When he took over the governorship after being elected in a record landslide, Eliot Spitzer brought with him a mostly insular cadre of advisers, mostly lawyers, from the state attorney general's office, under the aegis of the law-man and reformer.
Lt. Gov. David Paterson, elected on the same ballot, was different -- steeped in legislative comptromises, neighborhood assistance grants, and the city's and Democratic Party's leading African-American power circles.
Now, in the month after Paterson was suddenly thrust into the top spot, his different sensibility and life experience is reflected in his cabinet picks. And in a notable Capitol micro-trend, an unusual proportion of them have election experience of their own.
The experience ranges. Jim Yates, counsel, was elected to the state Supreme Court in the late 1990's, but is mostly considered a top jurist. On the other end, Carl Andrews, inter-governmental affairs director and a former state Senator, has been involved in U.S. Senate and other campaigns, has run for Congress, and served as a political lieutenant to the since-convicted former Brooklyn Democratic boss Clarence Norman Jr.
Dr. Jon R. Cohen, special adviser, a Democrat from Nassau, comes from the medical world but ran as a health-care candidate for lieutenant governor in 2006 until Spitzer picked Paterson for the slot. And Bill Cunningham, now the governor's senior adviser, ran for Suffolk County executive five years ago.
This reminded one wag at the Capitol of the old, facetious slogan often cited by Gov. Mario Cuomo: "Integrity is no substitute for experience."
Dan Janison