By Celeste Katz
Now it's REALLY personal.
Actually, he really IS mad tonight.
Our Glenn Blain is up in Lake George at the Sagamore Hotel, where GOP gubernatorial candidate Carl Paladino is making a stop to address the New York State Business Council dinner.
Blain tells me that as Paladino was walking in, he was approached by New York Post State Editor and radio personality Fred Dicker and a few other reporters -- and what could have been a regular Q & A session turned into a toe-to-toe confrontation.
After Dicker asked Paladino what evidence he had to make accusations to Maghabe at Politico that Democratic gubernatorial frontrunner Andrew Cuomo had cheated on his ex -wife, Blain reports, Paladino turned the tables, assailing Dicker over the Post's coverage of the daughter he fathered a decade ago with a woman other than his wife.
"I want to know why you sent your goons after my daughter, Fred," Paladino demanded. "You send another goon to my daughter's house and I'll take you out, buddy!"
(Update: Paladino also raised the issue of Cuomo's former marriage in a Newsday report this morning, saying he wanted the media to "go after Cuomo and his paramours" but, again, offering no evidence of what he was talking about.)
Paladino's campaign manager, Michael Caputo, separated the two men and sent his candidate into the men's room to calm down. Then, Caputo accused Dicker of working for Cuomo and doing his dirty work, so to speak.
At one point, Blain says, Paladino cursed Dicker, saying, "F--- him!"
Asked again if he had evidence of Cuomo's alleged infidelity, Paladino replied, "Of course I do. You'll get it at the appropriate time."
Asked after the fact if this was appropriate behavior for a gubernatorial candidate, Caputo replied: "It's appropriate behavior for a man who just met the man who sent photographers to take pictures of his 10-year-old daughter."
Caputo said Paladino is usually thick-skinned -- but not when it comes to his kids and grandkids.
"It's all about the kids," Caputo. "If Carl's affair 10 years ago is fair game, then anything Cuomo did 10 years ago is fair game."
Here is some video via State of Politics of the confrontation. (Also, YNN State Capitol reporter Kaitlyn Ross, who captured the episode on phonecam, said via Twitter that her photographer has a broken ankle, although -- update -- it was thankfully not a result of this particular incident):
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