ALBANY - Republican John Faso and Democrat Tom Suozzi are 50 percentage points behind front-runner Eliot Spitzer in the race for governor. Both trailed Spitzer by $15 million in the latest fundraising reports. Each was opposed by his party's top bosses.
So why continue to take on Spitzer, the two-term attorney general and Democratic favorite who made headlines worldwide for reforming Wall Street and icons of corporate America?
For that matter, what prompted Spitzer to embark on a path where he risks his star status with the magazine covers that
proclaimed him the “Sheriff of Wall Street” and one of the “sexiest men alive” to haggle over budgets, say “no” a lot and take the blame when things go bad?
The answer for all three begins in the 1960s. For Faso and Suozzi, the motivation was sparked in Long Island towns 20 miles apart.
“I remember my mother taking me to see Sen. John F. Kennedy when he came to the Long Island Rail Road stop near us, in 1960,” said Faso, the Conservative-Republican candidate for governor who grew up in Massapequa and now lives in upstate Columbia County. “I still have the button from that day.” He still remembers his mother calling him in to watch Kennedy's inauguration speech, when Faso was just 8.
“It really was the prominent question in that speech that I think has lived through me to now and should be an inspiration to all Americans: `Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country,”' Faso said of the Democrat who sparked his Republican career as Assembly minority leader.
“Unfortunately, a lot of people have forgotten that,” he said. “If it was asked today, I think a lot of people would say, `What has my country got to give me?”'
He said he moved to the GOP after studying economics and seeing what he viewed as a Democratic shift away from more fiscally conservative leaders such as President Harry Truman.
Across Long Island on the North Shore is Glen Cove, the setting for Suozzi's earliest political motivations.
“It comes from my family and growing up in a household where my father was involved in public life and my mother was very involved in public life,” said Suozzi, the 43-year-old Nassau County executive. “And it comes from my Catholic upbringing, growing up in Catholic schools.”
The first was St. Patrick's School in Glen Cove, then the all-boys Catholic Chaminade High School in Mineola, then Boston College and Fordham University Law School, both Jesuit schools.
“I have a fundamental faith in people, and that faith is based upon the belief that people are basically good, and I want to do the right thing,” Suozzi said.
He said that faith was supported last week when he looked for volunteers for his underdog campaign and 850 showed up. Among them was a man in a wheelchair who took trains from Newburgh to Long Island, then a cab.
“It was amazing,” Suozzi said. “I said then, `I'm not giving up.”'
Spitzer's earliest interest in social activism began with his parents. His father rose from a cold-water walk-up in the Bronx to become a millionaire Manhattan developer. By 1968, 9-year-old Eliot was fretting over the re-election bid of Republican President Nixon.
“I remember saying, `We can't re-elect Richard Nixon president,”' Spitzer said Friday. “The next morning, I remember shaking my head and saying, `How can this be?”'
The news junkie through high school, however, didn't participate in politics until Princeton University. As student body president in 1979-80 he helped lead the effort to end the university's investments in South Africa in an attempt to end apartheid.
As a Manhattan prosecutor, he found “it's simply more satisfying to represent the public interest. It sounds like a platitude, but there is a real sense of reward, of doing something that matters. You just can't beat it.”
---
On the Net:
http://www/johnfaso2006.com
http://www.spitzer2006.com
http://www.tomsuozzi.com
http://www.weldfornewyork.org
www.malachyforgovernor.com
AP-ES-06-10-06 1038EDT
For that matter, what prompted Spitzer to embark on a path where he risks his star status with the magazine covers that
proclaimed him the “Sheriff of Wall Street” and one of the “sexiest men alive” to haggle over budgets, say “no” a lot and take the blame when things go bad?
The answer for all three begins in the 1960s. For Faso and Suozzi, the motivation was sparked in Long Island towns 20 miles apart.
“I remember my mother taking me to see Sen. John F. Kennedy when he came to the Long Island Rail Road stop near us, in 1960,” said Faso, the Conservative-Republican candidate for governor who grew up in Massapequa and now lives in upstate Columbia County. “I still have the button from that day.” He still remembers his mother calling him in to watch Kennedy's inauguration speech, when Faso was just 8.
“It really was the prominent question in that speech that I think has lived through me to now and should be an inspiration to all Americans: `Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country,”' Faso said of the Democrat who sparked his Republican career as Assembly minority leader.
“Unfortunately, a lot of people have forgotten that,” he said. “If it was asked today, I think a lot of people would say, `What has my country got to give me?”'
He said he moved to the GOP after studying economics and seeing what he viewed as a Democratic shift away from more fiscally conservative leaders such as President Harry Truman.
Across Long Island on the North Shore is Glen Cove, the setting for Suozzi's earliest political motivations.
“It comes from my family and growing up in a household where my father was involved in public life and my mother was very involved in public life,” said Suozzi, the 43-year-old Nassau County executive. “And it comes from my Catholic upbringing, growing up in Catholic schools.”
The first was St. Patrick's School in Glen Cove, then the all-boys Catholic Chaminade High School in Mineola, then Boston College and Fordham University Law School, both Jesuit schools.
“I have a fundamental faith in people, and that faith is based upon the belief that people are basically good, and I want to do the right thing,” Suozzi said.
He said that faith was supported last week when he looked for volunteers for his underdog campaign and 850 showed up. Among them was a man in a wheelchair who took trains from Newburgh to Long Island, then a cab.
“It was amazing,” Suozzi said. “I said then, `I'm not giving up.”'
Spitzer's earliest interest in social activism began with his parents. His father rose from a cold-water walk-up in the Bronx to become a millionaire Manhattan developer. By 1968, 9-year-old Eliot was fretting over the re-election bid of Republican President Nixon.
“I remember saying, `We can't re-elect Richard Nixon president,”' Spitzer said Friday. “The next morning, I remember shaking my head and saying, `How can this be?”'
The news junkie through high school, however, didn't participate in politics until Princeton University. As student body president in 1979-80 he helped lead the effort to end the university's investments in South Africa in an attempt to end apartheid.
As a Manhattan prosecutor, he found “it's simply more satisfying to represent the public interest. It sounds like a platitude, but there is a real sense of reward, of doing something that matters. You just can't beat it.”
---
On the Net:
http://www/johnfaso2006.com
http://www.spitzer2006.com
http://www.tomsuozzi.com
http://www.weldfornewyork.org
www.malachyforgovernor.com
AP-ES-06-10-06 1038EDT
The Citizens' Say
There are No comments posted.