While Mike Bloomberg is busy hectoring Albany, and preening about how healthy the city's fiscal house is in comparison to the state, the new city unemployment numbers are in-and, as City Room reports, the picture isn't a good one: "The unemployment rate in New York City jumped in December to 10.6 percent, its highest level in nearly 17 years, as hotels and restaurants eliminated jobs and hiring was weak in most other businesses, the state’s Department of Labor said on Thursday."
Now what's also true-as the mayor laments about the impact of the national recession-is that the city's job picture is actually worse: "Last month was the first since the recession began two years ago in which the city’s unemployment rate was significantly higher than the nation’s. The city’s rate rose from 10 percent in November, while the national rate held steady at 10 percent last month, according to the Labor Department. Nearly 425,000 city residents were unable to find jobs in December, easily the most in the 33 years in which those records have been kept."
Now, would someone remind us why this man needed to have the results of two referendums overturned? Oh, that's right, it was his vaunted economic expertise that was indispensable-but the inconvenient truth that all of his sycophants in the real estate community failed to point out, was that it was under Bloomberg's stewardship that this mess has been exacerbated.
And now we get, what? More job training and small business loan programs-this is as lame as it gets; oh, and a State of the City address that fails to mention the high tax environment that is such a job creating impediment. As Business Week, owned by Bloomberg, points out: "In a city where the 10 percent unemployment rate mirrors the national average, Bloomberg, 67, promised job training; “financing fairs” for immigrant business owners to meet bankers who speak their language and a fund to help families refinance their homes."
But will the Rupert Zuckerman hand out the Knucklehead Award to the mayor for his failure to address the one key issue-a daunting tax and regulatory environment-that makes NYC such a challenging place to live in-and do business in? Sure, when pigs fly.
No, the tabs are happy to chase the help around-like Pedro Espada and Hiram Monseratte-while allowing the Master of the House to remain unaccountable and blameless for his failed tenure. Which is why their calls for ethics reform ring so hollow to us. After all, these were the folks behind the engineering of the purchase of Bloomberg's ethically challenged third term.
So to expect honesty at this juncture from the press (and we haven't forgotten the "Campaign Finance" NY Times) concerning the administration of Teflon Mike might be too much of a stretch, but as the economic situation in the city worsens, we hope that someone will emerge with the integrity to bell this bad cat.
Friday, January 22, 2010
NYC Campaign Finance Law Safe?
The NYC Campaign Finance Board issued an advisory yesterday (via Liz) that seeks to apparently allay our fears that the just announced Supreme Court ruling striking down McCain-Feingold might mean the death of the city's own law: ""While today’s decision may have a critical impact on the next federal elections, it addresses a specific provision of federal law that has no direct parallel in City law. "The decision addresses independent spending by corporations supporting candidates; it does not disturb the prohibition on direct contributions from corporations to candidates."
All quite true, as far as it goes, but we believe that the guiding principle being the SCOTUS ruling-one that devolves from the sanctity of the first amendment-will ultimately lead to the undoing of the city's own rule, precisely because of its invidious nature, restricting some but giving free rein to others. And this is the essence of the current legal challenge.
As the NY Times reported two years ago: "The real estate industry and lobbyists, who together provide millions in campaign cash for city candidates, are trying to overturn a new law that would vastly reduce how much they can donate. A lawsuit financially backed by the business interests and others was filed Monday in federal court in Manhattan against the City Campaign Finance Board, which enforces the campaign finance system. The suit charged that the limits violated free speech and equal protection provisions of the Constitution and discriminated against minorities."
We're not sure of the last argument, but the free speech violation that is alleged fits right in to the court's current ruling-and the unequal nature of the restriction is ground zero of the challenge brought by the constitutional lawyer James Bopp: "The suit also contends that the law is constitutionally untenable because it targets some entities doing business with the city, while leaving others, like labor unions and neighborhood organizations, unaffected. “The city is claiming the potential of undue influence by people who are doing business with the city and then they exempt two of the biggest categories of people doing business with the city,” Mr. Bopp said."
And this unlevel playing field has paved the way for the rise of the WFP-and the skewing of the political calculus in NY against homeowners, tax payers and small businesses-folks that the city council speaker has no natural connection to-as her comments evince: "City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn, who pushed the bill past skeptical Council members worried about their ability to raise money, said the law was designed specifically to help candidates who did not have connections to the city’s high-powered lobbyists and developers."
The impact that the skewing might have on policy making apparently either has eluded the speaker; or is simply something that barely troubles her. But with the enhanced power of the left, and Quinn's move starboard to be more aligned with real estate and the mayor, she just might find that she has been hoisted on her own petard in the next election cycle-emasculated against a Liu or a de Blasio by rules of her own making.
But all of this juicy speculation might just be made moot if the current law is given the heave ho-as we certainly hope it is. This should we expect all be resolved in a realtively short term.
All quite true, as far as it goes, but we believe that the guiding principle being the SCOTUS ruling-one that devolves from the sanctity of the first amendment-will ultimately lead to the undoing of the city's own rule, precisely because of its invidious nature, restricting some but giving free rein to others. And this is the essence of the current legal challenge.
As the NY Times reported two years ago: "The real estate industry and lobbyists, who together provide millions in campaign cash for city candidates, are trying to overturn a new law that would vastly reduce how much they can donate. A lawsuit financially backed by the business interests and others was filed Monday in federal court in Manhattan against the City Campaign Finance Board, which enforces the campaign finance system. The suit charged that the limits violated free speech and equal protection provisions of the Constitution and discriminated against minorities."
We're not sure of the last argument, but the free speech violation that is alleged fits right in to the court's current ruling-and the unequal nature of the restriction is ground zero of the challenge brought by the constitutional lawyer James Bopp: "The suit also contends that the law is constitutionally untenable because it targets some entities doing business with the city, while leaving others, like labor unions and neighborhood organizations, unaffected. “The city is claiming the potential of undue influence by people who are doing business with the city and then they exempt two of the biggest categories of people doing business with the city,” Mr. Bopp said."
And this unlevel playing field has paved the way for the rise of the WFP-and the skewing of the political calculus in NY against homeowners, tax payers and small businesses-folks that the city council speaker has no natural connection to-as her comments evince: "City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn, who pushed the bill past skeptical Council members worried about their ability to raise money, said the law was designed specifically to help candidates who did not have connections to the city’s high-powered lobbyists and developers."
The impact that the skewing might have on policy making apparently either has eluded the speaker; or is simply something that barely troubles her. But with the enhanced power of the left, and Quinn's move starboard to be more aligned with real estate and the mayor, she just might find that she has been hoisted on her own petard in the next election cycle-emasculated against a Liu or a de Blasio by rules of her own making.
But all of this juicy speculation might just be made moot if the current law is given the heave ho-as we certainly hope it is. This should we expect all be resolved in a realtively short term.
Thursday, January 21, 2010
Campaign Finance Bombshell
The Supreme Court, in a 5-4 decision, totally eviscerated the McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill. As the NY Times reports: "Sweeping aside a century-old understanding and overruling two important precedents, a bitterly divided Supreme Court on Thursday ruled that the government may not ban political spending by corporations in candidate elections.The ruling was a vindication, the majority said, of the First Amendment’s most basic free speech principle — that the government has no business regulating political speech. The dissenters said allowing corporate money to flood the political marketplace will corrupt democracy."
Well, all bitterness aside, this means that it won't be long before the inequitable city campaign finance law-the one that Mike Bloomberg (yes, that Mike Bloomberg) called a model for all to follow-goes into the dustbin of history. Which, to us, is a good thing because,as we have said before, the current law is patently unfair to business and overly favorable to labor-exempting unions from the restrictions imposed on all others.
Can you just here the screams of anguish over at the Times? The paper has championed this bit of social engineering-and has even topped the mayor in calling the local campaign finance law, "one of the best and fairest," while at the same time supporting, without any hint of irony, the Bloomberg spend-a-thon in the last election cycle. Without double standards there wouldn't be any over at the Times.
And the Times also failed to even mention the role of the WFP in its discussion of the need for more spending limits on business in a call for reform of the state's election law. Here's their hilarious money quote: "Politicians in New York City were embarrassed enough to create one of the best and fairest campaign financing systems in the country. Albany’s lawmakers, who know no shame, shrugged and did next to nothing. The system is just as disgraceful today as it was then."
So we must assume that apoplexy reigns now over on Eight Avenue, but as we have said the current city law is badly flawed: "The goal of campaign finance reform should be greater transparency-voters should know who's contributing so that they can better understand the interests that each candidate may be favoring. An unlevel playing field is, well, unfair, and the mayor and the speaker should insure that the rules apply equally to all the players in the system."
And now the SCOTUS presciently agrees with us; and the local law will crumble quickly since the legal challenge is on the same constitutional basis as that of the successful suit that formed the basis on today's court ruling. As we have commented before-and speaking of prescience, check out this article in the City Journal from 2008-the law in question protects certain rights while threatening those of other less protected classes of people-like lobbyists for instance. It deserves to be cast aside.
Well, all bitterness aside, this means that it won't be long before the inequitable city campaign finance law-the one that Mike Bloomberg (yes, that Mike Bloomberg) called a model for all to follow-goes into the dustbin of history. Which, to us, is a good thing because,as we have said before, the current law is patently unfair to business and overly favorable to labor-exempting unions from the restrictions imposed on all others.
Can you just here the screams of anguish over at the Times? The paper has championed this bit of social engineering-and has even topped the mayor in calling the local campaign finance law, "one of the best and fairest," while at the same time supporting, without any hint of irony, the Bloomberg spend-a-thon in the last election cycle. Without double standards there wouldn't be any over at the Times.
And the Times also failed to even mention the role of the WFP in its discussion of the need for more spending limits on business in a call for reform of the state's election law. Here's their hilarious money quote: "Politicians in New York City were embarrassed enough to create one of the best and fairest campaign financing systems in the country. Albany’s lawmakers, who know no shame, shrugged and did next to nothing. The system is just as disgraceful today as it was then."
So we must assume that apoplexy reigns now over on Eight Avenue, but as we have said the current city law is badly flawed: "The goal of campaign finance reform should be greater transparency-voters should know who's contributing so that they can better understand the interests that each candidate may be favoring. An unlevel playing field is, well, unfair, and the mayor and the speaker should insure that the rules apply equally to all the players in the system."
And now the SCOTUS presciently agrees with us; and the local law will crumble quickly since the legal challenge is on the same constitutional basis as that of the successful suit that formed the basis on today's court ruling. As we have commented before-and speaking of prescience, check out this article in the City Journal from 2008-the law in question protects certain rights while threatening those of other less protected classes of people-like lobbyists for instance. It deserves to be cast aside.
Bloomberg Doesn't "T" Off
Well we didn't go out to Astoria to be regaled by the mayor's oratory, but we trust the Times' David Chen to give us an accurate account of his State of the City address. And, according to Chen-and NY1 as well-the mayor acknowledged that the folks were hurting because of the national recession, but apparently took no responsibility whatsoever for his own role in the local economic debacle.
As the Times reports: "Mr. Bloomberg promised to expand job training services and to organize financing fairs for immigrant small business owners. He said five banks and five credit unions had volunteered to set up a program featuring bank accounts with no minimum balances or hidden fees. And in the city’s latest effort to help stanch the foreclosure crisis, he vowed to establish a $10 million fund that would help up to 1,000 families refinance their mortgages."
The mayor also vowed to streamline city government-a move that we have recommended and is long overdue: "Mr. Bloomberg, who won re-election to a third term by a surprisingly narrow margin in November, said that a new interagency task force would “consolidate,” “centralize” and “reduce” government operations. Among the goals, he said, would be reducing the number of city vehicles, and shrinking the city’s office space by 10 percent — or 1.2 million square feet — over four years. The reduced office space would save $36 million in rent, and $4 million in energy, each year."
Apparently, however, there are no plans to reduce the cost of doing business so that job creation could be jump started-and the tax word is simply absent from the Bloomberg lexicon, except when it involves financial services. And can he knock off the job training BS?-it is the last refuge of the ideologically bankrupt.
What's missing here-and from the commentariat as well-is the fact that the mayor has already larded up the city's budget with unaffordable programs, and a workforce that we will continue to pay for years after all of the workers retire. He has done this by adding costly taxes to an already overburdened citizenry-so his frugal posture now is both comical and sad, making his admonition to Albany simply risible.
