Now that the dust has settled on Albany's end-of-session collapse, it's obvious who's to blame for blowing things up: Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno.
He tries to point the finger at Gov. Spitzer, but Bruno's the one standing there like Wile E. Coyote, with half his fur singed off and a receipt from the Acme Explosives Co. in his back pocket.
Spitzer spent months pushing the Legislature to the brink of agreement on a bunch of worthwhile bills. Among other things, he wanted to clean up pollution at abandoned buildings, speed construction of power plants, collect DNA from all convicted criminals and grant paid leave to workers spending time with newborns or sick family members.
And Bruno torpedoed it all. Why? Because he fears his dwindling GOP majority could not survive without unlimited special-interest cash and bottomless pork-barrel spending.
As Spitzer revealed to the Daily News Editorial Board yesterday, Bruno was blunt about why he wouldn't go along with closing a loophole that lets some companies make unlimited, untraceable donations to Albany power brokers and other much-needed campaign finance reforms.
"Joe Bruno's statement to me was, 'We need that money,'" Spitzer said. "That was a direct quote."
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Regardless of who said what to whom, here's the bottom line: Bruno and the Senate GOP are just two seats away from losing their majority. They've managed to hang on this long only because they ruthlessly gerrymander districts, shower their voters with pork and go into every election with a massive money advantage over the Democrats. So they view even modest campaign-finance reforms as a mortal threat.
As I have been saying for quite some time, all that ridiculous BS about protecting the LLC loophole as a defense of "freedom of expression" and all the other laughable rationales for the status quo that have spewed forth from Bruno's mouth in recent months are nothing but a smokescreen for what is really motivating him. He knows that without that cash, he and his majority are finished. Not only are they finished, they aren't coming back anytime soon, for a generation or two at a minimum.
At least he's now admitting it.
