As some suggest that this year’s mayoral election is over, with Mayor Bloomberg certain to slide into a second term in City Hall, others are working very hard to make sure that this doesn’t happen. It has been reported that the Sergeants Benevolent Association, the police union that took the spotlight for providing the venue for Fernando Ferrer’s disastrous Amadou Diallo remarks, is actively raising funds from among its members for the mayor’s main Republican opponent, Thomas Ognibene.

Not that they endorse Mr. Ognibene, mind you. This is just an effort to “level the playing field” against the mayor. Mr. Ognibene is still $200,000 short of the quarter-million he needs to qualify for the 6-to-1 public matching funds that will instantly give him a seven-figure war chest. This may be a drop in the bucket compared with the estimated $100 million that the mayor may end up spending through November, but it could make a huge impact in a Republican primary.

More significant than the money is the fact that a union is so openly aiding a candidate that it is not formally backing. This may well set a pattern, at least for the Republican primary. This is the place where the unions can do the most damage to Mr. Bloomberg’s re-election hopes at the lowest cost.

I have suggested this before, and I have every reason to believe that unless the police, fire, and teachers unions have successfully concluded contract negotiations, they will vigorously support Mr. Ognibene in the GOP primary, even if they don’t actually endorse him. Imagine the impact that police and fire officers could have working the phone banks in the UFT borough offices, calling Republican “prime” voters in the days leading up to the September primary. In the outer boroughs, my suspicion is that there are few Republican households without some close relative either in the NYPD, FDNY, or teaching in the public schools.

UFT chief Randi Weingarten is perfectly positioned to make this happen, as she also heads the federation of municipal unions. Mr. Ognibene joined the Democratic hopefuls at the UFT anti-Bloomberg rally in Madison Square Garden last week.

It doesn’t matter what the polls tell you now: This is the kind of election that can be lost, even by a well-to-do candidate. If you don’t think so, ask Ronald Lauder about the cost of his 1989 losing primary against Rudolph Giuliani, and then head out to Staten Island on the newly-christened John J. Marchi ferry boat, and ask the senator for whom the boat was named how he defeated incumbent Republican mayor John Lindsay for the GOP nod back in 1969.

If, by some long shot, he should be defeated in the Republican primary, what does this leave Michael Bloomberg with? Lenora Fulani, Frederick Newman, the Independence Party, and eight weeks of nonstop bad headlines. The mayor even gets negative press when he fails to show up at Independence Party functions, as evidenced by the coverage Monday of the mayor’s no-show at a Sunday Independence Party event at the City Hall Restaurant.

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If there is a voter to be convinced or an issue to be exploited, count on Rep. Anthony Weiner to take full advantage. Last Thursday, at the UFT’s Madison Square Garden rally, he hijacked an unused microphone and gave an impromptu talk. By the time he generously handed the mike over to his Democratic rival Mr. Ferrer, the UFT stage managers caught on and cut the sound.

No sooner had the plug been pulled on WCBS-FM’s popular oldies format Friday afternoon than Mr. Weiner was bemoaning its loss. “WCBS ‘Oldies’ has been the soundtrack for the lives of so many lifelong New Yorkers,” he stated. “Summer in the city will be a little less fun without doo-wop and Cousin Brucie.”

Infinity Broadcasting may feel that the old format may not deliver the younger consumers that advertisers covet, so has replaced it with a new format inexplicably called “Jack.” But Cousin Brucie (legendary disc jockey Bruce Morrow) could help deliver the older voters that politicians covet, those who most dependably come to the polls. Can a press conference on the steps of City Hall be far behind with Mr. Weiner (perhaps with Cousin Brucie at his side) hi-“jack”-ing yet another issue?

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The Daily News has pointed out that the expected endorsement of Mr. Ferrer by Attorney General Eliot Spitzer has thus far failed to materialize, speculating on post-Diallo cold feet on Mr. Spitzer’s part. Now the stakes could be higher. Could a Spitzer endorsement of Mr. Ferrer lead to an endorsement of C. Virginia Fields by Nassau County Executive Thomas Suozzi, whose name is being floated as a possible alternative Democratic gubernatorial candidate?

Meanwhile, Mr. Spitzer has distanced himself from a key Bronx Ferrer ally, state Senator Efrain Gonzalez. The attorney general was listed as the chairman of a scheduled Gonzalez fund-raiser, but was a no-show at the event at the appropriately named Mirage Restaurant in the Bronx two weeks ago. According to published reports, Mr. Gonzalez is the subject of a federal corruption probe.