A Question of Character? Govenor Paladino...and his band of thieves? Tea Party Hitches up with "junkyard dogs, not pedigree poodles."

How is a candidate for governor like Carl Paladino possible? For a guy willing to "convert state prisons into workhouses for New York's poor and unemployed where they would be given jobs and taught basic hygiene,” is it any surprise the authoritarian tea party movement has backed him and his criminal accomplice’s? Yes, criminal.

NY Times: As he mounts an outrage-filled campaign for
governor of New York, Carl P. Paladino has vowed to forcibly rid Albany of the wayward officials and misbehaving bureaucrats who he says have demeaned state government, promising to “take out the trash.” … His campaign manager failed to pay nearly $53,000 in federal taxes over the last few years, prompting the Internal Revenue Service to take action against him.

An aide who frequently drives Mr. Paladino on the campaign trail served jail time in Arizona on charges of drunken driving.

Another adviser has been indicted on charges of stealing more than $1 million from Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s re-election bid last year.

And Mr. Paladino’s campaign chairwoman left a local government position amid claims that she had steered $1 billion in public money to a politically connected investment manager.

Their backgrounds could raise questions about the kind of cabinet Mr. Paladino, a Republican, would assemble … Rather than dispute the troubled past of his advisers, or distance himself from it, Mr. Paladino’s campaign appears to be embracing it, adopting a warts-and-all approach that has defined his insurgent candidacy from the start.

In an interview, Michael Caputo, the campaign manager who ran afoul of the I.R.S., said, “This is a campaign of junkyard dogs, not pedigreed poodles.”

A “campaign of junk yard dogs?” What a campaign slogan. That’s like saying, “Sure we’re crooks, we can’t be trusted, and that admission should count for something, right? Elect us.”

Like the Times article clearly states: “…the issue highlights a growing problem across the country for the Tea Party, which has backed Mr. Paladino.”

What that says to me is that tea parties are backing likeminded ideologues that morally and ethically believe in resorting to criminal activity while being politically rewarded for it by being elected to public office.

What a game changing movement.