Tom Robbins on Vito Lopez

This piece doesn't say anything new about the Democratic Party Chair, beyond getting some attention to North Brooklyn in one of the higher circulation citywide weeklies. I'll have more to say on it later, but read it, leave comments, etc. My role in this is the Voice called an editor, asked if they could use the photo, the editor said yes and notified me. That's about it.
Updated note: The Voice piece is a bit of a foul ball, not telling us much more than we already know. It's still a helpful guide for people just starting to pay attention to this race. I think that the tone may detract from the arguments, though some reporter friends I talked with have been split as to whether the Voice piece will be effective. The Times endorsement is more important, as will general hustle in the next two weeks. Real Reform Brooklyn has a bit more of a reminder rundown of the Lopez record, but unless you place Levin in the room when this stuff was going down (and they didn't), you can't just automatically lump the two together carte blanche.

Power Plays by Party Boss Vito Lopez
The Lord of Brooklyn, a Democratic powerbroker who is flexing his political muscles these days like a gym rat pumping the free weights
By Tom Robbins
Tuesday, September 1st 2009 at 1:46pm

Say this for Vito Lopez, the Brooklyn Democratic powerbroker who is flexing his political muscles these days like a gym rat pumping the free weights: He is not one to let a few silly scandals knock him off the game plan that has served him so well for so long.

Even as the investigation of politicians alleged to have steered government money to relatives and cronies is fast becoming a cottage industry for local prosecutors, Lopez has stayed the course. This year, the veteran State Assemblyman allocated another $350,000 in state funds to the organization he helped found back in the 1970s, the sprawling Ridgewood Bushwick Senior Citizens Council. This was only the latest of many millions in taxpayer monies that Lopez and his political allies have sent the group's way. Given his many and tangled ties to the group, lesser politicians might hesitate to be so openly generous. But that is why they are not Vito Lopez, and not the leader of the Kings County Democratic Party, nor the powerful chairman of the Assembly's Housing Committee.

For the full article, read more here...