According to The Gray Lady (the New York newspaper not owned by Rupert Murdoch), Crazy Billionaire Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s gal pal, Diana Taylor was considering a run as a republican for the New York senate seat previously held by Hillary Clinton, now being warmed by Kirsten Gillibrand.

You’d think Kirsten was a commie out to crush the banks or something, the way the Wall Street money types keep going into back rooms to look for people to dethrone her.  First they picked Harold Ford Jr.  who fizzled out when he couldn’t explain to Stephen Colbert how changing his opinion about everything since moving north didn’t make him a slippery, opportunistic operator.  It didn’t help that he’d only seen Staten Island from a helicopter and probably couldn’t find his way to Times Square on the seven train.

According to the Times article, Senator Taylor was the brainchild of Susan Molinari, the former congresswoman who’d inherited her seat from her father, Guy Molinari who used to be the King of Staten Island and was the only member of Congress to vote against the Martin Luther King Jr. federal holiday.

Taylor, like her boyfriend is a fiscal conservative, more liberal on social issues.  She had worked as an aide to former governor and republican operative, George Pataki and has done some good work in international micro-finance.  Per the Times, even Bono likes her.

Granted senators should be serious lawmakers, not pothole fixers, but still she seems to lack the common touch.  It’s hard to imagine her rubbing elbows with the plebs in any context or convincing them that she has a clue about their lives.  Voters elect people they believe will get the job done. The job (from the point of view of the constituents) is getting money and services back to your state.  While Taylor’s Wall Street friends may see her as someone who could bring it home, I doubt a majority of voters would.  Even her boyfriend has lost his luster.  After getting another crazy billionaire to drop his opposition to term limits “just this once,” and spending a record $85 million on his last re-election campaign, he was still almost beaten by a virtual non-entity.

Taylor’s “affiliation” with Bloomberg could hurt her in other ways as well, and I don’t just mean all of the cries of unfair influence because the man with whom she sleeps is both a mayor and a financial powerhouse.  We want a senator who can deliver, and by deliver, I mean the max — roads, schools, jobs, federal dollars up the wazoo for New York.  Diana has been her billionaire boyfriend’s “companion” for how many years now?  And yet, she still hasn’t sealed the deal.  Where’s the rock on her finger?  Call me old-fashioned, but if marriage didn’t still carry significant financial benefits, achieving marriage equality wouldn’t be such a big deal.  Diana may be a shrewd independent operator, but her man has assets, and if she’s so smart, why hasn’t she managed to get her hands on more of them?

So am I really saying I wouldn’t support Taylor because she not a gold-digger?  No, I wouldn’t support her for many reasons including the fact that the more certain New York financial types plot against Gillibrand, the more convinced I am that she’s maybe doing a good job.  But seriously, if Taylor’s appeal is her connections and the fact that she’s in bed with Big Money, shouldn’t Big Money at least make an honest woman out of her?