The Fourth Man
Back and Forth: Warren Redlich
Wed, 14 Apr 2010 09:15:00
“Warren Redlich for Governor?”
That is how Warren Redlich, a long shot candidate for the Republican and Libertarian gubernatorial nominations, greets visitors to his campaign website.
He knows people dismiss him as a gadfly, but he insists he has a shot to win.
A traffic lawyer from Guilderland who supported Ron Paul for president in 2008, Redlich is hoping to build support among New York’s growing Tea Party movement and mount an insurrection within the Republican primary. He also says he has the Libertarian nomination locked up and would consider running as a Tea Party candidate even if he does not land the GOP line.
The race, Redlich says, is really between him and Buffalo developer Carl Paladino, who has about 1,000 times as much money to spend on his campaign as Redlich. But if he can get more media coverage and get on the ballot, Redlich says he can beat Paladino.
Or, maybe, they could work together. Redlich took some time from his law practice to discuss that possibility, as well as his ideas for cutting as much as $10 billion in spending from the state budget. He also revealed a dark secret from his political past.
What follows is an edited tran scri pt.
The Capitol: You wrote a blog post that got some attention titled “Top Ten Reasons the Media Won’t Cover My Campaign.” Did it work?
Warren Redlich: The idea of the top 10 list had been percolating for a while because one of the perceptions that I think is out there is always, ‘Who is this Warren Redlich guy?’ Carl Paladino’s qualified because he’s going to spend $10 million of his own money. Steve Levy’s qualified because, well, I’m not really sure why he’s qualified, but he’s qualified. Rick Lazio is qualified because he’s a Wall Street lobbyist. I’m kind of making fun of the fact that, to some extent, there’s this perception that I’m not qualified to be governor, when the reality is, there really aren’t a whole lot of people who are.
TC: You have proposed capping public employee pay and slashing retiree benefits. Why is that better than what everyone else is proposing?
WR: The current set of proposals—Paladino’s proposals, or Ravitch’s proposals, or Paterson’s proposals, or Rick Lazio’s non-proposals, or Levy’s proposals—those proposals basically amount to, ‘We’re going to close parks and lay off teachers.’ That’s what they’re doing. And my proposals do not involve closing parks and they do not involve laying off teachers. They’re actually politically viable.
TC: How much would government shrink under Governor Redlich?
WR: I would say we’d go down about $10 billion in spending in the first year.
TC: But you would not cut education spending, as you have said?
WR: No, not right off the bat. I’m not saying it’s off the table, but it’s not the first place I would cut.
TC: How is that possible?
WR: There’s plenty of other cuts you can make first. And you’re effectively cutting education spending by capping pay. But it’s not a direct ‘I’m going to cut this from this.’ I do think there are other things we can do in the long-term. The way we do capital spending in schools is ridiculous
TC: What do you do beside serve as a Guilderland Town Board member?
WR: I run my own law firm, which I’ve been running since 2003. What we do mostly is we handle speeding tickets for people. And then we do some other criminal defense. A fair number of marijuana cases. That’s particularly becoming relevant the way that the law has changed. In terms of volume of cases, it’s like 600 or 700 speeding tickets per year, 10 DWI cases, another 10 criminal cases. But I really am a traffic lawyer.
TC: So you probably are not a speeder yourself, then.
WR: I can’t say I never speed. I’m sure there’s been a time in my life when I went over the speed limit.
TC: Have you always been a Republican?
WR: I was a Democrat back in the late 1990s. I am congenitally a Democrat, through my parents. Sometime in the late ’90s, I ran for town board in a Democratic caucus and lost. I was with the Democratic Party a short number of years and then I switched to Republican, mainly because of local stuff. The people I knew locally and I got along with were Republican. I think I’ve been conservative for a lot longer, but I just didn’t connect the dots.
TC: So you switched, like Levy and Paladino?
WR: I don’t really believe there’s a huge difference between the Democratic and Republican parties. Did Barack Obama get us out of Iraq? No. Did Barack Obama end the war in Afghanistan? No. Who started the bailout, Obama or Bush? It was Bush. So to me, the two major parties at the federal level and even at the state level, they’re the same.
TC: You ran against Rep. Mike McNulty in 2004 and 2006, and then you won a seat on the town board. How did you make that progression?
WR: One of my friends asked me to run with him, and foolishly, I said yes. I didn’t expect to win. The whole idea was that I wouldn’t get enough votes, and then I would throw my votes to the other side and he would get in. It’s ridiculous. I get paid $22,000 a year, and [I attend] 20 meetings a year. You break it down, it’s like $1,000 a meeting.
TC: What prompted you to run for governor?
WR: Some of the Libertarians in New York State asked me to run. I was thinking about running for attorney general. I had a specific thing that I wanted to do related to foreclosures. So I was talking to the Libertarians about running as their attorney general candidate. And they said, ‘Well, hey, Warren, do you want to run for governor?’ And I hadn’t thought about it.
