{"id":7419,"date":"2013-02-06T11:27:57","date_gmt":"2013-02-06T16:27:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.gunpoliticsny.com\/?p=7419"},"modified":"2013-02-06T11:27:57","modified_gmt":"2013-02-06T16:27:57","slug":"oops","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.gunpoliticsny.com\/?p=7419","title":{"rendered":"Oops!"},"content":{"rendered":"

After losing 3 GOP seats last election cycle over their support for the gay marriage bill, Dean Skelos<\/a> should have learned that being a rubberstamp for Cuomo<\/a> isn’t smart.<\/p>\n

Well, he didn’t<\/a>:<\/p>\n

“Senate Republican Leader Dean Skelos <\/em>said that while he found Assemblyman Steve McLaughlin\u2019s comments<\/a> on<\/em> Gov. Andrew Cuomo\u2019s legislative ta<\/em>ctics \u201cinapporpriate\u201d he did say that the chamber may have acted too quickly on the sweeping gun control law last month … \u201cI understand the concern about the use of the message of necessity,\u201d Skelos said at a news conference. \u201cAs I reflect back, perhaps we did act in haste and you\u2019ll see that there are going to be amendments to fix some of the mistakes, but I also think that that type of language is inappropriate.\u201d …”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Yeah, well fuck you.<\/p>\n

Having a power-sharing agreement with the IDC<\/a>, at first glance it might have been plausible to believe that Skelos was simply unable to block the gun bill from coming up for a vote. \u00a0However, there’s the matter of who is controlling the Senate<\/a>:<\/p>\n

“…\u00a0While much has been made of the unique structure at the top of the Majority Coalition, including the shared and coequal role played by the IDC\u2019s Jeff Klein<\/a> and GOP leader Dean Skelos, it\u2019s interesting to looks at the makeup of Senate<\/a> committees, which are in almost all cases dominated by Republican majorities, even if the IDC and the mainline Democratic members voted en bloc on a given issue … In total, the 31 Republican conference<\/a> members hold 242 committee posts (7.8 per senator), 166 for the 27 mainline Democrats (6.2 per member), and 34 for the five members of the IDC (6.8 per lawmaker) …”<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So, had Skelos’ not immediately caved, there’s a chance the Cuomo bill could have at least been stalled in committee for awhile to allow opposition to build. \u00a0Skelos did not want that<\/span>.<\/p>\n

The end result? \u00a0A 15-point approval drop for Cuomo<\/a> and who knows how much for the Republicans.<\/p>\n