HEY CASEY YOU EVER PLAY CHESS?

Casey Seiler of the Times Union has a column in today about our shared experience with the Public Integrity Commission. He does a far better job than I did in “LET THEM EAT CAKE” posted below, at capturing the texture of the moment, (notice the commas Casey) and uses better punctuation than I do (in fact I’m thinking of writing the blog in the future sans punctuation as kind of a signature style) But at the end of the column he states that I was grinning like a schoolboy and he was correct so now let me explain why

Anyone that has ever played chess knows that feeling the moment your opponent makes a move and you know for certain that checkmate is the only possible outcome Well that’s what happened when commission chair Mike Cherkasky said that he would answer my question You see it was a simple question requiring a yes or a no answer Either answer has very serious ramifications for the king and the court jesters Putting aside for the moment that the chairman could not answer the simplest of questions lets give Mike the benefit of the doubt and assume any question I asked was getting that “perfunctory brush-off” as Casey Seiler wrote

If the answer is yes the jesters have changed how they calculate due dates since the last batch of late fees then they are going to have to go back and review every single one to see if it was valid or if a refund is in order Big job for a bunch of shall we say less than ambitious jesters especially during track season (a special place in August for the special counsel) Doing all that work is not nearly as easy as moving chairs into locked rooms and having lunch delivered Plus they’ve got to admit I caught them trying to mislead the lobbying community In addition it will further establish that the special counsel was retaliating against me when he threatened me with a lifetime bar violation – if he changed “the program” he’s the one with a lifetime bar issue as he well knows to go along with what might very well be some official misconduct issues violation of my free speech rights and who knows how many Public Officer Law violations Come to think of it I never got an answer to the question of was Ralph authorized by his boss to threaten me the more the merrier

If the answer is no . . . well lets just say the first thing you learn in law school is don’t ask a question you don’t know the answer to I KNOW THE ANSWER The second thing you learn is in your official position tell the truth because someone always has the documents to prove if you are lying DON”T SAY I DIDN”T WARN YOU

CHECKMATE

Now how long will the King and the court jesters take to answer the question I’d set an over/under but that wouldn’t be fair I may have inside info So lets just keep track it’s day 3 and the king hasn’t answered the simplest question yet