So we are stuck with the least creative and innovative policy mind possible-one whose background and class perspective signifies more over development and less small business job creation in the next four years. Maybe the mayor-having bought this election-will suffer a deserved buyer's remorse of his own. One can hope.
As the Times reports: "Mr. Bloomberg promised to expand job training services and to organize financing fairs for immigrant small business owners. He said five banks and five credit unions had volunteered to set up a program featuring bank accounts with no minimum balances or hidden fees. And in the city’s latest effort to help stanch the foreclosure crisis, he vowed to establish a $10 million fund that would help up to 1,000 families refinance their mortgages."
The mayor also vowed to streamline city government-a move that we have recommended and is long overdue: "Mr. Bloomberg, who won re-election to a third term by a surprisingly narrow margin in November, said that a new interagency task force would “consolidate,” “centralize” and “reduce” government operations. Among the goals, he said, would be reducing the number of city vehicles, and shrinking the city’s office space by 10 percent — or 1.2 million square feet — over four years. The reduced office space would save $36 million in rent, and $4 million in energy, each year."
Apparently, however, there are no plans to reduce the cost of doing business so that job creation could be jump started-and the tax word is simply absent from the Bloomberg lexicon, except when it involves financial services. And can he knock off the job training BS?-it is the last refuge of the ideologically bankrupt.
What's missing here-and from the commentariat as well-is the fact that the mayor has already larded up the city's budget with unaffordable programs, and a workforce that we will continue to pay for years after all of the workers retire. He has done this by adding costly taxes to an already overburdened citizenry-so his frugal posture now is both comical and sad, making his admonition to Albany simply risible.
So we are stuck with the least creative and innovative policy mind possible-one whose background and class perspective signifies more over development and less small business job creation in the next four years. Maybe the mayor-having bought this election-will suffer a deserved buyer's remorse of his own. One can hope.
Wednesday, January 20, 2010
NY Times Focuses on Eminent Domain
Our old friend Terry Pristin casts her keen eye at one of the issues that could well play a role in the upcoming election cycle-the use of eminent domain, After observing that the 2005 Kelo decision led to legislative changes all over the country, but not in NY, she goes on to point out: "Some lawmakers tried to revise the state’s condemnation procedures in the wake of the Connecticut case, but their bills died because of strenuous opposition from the Bloomberg administration. Now, however, attention is again being focused on whether New York has too much power to force the sale of private property for economic development. A recent appellate court decision barred a state agency from condemning businesses occupying land that Columbia University wants for its $6.3 billion expansion. Even if the strongly worded ruling is overturned, as several land-use lawyers expect, it is providing fodder for people who believe the existing system is unfair to property owners."
To say that the real estate community has been shook, is to put it mildly: "The opinion on Dec. 3 by the New York Supreme Court’s appellate division, which found there was no civic or public purpose or blight to justify condemning Tuck-It-Away’s buildings for the university’s new campus, has unnerved public officials and developers. The Columbia decision “is the first thing that’s happened in New York that suggests the threat of a change in our eminent domain law,” said Kathryn S. Wylde, chief executive of the Partnership for New York City, a leading business group. “I think it’s frightening because there are few more important investments in our city’s future than that which Columbia is making.”
Really? Well, in our view, there is no more important an issue than the preservation of the rights of Americans to hold on to their hard earned property-and Wylde avoids the chicanery that was the basis of the adverse Appellate Court decision. But the worry that is felt among the bien pensants of real estate isn't limited to eminent domain alone: "The clamor for reform is also being driven by a recent wave of sentiment against development in New York, as demonstrated last month when the City Council defied Mr. Bloomberg and rejected a plan by the Related Companies to convert the Kingsbridge Armory in the Bronx into a shopping center. Emboldening critics is the sense that Mr. Bloomberg’s influence has waned since his narrow victory in last fall’s mayoral race."
WPU's attorney captures the mood: “I think people are really getting a foul smell from what’s been going on,” said Michael Rikon, a lawyer who represents business owners in the Willets Point section of Queens, where the city intends to condemn property to make way for a large redevelopment project."
What Columbia's supporters don't get is that their high handedness is turning the folks off-as if it couldn't go out and negotiate in the private sector without the use of the government pistola. Instead, they cry: "At the Harlem hearing, a Columbia executive vice president, Maxine Griffith, said the holdout properties were needed because the 16 new buildings would be connected underground. “If the basement can’t be connected, I don’t see how we can proceed,” she said."
Well Columbia could have entertained the swap that Nick Sprayregen had proposed. But, no, not when it knew that it had the power of the state to force its will on the feisty property owner-along with compliant consultants who were willing to find blight even before they took the train up to 125th Street: "The court chastised the state agency for commissioning its study of neighborhood conditions from the same consultant, Allee, King, Rosen & Fleming, known as AKRF, that Columbia had hired to help plan the project and prepare the environmental impact statement. State Senator Bill Perkins, a Harlem Democrat whose district includes the neighborhood where Columbia is seeking to build its new campus, peppered Empire State officials at the hearing with questions about their reliance on AKRF, which has played a prominent role in most of the city’s major development projects. Accusing the consultants of having a “particular agenda in mind,” Mr. Perkins said that “it just doesn’t look good.”
So, perhaps a new day is dawning-with the possibility of legislative changes, particularly when it comes to both the lack of any real due process, as well as the definition of blight that is currently vague, apparently not accidentally so: "Mr. Siegel said New York was the only state that did not permit people resisting condemnation to be heard at the trial-court level, where there would be an opportunity for discovery and cross-examination of witnesses. A provision to require trial-level review could be part of new legislation being drafted by Mr. Perkins, said Amy Lavine, a staff attorney with Albany Law School’s Government Law Center, who is advising the state senator. At the top of her list is substituting a specific definition of blight for the current standard of “substandard and insanitary.”
What might that look like? Lavine tells us: "One model might be Pennsylvania’s law from 2006, which permits a blight finding only when a substantial number of properties meet certain conditions like being “unfit for public habitation” or having been tax delinquent for two years. “It’s about making sure there are objective standards relating to public health and safety,” Ms. Lavine said."
But that would eliminate the current arbitrary bogarting that Wylde and her cohort are so enamored with-knowing that the use of eminent domain would never adversely impact them! We'll give Bill Perkins the last word on this: "Senator Perkins, who quoted the conservative columnist George Will with approval at the public hearing, said he expected to build a bipartisan coalition to improve the condemnation process. “Eminent domain is like a gun to people’s head,” he said."
To say that the real estate community has been shook, is to put it mildly: "The opinion on Dec. 3 by the New York Supreme Court’s appellate division, which found there was no civic or public purpose or blight to justify condemning Tuck-It-Away’s buildings for the university’s new campus, has unnerved public officials and developers. The Columbia decision “is the first thing that’s happened in New York that suggests the threat of a change in our eminent domain law,” said Kathryn S. Wylde, chief executive of the Partnership for New York City, a leading business group. “I think it’s frightening because there are few more important investments in our city’s future than that which Columbia is making.”
Really? Well, in our view, there is no more important an issue than the preservation of the rights of Americans to hold on to their hard earned property-and Wylde avoids the chicanery that was the basis of the adverse Appellate Court decision. But the worry that is felt among the bien pensants of real estate isn't limited to eminent domain alone: "The clamor for reform is also being driven by a recent wave of sentiment against development in New York, as demonstrated last month when the City Council defied Mr. Bloomberg and rejected a plan by the Related Companies to convert the Kingsbridge Armory in the Bronx into a shopping center. Emboldening critics is the sense that Mr. Bloomberg’s influence has waned since his narrow victory in last fall’s mayoral race."
WPU's attorney captures the mood: “I think people are really getting a foul smell from what’s been going on,” said Michael Rikon, a lawyer who represents business owners in the Willets Point section of Queens, where the city intends to condemn property to make way for a large redevelopment project."
What Columbia's supporters don't get is that their high handedness is turning the folks off-as if it couldn't go out and negotiate in the private sector without the use of the government pistola. Instead, they cry: "At the Harlem hearing, a Columbia executive vice president, Maxine Griffith, said the holdout properties were needed because the 16 new buildings would be connected underground. “If the basement can’t be connected, I don’t see how we can proceed,” she said."
Well Columbia could have entertained the swap that Nick Sprayregen had proposed. But, no, not when it knew that it had the power of the state to force its will on the feisty property owner-along with compliant consultants who were willing to find blight even before they took the train up to 125th Street: "The court chastised the state agency for commissioning its study of neighborhood conditions from the same consultant, Allee, King, Rosen & Fleming, known as AKRF, that Columbia had hired to help plan the project and prepare the environmental impact statement. State Senator Bill Perkins, a Harlem Democrat whose district includes the neighborhood where Columbia is seeking to build its new campus, peppered Empire State officials at the hearing with questions about their reliance on AKRF, which has played a prominent role in most of the city’s major development projects. Accusing the consultants of having a “particular agenda in mind,” Mr. Perkins said that “it just doesn’t look good.”
So, perhaps a new day is dawning-with the possibility of legislative changes, particularly when it comes to both the lack of any real due process, as well as the definition of blight that is currently vague, apparently not accidentally so: "Mr. Siegel said New York was the only state that did not permit people resisting condemnation to be heard at the trial-court level, where there would be an opportunity for discovery and cross-examination of witnesses. A provision to require trial-level review could be part of new legislation being drafted by Mr. Perkins, said Amy Lavine, a staff attorney with Albany Law School’s Government Law Center, who is advising the state senator. At the top of her list is substituting a specific definition of blight for the current standard of “substandard and insanitary.”
What might that look like? Lavine tells us: "One model might be Pennsylvania’s law from 2006, which permits a blight finding only when a substantial number of properties meet certain conditions like being “unfit for public habitation” or having been tax delinquent for two years. “It’s about making sure there are objective standards relating to public health and safety,” Ms. Lavine said."
But that would eliminate the current arbitrary bogarting that Wylde and her cohort are so enamored with-knowing that the use of eminent domain would never adversely impact them! We'll give Bill Perkins the last word on this: "Senator Perkins, who quoted the conservative columnist George Will with approval at the public hearing, said he expected to build a bipartisan coalition to improve the condemnation process. “Eminent domain is like a gun to people’s head,” he said."
Fat and Foolish, Taxing Credulity
Well, you didn't expect that we would continue in an effusive manner in reference to Governor Paterson's budget just because, after much dithering, he decides that, yes, he will enforce the taxation law against Indian cigarette dealers? Of course not, not when he the governor foolishly continues on his putative health kick by once gain proposing his fat tax on soda. As the NY Times reports: "His plan also assumes that there will be a significant recovery this year in the state’s tax collections and relies on a number of recycled proposals. A new tax on sugared sodas, $1.28 per gallon, would yield $465 million, similar to a proposal that Mr. Paterson made last year but dropped amid resistance from the Legislature and companies like PepsiCo Inc., which is based in Purchase, N.Y."
Just what the bodegas in NYC need, another tax that will either dampen demand for one of their staple products, or stimulate further cross border sales that are already at high levels because of the state's bottle law. And, just like the calorie posting mishogos that is the pet scheme of the mayor, the soda tax will raise costs but will have little or mo impact on the health of overweight New Yorkers.
But make no mistake about it, the tax is also regressive, and for those low income New Yorkers-some of whom may be quite trim indeed-who like to drink a sweet soda it will cost more at a time when money, not to mention work, is scarce. But leave it to the Times editorialists-most of whom we'd guess haven't had a regular Coke or Pepsi in years-to immediately demand that Paterson fight like hell for this tax.
As the paper tells us: "The new taxes would include a $1-per-pack addition to the $3.75 state tax on cigarettes and a penny-an-ounce levy on colas and other sugared beverages. The revenue from the cigarette tax is expected to collect $218 million a year, but the far more controversial soda tax could bring in as much as $465 million a year. Both are useful ways to raise money, especially since the governor has promised to use the proceeds for health care. But he has proposed a soda tax before, then caved, after orchestrated industry protests across the state. This time, he should resist and keep the tax."
