Global Strategy Group LLP

DENVER—Looks like the Durst Organization will wait another day to pour cocktails for New York politicians.

The real estate development firm just sent out an email saying it will no longer co-host an event at a Denver pub this afternoon with political consulting firm Global Strategy Group.

The culprit? Lobbying laws.

"We are not sponsoring the party to remove the possibility of conflict with the New York State Lobbying Laws," Durst spokesman Jordan Barowitz wrote.

The party's still on, though, hosted in full by Global Strategy Group.

Councilman Domenic Recchia has kept a low profile since the congressman he is trying to unseat, Vito Fossella, got arrested for driving drunk.

But when political consultant Jefrey Pollock prefaced remarks about Fossella on NY1 last night by saying he’s working for Recchia’s campaign, that was news.  read more »

Democratic consultant Bill Lynch, who has been giving advice to incoming Governor David Paterson, was hanging out this morning outside the executive chambers on the second floor of the Capitol.

I asked Lynch about reports that people are coming out of the woodwork to ask Paterson for favors and jobs.  read more »

After two and a half years in the hardest job in New York politics, Risa Heller is leaving government to work for Pollock, Silvan and company at the Global Strategy Group.

Which should give her a decent opportunity to put the skills she learned from her ubiquitous boss to good use.

Martha Stark got the vote of at least one senate Republican.

Global Strategy Group just hired one of Eliot Spitzer's top campaign aides, Ryan Toohey.

Is there some flexibility in Rudy Giuliani's position on partial birth abortion?

Rick Carlin has notes on Albany's idea of ethnic diversity.

Harry Siegel, who is obsessed with the NYPD's stop-and-frisk numbers, thinks the huge increase in that statistic comes down to a change in paperwork, not policy.

Get ready for the Conservative Party's state convention, taking place in Albany starting on the 11th.

Bill Murphy wonders how Craig Johnson's new colleagues will react to Johnson calling the legislature "dysfunctional" during his campaign.

Tim Russert took the stand in the Scooter Libby trial today.

The political blog for the Staten Island Advance has moved to a new site over here.

ReformNY compares electronic voting machines to ATMs and has some words from the head of the NYU Brennan Center on the issue.

Aaron Naparstek has more info about city employees driving the wife of the city's police commissioner.

And pictured above is Joe Bruno and Tom DiNapoli engaged in a handshakey kind of hug.

-- Azi Paybarah

Jeffrey Plaut, partner at Global Strategy Group, will join the campaign team of 11th congressional district candidate, Senator Carl Andrews. Another of Plaut's clients is running for governor. —Nicole Brydson

Yesterday's item on adman David Doak's all-but-official departure from the Ferrer campaign prompted a funny pair of responses: firm denials from the campaign that Doak is out, and also a number of tips as to who will replace him.

The likely choice is apparently a respected Madison Avenue guy who dabbles occasionally in politics, Ellis Verdi.

The new faces from the corporate advertising world will be working with Ferrer aide Jonathan Prince, a Clinton administration hand. Prince, according to several Democrats, been Ferrer's point man on the television campaign, and will continue in that role.

Doak's firm had been reduced to serving as the production company, not the usual place of a high-payed media strategist, and has apparently lost interest in playing that role.

Several Democrats suggested that Verdi, who had a role (more to come) in Hillary's Senate run and is close to Prince, will have a hand in producing Ferrer's next round of television spots. Verdi also has a running relationship with the Ferrer consultants over at the Global Strategy Group.  read more »

Ferrer spokeswoman Jen Bluestein emails: "DCO's contract runs through the primary and we're currently talking to them and other firms about how we structure our team to ramp up to beat Mike Bloomberg in November."

So look for an word soon of a new team to "join" Doak on the campaign, and read "replace" for "join."

On Feb.  read more »