Plowman, Meet the Press/APThroughout last year’s presidential campaign we heard a lot about a supposed “Bradley Effect,” a term used to describe discrepancy between pre-election voter opinion of black candidates and actual results at the polls.  Named after loser Los Angeles Mayor and gubernatorial candidate Tom Bradley who suffered a surprising defeat in 1982′s gubernatorial race in spite of holding a significant lead in the polls going into election day.  In primary after primary and then leading up to election day during last 2008′s presidential race, there was constant hand wringing about when Barack Obama would eventually be felled by the “Bradley Effect.”  Now that that he’s in power, it appears as if he’s vulnerable to falling prey to another electoral phenomena attributable t another black elected official, the “Dinkins Effect.”  However, Obama is unlikely to be the first prominent black elected official currently in office who will fall on this proverbial sword–that distinction belongs to New York Governor David Paterson.

Yesterday morning as I listened to David Paterson respond to questioning by Meet The Press host David Gregory regarding disclosures that the Obama administration encouraged him not to run for re-election this year, I couldn’t help but thinking of David Dinkins’ maligned tenure as New York’s mayor.  When Dinkins served as New York’s mayor it seemed as if he couldn’t do anything right, or rather New Yorkers were more interested in Dinkins as symbol, then Dinkins as a legislator.  And not unlike Paterson, the specter of Rudy Giuliani was forever looming over Dinkins’ tenure as mayor.  Once the fanfare over Dinkins’ election as New York’s first black mayor was over, it was now a matter of when, and not if, Giuliani would ever replace him as this city’s mayor. 

New Yorkers can at least point to the fact that they didn’t elect Paterson as Governor, which can partly help explain the lack of confidence in his leadership.  That said, this city’s short memory, and vulnerability to perceived bias in repeatedly touting Andrew Cuomo and Giuliani over Paterson is becoming rather disconcerting.

I’m placing particular emphasis on the city because I will not suggest any intimate awareness to how Paterson is perceived upstate, and am only operating on what I hear and listen to in New York City’s streets, newspapers and airwaves. 

At the risk of sounding like a Paterson apologist, I am really curious to know why do New Yorkers hold Giuliani in such high regard?  This one is particularly fascinating because Giuliani’s last two political campaigns have been complete and utter disasters.  He quit in his race against Hilary Clinton, and adapted a campaign strategy in his 2008 presidential bid so asinine that I was beginning to think his campaing was a money laundering scheme of sorts. 

Why are we so invested in a Cuomo dynasty?  One can make a case that given the simultaneous pummelings being leveled against Paterson and mayoral candidate Bill Thompson, both of whom are legacies themselves, and Cuomo’s tepid interest in running for governor, suggests that political dynasties may be on the decline in New York.  George Pataki and Michael Bloomberg proved that a well run grassroots machine, and in Bloomberg’s case billions of dollars will trump a name.  Pataki was especially adept at injecting into voters’ minds the notion that political dynasties were possibly on the wrong side of the thin line dividing altruism and nepotism. 

Therefore, as Paterson becomes further engulfed in the “Dinkins effect” New Yorkers on boths sides of the aisle will have to decide if we are willing to continue reaching back into the 1990s storage closet for political candidates, are we also prepared for a return to 90s era political debates and rhetoric. 

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