TC: So you will most likely be the Libertarian candidate for governor?
WR: My impression is that the Libertarian Party will endorse me. I am still seeking the Republican line. I’m going to these Tea Parties not for the Libertarian Party, but for the Republican Party. My hope is, through the Tea Party, to establish myself as a real, credible Tea Party candidate, and that Tea Party activists will help get signatures, because the real challenge is getting on the ballot.
TC: Do you think you can be the Tea Party candidate?
WR: I’ve got feelers out for groups in different parts of New York State. But I think right now there’s really two potential Tea Party candidates. There’s Carl Paladino, and there’s me. The Buffalo Tea Party people are coalescing around Carl Paladino. A lot of people out there like him. So he’s sort of stepped up as the Tea Party candidate. At the same time, I’m a Tea Party candidate. I think we’re the only two.
TC: Do you think you beat him?
WR: If I can get on the ballot in a Republican primary. I don’t think Carl’s perfect, but he might be the guy. If they settle on him, then I don’t have much of a chance in the Republican primary, because he and I would cut in on each other’s votes. So it either has to be me or Carl.
TC: Could you work together, maybe as running mates?
WR: I definitely think it’s possible, but it’s too early to say that yet.
TC: Have you raised any money?
WR: Not very much. It’s in the ballpark of $10,000. Not a lot of money.
TC: So how do you fund a campaign, then?
WR: There’s this perception that you have to spend a lot of money and I think that’s wrong. I think that Rick Lazio has shown that spending a lot of money doesn’t win you an election. Rick Lazio spent $45 million against Hillary, and he got clobbered. So it’s not just about money. It’s about motivating people. I don’t think that Scott Brown raised a lot of money early. You’ve got to get on the ballot first. It’s hard to be taken seriously as a candidate until you’re on the ballot. But once you get on the ballot, people help you raise money. There’s got to be a smart way to raise money, and Ron Paul was a great example.
TC: Speaking of Ron Paul, you supported him for president in 2008. Do you think you will pick up any of his supporters in New York?
WR: Sooner or later, we’ll have Ron Paul support.
That is how Warren Redlich, a long shot candidate for the Republican and Libertarian gubernatorial nominations, greets visitors to his campaign website.
He knows people dismiss him as a gadfly, but he insists he has a shot to win.
A traffic lawyer from Guilderland who supported Ron Paul for president in 2008, Redlich is hoping to build support among New York’s growing Tea Party movement and mount an insurrection within the Republican primary. He also says he has the Libertarian nomination locked up and would consider running as a Tea Party candidate even if he does not land the GOP line.
The race, Redlich says, is really between him and Buffalo developer Carl Paladino, who has about 1,000 times as much money to spend on his campaign as Redlich. But if he can get more media coverage and get on the ballot, Redlich says he can beat Paladino.
Or, maybe, they could work together. Redlich took some time from his law practice to discuss that possibility, as well as his ideas for cutting as much as $10 billion in spending from the state budget. He also revealed a dark secret from his political past.
What follows is an edited tran scri pt.
The Capitol: You wrote a blog post that got some attention titled “Top Ten Reasons the Media Won’t Cover My Campaign.” Did it work?
Warren Redlich: The idea of the top 10 list had been percolating for a while because one of the perceptions that I think is out there is always, ‘Who is this Warren Redlich guy?’ Carl Paladino’s qualified because he’s going to spend $10 million of his own money. Steve Levy’s qualified because, well, I’m not really sure why he’s qualified, but he’s qualified. Rick Lazio is qualified because he’s a Wall Street lobbyist. I’m kind of making fun of the fact that, to some extent, there’s this perception that I’m not qualified to be governor, when the reality is, there really aren’t a whole lot of people who are.
TC: You have proposed capping public employee pay and slashing retiree benefits. Why is that better than what everyone else is proposing?
WR: The current set of proposals—Paladino’s proposals, or Ravitch’s proposals, or Paterson’s proposals, or Rick Lazio’s non-proposals, or Levy’s proposals—those proposals basically amount to, ‘We’re going to close parks and lay off teachers.’ That’s what they’re doing. And my proposals do not involve closing parks and they do not involve laying off teachers. They’re actually politically viable.
TC: How much would government shrink under Governor Redlich?
WR: I would say we’d go down about $10 billion in spending in the first year.
TC: But you would not cut education spending, as you have said?
WR: No, not right off the bat. I’m not saying it’s off the table, but it’s not the first place I would cut.
TC: How is that possible?
WR: There’s plenty of other cuts you can make first. And you’re effectively cutting education spending by capping pay. But it’s not a direct ‘I’m going to cut this from this.’ I do think there are other things we can do in the long-term. The way we do capital spending in schools is ridiculous
TC: What do you do beside serve as a Guilderland Town Board member?
