Will the Real Republican Please Stand Up?

It just gets crazier and crazier out here in North Greenbush politics. Lou Desso wants to make Democrat Al Spain the GOP candidate for Supervisor. That runs contrary to a long time Republican and committee person, Stephanie Piel, who would also like to run for the post.

What's a real Republican to do? Should they support a real Republican or instead reward a turn coat Democrat. We don't pretend to have the answer but it sure has the ingredients for a wild primary season.

We already know that Lou Desso has no allegiance to any political party having invaded the Democratic Party nominating caucus so he could run with every line on the ballot. To Desso its about a power trip rather than enduring the inconvenience of a real competition of ideas and ideology. It's also about having a candidate he can control and make no mistake, Al Spain is his man. That's one reason Democrats ended their caucus system for nominating candidates replacing it with the more traditional primary method. The Primary method will keep Republicans out of the Democratic Party but it wont keep turncoat Democrats like Al Spain from accepting the Republican endorsement while entering a primary for the Democratic endorsement as well.

Democrats are gearing up for a possible Spain run for either Council or Supervisor. They'll be hammering away at 4 years of Spain voting with Republicans against his own party. He screwed up the Comprehensive Plan, awarding a needless $30,000 no bid contract to a firm to redo the completed document. They will also be reminding Democratic voters that Al Spain voted to change a law in town so that he could hire his brother's out of town attorney in a town job in exchange for the attorney providing free legal representation for brother Jeff after he liquidated the Democratic Committee's bank account of more than $3,000, crippling the party.

So far that legal representation has gotten Spain a Court decision ordering him to repay the Democratic Party and has done little to please the Spain's with the stellar legal work of his "free" attorney. Democrats will also remind voters that an ethics complaint filed against Al Spain for the apparent quid pro quo was allowed to languish in the office of Spain ally Town Clerk Kathryn Connolly since January 2010 when it was filed. She never sent the documents to town Ethics Board. Hey, what are friends for?

So hold on to your hats folks, it promises to be a lively election season as Al Spain tries to pull a Lou Desso with GOP support for both the Republican and Democratic nominations. With Republicans trying to take over the Democratic Party once again, this time using a registered Democrat to do the dirty work. Try not to mistake this for fraud in the legal sense. It's just fraud in an ethical sense and we all know about the ethics possessed by this crew of politicians.