Did they say another cigarette tax? And did they do so without even mentioning the governor's Indian tax collection proposal? Indeed they did. Which only goes to demonstrate how out-of-touch these folks are with any street level reality. In our earlier post on the governor's revocation of the so called letter of forbearance-the one that allowed the Indians to create a lucrative black market-we didn't weigh in on his other proposal to tax cigarettes once gain.
This is a good time to do so-because until the governor actually walks the walk on collecting the Indian cigarette taxes any additional taxes that are added on to the product is simply more black market moolah. But how would the Times editorialists know this. Maybe they should refer back to Stephanie Saul's great reporting in October of '08?
Here's Saul's money quote: "Combined, the city and state are losing more than $1 billion a year in tax revenue as a result of bootleg cigarettes distributed through New York’s reservations, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s office said on Monday. The losses to the city alone would pay the annual salaries and benefits for more than 3,000 schoolteachers, the mayor’s office said."
So if the Indian loophole isn't closed promptly, then the new tax is totally counterproductive-as well as harmful to the small stores that apparently don't have any advocates in the rarefied Times atmosphere. And isn't it strange that the paper can wax eloquently on the governor's martial arts proposal-inveighing against legalizing ultimate fighting as a sport-yet remains lock jawed on a criminal black market that robs the state of over a billion dollars a year?
Typical Times. Advocate taxes that will hurt poor people and the stores that serve them; but stay silent on a massive scofflaw operation that prevents billions of taxes from actually being collected-and also hurts small stores in the process. What kind of animus-not to mention policy myopia-permeates the august nether regions of that paper?
So there is much that needs to be done before this budget is adopted. The Times is right to call on the governor to fight harder this time-but misguided as to what issues he needs to fight hard. We should shelve both of his tax proposals until the tax revenue stream from Indian cigarette sales begins to come in. In our estimate, that money will likely eclipse any estimated revenues from the two proposed levies-making for good public policy that does no harm to businesses that have been treated badly by government neglect in enforcing existing law.
Just what the bodegas in NYC need, another tax that will either dampen demand for one of their staple products, or stimulate further cross border sales that are already at high levels because of the state's bottle law. And, just like the calorie posting mishogos that is the pet scheme of the mayor, the soda tax will raise costs but will have little or mo impact on the health of overweight New Yorkers.
But make no mistake about it, the tax is also regressive, and for those low income New Yorkers-some of whom may be quite trim indeed-who like to drink a sweet soda it will cost more at a time when money, not to mention work, is scarce. But leave it to the Times editorialists-most of whom we'd guess haven't had a regular Coke or Pepsi in years-to immediately demand that Paterson fight like hell for this tax.
As the paper tells us: "The new taxes would include a $1-per-pack addition to the $3.75 state tax on cigarettes and a penny-an-ounce levy on colas and other sugared beverages. The revenue from the cigarette tax is expected to collect $218 million a year, but the far more controversial soda tax could bring in as much as $465 million a year. Both are useful ways to raise money, especially since the governor has promised to use the proceeds for health care. But he has proposed a soda tax before, then caved, after orchestrated industry protests across the state. This time, he should resist and keep the tax."
Did they say another cigarette tax? And did they do so without even mentioning the governor's Indian tax collection proposal? Indeed they did. Which only goes to demonstrate how out-of-touch these folks are with any street level reality. In our earlier post on the governor's revocation of the so called letter of forbearance-the one that allowed the Indians to create a lucrative black market-we didn't weigh in on his other proposal to tax cigarettes once gain.
This is a good time to do so-because until the governor actually walks the walk on collecting the Indian cigarette taxes any additional taxes that are added on to the product is simply more black market moolah. But how would the Times editorialists know this. Maybe they should refer back to Stephanie Saul's great reporting in October of '08?
Here's Saul's money quote: "Combined, the city and state are losing more than $1 billion a year in tax revenue as a result of bootleg cigarettes distributed through New York’s reservations, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s office said on Monday. The losses to the city alone would pay the annual salaries and benefits for more than 3,000 schoolteachers, the mayor’s office said."
So if the Indian loophole isn't closed promptly, then the new tax is totally counterproductive-as well as harmful to the small stores that apparently don't have any advocates in the rarefied Times atmosphere. And isn't it strange that the paper can wax eloquently on the governor's martial arts proposal-inveighing against legalizing ultimate fighting as a sport-yet remains lock jawed on a criminal black market that robs the state of over a billion dollars a year?
Typical Times. Advocate taxes that will hurt poor people and the stores that serve them; but stay silent on a massive scofflaw operation that prevents billions of taxes from actually being collected-and also hurts small stores in the process. What kind of animus-not to mention policy myopia-permeates the august nether regions of that paper?
So there is much that needs to be done before this budget is adopted. The Times is right to call on the governor to fight harder this time-but misguided as to what issues he needs to fight hard. We should shelve both of his tax proposals until the tax revenue stream from Indian cigarette sales begins to come in. In our estimate, that money will likely eclipse any estimated revenues from the two proposed levies-making for good public policy that does no harm to businesses that have been treated badly by government neglect in enforcing existing law.
Governor Saddles Up on Indian Cigarette Taxes
The Alliance has been fighting for the better part of a decade to get the governor of New York to simply enforce the law and end the lucrative cigarette black market that is crippling small businesses all over the state. And yesterday, David Paterson finally said, "Enough's enough!"
As the Observer points out: "Governor Paterson is taking on the American Indians in New York, moving to collect taxes on cigarettes sold within reservations to non-Indians. The move is sure to provoke a fight, and past attempts have led to a tremendous backlash, with the Seneca tribe shutting down a highway near Buffalo. The move, announced Tuesday as part of his executive budget, has been pushed by legislators and budget watchdogs as an easy source of revenue—State Senator Carl Kruger has said it could be $1 billion a year—that is due to New York. The Seneca have opposed it, saying that as a sovereign nation, the state does not have the right to collect such taxes."
And the move by the governor drew praise from legislators in attendance. As Crain's Insider tells us (subsc.): "Gov. Paterson drew applause—tepid, but genuine—from legislators exactly once yesterday as he proposed his flat-spending budget for fiscal 2011. The clapping occurred when he called for enforcing the law on Indian tribes that are selling tobacco tax-free to non-Indians."
Legislators have grown frustrated seeing how, year after year, governors from Pataki to Paterson have ignored the laws they have passed to begin the collection process. But this year, Senator Carl Kruger began to draw a line in the sand-and the state is in such dire straights that the time was right for Paterson's about face: "The Pataki administration’s failed attempt to do so in 1997 resulted in tribes shutting down the New York State Thruway with a tire-burning protest. But there is a political as well as a fiscal upside to collecting the taxes now: It would prevent legislators like Sen. Carl Kruger from reprising their argument that Paterson should not slash services before collecting taxes on tribal tobacco sales."
We need to remember that the Paterson administration was singing a completely different tune last Fall-as the Observer reminds us: "This is a turn for the Paterson administration, which was resistant to legislators' calls to impose new rules on collecting the taxes. The governor's counsel, Peter Kiernan, said this of the taxes at a Senate committee in October: "While that remains an option, it is a one-dimensional choice that could have deleterious consequence that could include resistance, violence and retrenchment."
But, important and symbolic as was the the governor's change of heart yesterday, it doesn't mean that supporters of collection have a straight run to victory on this contentious issue: "Then again, it's unclear just how serious the administration is about the plan. The governor did not include revenue from the tax collections in his budget, saying that it would hold off until a six-month public comment period ends. Budget director Robert Megna told reporters this was because the state was being conservative in its expectations and that "We expect that ongoing negotiations will take place" with the Indians."
Which isn't quite true, because buried in the governor's budget proposal on page 98, under, "improve audit and compliance," is a $221,000,000 projection from this change in policy direction. But the Observer's warning is merited-as Senator Kruger makes clear in a press release he issued yesterday: “I am encouraged by the Governor's renewed attention to the need to collect the hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenue from sales of cigarettes by Native American enterprises to non-Indian customers,” Sen. Kruger said. “Rescinding the Tax Department's policy of forbearance, as the Governor now says he intends to do, would be a huge step forward. But we need to see a timetable, and we need to proceed in the proper sequence.”
And Kruger goes on to outline the steps that need to be taken on this: "He said the Governor must announce first that all cigarettes available for sale in the state must be tax-stamped, and that Native Americans living on reservations will be able to purchase cigarettes free of tax for their personal consumption through the issuance of ‘tax- free coupons’ to the tribes. When this takes place, “the Attorney General can go back into state court demonstrating compliance and have the present injunction lifted,” Sen. Kruger said."
All of which underscores that there is still much work left to be done-and that end zone dances today are premature. But we are still encouraged because of the damage the so-called policy of forbearance has done to the most vulnerable small businesses in New York-and it is why we will be holding a major press conference on this next week at City Hall-as Crain's reports:
"Paterson will find allies outside the Legislature, too. Stores say they lose millions of dollars in sales to a black market fed by the tribes. A coalition of legislators, anti-smoking groups and merchants, organized in part by lobbyist Richard Lipsky, plans a Jan. 28 press conference to support enforcement. Lipsky says bootleggers routinely drive to Southampton to buy cigarettes from Indians, who legally may exempt only Indian buyers from sales taxes. Lipsky estimates that a single van can hold $150,000 worth of smokes, which are then resold illegally to consumers, costing the state and its localities $1 billion annually. The key to enforcing the law, advocates say, is requiring cigarette wholesalers to buy tax stamps for their product."
We need to remember that this long battle had one individual, Red Apple chairman John Catsimatidis, who never tired of keeping the issue alive-paying for ads castigating the state's non actions and initiating his own law suit that was followed by Mayor Bloomberg's own legal challenge. In a major way, the Paterson reversal is a tribute to Catsimatidis' perserverance.
But the work is unfinished, and the Insider offers this final cautionary note: "During his speech, Paterson promised tribes that he would continue to talk with them. Negotiations have never succeeded, though, because the tribes know their sales would plunge if they charged tax."
Now, more than ever, we need to push the governor to develop an immediate enforcement timetable. Let's be clear: this is money that's on the table, and can be collected now if the steps outlined by Senator Kruger are followed. We aim to make sure that they are.
As the Observer points out: "Governor Paterson is taking on the American Indians in New York, moving to collect taxes on cigarettes sold within reservations to non-Indians. The move is sure to provoke a fight, and past attempts have led to a tremendous backlash, with the Seneca tribe shutting down a highway near Buffalo. The move, announced Tuesday as part of his executive budget, has been pushed by legislators and budget watchdogs as an easy source of revenue—State Senator Carl Kruger has said it could be $1 billion a year—that is due to New York. The Seneca have opposed it, saying that as a sovereign nation, the state does not have the right to collect such taxes."
And the move by the governor drew praise from legislators in attendance. As Crain's Insider tells us (subsc.): "Gov. Paterson drew applause—tepid, but genuine—from legislators exactly once yesterday as he proposed his flat-spending budget for fiscal 2011. The clapping occurred when he called for enforcing the law on Indian tribes that are selling tobacco tax-free to non-Indians."
Legislators have grown frustrated seeing how, year after year, governors from Pataki to Paterson have ignored the laws they have passed to begin the collection process. But this year, Senator Carl Kruger began to draw a line in the sand-and the state is in such dire straights that the time was right for Paterson's about face: "The Pataki administration’s failed attempt to do so in 1997 resulted in tribes shutting down the New York State Thruway with a tire-burning protest. But there is a political as well as a fiscal upside to collecting the taxes now: It would prevent legislators like Sen. Carl Kruger from reprising their argument that Paterson should not slash services before collecting taxes on tribal tobacco sales."
We need to remember that the Paterson administration was singing a completely different tune last Fall-as the Observer reminds us: "This is a turn for the Paterson administration, which was resistant to legislators' calls to impose new rules on collecting the taxes. The governor's counsel, Peter Kiernan, said this of the taxes at a Senate committee in October: "While that remains an option, it is a one-dimensional choice that could have deleterious consequence that could include resistance, violence and retrenchment."
But, important and symbolic as was the the governor's change of heart yesterday, it doesn't mean that supporters of collection have a straight run to victory on this contentious issue: "Then again, it's unclear just how serious the administration is about the plan. The governor did not include revenue from the tax collections in his budget, saying that it would hold off until a six-month public comment period ends. Budget director Robert Megna told reporters this was because the state was being conservative in its expectations and that "We expect that ongoing negotiations will take place" with the Indians."
