| Brooks Wins Bingo for Ballot
The ballot for the September 9 primary were made official on Thursday, July 31, at the Albany County Board of Elections. The method of selection was to load a bunch of numbered balls into a spherical wire-framed rotating contraption. The candidate drawing the lowest number would hit the top of the ballot, and so on, and the final drawing, and thus the order of the ballot, was confirmed as such:
Tracey Brooks...................1
Paul Tonko.......................3
Darius Shahinfar..............28
Joseph Sullivan...............69
Phil Steck.......................70
Clearly excited about the results, the Brooks campaign sent out this statement:
"Tracey Brooks drawing number 'one' and landing the top spot on the Democratic Primary ballot is a sign, perhaps a bit of foreshadowing for September 9th. Tracey Brooks is on a roll, from beating all of her opponents in second quarter fundraising to being the first to launch TV, radio and online ad campaigns. Tracey is gaining more and more local endorsements and connecting with more and more voters through online efforts, telephone town hall meetings, phone calls and going door-to-door in communities throughout the seven counties of the 21st Congressional District." - Kyle Kotary, Spokesman, Tracey Brooks for Congress
For the record, none of the other candidates sent out statements relating to the symbolic significance of their drawing.
Republican Petition Challenge Fails; New Wrinkle For Sullivan Challenge
In the beginning of the week, it seemed as though there would only be a Democratic primary in the district after Republican candidate Jim Buhrmaster challenged the filings of his opponent, Steven Vasquez. But yesterday, the Times Union reported that Buhrmaster has failed in that endeavor and will be facing Vasquez in the GOP contest.
Vasquez filed 1,640 signatures, more than the required 1,250. But Buhrmaster had challenged about 450 out of Vasquez's signatures, including a claim that more than 100 signers weren't Republicans who live in the district. He also alleged some people signed Buhrmaster's petitions first.
"We went up against one of the best election lawyers in New York. Our campaign volunteers did such a good job in the petition process that it wasn't even close," Vasquez said in a statement.
According to campaign spokesman and attorney Warren Redlich, who also sits on the Guilderland Town Board, Buhrmaster's campaign withdrew its challenge after McDonough ruled that nine signatures which listed a hamlet in addition to the required town were valid. Under election law, if one signature on a petition sheet is discounted, the entire sheet may be discounted.
At least six candidates are running for the seat, which has been held by Rep. Michael McNulty, D-Green Island, since 1988.
Dear Times Union: There are exactly seven candidates running for the seat and I'm tired of calling your corrections department regarding the number of candidates in this race.
For the record: Warren Redlich was the Republican candidate in the race in the previous two cycles.
Pure Opinion: That portion of our election laws, be it statutory or case law, is absolutely stupid.
On the Democratic side, a petition challenge brought forth by Keri Kresler to candidate Joseph Sullivan's filings must still be going on. The Times Union's coverage first inaccurately reported that Ms. Kresler worked for Citizen Action, who jumped to rebuke them in this juicy comment.
However, Ms. Kresler did not make mention of her prominent position in the local Working Families Party. Since Paul Tonko is the Democrat endorsed by that party, that lead me to wonder whether this was a back-door way for the Tonko campaign to get Sullivan off the ballot, but the campaign has confirmed that they are not challenging any petition filings, nor are any of the other campaigns. Still, if street-level dirty politics is your thing, Ms. Kresler's comments have it all.
My guess is that if the ballot drawings are official, then Mr. Sullivan will be joining us on September 9th.
NY-21 Candidate-by-Candidate News Wrap Up
Tracey Brooks
This week, Tracey Brooks released her third radio advertisement, this one titled "For All." While I haven't figured out how to get audio up on this thing, here's a transcript. You can imagine the hospital beeps in the background and Tracey Brooks's own voice saying these words for now:
"47 million Americans don't have health insurance and the rest of us are paying too much for it.
I'm Tracey Brooks.
In Congress, I'll take on the insurance and drug companies and fight for guaranteed health care for all.
I approve this message.
Paid for by Friends of Tracey Brooks."
In addition, Tracey Brooks released a statement on a recent grant of nearly one million dollars to fund breast cancer research at the Albany Medical Center. Nobody seemed to pick this up, so here's the meat of it:
Tracey Brooks, Democratic candidate for Congress in New York's 21st Congressional district, today issued the following statement about the $960,000 grant given to Albany Medical Center for breast cancer research. The grant from the American Cancer Society is the largest that organization has ever given to Albany Med.
"Under the Bush Administration, federal support for cancer and other medical research has not kept up with rising costs. Thanks to the American Cancer Society's grant, the breast cancer research at Albany Med has the real potential to work towards a cure and save the lives of millions of women who will be diagnosed with breast cancer in the years to come. This research is very promising, but more needs to be done including more federal support. We need the government to increase incentives for medical research and innovation to improve the quality of care for people living with breast cancer and other diseases and disorders, and we need comprehensive health care reform -- so that women and men with pre-existing conditions are not denied coverage or hit with higher costs for their care."
