Angered by Mayor Bloom berg’s “hypocrisy” over the state and city budgets and his repeated recent “insults,” Gov. Paterson is warning that he is ready to fight back.

“Mayor Bloomberg is not going to treat the governor poorly, with disrespect!” declared a source close to the Paterson administration.

“We’ve got just as many muscles as the mayor and his people do — and if they want a street fight, then so be it.”

The source accused Bloomberg and his aides of again insulting Paterson on Saturday when they tried to prevent the governor from visiting the scene of a ferry crash on Staten Island.

“They were saying, ‘It’s no big deal,’ he shouldn’t go because the mayor wasn’t in New York City and they didn’t want the governor to be there,” said the source.

A week earlier, Bloomberg insulted Paterson at an early-morning press conference after a car bomb was discovered in Times Square.

“When the governor was with the mayor during the car-bomb press conference, the mayor didn’t even have the class to ask the governor if he wanted to say anything — and he was there at 2:30 or 3 in the morning,” the source said.

“You have the governor of the state of New York at the podium with the mayor, and the mayor doesn’t ask him if he’d like to say a few words? The chutzpah of the mayor and his people.”

Paterson was especially furious last week after Bloomberg accused him of massively shortchanging the city while trying to close a $9.2 billion deficit in the state budget.

“How about the mayor’s inconsistent and hypocritical statements on the state and city budget as he takes cheap shots at the governor for trying to be fiscally responsible?” asked the source.

“The mayor always threatens layoffs and cuts and then never does them. He talks about giving teachers raises even as he threatens to lay them off. And what did he do when the city wasted $400 million because of overruns in its time and attendance system?

“And what is the mayor really doing to reduce pension and labor costs in the city?”

Still, the source offered something of an olive branch.

“We’d prefer to have a cordial working relationship with the mayor,” the source said. “But if you’re going to act out or act up, then the governor is going to respond in kind. We’re not going to be viewed as pushovers by anybody.”

Bloomberg spokesman Stu Loeser ducked questions about insults to Paterson and unfair criticism of the state budget.

“We’re focused on passing a budget that’s on time, in balance, fiscally responsible and fair,” he said. “And there’s still time for Albany to do three of these four.”

(Source: NY Post)