State Sen. David Valesky, whose district includes part of Cayuga County, deserves credit for saying last week that he would attend Gov. David Paterson's speech tonight to a joint session of the Legislature.

Only in Albany would such a statement actually take some political courage.

Here's a recap:

Last week leaders of the Senate Democratic conference, of which Valesky is a member, decided they would skip the governor's speech, essentially because they saw it as nothing more than a “photo op.” But the governor is planning to speak about the state's budget crisis, hardly a topic that can be treated lightly.

The remainder of the conferences - Republicans in the Senate and Assembly and Assembly Democrats - all said they would be at the speech. As Assembly Minority Leader Brian Kolb, another legislator whose district includes Cayuga County, said, “If the governor wants to bring us all together in one room on this, we should be there.”

Fortunately, at least two Democratic senators, Valesky and Albany-area Sen. Neil Breslin, said they would not go along with their conference leaders. They would attend the session.

A day later, the leaders themselves relented, and said they would be at the speech.

Once again, the Senate Democratic conference has embarrassed itself, with the exception of Valesky and Breslin. And what those two legislators showed is that individual lawmakers can defy their leaders when their leaders are acting stupidly. And by doing so, they just might shame those leaders into the doing the right thing.

It's too bad we don't see more legislators break ranks from leaders to do what makes common sense. If we did, we just might avoid spectacles like the Senate coup attempt of last summer. Let's hope Valesky and Breslin are starting a trend.