WR: I run my own law firm, which I’ve been running since 2003. What we do mostly is we handle speeding tickets for people. And then we do some other criminal defense. A fair number of marijuana cases. That’s particularly becoming relevant the way that the law has changed. In terms of volume of cases, it’s like 600 or 700 speeding tickets per year, 10 DWI cases, another 10 criminal cases. But I really am a traffic lawyer.
TC: So you probably are not a speeder yourself, then.
WR: I can’t say I never speed. I’m sure there’s been a time in my life when I went over the speed limit.
TC: Have you always been a Republican?
WR: I was a Democrat back in the late 1990s. I am congenitally a Democrat, through my parents. Sometime in the late ’90s, I ran for town board in a Democratic caucus and lost. I was with the Democratic Party a short number of years and then I switched to Republican, mainly because of local stuff. The people I knew locally and I got along with were Republican. I think I’ve been conservative for a lot longer, but I just didn’t connect the dots.
TC: So you switched, like Levy and Paladino?
WR: I don’t really believe there’s a huge difference between the Democratic and Republican parties. Did Barack Obama get us out of Iraq? No. Did Barack Obama end the war in Afghanistan? No. Who started the bailout, Obama or Bush? It was Bush. So to me, the two major parties at the federal level and even at the state level, they’re the same.
TC: You ran against Rep. Mike McNulty in 2004 and 2006, and then you won a seat on the town board. How did you make that progression?
WR: One of my friends asked me to run with him, and foolishly, I said yes. I didn’t expect to win. The whole idea was that I wouldn’t get enough votes, and then I would throw my votes to the other side and he would get in. It’s ridiculous. I get paid $22,000 a year, and [I attend] 20 meetings a year. You break it down, it’s like $1,000 a meeting.
TC: What prompted you to run for governor?
WR: Some of the Libertarians in New York State asked me to run. I was thinking about running for attorney general. I had a specific thing that I wanted to do related to foreclosures. So I was talking to the Libertarians about running as their attorney general candidate. And they said, ‘Well, hey, Warren, do you want to run for governor?’ And I hadn’t thought about it.
TC: So you will most likely be the Libertarian candidate for governor?
WR: My impression is that the Libertarian Party will endorse me. I am still seeking the Republican line. I’m going to these Tea Parties not for the Libertarian Party, but for the Republican Party. My hope is, through the Tea Party, to establish myself as a real, credible Tea Party candidate, and that Tea Party activists will help get signatures, because the real challenge is getting on the ballot.
TC: Do you think you can be the Tea Party candidate?
WR: I’ve got feelers out for groups in different parts of New York State. But I think right now there’s really two potential Tea Party candidates. There’s Carl Paladino, and there’s me. The Buffalo Tea Party people are coalescing around Carl Paladino. A lot of people out there like him. So he’s sort of stepped up as the Tea Party candidate. At the same time, I’m a Tea Party candidate. I think we’re the only two.
TC: Do you think you beat him?
WR: If I can get on the ballot in a Republican primary. I don’t think Carl’s perfect, but he might be the guy. If they settle on him, then I don’t have much of a chance in the Republican primary, because he and I would cut in on each other’s votes. So it either has to be me or Carl.
TC: Could you work together, maybe as running mates?
WR: I definitely think it’s possible, but it’s too early to say that yet.
TC: Have you raised any money?
WR: Not very much. It’s in the ballpark of $10,000. Not a lot of money.
TC: So how do you fund a campaign, then?
WR: There’s this perception that you have to spend a lot of money and I think that’s wrong. I think that Rick Lazio has shown that spending a lot of money doesn’t win you an election. Rick Lazio spent $45 million against Hillary, and he got clobbered. So it’s not just about money. It’s about motivating people. I don’t think that Scott Brown raised a lot of money early. You’ve got to get on the ballot first. It’s hard to be taken seriously as a candidate until you’re on the ballot. But once you get on the ballot, people help you raise money. There’s got to be a smart way to raise money, and Ron Paul was a great example.
TC: Speaking of Ron Paul, you supported him for president in 2008. Do you think you will pick up any of his supporters in New York?
WR: Sooner or later, we’ll have Ron Paul support.
|
Minor details Thanks for covering my campaign. Just a couple of minor details: 1. I don't think I said I have the LP nomination locked up. In the tran scri pt I said it was my impression that the party will endorse me. That's very different. 2. If I don't get the GOP line I do intend to run on the LP line through the general election. I haven't thought about running on a Tea Party line, but rather that I would appeal to Tea Party voters from the LP line. I don't believe there will be a Tea Party line. Thanks again, Warren |
| Comment By: Warren Redlich on April 15th, 2010 |
| ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
