ALBANY – This time, Gov. Pater son better get it right.
It was one thing when the then-new governor picked Charles O’Byrne last spring as his chief of staff, only to see him resign in disgrace in October after The Post revealed he was a serial tax dodger.
It’s quite another thing for Paterson to pick a successor for soon-to-be Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Another mistake could cost the accidental governor his own shot at winning election in 2010.
Just as John McCain was partly defined by his selection of Sarah Palin, Paterson will be defined in part by his choice of Clinton’s successor.
That’s true for several reasons, not the least of which is the special way New Yorkers have viewed their senators for decades.
New Yorkers pride themselves on sending people of great intellectual and political accomplishment to the Senate, such as scholar and former UN Ambassador Daniel Patrick Moynihan, former Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, former US Rep. and New York Attorney General Jacob Javits and international diplomat and former Gov. Herbert Lehman, to name a few.
While New York’s 29 members of the House of Representatives receive little more than regional scrutiny, New York senators are under a glaring media and public spotlight.
The scrutiny will be even more intense with Paterson and the Legislature grappling with a massive budget deficit they hope will be offset by the federal rescue package being considered in Congress.
Strong leadership by New York’s two senators – not just from senior Sen. Charles Schumer – will be a must because powerful Southern and Western lawmakers already resent the Empire State’s disproportionate consumption of tax dollars from the massive federal welfare, housing and Medicaid programs.
A prominent Paterson political friend put it this way: “The governor has to go with the person who will let him look right at the camera and say with a straight face, ‘I picked the best person on the merits, regardless of politics.’ ”