchecked power of the Senate’s Republican Conference Mr. Bruno led also gave birth to other convictions including departed Senator turned almost County Executive Vincent Leibell, and the late and the late and unlamented Lucchese soldier, Guy Velella (Senator Kruger only lived in ”Gaspipe” Casso’s house; Mr. Velella seems to have supped at the Lucchese Family table).
And, it should also be noted that the shakedowns which are technically legal continue, unabated.
But the problem with Republicans calling Kruger a specifically Democratic problems is more than a just a systemic one.
Yes, Kruger was a problem, but I would argue that he was a problem largely enabled by Republicans.
Let us review.
As I first noted in 2007, the Senate’s Republican Majority should be toast in the long term, and no one knows it better than they do. Their once robust majority has gradually evolved into a naturally occurring retirement community of old men sadly serving out terms of life imprisonment without parole on their way to the elephant’s graveyard.
It survives in a hothouse environment supported by the artificial sunlight of member items, “member services”, legislation sold to the highest bidder, malapportionment and inertia; its greatest enemies are actuarial tables and changing demographics.
The Republicans know this, but have a plan to deal with the problem which has gradually evolved over the last decade or so:
Run 'em as Dems, keep em as Dems, but have their votes to organize the Senate if the Dems ever take the majority.
Back in 2007, I gave it a name.
"The Kruger Plan".
The facts are simple. The Senate Republican majority is doomed in the long-term unless they find a way to corral some non-Republicans into either switching parties or voting with them to organize. This was their long-range strategy for many years. They find "Democrats In Name Only" and run them in prohibitively Democratic districts, so they can hold them in reserve in case the Dems ever take the majority.
Back in 2007, I gave twelve examples of this; four of them were Carl Kruger, Pedro Espada, Ruben Diaz and Hiram Monserrate (these day’s they’ve upgraded to a 2011 model Klavino).
Here is my line about Kruger:
“Example #11: Carl Kruger; already bought and paid for, many times over, but like a case of the clap, or Nancy Larraine Hoffman, Kruger is the gift that keeps on giving. Worth an article all his own; will get one soon.”
As I’ve documented, a race in 2002 set new precedents for how far Joe Bruno could go in buying off local Democratic party officials, with no one taking any steps to enforce discipline. This was the race where incumbent Vinnie Gentile’s district was decimated in reapportionment, as the Republicans prepared to beat him with Bay Ridge Councilman Marty Golden.
The 2002 race where Golden won election was an historical landmark. It was nothing new for Brooklyn Democrats to endorse Republicans for President, Governor and Mayor, but never had Brooklyn Dems jumped ship, en masse, to desert a local incumbent. Nonetheless, one had to forgive them, for they only gave up their support after hours of torture being forced to contemplate huge piles of cash, pork and patronage.
Five members of the Democratic State Committee jumped ship, as did an incumbent Councilmen, Assemblyman and, incredibly, a Democratic State Senator.
That Senator was Carl Kruger, and he brought along with him such allies as the Garson Crime Family (whose membership at one point had a husband on Kruger’s staff and a wife on Golden’s) and Bruce Ratner’s consigliore Bruce Bender (a figure in the Kruger indictment).
Kruger pretty much ran Golden’s campaign and elected him to the Senate.
As I noted in Part One, from 2002, onward, Kruger was a virtual member of the Republican Conference, basically getting serviced out of their allocations for any shortfalls in staff or member items, and getting some of his bills passed without David Paterson or Malcolm Smith having to beg for it. They even stopped running candidates against him and sometimes even gave him their line.
Then, in 2007, he upped the ante.
Eliot Spitzer and Malcolm Smith were working assiduously to get two Republican to vote with the Democrats to reorganize. They needed two to jump at once, because no one wanted to do it alone.
The more credible it was that the majority would changes hands, the more likely Republicans would have been to jump, and things looked excellent.
Until Carl Kruger saved Joe Bruno‘s hide.
In a brilliantly executed coup de grace, Bruno brutally forced Kruger to accept appointment to the Chairmanship of the Senate’s Social Service Committee by holding a $12,500 a year check to his throat (The threats of extra staff and member items caused additional hyperventilating) .
By accepting this position, Kruger allowed Bruno to send his conference a powerful message:
“Don't bother jumping ship; I have Democratic votes, and you'll end up in the minority.”
Kruger had taken the wind out of Smith's sails, and he got a prize for it.
As I’ve noted, this was the beginning of the end for Spitzer. Kruger had blown his best shot at turning the Senate, and with it, his best opportunity for enacting his reform agenda.
As documented by Lloyd Constantine, the failed effort to turn the Senate was the beginning of the end, as Spitzer’s efforts became more and more desperate. There was Choppergate, and an effort to get the Sen Dems to complain about Bruno to the IRS (which Kruger dropped the dime about).
If one is to believe Constantine, the despondency over Bruno is what led to the prostitutes. Spitzer, already softened by Choppergate, could not survive another scandal.
All traceable in its way to Carl Kruger.
We should also note Kruger’s role in facilitating Joe Bruno’s crucial relationship with the repulsive Independence Party.
So overcome was Kruger by his hyperventilating over Bruno’s money, that Bruno got Kruger to hide Independence Party Vice Chair Tom Connolly on his payroll.
It was a truly emblematic illustration of how the Albany bi-partisan ruling establishment really works.
In 2006, facing an imminent Spitzer-Hilary blowout of monumental proportions, Bruno was worried that not even the reliable incompetence of David Paterson and friends could save his party from the unhappy accident of voters starting at Spitzer and voting straight down the line.
But thanks to the IP, there existed a ballot line where a voter could cast their votes for Spitzer and Hillary, and then continue down the line and be able to support every single solitary Senate Republican whose existence might be threatened by a Democratic landslide, as well as every Senate Republican candidate who has even a theoretical chance of taking a Democratic seat.
That year, the Independence Party has become Joe Bruno’s trump card; a wholly owned subsidiary of the Republican State Senate Campaign Committee (RSSCC), essentially run out of the RSSCC offices, providing Republicans with life jackets to save them from the likely Democratic tsunami.
And it worked. At least one Republican seat (Serph Maltese’s) was saved by the IP line.
And Carl Kruger was now helping Joe Bruno to continue making it happen.
Then in early 2008, when a Special election enabled the Democrats to go after a seat in the North Country, litigation ensued over the IP line. Representing the interests of the pro-GOP Connolly faction (whose leader was ensconced on Kruger’s payroll) was Kruger’s Counsel.
After the fall of Spitzer, Kruger pretty much continued to function as a member of the Republican Conference, up until the point where the Senate became Democratic by one vote.
Kruger then set up the “Amigos,” using his balance of power to throw the Senate into chaos until he became Chair of the Finance Committee.
Extortion, pure and simple. Something Kruger also faced trial (something Kruger also faced trial for in the early 1980s)
Later, the next summer, when Amigos Pedro Espada and Hiram Monserrate attempted to repeat the trick, Kruger basically served as their negotiator with the Senate Democrats, helping to make Espada the Majority Leader.
As I’ve noted, the whole two act fiasco was perhaps the greatest New York political disgrace of our lifetime, and Carl Kruger was pretty much the ring master of that three wing flea circus.