ALBANY >> Assemblyman and state Senate candidate Jim Tedisco’s Wikipedia page was vandalized this week by someone who is not a fan.
“James Nicholas Tedisco (born July 15, 1950) is a career politician who has been on the public dole for more than three decades,” the re-edited entry for the “Jim Tedisco” page read. “He has never been in the majority and has been considered by many as a total failure.”
The original entry said only Tedisco “is an American politician.”
The site’s logs show that the change was made shortly after midnight Thursday, from an IP address on Long Island. It was changed back the original wording on Saturday.
Tedisco expressed dismay Saturday about the vandalism.
“People can ambush and they are not very concerned about the facts,” Tedisco said, citing his current sponsorship of a bill to term limit legislators to six two-year terms.
He said the vandalism is a downside of digital communications and new technologies. “That’s a negative aspect of it and how you control it, I don’t know,” he said.
Tedisco, who was first elected to the Assembly in 1982, is now running for the seat vacated by Sen. Hugh Farley (R-Niskayuna). His opponent is Chad Putman, a Schenectady City Hall deputy clerk who is making his first run for elected office.
They are running in the 49th Senate district that goes from south of Long Lake, through the Adirondack wilderness areas, down to the Johnstown-Gloversville, then east to Schenectady and the Southern Saratoga County area.
Vandalism to Wikipedia pages is nothing new, since anyone can edit them unless special restrictions are put into place to limit authorized editors to a small group of vetted Wikipedia contributors.
The Bill and Hillary Clinton Wikipedia pages were also vandalized this month, with an X-rated picture and racist language. The page was quickly repaired and subsequently locked to prevent similar attacks.
In Tedisco’s case, the wiki-vandal targeted his long career as an elected official, Tedisco, who is 66, served on the Schenectady city council prior to running for the Legislature 33 years ago.
The Legislature overall is dead-set against term limits to prevent such long careers, and the topic has become an issue in an Assembly race in adjoining district.
Republican Chris Boyark (R-Mechanicville) sent out a mailer this weekend promising to “Clean Up Our Corrupt Capitol” and promising support for three issues.
The first was “Term Limits, because representing people should be a service not a racket.” The other two involved pension forfeiture and long prisons for bid-rigging on public contracts.
Boyark, a Saratoga County Republican committeeman, is challenging Assemblywoman Carrie Woerner (D-Round Lake).
