MARKET WATCH COLUMNIST
“Paterson pours on the whine”, Ellis Henican Column, amNewYork, December 17, 2010
He’s really Governor Whiney now.
You’d think that David Paterson would express some appreciation — perhaps even a little relief — as he screeches to the end of his brief and accidental governorship.
Appreciation because no one ever seriously thought of him as governor material. Relief because — well, in nine short months, he proved most of his naysayers right. And now, it will all be over soon.
But there the grumbling governor was on Thursday, uttering neither appreciation nor relief. Instead, he was blaming his troubles on the succession of men he chose to be his No. 1 aide.
Put aside for a second that Paterson was the one who did all the choosing. He’s not happy at all, he says, with the way this aiding turned out.
But how hard could any of this really be? This is the same governor whose life in Albany is so 
easy that he spent five hours in the WFAN studio on Dec. 1, chitchatting about sports and politics.
“I think the caliber of people I worked with in Albany 25 years ago … [was] far superior than it is now,” he complained that day. “I think people are more nasty now.”
Thursday, Paterson whined about former aide Charles O’Byrne, who resigned over a $300,000 income-tax debt. “This is almost like my partner,” Paterson told WOR/710’s John Gambling. “What I should’ve done is stop the clock, conduct a search and stop worrying about the time because you’re going to have to live with whoever you get.”
Well, OK.
Instead, Paterson hired some guy named Bill Cunningham, who came from the governor’s father’s law firm and was unsuited for the job.
“Eventually, four months after that, I got the right person,” Paterson said. “But a lot of things happened in those four months that caused me a lot of problems.”
Like showing the world he had no idea how to be governor. His approval rating sinking below 30 percent. The Caroline Kennedy Senate pick implosion and the state budget debacle.
Cunningham’s replacement was Lawrence Schwartz, who has the job now. But who knows? He could be gone by New Year’s Eve. And that’ll give Governor W something new to whine about.
E-mail ellis@henican.com. Follow him at twitter.com/henican
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