All I know is that since Jack Cox Jr. filed more than 942 signatures, about 400 more than necessary to get start a third party, the Revolutionary Party, and get himself in the mayor’s race we’ve had an earthquake, a hurricane, a mudslide on Brunswick Road that destroyed at least two homes and flattened the Clement Garage business and two 150-pound propane tanks break loose from the Brunswick Barbecue and floated down the Poestenkill towards Troy. (A the time of this posting, I have no idea if they made it down or not, but Troy firefighters were evacuating people along the Poestenkill as a precaution.


And that’s not to mention the flooding that started tonight and will get nothing but worse on Monday.

Or maybe it’s because the Republican camp of Carmella Mantello are now trying to get his signatures bounced because of some technicality.

The guy said he got 800 of those 942 signatures on his own, and that’s a lot of work. He wants to run. It’s America and the last I knew it’s his right to run. He shouldn’t get bounced off because of some technicality. It wouldn’t surprise me, though, if the GOP has a leg to stand on. If Jack Cox Jr. is anything like his father, he doesn’t pay much mind to technicalities.

Again, let the guy run even if he didn’t follow the letter of the state’s byzantine Election Law, he certainly followed its spirit.

Today, Bill McInerney is widely expected to plead guilty, and along with that guilty plea comes, I am sure, an agreement to share what he knows about voter fraud.

MCINERNEY

It’s going to be kind of neat to see what he has to say, though, we may not know when he pleads today. We’ll have a better idea when the Grand Jury meets the next time, which I’m hearing isn’t too far down the road. Voter fraud could be coming to an end. I know I’ve written that before but this time it seems like it’s the real deal. I know I’ve written that before too but this time it does – no really, honest to God.

So what does McInerney spill? That’s the $64,000 question. My guess is he knows a ton of what was going on since he pretty much ran the party’s absentee ballot operation in ’07, ’08 and ’09. No, as Chair Tom Wade pointed out, it wasn’t party sanctioned, but it was on behalf of the party.

There are all sorts of scenarios out there. If you really want to get conspiratorial, McInernery and DA Rich McNally are pretty tight and if you remember it was the absentees that put McNally over the top in the ’07 race against Greg Cholakis, days after the polls closed. Also, McInerney is county Chair Tom Wade guy, he brought him into the mix. And a Grand Jury investigation into allegations of Wade extorting Democratic appointed employees for campaign contributions was allowed to time out after McNally took office.

Those things are nothing new, and not of my making, despite what some may say, and doesn’t even touch on the other seven Democrats implicated, including those who testified for the prosecution in the indictment of Elections Commissioner Ed McDonough and Councilman Michael LoPorto, who together stand charged with 116 felonies of forgery in the ’09 Working Family Party primary.

So, the question is what does McInerney know? And what’s he going to tell the special prosecutor and, more importantly, the grand jury? My guess is a whole bunch.

I think I’ve written that before too but now I think it’s for real – no really, honest to God.

CASALE

I do think both mayoral candidates, Lou Rosamilia for the Dems and Carmella Mantello for the GOP, are good people and will run good, clean campaigns, but I’m not too crazy about who they have surrounded themselves with.

Vince Casale, of the Mantello campaign, tried to tell me Mantello actually resigned from the Canal Corp. and gave up a $150,000 gig so she can run for mayor and make $95,000. I’m not stupid. Mantello's term was up, there's a strong, Democratic governor who appointed Brian Stratton to her post and, well, she needs a job.



NAPIER



On the flip side of things there is Steve Napier, who once forwarded a press release from Councilman Bill Dunne with a tagline that said something like: “Send out soon, Let Clem know.” And he, or a company he is affiliated with, made some $11,000 in about two months from the aborted campaign of Council President Clement Campana.

Then, the campaign decides to hold a press conference about keeping the cops in the schools fulltime but doesn’t check with the district first. The new superintendent, Brian Howard, called up county Chair Tom Wade and tells him “no politics on school grounds” so they had to hold it on the sidewalk in front of School 12. It’s a legitimate issue, but you’d think someone would have called the district, and wouldn’t hold the press conference at an elementary school that was just closed down.

MASON

The Democrats appointed Legislator Ed Manny as a city marshal and it greatly upset another city marshal and party operative, Rick Mason, the longtime, now retired head of security at the Troy Housing Authority. Jack McCann, the city’s Democratic Party chair is also a marshal.

Mason wasn’t implicated in the voter fraud scandal but he did testify during the court proceeding that saw a judge, Michael Lynch, bounce scores of Working Families Party absentee ballots in the ’09 primary. During that testimony Mason said, under oath, the two questionable absentee ballots that were supposed to be released to him were picked up at the Board of Elections by Councilman Kevin McGrath, who testified on behalf of the special prosecutor, Trey Smith.

