• • Sound Bites • • |
| • RUDY'S SUBTLE
MESSAGE: Once again, the Mayor sent a not-so-subtle message of who he’s leaning
towards, or, more accurately, against in the hotly-contested Dem mayoral race for 2001. In
the City budget announced last week, one office got a big cut for the fiscal year —
almost $5 million was lopped from the Comptroller’s budget for next year. Was it
payback for Alan Hevesi’s attack on the Mayor’s welfare contracts awarded
to Giuliani’s ex-aide a few months ago? Just asking. |
| • CITY BOYS OF
SUMMER: In the past, New York’s baseball stars may have played in Queens and the
Bronx, but often opted to live in the City’s plush suburbs like Long Island and
Westchester. But of late, a new trend is emerging with the City’s Boys of Summer.
Yankee stars like Chuck Knoblauch, Derek Jeter and David Cone have settled
down on Manhattan’s East Side. Now, we hear that new Mets sluggers Todd Zeile (East
Village) and Derek Bell (living on a boat docked at Chelsea Piers) have joined
their crosstown rivals and have settled down in Manhattan. |
Musical
Messages
Rick Lazio is clearly trying to send
a message with the theme music for his Senate campaign, reports our sister paper, The
Hill.
The Long Island Republican signaled that
he’s a political centrist as the loudspeakers on his "Mainstream Express"
campaign bus blared the John Fogarty tune "Centerfield" during a stop in
Syracuse recently.
Then, in an apparent effort to capitalize
on his youthful good looks, and perhaps pick up the women’s vote, Lazio plunged into
a crowd in Corning (no, he didn’t cut his lip this time) as the loudspeakers blasted
out the 1970’s hit song by Hot Chocolate, "You Sexy Thing."
"We’re just trying to use some
high-energy music to get the crowds pumped," Lazio’s aide Dan McLagan
told The Daily News before pointing out that the song’s opening line is,
"Do you believe in miracles?"
Lazio may have dropped a musical hint that
he misses the job he now wants to trade for a Senate seat. At another rally last week, his
campaign theme song
was "Our House," by Madness.
Maybe Lazio’s Democratic opponent,
First Lady Hillary Clinton, will play "I Left My Heart in Syracuse" at
her next campaign stop.
The Coup Fallout
Now that the dust has settled on the Albany
Coup and The Rudy Chronicles, the rumors are flying.
One political insider told NYConfidential
last
week that one overlooked subtext of the aborted overthrow of Speaker Sheldon Silver
in the State Assembly was the attempt to clear the path to
City Hall for City Council Speaker Peter Vallone.
Here’s how it would have worked:
Queens Dem County head Tom Manton, a Vallone ally, was trying to line up
Comptroller Carl McCall’s support to have Alan Hevesi succeed him at
State Comptroller when McCall makes his run for the Governor’s mansion in 2002.
With Hevesi out of the Mayoral sweepstakes,
the way would be cleared for Vallone to put together a three-borough ticket with Fernando
Ferrer for Comptroller and an African-American Council-member from B'klyn (Una
Clarke?) for Public Advocate.
But, alas, like many well-planned paths,
this one went awry as Silver beat back the Manton-engineered coup by Mike Bragman.
Now the Queens delegation in the Assembly and Bragman are left to lick their wounds.
And Vallone is no closer to City Hall than he was before.
He's A Pepper
One name that emerged in the news of late as a political
player is billionaire financier and philanthropist Theodore J. Forstman. The former
leveraged buyout king, who made his fortune on LBO’s of companies like Dr. Pepper and
Gulfstream Aerospace, was mentioned briefly as a GOP alternative to Rudy in the Senate
race before he declared that he was not interested in running. Then he made news with an
announcement of a multi-million dollar scholarship program for underprivileged children
who want to attend private and parochial schools. One little known fact about Forstman is
that he’s also involved in publishing — he’s an investor and advisor to the
glossy monthly magazine for twenty-somethings, Manhattan File.
| Confidentially
New York . . . |
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E-MAIL your items to: conf@queenspress.com |