Which isn't quite true, because buried in the governor's budget proposal on page 98, under, "improve audit and compliance," is a $221,000,000 projection from this change in policy direction. But the Observer's warning is merited-as Senator Kruger makes clear in a press release he issued yesterday: “I am encouraged by the Governor's renewed attention to the need to collect the hundreds of millions of dollars in tax revenue from sales of cigarettes by Native American enterprises to non-Indian customers,” Sen. Kruger said. “Rescinding the Tax Department's policy of forbearance, as the Governor now says he intends to do, would be a huge step forward. But we need to see a timetable, and we need to proceed in the proper sequence.”
And Kruger goes on to outline the steps that need to be taken on this: "He said the Governor must announce first that all cigarettes available for sale in the state must be tax-stamped, and that Native Americans living on reservations will be able to purchase cigarettes free of tax for their personal consumption through the issuance of ‘tax- free coupons’ to the tribes. When this takes place, “the Attorney General can go back into state court demonstrating compliance and have the present injunction lifted,” Sen. Kruger said."
All of which underscores that there is still much work left to be done-and that end zone dances today are premature. But we are still encouraged because of the damage the so-called policy of forbearance has done to the most vulnerable small businesses in New York-and it is why we will be holding a major press conference on this next week at City Hall-as Crain's reports:
"Paterson will find allies outside the Legislature, too. Stores say they lose millions of dollars in sales to a black market fed by the tribes. A coalition of legislators, anti-smoking groups and merchants, organized in part by lobbyist Richard Lipsky, plans a Jan. 28 press conference to support enforcement. Lipsky says bootleggers routinely drive to Southampton to buy cigarettes from Indians, who legally may exempt only Indian buyers from sales taxes. Lipsky estimates that a single van can hold $150,000 worth of smokes, which are then resold illegally to consumers, costing the state and its localities $1 billion annually. The key to enforcing the law, advocates say, is requiring cigarette wholesalers to buy tax stamps for their product."
We need to remember that this long battle had one individual, Red Apple chairman John Catsimatidis, who never tired of keeping the issue alive-paying for ads castigating the state's non actions and initiating his own law suit that was followed by Mayor Bloomberg's own legal challenge. In a major way, the Paterson reversal is a tribute to Catsimatidis' perserverance.
But the work is unfinished, and the Insider offers this final cautionary note: "During his speech, Paterson promised tribes that he would continue to talk with them. Negotiations have never succeeded, though, because the tribes know their sales would plunge if they charged tax."
Now, more than ever, we need to push the governor to develop an immediate enforcement timetable. Let's be clear: this is money that's on the table, and can be collected now if the steps outlined by Senator Kruger are followed. We aim to make sure that they are.
Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Not the Best and the Brightest
According to the NYC Public School Parents blog, city school kids have done progressively worse over the Bloomberg/Klein years when it comes to the competitive Intel Science Talent Search. The blog first catalogues all of the media crowing about past achievements on this prestigious benchmark, and then fast forwards to the present: "So here we are in January 2010, with the NYC public schools' just announced miserly showing of just 15 Intel semifinalists, all but one of them from Stuyvesant and Bronx Science, and not a peep from any of those newspapers. Nothing said about the precipitous decline in the city schools' Intel Science Talent Search contest over the past few years, a dropoff that mirrors almost precisely the years of mayoral control and Joel Klein's stewardship of the public schools."
Do you think that with all of our yeoman-like efforts to lift every voice and sing, we've let the talented soloists languish? And, with the exception of the two elite high schools, the drop off is percipitous: "Of course, we might well ask why a different story line hasn't appeared instead, one that asks why, with the exception of Bronx Science and Stuyvesant, the NYC public schools have virtually disappeared off the Intel STS map and what this relentless, seven-year, downhill trend says about our public high schools under Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein. We might also ask when the local print media were apparently, surreptitiously, also put under mayoral control."
Just as we have pointed out, there is a conspiracy of silence that continues to this very day-except when the local papers are exaggerating the results of mayoral control. But what concerns us is the plight of the city's best and the brightest-and we remember that the early Klein efforts were conspicuously absent when it came to the talented and gifted programs in the schools. So these results don't shock.
But is our schools cannot devote the proper resources to the city's talented kids, we have a failure of not only will but philosophy-one that is mirrored in the following Op-ed complaining about charter schools from the UFT's Mulgrew: "As New York finalizes its application for the federal Race to the Top program, a proposal to end the cap on the number of charter schools has been promoted as key to our success in getting these new federal funds. But promoters of this proposal are ignoring two other critical issues: The small role that charter schools play in the Race to the Top application, and the fact that city charters are not serving a representative sample of our neediest students."
Now Mulgrew exaggerates a bit here. Consider the following: "According to an analysis by the UFT using 2007-2008 data from the state Education Department, in Harlem (districts 4 and 5) nearly 72% of students in regular elementary and middle schools qualify for free lunch. Yet in charter schools in and around the neighborhood, the equivalent number is about 61%."
Not that much of a real difference in our view, but it might point to the fact that parents with a little higher incomes are looking to get their kids into better schools-and that charters are interested in promoting the talents of the more motivated and gifted. If so, more power to them.
For our school system to be a success, it needs to do more than elevate the masses-although the extent to which it is actually doing this is certainly questionable. The Intel results, when seen in the context of the poor local showing on the NAEP tests, are discouraging, but what's even more so, is the failure of the Fourth Estate to give New Yorkers an accurate picture of the real status of the schools under mayoral control.
Do you think that with all of our yeoman-like efforts to lift every voice and sing, we've let the talented soloists languish? And, with the exception of the two elite high schools, the drop off is percipitous: "Of course, we might well ask why a different story line hasn't appeared instead, one that asks why, with the exception of Bronx Science and Stuyvesant, the NYC public schools have virtually disappeared off the Intel STS map and what this relentless, seven-year, downhill trend says about our public high schools under Mayor Bloomberg and Chancellor Klein. We might also ask when the local print media were apparently, surreptitiously, also put under mayoral control."
Just as we have pointed out, there is a conspiracy of silence that continues to this very day-except when the local papers are exaggerating the results of mayoral control. But what concerns us is the plight of the city's best and the brightest-and we remember that the early Klein efforts were conspicuously absent when it came to the talented and gifted programs in the schools. So these results don't shock.
But is our schools cannot devote the proper resources to the city's talented kids, we have a failure of not only will but philosophy-one that is mirrored in the following Op-ed complaining about charter schools from the UFT's Mulgrew: "As New York finalizes its application for the federal Race to the Top program, a proposal to end the cap on the number of charter schools has been promoted as key to our success in getting these new federal funds. But promoters of this proposal are ignoring two other critical issues: The small role that charter schools play in the Race to the Top application, and the fact that city charters are not serving a representative sample of our neediest students."
Now Mulgrew exaggerates a bit here. Consider the following: "According to an analysis by the UFT using 2007-2008 data from the state Education Department, in Harlem (districts 4 and 5) nearly 72% of students in regular elementary and middle schools qualify for free lunch. Yet in charter schools in and around the neighborhood, the equivalent number is about 61%."
Not that much of a real difference in our view, but it might point to the fact that parents with a little higher incomes are looking to get their kids into better schools-and that charters are interested in promoting the talents of the more motivated and gifted. If so, more power to them.
For our school system to be a success, it needs to do more than elevate the masses-although the extent to which it is actually doing this is certainly questionable. The Intel results, when seen in the context of the poor local showing on the NAEP tests, are discouraging, but what's even more so, is the failure of the Fourth Estate to give New Yorkers an accurate picture of the real status of the schools under mayoral control.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Picking on Pedro
The NY Post is at it again-singling out Senator Pedro Espada for ridicule and leaving out any of the context that would, if understood, make mockery of the paper's invidious campaign of slander: " As for “controlling government spending” — let’s just say he’s trying to control as much of it as he can. Soundview, a nonprofit, relies heavily on Medicaid dollars — yet Espada appears to run it as a personal and political piggy bank.He took home a $460,000 salary in 2007, while Soundview pays his for-profit custodial outfit nearly $400,000 a year, far more than the job should cost. That’s money, Cuomo believes, that flows directly into Espada’s campaign accounts — and pockets."
Now for the missing context-and also missing is the fact that neither the Post's Rupert Murdoch, whose paper delights in making sport of Bronx pols, nor the attorney general-have ever done a damn thing to bring health care to the underserved South Bronx; something that Espada's Soundview HealthCare Network has done for over thirty years.
The NY Times captured this last year in an article that AG Cuomo's folks would do well to read carefully: "But on White Plains Road in the Castle Hill section of the Bronx, State Senator Pedro Espada Jr. is a central figure, to some a populist crusader, in a health care system that every year provides care to 25,000 poor people who have long been ignored by the medical establishment."
25,000 people a year! Clearly, Soundview isn't just another one of those phony neighborhood groups established by politicians looking for their own piggy bank-like the one set up by Ephraim Gonzales, the man whose seat Espada one in a hotly contested primary.
As the Times points out: "Mr. Espada may not be able to match Huey Long’s roads, bridges and hospitals in Depression-era Louisiana. But his Christmas toy drives, Thanksgiving dinners, baby showers and Mother’s and Father’s Day health fairs are famous in the Bronx...He freely admits that the Soundview HealthCare Network, a web of clinics that evolved out of a nonprofit group he founded more than 30 years ago, has made him a household name in many parts of the Bronx and helped him get elected to his first Senate seat in 1992, after a failed run for Congress in 1988. “I created a valuable human service organization that gave me tremendous name recognition in the community,” Mr. Espada, 55, said in an interview Friday. “The community always saw that as Pedro’s clinic. That does happen when you have a strong personality.”
And while we're at it, maybe the Post could-in the interest of being fair and balanced-examine the salaries of the entire not-for-profit sector in NYC. We're sure that Peter Gelb is doing a great job running the Metropolitan Opera, but is his $1.5 million justified? And is some of the money that goes to his salary coming from the same public sources that fund Soundview?
And take a look at our local universities, where the slash and burn, community be damned Lee Bollinger pulls in $1.4 million a year. Finally, not to beat the horse into a coma, go down to Philly where Ralph Muller runs the University of Pennsylvania Health System for a paltry $2.5 million a year. Isn't Sounview doing the same thing as UPenn? And the proof of the pudding is, as they say, in the eating.
The Times makes this clear in talking to the folks who utilize this vital health delivery system: "None of this seems to trouble patients or doctors at his clinics. “I don’t know the history so I can’t comment on it,” Leopoldo Fleming, a dapper 69-year-old percussionist, said last week as he left the flagship clinic, the Soundview Health Center at 731 White Plains Road. Mr. Fleming, who has lived in the neighborhood since 1959, was getting a checkup before setting off for a European gig in July. The clinic is better than the emergency room, he said, and “I like the way I’m treated when I come here.”
And the quality of the care is reflected by the quality of the doctors Soundview attracts: "The network’s medical director, Dr. David C. Collymore, is a New York success story. His parents are from Barbados, his mother a day care teacher and his father an accountant and preacher. He grew up in South Jamaica, Queens, graduated from Hunter College High School, one of the city’s elite public schools, and went to Howard University on scholarship."
Is Pedro Espada using his health network to make a name for himself. As Sarah Palin might say, "you betcha!" Is Mike Bloomberg using his money and financial network for self aggrandizement? You all get the picture-but for the Post, the focus is on the little guys, while the rich social cohort of the publisher (Steve Ross of Related comes to mind)-are wined, dined, and pocket lined by the mayor.
So Espada and Soundview are doing an immense amount of good things for the medically underserved communities of the South Bronx. As the Uptown Chronicle reports: "With 2,832,287 people in New York City eligible for Medicaid this year, according to New York State’s Department of Health and Human Services, there is a disproportionate number of patients receiving subsidized healthcare in the city’s poorer neighborhoods. In the South Bronx, where unemployment hovers above 13 percent, it’s the small conveniences that make Soundview so appealing to residents in the neighborhood. “It’s a big reason why I come here,” Rodriguez said. “They don’t hassle you. This place is meant for people who are poor. It’s not a big surprise to them or anything.”