MCGRATH

I think it’s worth mentioning that McGrath’s plea deal - which includes no criminal charges and allows him to run for council again in District 1 - is contingent on what he said to the Grand Jury was truthful. It’s also worth mentioning a number of THA residents were allegedly defrauded. Tony DeFiglio, who also used to work for the THA, pretty much said they were targeted in his affidavit because they wouldn’t care or know any better.

That said, word is Mason isn’t too happy with Manny’s appointment to city marshal and has reached out – not sure if it’s with the threat of a jab or a roundhouse – to party leaders expressing his displeasure. As I understand it, the marshals get paid per eviction notice they deliver and there is only so much work to go around.

Why Manny, a retired firefighter with a pension who makes an extra $20,000 as a county legislature – and that doesn’t include a whole lot of heavy lifting outside of congratulating softball teams - would want to deliver eviction notices is anyone’s guess. But he does get three public paychecks. While “Three Job Ed” doesn’t have the same ring as “Three Job Bob,” the principle is the same.

I feel the need to too say I’ve always like Mason. If there is one guy who lets you know where you stand it’s Mason. He once told me if he ran into a former Record reporter Carmen Napolitano - who did some not so flattering stories about the THA that eventually led to some people going to jail - in an alley alone he would shoot him. Classic.

LAPOSTA

It’s amazing how quiet everyone is about voter fraud.

About the only person saying anything is Frank LaPosta, who is running with the Republicans for Council District 1. He once ran for mayor with the Democrats and then ran as an Independent. I think. And then was a registered Conservative for a while before becoming chair of the Democratic Party. I think. It’s hard to keep up with what party LaPosta is affiliated with.

This year he’s running with the GOP against incumbent Democrat Kevin McGrath, who cut a deal and testified for the prosecution in voter fraud but faces no charges. District 1 is one of the more interesting in the city. That and District 4, where Michael LoPorto is running on the Working Families Party line, the same line he stands accused of stealing in 2009, are the two to watch.

NO NEED FOR A CAPTION

LaPosta does make a good point. Heading into this year’s primary, which is within three weeks, there are some people who may or may not have some things to answer to working for the Dems at the Board of Elections.

Ed McDonough, the elections commissioner, faces scores of felonies for possession a forged instrument and outright forgery. Kevin O’Malley, widely seen as McDonough’s right hand man, testified for the prosecution in front of the grand jury – twice. The first time evidentially wasn’t truthful enough because the second time he showed up with an attorney. And just about everyone else working at the board testified too.

GALUSKI

And then there is Councilman Gary Galuski, D-District 6, who was implicated and gave up a sample of his DNA, who works there too.

It might or not be a campaign issue, but I’m guessing this is the cleanest election in this county – since both parties have been goofing around with minor party lines since Christ was a carpenter- since Christ was a carpenter.

I know I’m perceived as being pro Republican, but I don’t make this up.

Jim Gordon, the GOP city chair running for an at large council seat, also critisized the Dems mayoral candidate Lou Rosamilia for accepting the WFP line in light of the ongoing voter fraud scandal. Rosamilia likely had no idea the absentee operation was going on but there is a chance he benefited since he ran for and won a seat on the Legislature in 2009.
His Dem counterpart, Jack McCann sent out the following statement: "Jim Gordon is showing his true partisan colors. Lou Rosamilia is in no way linked with this scandal but Jim Gordon is grasping at straws in an attempt to tarnish the name of a good man and steadfast public servant.  This is an indication of what kind of Councilman Mr. Gordon will be:  The kind who is more focused on making political attacks against the mayor, than affecting real change for the people of Troy.  Any voter who was considering a vote for Jim Gordon might want to rethink that decision."

I have no idea what the Republicans on the county Legislature are doing. As governmental bodies around the world are strengthening ethics laws, the GOP are weakening them here. Or so it seems.


The argument is that Hudson Valley Community College should not be considered a county agency and therefore should not be subject to the provision in the Ethics Law that says a political wheel can’t be involved in the inner workings of the college – for example, a county chair can’t serve on the board.

REID

The logic behind changing the Ethics Law is that the college should be separate and distinct from the county government to avoid any conflicts of interest and so it doesn’t turn into a patronage mill. That was the logic back some 20 years ago, when the Ethics Law was implemented in the wake of the Ed McDonough scandal – no, not the voter fraud scandal going on now, the one involving the election commissioner’s dad of insurance scandal infamy.

The entire thing stems from Neil Kelleher, the longtime chairman of the Legislature, getting appointed to the board while he was the county GOP chair. Under the old Ethics Law that was a no-no. Under the new one, I have no idea, but I think he would be eligible.

The new law goes into effect Nov. 15. So we’ll see what happens to Kelleher, who gave up the chairmanship to keep his spot on the HVCC board. I guess we’ll see how genuine the GOP is in the coming months and whether or not they re-elect Kelleher as their chair.

