Why does everything happen when you’re off?

All of last week, I watched in disbelief as Albany once again descended into chaos. How many states have a coup in their capitals?

I remember Texas Democrats fleeing to neighboring Oklahoma six years ago to avoid a redistricting vote, but a coup?

And what could be funnier than New York’s Republicans insisting that they wanted to move forward with ethics reform while embracing these particular Democrats—Hiram Monserrate, a first-term senator from Queens who has been accused of slashing his companion in the face with a glass, and Pedro Espada, the Bronx legislator who has been fined thousands for election law violations and who has a house in Mamaroneck?

(Monserrate says he tripped while carrying a glass of water and accidently cut his companion, while Espada insists that his co-op in the Bronx, and in his district, is his primary address.)

So what’s happened today? Democrats have named John Sampson as the newly created conference leader, the state judge who was asked to intervene has adjourned the case again, and legislators are talking about how to share power.

Stay tuned.

I’m out of the office until June 15, and won’t be posting until I come back.

There’s been lots of reaction to President Obama’s speech in Cairo. Here’s an interesting roundup by the BBC of Israeli points of view.

PHOTO: U.S. President Barack Obama tours the Buchenwald concentration camp with Holocaust survivor Elie Wiesel and German Chancellor Angela Merkel today in Buchenwald, Germany. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

Rep. Carolyn McCarthy says she won’t challenge Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand after all.

Read it here.

PHOTO: Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor, right, has lunch with Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., Tuesday, in Schumer’s office on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Charles Dharapak)

You can read Sonia Sotomayor’s responses here.

PHOTO: Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor meets with Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa., left, in his hideaway office on Capitol Hill in Washington today. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

Sonia Sotomayor, President Obama’s pick for Supreme Court, was raised a Catholic and graduated from a Catholic high school.
Is she a practicing Catholic now?
The White House described her current involvement in the church this way: She “attends church for family celebrations and other important events.”
It’s a bit unclear but no matter.

Today Rush Limbaugh described her as a devout Catholic. The liberal blog Think Progress quoted him as saying:
“She would be the sixth Catholic on the Supreme Court. … She’s a Catholic, a devout Catholic, she hasn’t got a record on [abortion] … I can see a possibility of supporting this nomination if I can be convinced that she does have a sensibility towards life.”
We’ll see.

PHOTO: In this Jan. 13, 2009 file photo, talk radio host Rush Limbaugh talks with former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld in the East Room of the White House in Washington. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, FILE)

Today, I wrote about the book publishing industry and its convention over the weekend at the Jacob Javits Convention Center.

Here’s a photo of Brian Buerkle, the marketing manager at the Tarrytown-based Marshall Cavendish, and Jessica Prudhomme, who works with him in the marketing department.

Buerkle is holding a copy of “Frida: Viva la vida! Long Live Life,” comprised of biographical poems about the life and work of Mexican artist Frida Kahlo and pictures of her art. It’s for ages 12 and up.