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State pols work on expanding power base

Dan Janison | dan.janison@newsday.com

June 30, 2008

Upon winning a top political post, you start taking for granted your base - the people who put you there.

Next, you try to butter up those who come from outside that base, in order to expand your power.

So goes the unwritten rule.

This month, in his first legislative session as governor, David A. Paterson - who in 2006 was representing a Manhattan Senate district - touted a property-tax cap, a measure to help homeowners outside his city.

As the presumptive Democratic nominee for president, Barack Obama clearly is trying something similar with his message to win Hillary Clinton backers.

As State Senate majority leader, lifelong upstater Joseph Bruno last year made a high-profile stand against Gov. Eliot Spitzer to boost Long Island school aid.

Now, Bruno's successor, Dean Skelos (R-Rockville Centre) - who surpassed upstaters Thomas Libous and George Maziarz for the top job - reaches out to the north and west.

With his majority facing a fight for its life in November, Skelos plans to travel this week and next to Buffalo, Rochester, Binghamton, Syracuse and Utica to meet with community groups, editorial boards and others.

John Durso, president of the Long Island Federation of Labor, who counts Skelos as an ally, noted during an interview Friday: "Dean makes sure Long Island gets its fair share. Now he has to worry about the entire state."

That will mean staying in the majority past December, of course.

MACK GIVES BACK: The uproar over special perks for the transit system's corporate elite intensified June 18 when Metropolitan Transportation Authority board member David S. Mack of Kings Point walked to the press section during a break at a meeting to defend them. Now, with the unlimited rail, bus and E-ZPass freebies being revoked, Mack is concluding another flap, this one over an honorary badge and uniform granted him as a police buff.

It is worth noting that Mack is a reliable campaign contributor. Tapped for the MTA in 1993 by GOP Nassau County Executive Thomas Gulotta, he's donated many thousands of dollars to Nassau state Sens. Skelos, Carl Marcellino, Michael Balboni, Kemp Hannon and Charles Fuschillo, and several Democrats, including then-Assemb. Thomas DiNapoli and county Comptroller Howard Weitzman, and statewide political committees of both parties, among others, records show.

ALL THE WAY WITH DNA: Most people would guess it's nurture, not nature. But genetic variation goes a long way to determining whether people vote, according to a study published in a journal of the American Political Science Association. Authors James Fowler, Christopher Dawes and Laura Baker reached this conclusion by analyzing turnout patterns of identical and nonidentical twins in California.

The findings fail to predict who will win the New York Senate. We checked.