Strategists for front-running gu bernatorial hopeful Andrew Cuomo have concluded that they prefer wealthy, bomb-throwing Tea Party activist Carl Paladino to nearly bankrupt and lackluster former US Rep. Rick Lazio as their GOP opponent, The Post has learned.
The conclusion comes despite the Buffalo-based Paladino’s threat to spend $10 million on his gubernatorial campaign and his penchant for generating widespread press and public attention through the use of inflammatory rhetoric.
“Paladino flunks the threshold test of credibility and will drive many traditional Republican voters to Andrew; that’s the bottom line,” said one source close to Cuomo.
Another source said, “He’s on the far right and will alienate minority voters with his talk of using prisons for welfare recipients, and will alienate women with his anti-abortion stance.”
In recent days the state Democratic Party has issued several attacks on Lazio but none against Paladino, suggesting that Democrats are doing their best to help the Tea Party candidate.
Paladino has raised questions about his fitness for office by suggesting that Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver (D-Manhattan) be imprisoned in Attica — after first being beaten by angry taxpayers along the Thruway; by threatening to take an “ax” to state government; by comparing President Obama’s health-care legislation to the 9/11 terror attacks; and, over the weekend, by renewing a call for welfare recipients to get voluntary work training and instructions in “personal hygiene” in unused state prisons.
He’s also been gaining in public-opinion polls on the nearly bankrupt Lazio, who is supported by virtually the entire GOP establishment and is given a good chance by insiders of winning the Sept. 14 primary.