NY-Sen: If Hillary Clinton Becomes Secretary of State...

[ccharles000]

http://swingstateproject.com

Then who would Gov. David Paterson appoint in her stead? Paterson needs to think about, among other things, a) removing potential threats to his governorship and b) earning some serious favors and goodwill. Picking AG Andrew Cuomo ships a contender off to DC, and would also let Paterson earn a second chit with an appointment to the Attorney General post.
Alternately (as Trapper John suggested to me), he could pick someone like Rep. Nydia Velazquez (NY-12), which might burnish his support among Hispanics and women. TJ also tossed out Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown as a dark-horse choice: young, African American, and from upstate. I in turn proposed ultra-dark-horse candidate DavidNYC, but I admit the odds of a second Jewish guy from New York City getting tapped to represent this state in the Senate are fairly slim.

There's still no shortage of names out there, of course. As always, who do you think Paterson would pick, and who should he pick?

Update (James): From the NY Daily News:


Rep. Nydia Velazquez is the front-runner - for now, at least - to replace Hillary Clinton if she becomes the next secretary of state, a source close to Gov. Paterson said yesterday.
There are two other top contenders: Rep. Brian Higgins of Buffalo and Rep. Steve Israel of Long Island. Each would help Paterson with key constituencies when he makes his first run in 2010 for the post he inherited from disgraced Gov. Eliot Spitzer - upstaters in Higgins' case and suburbanites in Israel's.

[ShortnFiery]

1. Bill Clinton will NOT open up his finances for scrutiny. HRC will stay put.

:thumbsup:

[jobycom]

3. And snow will not fall on the Rio Grande in Texas. Corn is a grain.

:shrug:

[PBS Poll-435]

4. Sheep sleep best after light exercise

:shrug:

[Imperialism Inc.]

5. His point being that when someone is in the position of Sec of State

it is sort of important to know if they or their spouse has taken massive sums of cash from foreign heads of state.

[jobycom]

9. His point had less than nothing to do with the OP--just like my random comments.

The OP asked who would replace Clinton ***IF*** she joined the cabinet. Not whether she would join it.

[brendan120678]

2. As a former upstate-NY'er, I say go with Higgins!! n/t

[whistler162]

6. Nah... we need to Slaughterize the Senate!

Louise Slaughter for Senate!

[PBS Poll-435]

7. Nah...As much as I like her, she wouldn't give up the Rules Chair to be a

Junior Senator.

[Me.]

8. If She Had Won The Nom, RFKjr.

Was going to run for her seat.

[Metric System]

10. A bit early for such speculation. Kind of jumping the gun here. Things are so tense around here that

I don't think this kind of thread is helpful.