Category: News and Opinion

I am quite aware that I do not write as often as I used to, but I did put you all on notice. I also gave some of the many reasons why I have chosen to decrease my output. Now it looks as though another writer/blogger is probably going the same route. That’s not good for NYC political-blogging. Over the years we have lost many political-bloggers in this city: or have we already forgotten Maurice Gumbs? 

Back in my High School days in Paramus NJ, a gay teacher named John Gish, who was not technically out, was removed from the class rooms by the Paramus School Board for the heinous act of heading a political group which merely advocated for Gay Civil Rights. Later he was set up in a dubious drug bust and fired outright.

Another reason for a Millionaires’ Tax Department:

Cutbacks in Family Court hours results in a death.

According to a study reported by the Boston Globe, the wealth gap between older and younger Americans is the largest ever. “The typical U.S. household headed by a person age 65 or older has a net worth 47 times greater than a household headed by someone under 35, according to an analysis of census data released Monday. While people typically accumulate assets as they age, this wealth gap is now more than double what it was in 2005 and nearly five times the 10-to-1 disparity a quarter-century ago, after adjusting for inflation.”

This study only measures financial wealth, and a full picture would be much worse for younger generations. For most of U.S. history younger generations were better educated than older generations as education expanded and improved, but this is no longer the case. You can blame the schools, or blame the fact that those now over 55 did a less good job of parenting, but education in this country has plateaued at best. Then there are the public debts, which older households ran up but won’t be around to pay back, since even now there is talk of tax cuts despite huge deficits. And the state of the infrastructure, previously improving but in recent decades deteriorating as the U.S. invests two percent of GDP, or about half the level of Europe. In Boston, the transit system is not only bankrupt (as in the New York area) but it is also falling apart. Finally there are public employee pensions in state and local government and old age benefits provided by the federal government. These were allowed to soar in cost without limit and were retroactively enhanced for older generations, but are being slashed for younger generations who will face poverty when they reach old age.

http://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/americans-torn-tea-party-occupy-wall-street-back-independent-president-article-1.972696

Though I still don't understand what a guy retired from electoral politics is raising funds for, Steve Cohn's annual pre-election breakfast at Junior's needed neither a rationale nor much of an election to attract most of the 2013 Mayoral frontrunners (there was even a Tony Weiner lookalike, who thankfully kept his pants on).

If you live in NYC, unless you are an election inspector and have to spend 15 hours at a polling place, or you are a public employee who has Election Day off in their contract, you probably don’t know there’s election this coming Tuesday.

And you have little reason to care.

The Huffington Post reports on the deal between Cooper Union and the St. Mark’s Bookstore to keep the store open.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/03/st-marks-bookshop-reaches_n_1074199.html

While the story is played as feel good story, I don’t agree.

According to the New York Times, police corruption is rising. "One former Internal Affairs Bureau investigator who was involved in scores of cases in recent years said the number of corruption complaints — ‘logs in police parlance — had been on the rise, climbing to about 65,000 a year from about 45,000 a year in a little under a decade." Why is that?

A little rumor I heard third hand. The soaring number of criminal cops dates from the era when police starting pay was slashed to $25,000 per year. To pay for all the retroactive pension enrichments around the year 2000, which have caused pension spending to soar toward equality with payroll for cops actually on the job. Now we are paying hugely for each police officer, but most of the money is going to the retired. And the police on the job increasingly resent their pay — no matter how much they cost. Take the two together and it isn’t the police who are getting ripped off, at least collectively. Those who pay for them are.