’Tis the season to name the winners and losers in state government and politics for 2012, and what a year for losers — both Democrats and Republicans — it has been.
The list, compiled with the aid of political insiders, including lobbyists, operatives and some of the state’s most prominent public officials, does, of course, include some winners, topped by Gov. Cuomo, who continues to enjoy astoundingly high approval ratings after nearly two full years in office.
Cuomo is also being touted nationally as a potential Democratic candidate for president in 2016 — assuming, that is, that another major New York winner, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, doesn’t clear the field by entering the race.
There’s a cautionary note for Cuomo’s win. His legislative achievements — a soundly balanced budget, a new fiscally prudent Tier 6 for future public employees, and a teacher-evaluation system — were modest at best and not nearly as dramatic as his first year’s list.
He hasn’t delivered on his “jobs, jobs, jobs” pledge, he’s continued to dither over natural-gas drilling in the Southern Tier, and the state remains at the bottom of the barrel nationally when it comes to a favorable business climate.
Another major winner this year: Bronx Sen. Jeff Klein, who gambled nearly two years ago by bolting from the Senate’s Democratic conference to create the Independent Democratic Conference — in hopes that Republicans would need his small group to hold on to their power after this year’s elections.
Klein is now on the verge of becoming the co-leader of the Senate and hence one of the most important figures in state government.
One more winner: Metropolitan Transportation Authority Chairman Joseph Lhota, whose skillful handling of the world’s biggest transit system after Hurricane Sandy won such high grades with the public that he’s now thisclose to announcing his campaign for mayor.
This year’s loser list is led by Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, who was badly damaged by the revelation that, without public notice, he agreed to pay $103,000 in state funds to two women who had accused Brooklyn Assemblyman Vito Lopez of sexual harassment.
To make matters worse, the revelation came out only after the normally savvy Silver revealed that the Assembly Ethics Committee had censured Lopez for allegedly harassing two other women — but had taken the action without being told by Silver of the earlier harassment charges.
Lopez, of course, was another big loser. While he managed to win re-election to the Assembly, the revelations forced him to give up his position as Brooklyn Democratic leader, as well as his chairmanship of the powerful Housing Committee.
Other big losers include media-hungry Attorney General Eric Schneiderman, who, after two years in office, is little known by the public, has yet to find a major issue with which to define himself, and appears to think his most important constituencies are the left-wing advocacy groups and the New York Times editorial writers, to whom he continually panders.
State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli is another loser with an undistinguished year — unless one thinks he deserves points for advocating for more state borrowing and for fighting Cuomo’s efforts to hold the line on public-employee pension costs, which helped drive local property taxes through the roof.
And, of course, this year’s two Senate leaders, Majority Leader Dean Skelos and Minority Leader John Sampson, are both big losers.
Skelos, whose staff redrew all the Senate district lines to benefit Republicans and who had far more campaign dollars than did the Democrats, will have to share power with Klein.
And Sampson, if he even manages to hold on to his post as leader of the larger blocs of Democrats, will be in the humiliating position as the Senate’s No.3.