And Now This: Mort Zuckerman For Senate?

Anyone else feel like New York politics has turned into some sort of evil game of roulette? With yesterday’s news that Harold Ford would not be throwing his hat in the New York senate ring (carpetbagging is harder than it looks folks!) comes a whole new round of gaming who might be willing to give it a shot. Enter (again) Daily News and US News & World Report publisher Mort Zuckerman. Even the New York Post thinks this is a good idea.

So how likely is a Zuckerman run? And is this actually a good thing. This from Ben Smith at Politico:

“A lot of donors were telling [Ford] that if Mort ran, they would be with Mort,” said a senior New York Democrat.

But Zuckerman – who would likely skip the Democratic primary and challenge Gillibrand in the general election as a Republican-Independent – poses a far graver threat to the national political status quo. The New York billionaire who owns one of the Democratic Party’s loudest megaphones, the New York Daily News, backed Barack Obama in the 2008 campaign but has emerged as a bitter White House critic, and his entry into the race would put Republicans clearly within striking distance of retaking the Senate.

Smith goes on to note that what may be holding Zuckerman back is his own hesitancy to “to give up the unusual status he’s bought as a figure who is public when he chooses to weigh in on public policy issues and utterly private in his unconventional personal life.” I suspect that all things considered at the moment, the personal life bit might be less of a problem than it once was. In the meantime, better the devil you know?

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