So before the AG-and the Post-look to make an example out of Pedro Espada, maybe they should re-examine what he has been able to accomplish for the communities that his health clinics serve. The demonization of Espada is simply a caricature of the man and his work. When it is all said and done, there are few people in the legislature-or in statewide office for that matter-who have done more to help poor people than Pedro Espada. We're just saying.
Now for the missing context-and also missing is the fact that neither the Post's Rupert Murdoch, whose paper delights in making sport of Bronx pols, nor the attorney general-have ever done a damn thing to bring health care to the underserved South Bronx; something that Espada's Soundview HealthCare Network has done for over thirty years.
The NY Times captured this last year in an article that AG Cuomo's folks would do well to read carefully: "But on White Plains Road in the Castle Hill section of the Bronx, State Senator Pedro Espada Jr. is a central figure, to some a populist crusader, in a health care system that every year provides care to 25,000 poor people who have long been ignored by the medical establishment."
25,000 people a year! Clearly, Soundview isn't just another one of those phony neighborhood groups established by politicians looking for their own piggy bank-like the one set up by Ephraim Gonzales, the man whose seat Espada one in a hotly contested primary.
As the Times points out: "Mr. Espada may not be able to match Huey Long’s roads, bridges and hospitals in Depression-era Louisiana. But his Christmas toy drives, Thanksgiving dinners, baby showers and Mother’s and Father’s Day health fairs are famous in the Bronx...He freely admits that the Soundview HealthCare Network, a web of clinics that evolved out of a nonprofit group he founded more than 30 years ago, has made him a household name in many parts of the Bronx and helped him get elected to his first Senate seat in 1992, after a failed run for Congress in 1988. “I created a valuable human service organization that gave me tremendous name recognition in the community,” Mr. Espada, 55, said in an interview Friday. “The community always saw that as Pedro’s clinic. That does happen when you have a strong personality.”
And while we're at it, maybe the Post could-in the interest of being fair and balanced-examine the salaries of the entire not-for-profit sector in NYC. We're sure that Peter Gelb is doing a great job running the Metropolitan Opera, but is his $1.5 million justified? And is some of the money that goes to his salary coming from the same public sources that fund Soundview?
And take a look at our local universities, where the slash and burn, community be damned Lee Bollinger pulls in $1.4 million a year. Finally, not to beat the horse into a coma, go down to Philly where Ralph Muller runs the University of Pennsylvania Health System for a paltry $2.5 million a year. Isn't Sounview doing the same thing as UPenn? And the proof of the pudding is, as they say, in the eating.
The Times makes this clear in talking to the folks who utilize this vital health delivery system: "None of this seems to trouble patients or doctors at his clinics. “I don’t know the history so I can’t comment on it,” Leopoldo Fleming, a dapper 69-year-old percussionist, said last week as he left the flagship clinic, the Soundview Health Center at 731 White Plains Road. Mr. Fleming, who has lived in the neighborhood since 1959, was getting a checkup before setting off for a European gig in July. The clinic is better than the emergency room, he said, and “I like the way I’m treated when I come here.”
And the quality of the care is reflected by the quality of the doctors Soundview attracts: "The network’s medical director, Dr. David C. Collymore, is a New York success story. His parents are from Barbados, his mother a day care teacher and his father an accountant and preacher. He grew up in South Jamaica, Queens, graduated from Hunter College High School, one of the city’s elite public schools, and went to Howard University on scholarship."
Is Pedro Espada using his health network to make a name for himself. As Sarah Palin might say, "you betcha!" Is Mike Bloomberg using his money and financial network for self aggrandizement? You all get the picture-but for the Post, the focus is on the little guys, while the rich social cohort of the publisher (Steve Ross of Related comes to mind)-are wined, dined, and pocket lined by the mayor.
So Espada and Soundview are doing an immense amount of good things for the medically underserved communities of the South Bronx. As the Uptown Chronicle reports: "With 2,832,287 people in New York City eligible for Medicaid this year, according to New York State’s Department of Health and Human Services, there is a disproportionate number of patients receiving subsidized healthcare in the city’s poorer neighborhoods. In the South Bronx, where unemployment hovers above 13 percent, it’s the small conveniences that make Soundview so appealing to residents in the neighborhood. “It’s a big reason why I come here,” Rodriguez said. “They don’t hassle you. This place is meant for people who are poor. It’s not a big surprise to them or anything.”
So before the AG-and the Post-look to make an example out of Pedro Espada, maybe they should re-examine what he has been able to accomplish for the communities that his health clinics serve. The demonization of Espada is simply a caricature of the man and his work. When it is all said and done, there are few people in the legislature-or in statewide office for that matter-who have done more to help poor people than Pedro Espada. We're just saying.
Friday, January 15, 2010
REBNY on the March
Daily Politics is reporting that REBNY is looking to take on the WFP in this year's state senate races: "New York's real estate industry raised $750,000 last year to elect business-friendly candidates to the City Council, and its leaders say that was just a prelude to a multimillion-dollar effort in this year's state Senate races, DN City Hall Bureau Chief Adam Lisberg reports."
But, as we have pointed out-here, here, and here-this is what is known as a necessary condition, not, however, a sufficient one. The necessary aspects is of course related to the money that REBNY and the like minded will be able to raise. What's missing-and therefore the insufficiency-is the grass roots kindling that will be able to generate real mass support for political change.
If there is no linkage, in our view, the money will be unable by itself to match the ground game of the WFP-and the results in last year's city council races shouldn't be seen by REBNY's Spinola as a harbinger of the business community's clout: "This was a trial run to figure out what it takes so that the broader business community can get behind this kind of effort," said REBNY President Steve Spinola, who recently switched his own enrollment to the Independence Party. Spinola said the group hopes to raise as much as $5 million to be active in as many as 10 of the state's 62 Senate districts this year."
Spinola, for his part, realizes that real estate can't do this on its own: "We need allies, and we think the only way to get allies is to demonstrate that it is doable," Spinola said. "It can't be just real estate, simply because the effect is too big for just real estate to deal with it." And the Independence Party needs to be more Tea Party than Liberal Party if it hopes to succeed.
There is also the lack of unanimity among even the real estate cohort: "Other business leaders paid attention to Spinola's effort in 2009, but they're not yet convinced a third-party effort would be better than simply backing candidates directly."Making a presence felt in these races is important," said Frank Ricci of the Rent Stabilization Association, which also represents city landlords. The anger level among other business groups is something I've never seen," he said. "It'll be a lot more than just real estate. But it may not all be channeled into the Independence Party if they don't choose anti-tax, pro-business candidates."
But the larger point is that the anger that Ricci rightly sees isn't simply limited to the business community-it is more generalized and free floating, and is in need of an organization component to be fully activated. If the IP sees itself exclusively as purely an electoral phenomenon than it won't be able to maximize the anger and frustration that's out there. Getting to that anger is essential for any successful opposition to the WFP.
But, as we have pointed out-here, here, and here-this is what is known as a necessary condition, not, however, a sufficient one. The necessary aspects is of course related to the money that REBNY and the like minded will be able to raise. What's missing-and therefore the insufficiency-is the grass roots kindling that will be able to generate real mass support for political change.
If there is no linkage, in our view, the money will be unable by itself to match the ground game of the WFP-and the results in last year's city council races shouldn't be seen by REBNY's Spinola as a harbinger of the business community's clout: "This was a trial run to figure out what it takes so that the broader business community can get behind this kind of effort," said REBNY President Steve Spinola, who recently switched his own enrollment to the Independence Party. Spinola said the group hopes to raise as much as $5 million to be active in as many as 10 of the state's 62 Senate districts this year."
Spinola, for his part, realizes that real estate can't do this on its own: "We need allies, and we think the only way to get allies is to demonstrate that it is doable," Spinola said. "It can't be just real estate, simply because the effect is too big for just real estate to deal with it." And the Independence Party needs to be more Tea Party than Liberal Party if it hopes to succeed.
There is also the lack of unanimity among even the real estate cohort: "Other business leaders paid attention to Spinola's effort in 2009, but they're not yet convinced a third-party effort would be better than simply backing candidates directly."Making a presence felt in these races is important," said Frank Ricci of the Rent Stabilization Association, which also represents city landlords. The anger level among other business groups is something I've never seen," he said. "It'll be a lot more than just real estate. But it may not all be channeled into the Independence Party if they don't choose anti-tax, pro-business candidates."
But the larger point is that the anger that Ricci rightly sees isn't simply limited to the business community-it is more generalized and free floating, and is in need of an organization component to be fully activated. If the IP sees itself exclusively as purely an electoral phenomenon than it won't be able to maximize the anger and frustration that's out there. Getting to that anger is essential for any successful opposition to the WFP.
Not Working for Him
John Avlon joins with us in today's NY Post with a critique of the ideological danger that the Working Families Part poses-to both the Democratic Party as well as to NY State as a whole: "Formed a dozen years ago by local labor unions and the now-infamous community-organizing group ACORN, the WFP has emerged as the key power broker and ground-game organizer in local liberal politics -- thanks to its remarkable rate of success in backing leftist candidates in Democratic primaries...With most elections in the city determined in closed partisan primaries, the WFP endorsement -- and the help it brings -- has become critical for any winning campaign. This has shifted the Democratic Party and the entire local elected government significantly to the left."
But does a shifting political landscape make the leftward shift a danger? Well, if what's happening in Massachusetts is any indication-and the latest poll shocker shows Republican Scott Brown with a four point lead in a state where Republican enrollment tips the scales at 14%-then the shift is into a potential mind field in the upcoming statewide races.
And making it even more ominous is the poll's findings about ObamaCare: "But if Brown’s momentum holds, he is poised to succeed the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy - and to halt health-care reform, the issue the late senator dubbed “the cause of my life.” Yet even in the bluest state, it appears Kennedy’s quest for universal health care has fallen out of favor, with 51 percent of voters saying they oppose the “national near-universal health-care package” and 61 percent saying they believe the government cannot afford to pay for it."
If this is a shift, it is certainly a seismic one. So by saying, "Leftward Ho," the Dem/WFP alliance may be heading them both into a political buzz saw come November-and the zombie-like response from our two senators on the president's proposed bank tax, one that might just cripple a significant slice of the city's tax base, is symptomatic of a general tone deafness.
So, while we're uncertain about the legal ramifications of the WFP tial in Staten Island-now postponed until February 23rd-we more convinced than ever that the continued tail wagging by the WFP spells doom for Democrats. We'll give Avlon the last word about the dangers of the leftwing lurch: "More important, the "left" here means a party established by public-sector unions and a community group that depends on taxpayer funds -- a profile that takes on more sinister connotations at a time when our city and state face deep budget deficits."
But does a shifting political landscape make the leftward shift a danger? Well, if what's happening in Massachusetts is any indication-and the latest poll shocker shows Republican Scott Brown with a four point lead in a state where Republican enrollment tips the scales at 14%-then the shift is into a potential mind field in the upcoming statewide races.
And making it even more ominous is the poll's findings about ObamaCare: "But if Brown’s momentum holds, he is poised to succeed the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy - and to halt health-care reform, the issue the late senator dubbed “the cause of my life.” Yet even in the bluest state, it appears Kennedy’s quest for universal health care has fallen out of favor, with 51 percent of voters saying they oppose the “national near-universal health-care package” and 61 percent saying they believe the government cannot afford to pay for it."
If this is a shift, it is certainly a seismic one. So by saying, "Leftward Ho," the Dem/WFP alliance may be heading them both into a political buzz saw come November-and the zombie-like response from our two senators on the president's proposed bank tax, one that might just cripple a significant slice of the city's tax base, is symptomatic of a general tone deafness.
So, while we're uncertain about the legal ramifications of the WFP tial in Staten Island-now postponed until February 23rd-we more convinced than ever that the continued tail wagging by the WFP spells doom for Democrats. We'll give Avlon the last word about the dangers of the leftwing lurch: "More important, the "left" here means a party established by public-sector unions and a community group that depends on taxpayer funds -- a profile that takes on more sinister connotations at a time when our city and state face deep budget deficits."
Familiarity Breeds...
