David Paterson's story is about one man alone

Since his tenure began in a crash of political lightning nearly two years ago, Gov. David A. Paterson has left others puzzling over how he runs state offices - and who guides and executes his agendas.

Now two longtime Paterson aides are drawing new scrutiny and skepticism from Albany's Kremlinologists, just as the governor prepares to launch his first campaign for the job he got when Eliot Spitzer imploded.

The men in the spotlight: David W. Johnson and Clemmie Harris, who attract insider interest because they spend much face time with him and are widely believed to influence some of his scheduling and personnel choices.

As their qualifications, actions and relationships go under the microscope, Harris and Johnson become the latest lightning rods in the ongoing story of a governor seeking to hang on - despite poor polling, severe state fiscal straits, comparatively weak campaign fundraising, controversy over a big-money casino proposal and an expected primary challenge from Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.

Says a veteran Democrat and one-time ally who has known Paterson through his two-plus decades in Albany: "He's in a hopeless political situation, but it's just like him to think a miracle is going to occur. He must think he's going to . . . [outlast] Andrew. But if Andrew backs down and doesn't run, someone else will enter the race and beat him in the primary. At the end of the day, people are worried we could lose to [Republican Rick] Lazio."

That's a sample of the prevalent, jittery talk inside the party.

For his part, Paterson seems determined to keep insisting that his administration has made the tough budget decisions, told the legislature the hard truth, and been victimized by orchestrated rumors and unfair news coverage, and his newly cherished, self-declared status as a political "outsider."

But the day-to-day discipline, command and management of the administration, with its vast overview of so many billions of dollars in state spending in revenues, has been in question all along.

Turnover and a perception of turmoil haven't helped.

Secretary and gatekeeper Charles O'Byrne was prodded out over tax problems in October 2008. By last February, William J. Cunningham III was gone as top aide, putting Larry Schwartz in the post. A month earlier, the question of who reported to whom in the administration blew into the open after a leaky and unwieldy selection process that made Kirsten Gillibrand the interim U.S. senator pending this year's election.

Who represents, drives, socializes with or runs errands for the top official seems almost beside the point.

As relations between the executive offices and the legislature worsened, staffers to key lawmakers - Democrats, like the governor - spoke of chaos and blockages in the top levels of the executive branch when it came to getting a question answered or a policy decided. Paterson's loyalists will tell you such talk is not unusual for any administration.

In the end, this story is about one man alone.