Vito Lopez: No, I will NOT give you my proxy vote!
Today, my wife and I got our little "invitations" from the head of the Kings County Democratic County Committee, Vito Lopez, to appoint him as our proxy for the County Committee meeting.
First of all, getting this invitation means Joy and I qualified for County Committee, so congratulate us: we can continue to be thankless cogs in the wheel of the local party. In the words of the person who recruited us to do it in 2004, it is the lowest elected position in the Democratic Party. In my words Joy and I are expected to be rubber stamps for the machine but try our best to be little, rebellious rubber stamps.
As to appointing Vito Lopez as proxy: No, Mr. Lopez, we will not contribute to the disgusting corruption of the County Committee by giving you even more power than you currently have. We will dutifully attend and watch the circus that is the Democratic County Committee meeting in Brooklyn. Will it be scripted (I am not kidding!) like it was in 2004? How does one get that script, Mr. Lopez? Will you run it as smoothly and behind the scenes as Clarence Norman did?
What I most look forward to is Ken Diamondstone, who two years ago did all he could to call the Norman machine on the farce they had made County Committee. This will be Lopez's first time leading the circus. How will he do and will Diamdonstone put up a good counter show?
Stay tuned. County Committee is coming up this month! For those who have never seen it, it is quite a show.
Since I'm Not from Brooklyn,
I don't know what it is you are saying that Vito Lopez has done wrong. Has he done something you disagree with? What?
Brooklyn Machine
Lopez is part of the very corrupt Brooklyn machine that focuses on holding power in the primaries, but doesn't deliver votes in general elections. The machine may be changing under Vito, but it was abyssmal under Clarence Norman.
But Vito Lopez is part of the corruption. Whether he is better than Norman (who is now in jail) is beside the point to me. He has been part of the corruption that Norman is now in jail for (as, most likely, has Carl Andrews).
I wrote about Vito Lopez before.
Vito Lopez may be guilty
of something or other. I don't know him. But I, for one, wish and hope that it doesn't turn out to be guilt by association that you are accusing him of. Being "part of the very corrupt Brooklyn machine." is fairly vague. My own suggestion is to attack Vito Lopez for his political positions or for his wrong-doing not for his associates.
Excuse me
In my previous comment I provided the link to my earlier article outlining Vito Lopez's corruption. Care to read it before you accuse me of assuming guilt by association?
If you don't know that Vito
If you don't know that Vito is the definition of a corrupt party boss you haven't been paying attention. He doesn't even try to hide it. He buys peoples votes through free dinners, only gives subsidies to nonprofit organizations that he himself runs, forces patronage jobs. etc.
That, I guess, is the point. I've not been paying attention
to Vito Lopez.
The charges you make and those which mole333 reports are all I know.
Whose votes have been bought by free meals? I've been a guest at a politcal dinner. Is that the sort of free meal you're talking about?
Which non-profits operated by Lopez get all the money from Lopez which he gives (I assume you're talking about member items, but you could you also be referring to something else)?
The "forced patronage" charge sounds like the one in which he attempted to get his daughter a job as a law assistant. Is that the one you are referring to -- or are their others?
Does he actually reside in the district or with his reputed girl friend in Queens? Well, there are people who may care about that more than I do. But what are the facts?
Look, for all I know, Assemblymember Lopez may well be a bad guy -- but charges here seem either incomplete (Did he actually force someone to hire his favored applicant?), vague or trivial.
Is the fact that he's the boss of the machine reason enough to oppose him? Might be, but I think we're a little short on the facts here.
Short on facts?
No...but I guess you won't click on the link I provided. So, I will bring you a few highlights. But if you want more you reall will have to read the article I previously wrote.
How about these:
"When Margarita Lopez-Torres was elected to a county-wide Civil Court in Brooklyn in 1993 on the recommendation of Vito Lopez, she rejected every job applicant sent to her by the county organization... The payback for this defiance was the county's refusal to designate her for re-election when her term expired in 2003." (New York Civic)
"Two years ago, Norman and party district leaders, Lopez included, pledged they would never support a candidate for a judgeship who had not been approved by an independent screening commission. This year, for the first time, the panel reviewed Civil Court candidates.
And guess what? The party shoehorned two lawyers onto the bench without any screening. Kenny Sherman, son of district leader Roberta Sherman, will get a 10-year Civil Court term without so much as a primary. And Canarsie Assemblyman Frank Seddio was awarded an uncontested ballot line for Surrogate's Court. So much for quality control. So much for keeping your word." (Daily News)
"The lengthy lead story in the Real Estate section [of the NY Times] credited Lopez with sparking a massive rebuilding effort in Bushwick, way back when he was a graduate student in 1971, and then carrying it through. The story also mentioned that Angela Battaglia's agency is the developer for a $20 million component of the rebuilding effort. It even pictured Lopez and Battaglia standing together in front of new housing construction. But the story omitted that Battaglia is Lopez's girlfriend." (LID)
And thereis more.
You have Lopez right in the heart of the judicial corruption that made the Brooklyn Dem machine the by-word for corruption, including the "punishment" of Lopez-Torres for not appointing machine cronies. Vito led the vicious attacks on her after she refused to play the machine's game and instead hired based on qualifications. The awarding of Vito's girlfriend lucritive contracts smacks of the cronyism typical of the Norman machine. Vito was up to his ears in the activities of the Norman machine. I have other stories, but they'd have to be told in private since those who told me do not want to be on record and do not want their stories public, but the degree of corruption goes deeper than what the public knows.