Tom Robbins examines the Working Families Party kerfuffle in this week's Village Voice-but doesn't think much about the legal issues involved. He does focus, however on the history repeating itself angle; and sees the challenge to the WFP having echoes from the 1930s "In 1938, in the teeth of the Great Depression, the Roosevelt administration won passage of a 40-hour-week wage law. Employers were now obliged to pay their workers overtime. Shock and horror echoed across the nation's business establishments.The mightiest oligarchs of the time—leaders of Republic Steel, Sun Oil, Kennecott Copper, Eli Lilly & Co.—combined to create something called the Committee for Constitutional Government, which began pouring cash into the coffers of candidates pledging to restore free enterprise, lower taxes on the wealthy, and tame organized labor."
That was then, and this is now: "History loves a do-over, and there's a small-bore version of this scenario playing out right now in New York. It began last spring, when the labor-backed Working Families Party scared the bejesus out of the propertied classes by providing much of the political heft behind the move to impose a new budget-balancing tax on high-level earners...The string of party successes rang alarm bells among monied interests around the state, who gathered in a confab to try and devise a counter-strategy."
And the counter strategy was to team up with the Independence Party to challenge the growing hegemony of the WFP-and the team attracted some heavy hitters: "First to pick up this cudgel was Steve Spinola, who was hired by the city's largest landlords to run the Real Estate Board back in 1986 after several years in dress rehearsal as city development commissioner. Spinola helped round up some $700,000 this fall in landlord donations in a mostly losing effort to stave off WFP-supported candidates in several Council races."
The result? Not too good-as WFP successes continued relatively unabated. So Robbins doesn't think that the political challenge will prove to be too daunting; and, as it is currently configured, we tend to agree with his assessment. But what about the legal challenge? Robbins derides this as well: "Plaintiffs in the case are five loyal supporters of Guy Molinari, the venerable GOP warhorse and former Staten Island borough president who has long been Giuliani's biggest booster. Like the rest of the Republican establishment, Molinari has a vested interest in any legal knee-capping of the WFP. Trial begins this week, but so far the only evidence Mastro has offered is a pair of affidavits by his own former City Hall aide turned political consultant, Jake Menges. Back in Giuliani Time, Menges was best remembered for his charge across the Council chambers where he feigned throttling a black Councilman who had gone against the administration's wishes. Menges raged: "You can forget your fucking Beacon school," according to Jim Dwyer in the Daily News, who dubbed Menges a "baby hack."
Is this analysis correct? Well, according to Daily Politics, there may be more to it than the WFP-sympathetic Robbins would have us believe-and the damaging testimony of the treasurer of Debi Rose's campaign was an embarrassment: "The Working Families Party trial is on hold at least until Feb. 23 while a witness consults an attorney and lawyers for the labor-backed party and its for-profit arm, Data and Field Services, conduct a search for additional documents, the DN's Erin Einhorn reports. The trial was supposed to resume this morning after a day of testimony yesterday. But Staten Island Judge Anthony Giacobbe huddled with lawyers for both sides for more than an hour, then brought the court back to session just long enough to offer legal advice to David Thomas, who was campaign treasurer to Debi Rose’s City Council campaign."
It appears as if Thomas, who describes the Rose campaign as "dysfunctional," may have perjured himself in his claim that an affidavit drafted in his name was written by others and he claims little knowledge of its content. Now this might not be attributable to WFP-inspired machinations, but more to the campaign's ineptitude, but clearly Houston we have a problem.
And City Hall, the paper that has led the charge against the WFP, agrees: "Over the summer, Council Member Debi Rose’s campaign treasurer swore to and provided intricate affidavits for the Campaign Finance Board in response to inquiries about the campaign’s relationship with Data & Field Services, the for-profit company owned by the Working Families Party. But when on Wednesday he was presented on the stand with the affidavits as part of the case being brought against Rose and Data & Field Services by Randy Mastro, the treasurer, David Thomas, said he had not written the affidavits—and in fact, was unfamiliar with most of the information contained within them."
But in our view, the problem that the WFP presents is thoroughly political-and not in the way Robbins characterizes it: "Actually, the WFP's biggest flaws are hardly indictable offenses. Its leaders tend to lapse into the arrogant lingo of the old-school bosses they seek to replace. They talk about taking political "scalps" just to show that they know how it's done; diligent legislators outside the inner circles of power are dismissed as "irrelevant."
Robbins goes on to develop, in comparing the WFP to FDR, the kind of stretch marks that only a women carrying sextuplets could exhibit: "But then you have to figure that FDR's team—the one that changed America—suffered its own share of swollen egos." As if egotism was the only WFP sin. WFP=New Deal? Not happening for us.
We're not sure what is indictable here, but we do feel that the WFP's sins transcend out sized personality problems-and the landlord opposition only serves to camouflage the danger to the polity-and to the Democrats-that the WFP represents. Put simply, the party is driving the policy discussion way out into left field-a dangerous piece of real estate to occupy in the upcoming election cycle.
It is out of touch with real working families-and the Democratic dog better be careful before its WFP tail puts it into, well, a tailspin. But for that to happen, the landlords need to take a giant step back and allow the folks-you know the homeowners, small business people, and the average NY tax payers-to come front and center. And speaking of dogs, there's one big sleeping one called an outraged electorate that could throw the Democrats for a loop come this November if they're not more careful about the company they keep.
That was then, and this is now: "History loves a do-over, and there's a small-bore version of this scenario playing out right now in New York. It began last spring, when the labor-backed Working Families Party scared the bejesus out of the propertied classes by providing much of the political heft behind the move to impose a new budget-balancing tax on high-level earners...The string of party successes rang alarm bells among monied interests around the state, who gathered in a confab to try and devise a counter-strategy."
And the counter strategy was to team up with the Independence Party to challenge the growing hegemony of the WFP-and the team attracted some heavy hitters: "First to pick up this cudgel was Steve Spinola, who was hired by the city's largest landlords to run the Real Estate Board back in 1986 after several years in dress rehearsal as city development commissioner. Spinola helped round up some $700,000 this fall in landlord donations in a mostly losing effort to stave off WFP-supported candidates in several Council races."
The result? Not too good-as WFP successes continued relatively unabated. So Robbins doesn't think that the political challenge will prove to be too daunting; and, as it is currently configured, we tend to agree with his assessment. But what about the legal challenge? Robbins derides this as well: "Plaintiffs in the case are five loyal supporters of Guy Molinari, the venerable GOP warhorse and former Staten Island borough president who has long been Giuliani's biggest booster. Like the rest of the Republican establishment, Molinari has a vested interest in any legal knee-capping of the WFP. Trial begins this week, but so far the only evidence Mastro has offered is a pair of affidavits by his own former City Hall aide turned political consultant, Jake Menges. Back in Giuliani Time, Menges was best remembered for his charge across the Council chambers where he feigned throttling a black Councilman who had gone against the administration's wishes. Menges raged: "You can forget your fucking Beacon school," according to Jim Dwyer in the Daily News, who dubbed Menges a "baby hack."
Is this analysis correct? Well, according to Daily Politics, there may be more to it than the WFP-sympathetic Robbins would have us believe-and the damaging testimony of the treasurer of Debi Rose's campaign was an embarrassment: "The Working Families Party trial is on hold at least until Feb. 23 while a witness consults an attorney and lawyers for the labor-backed party and its for-profit arm, Data and Field Services, conduct a search for additional documents, the DN's Erin Einhorn reports. The trial was supposed to resume this morning after a day of testimony yesterday. But Staten Island Judge Anthony Giacobbe huddled with lawyers for both sides for more than an hour, then brought the court back to session just long enough to offer legal advice to David Thomas, who was campaign treasurer to Debi Rose’s City Council campaign."
It appears as if Thomas, who describes the Rose campaign as "dysfunctional," may have perjured himself in his claim that an affidavit drafted in his name was written by others and he claims little knowledge of its content. Now this might not be attributable to WFP-inspired machinations, but more to the campaign's ineptitude, but clearly Houston we have a problem.
And City Hall, the paper that has led the charge against the WFP, agrees: "Over the summer, Council Member Debi Rose’s campaign treasurer swore to and provided intricate affidavits for the Campaign Finance Board in response to inquiries about the campaign’s relationship with Data & Field Services, the for-profit company owned by the Working Families Party. But when on Wednesday he was presented on the stand with the affidavits as part of the case being brought against Rose and Data & Field Services by Randy Mastro, the treasurer, David Thomas, said he had not written the affidavits—and in fact, was unfamiliar with most of the information contained within them."
But in our view, the problem that the WFP presents is thoroughly political-and not in the way Robbins characterizes it: "Actually, the WFP's biggest flaws are hardly indictable offenses. Its leaders tend to lapse into the arrogant lingo of the old-school bosses they seek to replace. They talk about taking political "scalps" just to show that they know how it's done; diligent legislators outside the inner circles of power are dismissed as "irrelevant."
Robbins goes on to develop, in comparing the WFP to FDR, the kind of stretch marks that only a women carrying sextuplets could exhibit: "But then you have to figure that FDR's team—the one that changed America—suffered its own share of swollen egos." As if egotism was the only WFP sin. WFP=New Deal? Not happening for us.
We're not sure what is indictable here, but we do feel that the WFP's sins transcend out sized personality problems-and the landlord opposition only serves to camouflage the danger to the polity-and to the Democrats-that the WFP represents. Put simply, the party is driving the policy discussion way out into left field-a dangerous piece of real estate to occupy in the upcoming election cycle.
It is out of touch with real working families-and the Democratic dog better be careful before its WFP tail puts it into, well, a tailspin. But for that to happen, the landlords need to take a giant step back and allow the folks-you know the homeowners, small business people, and the average NY tax payers-to come front and center. And speaking of dogs, there's one big sleeping one called an outraged electorate that could throw the Democrats for a loop come this November if they're not more careful about the company they keep.
Thursday, January 14, 2010
Without Fear or Favor?
The NY Post is reporting that AG Cuomo is going after State Senator Pedro Espada for wrongdoing alleged by the senator's Soundview Health Clinic: "Attorney General Andrew Cuomo said yesterday he has found "extensive evidence" of wrongdoing by state Senate Majority Leader Pedro Espada, including bilking his Bronx not-for-profit health-care clinic of $130,000 a year by switching a janitorial contract to an Espada-owned firm.The explosive allegations were outlined in a 17-page motion filed in Manhattan state Supreme Court that seeks to enforce a subpoena for a wide range of records issued to the for-profit Espada Management Co. in August."
Cuomo appears eager to demonstrate his reform bona fides in preparation for his anticipated run for the governor's office this year. The question we have is, Will the AG show even handedness by showing the same vigor against the alleged illegal lobbying activity of Claire Shulman and her bogus not-for-profit? Will Coumo go after the more egregious eminent domain abuse of the Bloomberg administration against the businesses of Willets Point?
Shulman, the borough of Queens' pol emeritus, is tied into the entire Queens political establishment, while Espada is more of an independent lone wolf. And let's not forget who set up this phony grass roots vehicle-Mike Bloomberg's EDC. Therefore, going after Claire takes a good deal more intestinal fortitude than beating up on the editorial boards' favorite whipping boy, Pistol Pete Espada.
So, as Meatloaf once sang: "What'll it be boy?" Will AC exercise the full power of his office in an equitable way? Or will he take a pass on the more connected Shulman. Inquiring minds want to know.
Cuomo appears eager to demonstrate his reform bona fides in preparation for his anticipated run for the governor's office this year. The question we have is, Will the AG show even handedness by showing the same vigor against the alleged illegal lobbying activity of Claire Shulman and her bogus not-for-profit? Will Coumo go after the more egregious eminent domain abuse of the Bloomberg administration against the businesses of Willets Point?
Shulman, the borough of Queens' pol emeritus, is tied into the entire Queens political establishment, while Espada is more of an independent lone wolf. And let's not forget who set up this phony grass roots vehicle-Mike Bloomberg's EDC. Therefore, going after Claire takes a good deal more intestinal fortitude than beating up on the editorial boards' favorite whipping boy, Pistol Pete Espada.
So, as Meatloaf once sang: "What'll it be boy?" Will AC exercise the full power of his office in an equitable way? Or will he take a pass on the more connected Shulman. Inquiring minds want to know.
Ballot Police
Wayne Barrett has a must read piece in this week's Village Voice on the battle to keep Kirsten Gillibrand from having to face any primary opponent this September in her first race for statewide office: "Thank God for the ballot police. But for them, five or six elected Democrats would've already committed the crime of running against Kirsten Gillibrand. Now we have the man Harry Reid obviously mistook for Barack Obama, Harold Ford Jr., illegally panhandling at Steve Rattner's 5th Avenue apartment, shaking down big donors in a brazen attempt to challenge our unelected senator, handpicked by our unelected governor. Zero tolerance for broken window violators!"
