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If and when the State Legislature reconvenes to rejigger the state budget in light of the Wall Street meltdown, Gov. David Paterson will have to sort through not only extraordinary financial times but high-stakes election-year politics.

State Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos began this missive yesterday in a straightforward way, but ended with some pretty heavy name-calling aimed at the Senate Democrats.

Over the last few days, I have been in constant contact with Governor Paterson and the financial industry to discuss the crisis affecting Wall Street. I strongly support the Governor’s efforts on behalf of AIG and believe we must continue to do all we can to prevent further deterioration of the financial sector.

We will continue to monitor the fiscal situation, and if legislative action becomes necessary we will partner with the Governor and the Assembly to address this crisis and its related impact on New York State.

However, we will not raise taxes as Senate Minority Leader Smith and the Democrats have called on us to do. In a fragile economy, it would be disastrous to support the Democrats’ efforts to raise taxes, as it would only exacerbate the crisis we face.

In response, Democratic Leader Malcolm Smith thoroughly twisted Skelos' words and tried to tie the New York Republicans to those running the White House:

Maybe Dean Skelos thinks raising taxes is the answer to the financial crisis which was caused in part by the Republicans failure to address the housing crisis, but Democrats don’t. We need to focus on rebuilding New York's economy by cutting property taxes, creating jobs and reducing wasteful spending.

It's going to be a long seven weeks until Election Day.