It's got to be tough to be John McArdle these days. It can't be much fun to confront the reality that the chances of still getting $180K salary and a state car from New York's taxpayers at this time next year are growing increasingly slim. This morning, he's even got to read Roger freaking Stone bash him in the pages of the New York Sun.
On Friday, in the wake of his party's humiliating defeat in a special Senate election in a northern district, Mr. Bruno accepted the resignation of the Senate Republican Campaign Committee's longtime director, Edward Lurie, who was in charge of the campaign's field operations. Calling Mr. Lurie a "mechanic who never had any strategic authority," Mr. Stone insists that Mr. Bruno pinned the blame on the wrong guy. The man, he said, who ought to have taken the hit is John McArdle, Mr. Bruno's tough-talking communications director whom Mr. Stone described as the primary force behind the Senate's Troopergate monomania.
"John McArdle is a believer in one thing: Troopergate," he said. "Anything that distracts from Troopergate, he's against. Bruno needs to fire McArdle."
Note to Bruno: Please do not fire John McArdle. He's doing a fine job for you and is worth every penny of our money you are paying him.
Then you have to go out and whine to the New York Times because your boss apparently no longer knows what the term "on the record" means.
"New York magazine did a tremendous disservice to its readers and to Senator Bruno by shamefully and purposely taking out of context comments Senator Bruno made several months ago to its reporter that clearly were not intended to appear in print," Mr. McArdle said. "It is especially troubling that this reporter chose to misrepresent his intentions and violate trust and access given him at a time when Senator Bruno was dealing with difficult personal and family issues."
Not that he didn't say these things, but that he didn't think they would be printed. Stuff like this:
"I provided the entrée. In that business, the biggest problem is access. I provided access." Bruno, who makes $121,000 a year in salary as majority leader, believes there is nothing improper about steering people he does business with in politics to open portfolios at Wright. There was no quid pro quo, he says. If Wright wanted to meet with trustees of a union looking to invest pension money, Bruno would make the phone calls. "My pitch to them was, 'If you like what they have to say, take it to the next level. If you don't, say good-bye.'?"
Or maybe this:
Ask him about his legacy, and he'll point to his mastery of the pork process. "Take a look around Albany. Take a look around Troy. Take a look at the airport. Do you think that airport would be there if I wasn't the leader?" he says. "You know how the airport got there? We're trying to close the budget and Shelly wouldn't close. So Pataki says, 'What's it take to close?' Shelly says, 'I need a library in Brooklyn.' 'How much?' Shelly says, '$65 million.' Pataki says, 'Well, that's all right.' It was a $100 billion budget. So I said, 'It's not okay with me. I don't have a single member in Brooklyn.' 'So what do you need?' 'I need $65 million for the airport.' Pataki says, 'Shelly, do you care?' 'No, I don't care, as long as I get my library.' Pataki says, 'Good. Done.'?"
This image can't be helpful either:
Joe Bruno has his loafers off in his vast sanctum on the New York State capitol's third floor. He saunters around on the plush white carpet in dress socks. There's a set of dueling pistols and pictures of himself in political postures, at groundbreakings or saddled up on one of his eight horses at a parade, in his Stars and Stripes cowboy shirt. Many of these pictures were taken a while ago, but Bruno, who will be 79 next month, somehow looks like he hasn't aged. There are three golf clubs in his office and a green Astroturf mat against one wall. Bruno picks up a five-iron, checks his grip, pulls the club back slow, and rips a clean, full swing.
"Ohhh." He stretches his back. "Ahhh." He puts down the club. "See, that's the problem. You should warm up when you do that shit. When you're my age, you have to warm up." He then plumps down in his cushy chair, picks up an empty water bottle from his desk, and wings it across the room at the garbage can.
Clank! A miss.
"Shit, first one I missed-first one I missed out of four," Bruno says. "Now, that's disturbing."
It kinda sucks to be John McArdle these days. Couldn't happen to a nicer guy... |