And then he gets to the issue of Ford's about face on the issues-and calls out Empire State Pride for its attack on Ford's "evolution." "Empire State Pride Agenda jumped on Ford, too, angered because he was against gay marriage before he was for it, just like Schumer and Gillibrand. On this question, for heterosexual politicians, it's all about when they jumped out of the closet. He voted for a constitutional ban on gay marriage, but supported civil unions, unfortunate, as he was, to arrive in the House 10 years before Gillibrand, and leaving just as she got there in 2007. Even as late as December 2008, Gillibrand was blessed by an unusually personal gestation period on the marriage issue, since the interview she gave opposing it wasn't actually published until after Governor Paterson gave her a senate seat and she'd switched positions on the issue, making it possible for her to claim, as she does, that she's all but performed them."
That didn't stop Alan Van Cappele from calling Ford a, "snake oil salesman." Apparently, as Barrett says, altering your views is alright if you, what? We're not sure the exact criteria on this touchy subject, and the more we look at both candidates the dizzier we get. We are, however, happy to see that Ford is going after both New York senators on health care-a fact that the green Gillibrand, finally overcoming her laryngitis, finds objectionable.
As the NY Daily News reports: "Responding to a call by Ford that she should vote "no" on any health care overhaul that costs New York Medicaid cash, Gillibrand said: "I will take a backseat to no one when it comes to fighting for New York. If Harold Ford wants to move from Tennessee and run in New York, he is welcome to do so," she said of the former Memphis congressman."His record of being anti-choice, anti-marriage equality and now opposed to President Obama's health care legislation may be right for Tennessee" but not New York, she added."
Wow. If we had Harry Reid sensibilities we would be mumbling something about the pot and the kettle right about now-but we digress. Gillibrand does have chutzpah-something that New Yorkers can relate to-given her mutating political stances. And Ford's mouthpiece responds: "It's sad to see the unelected senator resort to the politics-as-usual of distorting records," Ford spokesman Davidson Goldin shot back. Goldin insisted Ford is pro-choice, despite his once having cast himself as "pro-life," and said he has "evolved" on gay marriage, much like Gillibrand."
But we'll give Wayne Barrett the last word in this lesson in evolution: "Does any real Democrat with an open mind and a progressive heart have the slightest idea of who they'd vote for between these two at this stage? How can you tell? They will still be evolving primary morning."
Which gets us to the point we made yesterday about the fact that the leftwing of the party-now known as progressive (Bull Moose?)-has no one to blame but itself on this spectacle, having obediently benched itself because the White House bosses told them to sit quietly on the sidelines-something that the NY Post screamed about yesterday: "What is it that gives President Obama the notion that he's entitled to a vote on who represents New York in the US Senate? He's made it clear from the git-go that he prefers seat-warming cipher Kirsten Gillibrand as a permanent replacement for Hillary Rodham Clinton. And it's easy to understand why: Gillibrand is a regular Docile Dora when it comes to the administration -- doing what she's told and not making a peep about it, no matter how much damage it does to New York."
All of which leaves us with the thought that there is a wide opening for Republicans in the aftermath of this side splitting reincarnation. Imagine, a candidate from the other side who actually has views that have held fast for over twenty minutes-and really believes that the current political agenda of the Obami isn't really good for New York. After this primary battle of chameleons, this mystery candidate might actually win. Can anyone say, Scott Brown?
And then he gets to the issue of Ford's about face on the issues-and calls out Empire State Pride for its attack on Ford's "evolution." "Empire State Pride Agenda jumped on Ford, too, angered because he was against gay marriage before he was for it, just like Schumer and Gillibrand. On this question, for heterosexual politicians, it's all about when they jumped out of the closet. He voted for a constitutional ban on gay marriage, but supported civil unions, unfortunate, as he was, to arrive in the House 10 years before Gillibrand, and leaving just as she got there in 2007. Even as late as December 2008, Gillibrand was blessed by an unusually personal gestation period on the marriage issue, since the interview she gave opposing it wasn't actually published until after Governor Paterson gave her a senate seat and she'd switched positions on the issue, making it possible for her to claim, as she does, that she's all but performed them."
That didn't stop Alan Van Cappele from calling Ford a, "snake oil salesman." Apparently, as Barrett says, altering your views is alright if you, what? We're not sure the exact criteria on this touchy subject, and the more we look at both candidates the dizzier we get. We are, however, happy to see that Ford is going after both New York senators on health care-a fact that the green Gillibrand, finally overcoming her laryngitis, finds objectionable.
As the NY Daily News reports: "Responding to a call by Ford that she should vote "no" on any health care overhaul that costs New York Medicaid cash, Gillibrand said: "I will take a backseat to no one when it comes to fighting for New York. If Harold Ford wants to move from Tennessee and run in New York, he is welcome to do so," she said of the former Memphis congressman."His record of being anti-choice, anti-marriage equality and now opposed to President Obama's health care legislation may be right for Tennessee" but not New York, she added."
Wow. If we had Harry Reid sensibilities we would be mumbling something about the pot and the kettle right about now-but we digress. Gillibrand does have chutzpah-something that New Yorkers can relate to-given her mutating political stances. And Ford's mouthpiece responds: "It's sad to see the unelected senator resort to the politics-as-usual of distorting records," Ford spokesman Davidson Goldin shot back. Goldin insisted Ford is pro-choice, despite his once having cast himself as "pro-life," and said he has "evolved" on gay marriage, much like Gillibrand."
But we'll give Wayne Barrett the last word in this lesson in evolution: "Does any real Democrat with an open mind and a progressive heart have the slightest idea of who they'd vote for between these two at this stage? How can you tell? They will still be evolving primary morning."
Which gets us to the point we made yesterday about the fact that the leftwing of the party-now known as progressive (Bull Moose?)-has no one to blame but itself on this spectacle, having obediently benched itself because the White House bosses told them to sit quietly on the sidelines-something that the NY Post screamed about yesterday: "What is it that gives President Obama the notion that he's entitled to a vote on who represents New York in the US Senate? He's made it clear from the git-go that he prefers seat-warming cipher Kirsten Gillibrand as a permanent replacement for Hillary Rodham Clinton. And it's easy to understand why: Gillibrand is a regular Docile Dora when it comes to the administration -- doing what she's told and not making a peep about it, no matter how much damage it does to New York."
All of which leaves us with the thought that there is a wide opening for Republicans in the aftermath of this side splitting reincarnation. Imagine, a candidate from the other side who actually has views that have held fast for over twenty minutes-and really believes that the current political agenda of the Obami isn't really good for New York. After this primary battle of chameleons, this mystery candidate might actually win. Can anyone say, Scott Brown?
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Gluttons for Punishment
The NY Times, like an emaciated dog with a bone, can't seem to let go of the bogus calorie posting study done at city Starbucks. Now, however, they use the study ti highlight that people become more gluttonous during the winter holidays-who knew? As the Times tells us: "When a study on New Yorkers’ eating habits was released last week, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, city health officials and the report’s authors focused on what appeared to be a triumph of government policy: After the city began requiring restaurant chains to post calories, customers ordered lighter food. But the study also revealed a stronger trend, one that speaks to the weight of human nature: Around Thanksgiving and Christmas, New Yorkers seemed to lose all control. Statistically speaking, they pigged out."
But as we pointed out earlier, this was no triumph-except of misdirection and spin-since the focus was on the latte crowd and not those fast fooders who are in the forefront of the obesity focus. As we said when the study came out: "But of course everyone knows that the typical Starbucks customer isn't from the same demographic as the typical McDonalds patron-and it is the Big Mac that is the real target of the calorie posting policy. Your Starbucks denizen will be notably higher educated and less obese than her counterpart at McDonalds and Burger King."
So what's with this rehash-and what relationship does it have to the ersatz triumph? None really; and there is, of course, no evidence that the McDonalds crowd let up at all after the first of the year-but that didn't stop the Times from this observation: "Some customers interviewed at the Starbucks at Broadway and West 95th Street in Manhattan this week said that the calorie postings had changed their buying habits. Others were unmoved."
Our advice? Why doesn't the paper go over to White Castle on Fulton Street, or Burger King on Fordham Road to interview those customers. By failing to do so, the paper reinforces the false triumphalism of the Bloombergistas; while at the same time underscoring the Times' own elitist tendencies.
AFordable New York?
We are indeed witnessing quite a political spectacle in NY State-a Herculean effort to prevent anyone, no offense Tasini, from challenging the unelected junior senator. But, given the nail biter in Massachusetts, maybe there is some logic behind the effort.
In any case, Kirsten Gillibrand is someone who deserves to be challenged-and NY deserves a representative who hasn't been afflicted with lockjaw when it comes to the crucial issues of the day; someone who isn't simply a muñeca for the state's senior senator, an ambitious pol who apparently feels that ascending to the majority leader position is more important than standing up for his own constituents on health care.
And then there's the question of Gillibrand's, how should we put this, malleability on the issues. Her mentor Schumer claims that she has "evolved," but on closer examination what looks to him as evolution more accurately resembles an act of mutation. Clearly, she is someone whose allegiance is ruled by expedience. So, we agree with the NY daily News' Bill Hammond who points out that: "Gillibrand is running scared." And, given her staggering about faces-and low poll numbers-who can blame her?
As Hammond says: "If anyone deserves a spirited, competitive election this fall, it's Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand. She is, after all, the unelected appointee of an unelected governor. New Yorkers were turned off by her history of conservative positions on gun control and immigration, and dizzied when she reversed those positions at the drop of a hat."
Not to mention the strong armed tactics being employed by the president: "By rights, she should be facing the political fight of her life - beginning with a contentious Democratic primary in September. But Gillibrand supporters from President Obama on down are doing their level best to shut the voters out again - by strong-arming every serious candidate out of the primary race."
Which gets us to the potential challenge of Harold Ford-one of those immigrants to the state that the mayor always welcomes. Ford, unlike Gillibrand, is being excoriated for his adaptability to the politics of his adopted state. As the NY Times reports: "But what is likely to gain the most immediate attention is his record on issues, which Ms. Gillibrand’s defenders say is too conservative for New York. Mr. Ford twice voted for legislation in the House that would make same-sex marriage illegal. In 2006, when Tennessee voters considered a ballot initiative to outlaw the practice, he vowed to support it. “I oppose gay marriage,” he said at the time."
As far as we're concerned, however, on the question of political alterations, the contest between Ford and Gillibrand is a push-which than raises the question of who is best situated-by temperament and political outlook-to be the next junior senator? In our view, Ford rates more highly-and it is on the economy and health care legislation is where he stands out, particularly when it comes to providing a counterweight to the current direction in Washington: "He blasted her support for the proposed health care overhaul, which is expected to cost New York an extra $1 billion a year, and for opposing the taxpayer bailout of the financial industry. “It was a mistake,” he said, noting that most Wall Street firms had already paid back the money. “How can you be against ensuring that the lifeblood of your city and of your state survives?”
And Ford goes on to say: “I am a capitalist,” he said. “I believe that people take risk, and there are rewards if they do well; they should lose if they don’t.” Incredible, huh? A candidate that actually supports a strong free market economy. That being said, while we do feel that Ford is too entrenched with those big business interests that have colluded with government to get us into this economic mess, we feel that he at least will exercise independent leadership.
Here's his take on what we feel is a crucial difference with the current office holder: "Zeroing in on a perception that Ms. Gillibrand too readily defers to Senate leaders, especially Senator Charles E. Schumer, he added: “We have a fundamental difference on independence. We have a difference on the level, the kind and the stature of advocacy New Yorkers deserve. And we have some honest differences on issues.”
Is Ford an ideal candidate? Probably not to the left wing of the party. But where's the progressive alternative to Gillibrand? Cowed by the party bosses and some thug who works at the While House-so their complaints about Ford's conservatism, and their defense of the newly liberal Gillibrand, are pretty silly given their own lack of political fortitude.