By the way, the quote from the Chairman of the Leislature Martin Reid about how many on the Legislature fell the Ethics Law should have been changed long ago was classic: “But we kind of did forget. So, oops.”

Oops? Really?

Well, it looks like the State Police are sick of the waiting game.

In the print edition of Talespin I said “the waiting game that is voter fraud” but today the State Police arrested former City Clerk Bill McInerney on 10 felony counts of possession of a forged instrument. Looks to me like they got sick of waiting, or they are putting the squeeze on McInerney to get him to cough up everything he knows – and by everything I mean everything.

Last week, plea-deal talks broke down between McInerney and the special prosecutor Trey Smith because the FBI wouldn’t give McInerney immunity. While I’m not sure the FBI has the authority to grant immunity, I’m pretty sure they knew what was up and weren’t too happy with what was going down.

And, evidently, neither were the State Police and the pace things are going in the two-year-old investigation.

So, my guess is McInerney better start talking or he’ll find himself behind bars.

There are two others charged in the investigation – Councilman Michael LoPorto and Elections Commissioner Ed McDonough – and the attorney for the latter, Brian Premo, has maintained this investigation should go way higher than those two.

If anyone knows who that is its McInerney. So, as I said, if he doesn’t start talking he’ll find himself behind bars.

Well, that’s a neat little twist on things isn’t it?

MCINERNEY

According to reports, former City Clerk Bill McInerney was finalizing a plea deal with Trey Smith, the special prosecutor investigating voter fraud in the 2009 Working Families Party primary, until the FBI showed up and McInerney’s attorney, Jim Long (Ball), opted to end the conversation because the Feds refused to give his client immunity for alleged improprieties in not only ’09, but ’07 and ’08 too.

No kidding, Dave Canfield reported that in March and it’s nothing new to Smith or the Feds or Long. It should be a pretty straight forward request by Smith to ask Judge George J. Pulver, to expand his authority beyond ’09 and include ’07 and ’08, but as of this posting it’s still working its way through the process.

MacInerney resigned his post as City Clerk effective Aug. 1, and it was widely expected it was part of a plea deal he reached with Smith that presumably included MacInerney sharing what he know about others implicated in the scam and maybe those already indicted – Elections Commissioner Ed McDonough and Councilman Michael LoPorto.

And, this is the kicker everyone’s been talking about, maybe even share some stuff on those who haven’t been implicated yet. If you remember, Brian Premo, McDonough’s attorney, has been pounding the theory Smith selectively prosecuted his client and is ignoring the bigger picture. In essence Premo claims the conspiracy goes deeper than Smith is willing to take it. There has to be some reason the FBI didn’t sign off on the deal, and I just don’t know what that is. Or maybe they did? I honestly have no idea but there has to be some reason McInerney resigned when he did.

SMITH

One thing I’m pretty sure of, the State Police and the FBI have more important things to worry about than people cheating to get a minor party line in the City of Troy and want the whole thing put to bed. Yes, there is the whole “clean and honest election thing being the foundation of our democracy” but really – it’s going on two years now. I’m pretty sure Smith wouldn’t mind seeing the whole thing over with as well.

It was supposed to take a major step towards that end on Friday but somehow or another, something changed. I’m not sure what that is exactly, but something definitely changed. Whatever it was, you can bet a bunch of Democrats are not sleeping too well.

Earlier in the post, I said “reports” but the TU’s Brendan Lyons wrote the story and to him I tip my hat.

It’s a sad day.


The founder of Talespin, Steve Nelson, died at his apartment here in Troy. The circumstances I’m not sure of, but the MS had gotten progressively worse over the years.

In his prime, Nelson was one of the best, toughest reporters in the Capital District. “A reporter’s reporter,” as one guy said, “it was instinctual for him.” Up until just a few weeks ago, he would still give me crap about typos or other shortcomings he saw in the paper when I used to run into him over at Francesca’s.

Nelson was not known to hold his tongue - and he was not known to care if you liked what his tongue said either.

So, some 25 years ago after coming to this paper from The Gazette, Nelson was looking to start a reporters’ notebook type column and was searching for a name. He went to his mom, an English teacher, and Talespin was born.

Through the years, the column has been through a number of changes with countless reporters contributing on a weekly basis. It was started as a way to provide insider, street level information that didn’t necessarily warrant a full-blown story. And it was meant, as the name implies, to provide a humorous spin on such tales.

After leaving the paper, Nelson became spokesman for then-County Executive Henry Zwack – a thankless job if there ever was one. At the time, Zwack was either being investigated, dogged by the likes of C.B. Smith or under indictment. Nelson stuck by him though, and through it all did the best job he could under what were near impossible circumstances.

Nelson might not have been the nicest guy in the world, or the warmest, or the cheeriest but what you saw is what you got.

RIP Steve Nelson