By Dee Richard
Of the district leaders who attended the Maltese meeting, they all voted to endorse Ognibene rather than Bloomberg. All that is, except one lone vote. The one “no” vote was voiced by College Point District Leader Joan Vogt. A number of other district leaders were absent; they felt it was way too early to make a commitment. Others stated that in the case of a primary they did not take sides, but always endorsed the winner of the primary. In the past it had been the club's custom for years, and saw no reason to break with tradition now.Part two of last Thursday's events was a dinner meeting held at the Bella Sera Restaurant in Whitestone. That meeting was also a double header. Their part one was to celebrate the reactivation of the Whitestone Republican Club, which had been dormant for a number of years. The second part of their meeting was to announce their support for Bloomberg. The Whitestone Club members were there in full force. They were joined by a number of Queens district leaders who did not attend Maltese's meeting because they disagreed with his mayoral choice and came to Whitestone to show their support for Bloomberg.A few of the Whitestone group's noteworthy guests were Deputy Mayor Marc Shaw and New York State Republican Chairman Stephen Minarik, who pledged his support, all the way, for Bloomberg. John Haggerty who works for the governor in Albany said, “the mayor has the governor's full and unequivocal support as well as his.” State Sen. Frank Padavan (R-Bellerose) formally gave his endorsement to the mayor. There were more than 40 people in attendance. A very lively and spirited meeting.Instead of Maltese's meeting being one of solidarity, it appears he has caused what seems to be an irreconcilable split in his party. The reason Maltese gave for his failure to support the mayor was that the mayor has not done enough for Queens Republicans. If that truly was his reason, it would seem that this gambit is not among his brightest ideas.As for the northeast Queens group, they gave as their reason for defecting from the Maltese faction the fact that Maltese did nothing for Queens Republicans but instead, seemed to prefer to align himself with the local Democrats. It sounds as though both groups have the same script writer. As a matter of fact, the rumor mill has it just as Maltese's group are unhappy with the mayor, this group is equally unhappy with Maltese as the Republican county leader and are seriously considering running one of their own to challenge Maltese for his chairmanship.So much for the emotional side of things. Let's take a look at the logical side. What is Ognibene's platform? What are his issues? What in his background qualifies him to be mayor? Since by his own admiss-ion he has less than $2,000 at his disposal – a thousand of which he had to borrow – how does he plan on financing his camp-aign? You need at least 15,000 solid signat-ures on your petitions to even get on the ballot, which means you will need an additional 5,000 or 10,000 since so many get challenged and subsequently get tossed out. Where are these voters going to come from? According to an article in one of the newspapers, Ognibene says he will get the support of the other strong Republican county, namely, Staten Island, to support him. Why should they? What could he possibly promise to do for Staten Islanders that Bloomberg couldn't do bigger and better? As Ognibene's credentials qualifying him for such a huge job are practically nonexistent, why would you want to change horses in midstream? Is the mayor perfect? Of course not! Do we agree with everything the mayor has proposed? Of course not! That's what the art of negotiation is about. If you want to get, you have to give. It seems like the Ognibene group wants to do all the getting and none of the giving. Where can you get a man with Bloomberg's credentials for $1 a year? That seems like the best bargain in town. It also sounds like the mayor is not into greed, graft and corruption – otherwise he would not work for $1 a year. Can anybody in the opposition group make the same claim? That would not seem to be a logical deduction since you offer no alternative solutions to the city's problems but are focused rather intently about complaining you are not getting your share. Is that a reason to run for mayor?This discussion today was of a philosophical nature, Mr. Ognibene, but if you persist in your quest to unseat the mayor with so little to support you, don't you think you will eventually arouse the curiosity of the press, at which point you will realize they will start digging? There is more than enough of the blame game to go around. It would seem that a trip down memory lane (the kind of trip that explores all the closets to dig out all the skeletons therein) does not sound like fun or profitable trip to embark on. Are you really sure this is what you want to do? There is still time to think it over.As a political wag once said, “The government, city, state, and federal is the biggest employer of the unemployable.” Keep the voice mails coming at 718-767-6484 the fax at 718-743-0066 and e-mail at deerrichard@aol.com and be sure to check the photos on the “Focus on Queens Page.” Till next week,Dee