So bring it on-and come on Republicans, find a decent candidate to oppose the winner of the Democratic primary. New York, and the rest of the country, is facing some monumental challenges. And there are some real questions about what kind of policies are best suited to meet these challenges. Which means that the absence of a strong democratic process-signified by party bossism at the state and federal levels-is disastrous for the country.
And Gillibrand should realize this and embrace the primary challenge as a chance to articulate where she-and not some puppet master-stands on the great issues of the day. We'll give Hammond the last word: "If Gillibrand wants to be taken seriously as a leader, she should call off the dogs and welcome Ford into the race. If her criticisms to date are on target, he's a reverse carpetbagger from Tennessee who's too conservative for this state's voting public. So, what does she have to be afraid of?"
In any case, Kirsten Gillibrand is someone who deserves to be challenged-and NY deserves a representative who hasn't been afflicted with lockjaw when it comes to the crucial issues of the day; someone who isn't simply a muñeca for the state's senior senator, an ambitious pol who apparently feels that ascending to the majority leader position is more important than standing up for his own constituents on health care.
And then there's the question of Gillibrand's, how should we put this, malleability on the issues. Her mentor Schumer claims that she has "evolved," but on closer examination what looks to him as evolution more accurately resembles an act of mutation. Clearly, she is someone whose allegiance is ruled by expedience. So, we agree with the NY daily News' Bill Hammond who points out that: "Gillibrand is running scared." And, given her staggering about faces-and low poll numbers-who can blame her?
As Hammond says: "If anyone deserves a spirited, competitive election this fall, it's Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand. She is, after all, the unelected appointee of an unelected governor. New Yorkers were turned off by her history of conservative positions on gun control and immigration, and dizzied when she reversed those positions at the drop of a hat."
Not to mention the strong armed tactics being employed by the president: "By rights, she should be facing the political fight of her life - beginning with a contentious Democratic primary in September. But Gillibrand supporters from President Obama on down are doing their level best to shut the voters out again - by strong-arming every serious candidate out of the primary race."
Which gets us to the potential challenge of Harold Ford-one of those immigrants to the state that the mayor always welcomes. Ford, unlike Gillibrand, is being excoriated for his adaptability to the politics of his adopted state. As the NY Times reports: "But what is likely to gain the most immediate attention is his record on issues, which Ms. Gillibrand’s defenders say is too conservative for New York. Mr. Ford twice voted for legislation in the House that would make same-sex marriage illegal. In 2006, when Tennessee voters considered a ballot initiative to outlaw the practice, he vowed to support it. “I oppose gay marriage,” he said at the time."
As far as we're concerned, however, on the question of political alterations, the contest between Ford and Gillibrand is a push-which than raises the question of who is best situated-by temperament and political outlook-to be the next junior senator? In our view, Ford rates more highly-and it is on the economy and health care legislation is where he stands out, particularly when it comes to providing a counterweight to the current direction in Washington: "He blasted her support for the proposed health care overhaul, which is expected to cost New York an extra $1 billion a year, and for opposing the taxpayer bailout of the financial industry. “It was a mistake,” he said, noting that most Wall Street firms had already paid back the money. “How can you be against ensuring that the lifeblood of your city and of your state survives?”
And Ford goes on to say: “I am a capitalist,” he said. “I believe that people take risk, and there are rewards if they do well; they should lose if they don’t.” Incredible, huh? A candidate that actually supports a strong free market economy. That being said, while we do feel that Ford is too entrenched with those big business interests that have colluded with government to get us into this economic mess, we feel that he at least will exercise independent leadership.
Here's his take on what we feel is a crucial difference with the current office holder: "Zeroing in on a perception that Ms. Gillibrand too readily defers to Senate leaders, especially Senator Charles E. Schumer, he added: “We have a fundamental difference on independence. We have a difference on the level, the kind and the stature of advocacy New Yorkers deserve. And we have some honest differences on issues.”
Is Ford an ideal candidate? Probably not to the left wing of the party. But where's the progressive alternative to Gillibrand? Cowed by the party bosses and some thug who works at the While House-so their complaints about Ford's conservatism, and their defense of the newly liberal Gillibrand, are pretty silly given their own lack of political fortitude.
So bring it on-and come on Republicans, find a decent candidate to oppose the winner of the Democratic primary. New York, and the rest of the country, is facing some monumental challenges. And there are some real questions about what kind of policies are best suited to meet these challenges. Which means that the absence of a strong democratic process-signified by party bossism at the state and federal levels-is disastrous for the country.
And Gillibrand should realize this and embrace the primary challenge as a chance to articulate where she-and not some puppet master-stands on the great issues of the day. We'll give Hammond the last word: "If Gillibrand wants to be taken seriously as a leader, she should call off the dogs and welcome Ford into the race. If her criticisms to date are on target, he's a reverse carpetbagger from Tennessee who's too conservative for this state's voting public. So, what does she have to be afraid of?"
InSalting Food Fraud
Now we have been constantly harping on the fraudulent-and dangerous to our liberties-nature of this city's attempt to instruct is citizenry on what it should be eating. The efforts, ranging from the ban on transfat to the forced posting of calories on menu boards, dramatize a mentality that is both intrusive, as well as scientifically questionable. Daniel Compton picks up on this theme in regards to the recently announced anti-salt policy that DOH has inaugurated.
As Compton points out, there is no underlying scientific research that justifies this new effort to tell people what's good for them: "On Monday, city officials rolled out an initiative to curb the salt content in manufactured and packaged foods. But the idea behind it -- that salt intake has reached extreme levels in America -- is a myth, and this "solution" wouldn't work, anyway."
Compton lays out why this isn't a public health problem: "Nutritionists at the University of California/Davis just published the first and only study to address salt intake and public policy. They found that people are naturally inclined to regulate salt intake to physiologically determined levels by unconsciously selecting foods to meet their needs -- and even the most extreme interventions don't do much. "
So, just as with calorie posting-an idea that comes out of Michael Jacobson's Center for Science in the Public Interest (Jacobson has recommended making the distribution of Halloween candy illegal)-we find that there are no peer reviewed studies that even give the inclination that this is smart public policy: "The UC Davis study (published in the October issue of The Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology) looked at data from more than 19,000 individuals from 33 countries worldwide. It determined that daily sodium intake ranges only from 2,700 milligrams to 4,900 mg, with the worldwide average of 3,700 mg. It also determined that the average American consumes about 3,400 mg a day -- disproving the claim spread by advocates such as the Center for Science in the Public Interest that US salt consumption is out of control. In other words, Farley's trying to fight a problem that doesn't exist."
Yet somehow Dr. Tom wants to reduce the salt intake to levels that really don't make for good health at all: "Worse, his new guidelines say that daily sodium intake for most people shouldn't exceed 1,500 mg -- which is a ridiculous 45 percent below the bottom of the normal consumption range the UC Davis study identified, and a full 60 percent lower than the worldwide average. The researchers also cite decades of research describing the specific mechanism by which the central nervous system, acting together with several organ systems, controls our appetite for salt."
So not only is the current initiative dangerously intrusive, it just may be scientifically unsupportable. Who knew? But this doesn't deter the food police who believe that the folks are in desperate need of guidance. In fact, the UC California study indicates that the city's entire effort is a waste of time and money it doesn't have: "The researchers also cite decades of research describing the specific mechanism by which the central nervous system, acting together with several organ systems, controls our appetite for salt. One of the studies they cite involved hundreds of participants in what was to be a three-year sodium-intake intervention, with the goal of reducing daily intake to 1,850 mg. But after six months, researchers noted that participants were simply unable to cut sodium intake below about 2,750 mg a day -- close to the bottom of the range the UC Davis study identified."
To us, this only confirms what we have been saying all along-the city's Nanny policies are bogus and the Department of Health should simply butt out of the regulatory instruction business; at least until it has a scintilla of evidence that a designated policy night make some sense. How's that for an inconvenient truth?
We now have pseudo-scientific poseurs trying to make food policy-and can manufactured data (hide the decline) be far behind? "The New York guidelines are voluntary -- for now. But the city's ban on trans fats started that way, too. And the federal Food and Drug Administration has also been looking to get in on the action -- it may classify it as a "food additive," subject to regulation, sometime this year. But this campaign isn't about public health -- it's about grandstanding on a pseudo-issue ginned up by activists, when science clearly shows that there's neither a crisis nor a way for the government to actually alter our salt intake."
But, so what? The city doesn't have any other pressing issues that it needs to address-and we have plenty of excess funds in out treasury to spend diddling a pliant public. What we really need to do, is insist that Mike Bloomberg be monitored-perhaps Mike Jacobson can do the honors-on a daily basis to insure that his salt intake stays at the new low levels that DOH recommends. If he's unable to maintain this ridiculously low standard, than he should agree that the entire policy experiment will be guttered. Now that's a peer reviewed study that we'd be willing to live by.
As Compton points out, there is no underlying scientific research that justifies this new effort to tell people what's good for them: "On Monday, city officials rolled out an initiative to curb the salt content in manufactured and packaged foods. But the idea behind it -- that salt intake has reached extreme levels in America -- is a myth, and this "solution" wouldn't work, anyway."
Compton lays out why this isn't a public health problem: "Nutritionists at the University of California/Davis just published the first and only study to address salt intake and public policy. They found that people are naturally inclined to regulate salt intake to physiologically determined levels by unconsciously selecting foods to meet their needs -- and even the most extreme interventions don't do much. "
So, just as with calorie posting-an idea that comes out of Michael Jacobson's Center for Science in the Public Interest (Jacobson has recommended making the distribution of Halloween candy illegal)-we find that there are no peer reviewed studies that even give the inclination that this is smart public policy: "The UC Davis study (published in the October issue of The Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology) looked at data from more than 19,000 individuals from 33 countries worldwide. It determined that daily sodium intake ranges only from 2,700 milligrams to 4,900 mg, with the worldwide average of 3,700 mg. It also determined that the average American consumes about 3,400 mg a day -- disproving the claim spread by advocates such as the Center for Science in the Public Interest that US salt consumption is out of control. In other words, Farley's trying to fight a problem that doesn't exist."
Yet somehow Dr. Tom wants to reduce the salt intake to levels that really don't make for good health at all: "Worse, his new guidelines say that daily sodium intake for most people shouldn't exceed 1,500 mg -- which is a ridiculous 45 percent below the bottom of the normal consumption range the UC Davis study identified, and a full 60 percent lower than the worldwide average. The researchers also cite decades of research describing the specific mechanism by which the central nervous system, acting together with several organ systems, controls our appetite for salt."
So not only is the current initiative dangerously intrusive, it just may be scientifically unsupportable. Who knew? But this doesn't deter the food police who believe that the folks are in desperate need of guidance. In fact, the UC California study indicates that the city's entire effort is a waste of time and money it doesn't have: "The researchers also cite decades of research describing the specific mechanism by which the central nervous system, acting together with several organ systems, controls our appetite for salt. One of the studies they cite involved hundreds of participants in what was to be a three-year sodium-intake intervention, with the goal of reducing daily intake to 1,850 mg. But after six months, researchers noted that participants were simply unable to cut sodium intake below about 2,750 mg a day -- close to the bottom of the range the UC Davis study identified."
To us, this only confirms what we have been saying all along-the city's Nanny policies are bogus and the Department of Health should simply butt out of the regulatory instruction business; at least until it has a scintilla of evidence that a designated policy night make some sense. How's that for an inconvenient truth?
We now have pseudo-scientific poseurs trying to make food policy-and can manufactured data (hide the decline) be far behind? "The New York guidelines are voluntary -- for now. But the city's ban on trans fats started that way, too. And the federal Food and Drug Administration has also been looking to get in on the action -- it may classify it as a "food additive," subject to regulation, sometime this year. But this campaign isn't about public health -- it's about grandstanding on a pseudo-issue ginned up by activists, when science clearly shows that there's neither a crisis nor a way for the government to actually alter our salt intake."
But, so what? The city doesn't have any other pressing issues that it needs to address-and we have plenty of excess funds in out treasury to spend diddling a pliant public. What we really need to do, is insist that Mike Bloomberg be monitored-perhaps Mike Jacobson can do the honors-on a daily basis to insure that his salt intake stays at the new low levels that DOH recommends. If he's unable to maintain this ridiculously low standard, than he should agree that the entire policy experiment will be guttered. Now that's a peer reviewed study that we'd be willing to live by.
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