Darius Shahinfar
The big news out of the Shahinfar camp was covered here at TAP and focuses on the retention of major Democratic strategist Joe Trippi in the campaign. I was tempted to lead with the headline "Shahinfar Gets Trippi", but TAP beat me to it. Here's a summary of the campaign statement; click the link for the whole deal:
Today, Democrat Darius Shahinfar's campaign for Congress in New York's 21st announced the addition of Joe Trippi & Associates as its media and internet communications team. Joe Trippi is most known for his work not only in producing winning television advertisements, but for his pioneering ideas in utilizing the internet for political campaigns, most notably Howard Dean in 2004.
"Our campaign continues to build momentum and with Joe Trippi and his innovative strategies now fully engaged with our current team, we get that much closer to winning the Democratic nomination, winning this congressional seat and bringing about change in Washington," said Darius Shahinfar.
It appears that the campaigns, in general, are beginning to use the word "momentum," in their releases more often, signifying that the campaign is about to get even more competitive than it already has been.
Phil Steck
Technically reaching back into last week, Phil Steck's recent letter to the editor of the Business Review for the Capital Region is still on newsstands. The topic is still health care reform, but takes a different perspective than the rest of the candidates:
To the editor:
I read with great interest James Barba's opinion piece entitled "Health care reform is a business issue." I applaud him for taking a visible leadership role on this critical issue. I recently had the opportunity to meet with him individually to discuss the benefits of a national single-payer heath care system and other challenges faced by health care providers.
Even before I declared my candidacy for Congress, I have supported single-payer health care, known as "Medicare for All," because it is a system that is proven and tested. Medicare, the health system for the elderly, has a long history of success despite recent efforts to undermine it. It is statistically the most efficient health insurance care system available in the United States. Single-payer would benefit our economy, by lowering costs for patients, doctors, employers, and government. Single-payer would make us far more competitive internationally because many foreign businesses do not have to absorb the health care costs like their American counterparts.
In addition to hospital industry leaders like Jim Barba, a majority of doctors support single-payer because of the burdens that the current system places on them, primarily additional administrative costs.
As a partner in an Albany law firm, I understand the ever-escalating costs that businesses face in order to provide employees with health insurance. As an Albany County Legislator, I am all too familiar with the problems associated with the patchwork expansion of Medicaid. In Albany County we have worked to keep property taxes the 4th lowest in the state, but 90% of the county property tax goes toward Medicaid expenses. In a single-payer system, that local unfunded mandate is eliminated.
Sincerely,
Phil Steck
Candidate for Congress, NY-21
In addition to getting his message out in the papers, Phil Steck also let voters know about his campaign via a robo-call that went out to 60,000 voters on Wednesday, the same day his first district-wide mailer went out. Last week, Steck targeted only his home town of Colonie, and is setting quite the pace when it comes to reaching out goes. Below is the transcript of the robo-call and a picture of the mailer voters received the same day:
Hi. This is Democratic candidate Phil Steck.
I'm running for Congress because special interests and lobbyists have control in Washington.
I have spent my career fighting for people as a civil rights and labor attorney, a County Legislator, and as Democratic chairman in Colonie.
In the next few weeks, you'll be recieving more information about my campaign. I greatly appreciate your consideration and hope to earn your support in the Democratic primary on September 9th
Steck for Congress Mailer: Our Interests, Not Lobbyists
Full Disclosure: I am a Steck for Congress volunteer.
Paul Tonko
There was actually no news that either came to me or could be found for this week. Aside from the slight one-hour delay that had to be made for the candidate's appointment to meet with this blogger for the upcoming interview, but that's getting a little too internal. Personally, I'm just excited to meet another candidate and conduct another interview...expect it sometime next week.
Joseph P. Sullivan
Technically, there was no news from the Sullivan campaign last week. And there is no news this week besides the aforementioned petition challenges. In fact, the latest message on his campaign website, pre-dates these weekly wrap ups entirely. Here's what it says:
Sunday, July 20, 2008
12:48:11 PM EDT
THANK YOU THE ALBANY PROJECT/SOUNDPOLITIC
Thank You THE ALBANY PROJECT/ Soundpolitic for your summation of
the July 17, 2008 JCC 21st Congressional District Forum:
http://www.thealbanyproject.co...
THANK YOU Jewish Family Services of NENY Neighborhood NNROC
and the Albany JCC for hosting the forum.
A major step toward campaign reform!
J P Sullivan
Aw, shucks, Joe. You're welcome!
I'll be at the upcoming forum as well on August 12. And I'll be back with another update next Friday, right here on The Albany Project. |
