Gov. Paterson, still battling rumors of improper personal conduct as well as new speculation on the just-launched federal Aqueduct gambling deal probe, continued to assert this morning he's a victim of unnamed plotters conspiring against him.

“I don't want to speculate on why it's happening because I don't know who is doing it….That would be me engaging in the same kind of conduct that's happening now,'' Paterson said during a friendly interview with WOR's John Gambling.

“There are people who don't want me to run for office because as I run for office I'm taking the discussion to a place where people don't want to hear right now,'' he insisted.

The governor's list of alleged plotters could be a long once since top Democratic leaders including President Obama, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver all want to see Paterson go.

Paterson, the state's first African-American governor, also again ripped into the New York Times, which he said was directly and indirectly responsible for two weeks of rumors that had portrayed him in a “racialized, hypersexualized and dissolute fashion,'' although he offered no explanation of how he was using those words.

Meanwhile, when asked about the just-opened probe of his highly controversial decision awarding the lucrative Aqueduct gaming contract to a group connected with politically influential Queens minister Floyd Flake, Paterson insisted the probe “doesn't have to do with the (contract) bid.''