Posted on 08/23/2008 1:16:56 AM PDT by neverdem
There will be a show of Democratic unity this afternoon in an effort to topple a longtime Republican state senator from Queens. One of the Democratic candidates, Albert J. Baldeo, will be withdrawing from the race and endorsing City Councilman Joseph P. Addabbo Jr.
Two years ago, Mr. Baldeo was a little-known lawyer in Queens who came within 2 percentage points, about 900 votes, of defeating the longtime Republican incumbent, State Senator Serphin R. Maltese. And Mr. Baldeo achieved that with no support from the party organization in Queens and largely with his own money. But this year, Mr. Baldeo’s desire for a rematch never quite achieved much support among Queens Democratic officials. They preferred Mr. Addabbo, the son of a well-known congressman.
In an interview this morning, Mr. Baldeo said that he thought it would be better to endorse Mr. Addabbo and avoid a divisive Democratic primary.
“It was a gut-wrenching, difficult decision,” Mr. Baldeo said. “But I decided to endorse him for the greater goal of Democratic Party unity. We want to put all of our resources behind one candidate. And that’s Councilman Addabbo. I’ll be actively campaigning for him.” In fact, the two men are scheduled to appear together this afternoon at a press conference at Mr. Baldeo’s office in the Richmond Hill section of Queens. Mr. Baldeo has had an arms-length relationship with the Democratic organization in Queens for some time. And has been described by leaders of the organization as something of an unpredictable candidate. Despite Mr. Baldeo’s narrow loss to Senator Maltese, party leaders made clear their preference for Mr. Addabbo long before the councilman officially entered the race.
When asked whether he had been pressured to leave the race — either by United States Representative Joseph Crowley, the Queens Democratic leader, or Michael...
(Excerpt) Read more at cityroom.blogs.nytimes.com ...
I remember Seraphin Maltese running for statewide office as a Conservative Party candidate years ago.
NY is scre*ed without the 1-seat GOP senate. It’ll be open season for all leftist legislation, including q*ee* ‘marriage’.
Study: Large Earthquake Could Strike New York City
New York economy officially in recession, state budget director says ("emergency economic session")
FReepmail me if you want on or off my New York ping list.
It’ll get worse when they realize:
A)Ad budgets for many corps are down...alot
B)Those Wall Street bonuses don’t come through this year
Serph Maltese used to be the Chairman of the board of trustees of my high school. He ran against my sister for City Council, and won, despite the fact that my sister was endorsed by the New York Times. (You can guess whom I was rooting for.)
Serph organized a police union rally endorsing George Bush Sr. that was held at my high school in 1988 that garnered considerable national press coverage.
Joseph P. Addabbo Sr. was my Congressman, I remember him meeting my scout troop on the steps of the Capitol in February 1964 and personally handing our scoutmaster a bunch of tour tickets. He, was, nevertheless, a dreadful hack.
Thanks for the ping!
Maltese has alot of support. It will not be easy to unseat him.
Serf, on the other hand, is a treasure.
Good.
They’ve targeted several seats though haven’t they. All they need is one. Unless we take one from them, don’t know if any rats seats are vulnerable.
Padavan is basically entrenched being around so long. He has alot of involvement in the community, and his name is favorably well known. I don’t agree with everything he supports, but I didn’t know he was anti-2nd amendment.
Padavan’s office doles out funds every year to a non-profit organization I am a part of, so I can’t complain.
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