You may be wondering why Staten Island wants to secede from New York City, Rockland, Orange and Duchess counties want to secede from the MTA region, Long Island wants to secede from New York State, and Texas wants to secede from the United States. It is because they want to secede from the consequences of past decisions, and stick those consequences on those left behind. For the past 25 years virtually every public decision, non-decision and deal has benefited the narrow interests that have seized control of our public institutions, particularly the State of New York and its associated agencies. These interests disguised the cost from others, and thus avoided opposition, by shifting that cost to the future — in the form of vast public debts, unfunded pension and other retiree obligations, inadequately maintained infrastructure, and unaddressed environmental issues. Now that the past costs are coming due, those seeking secession are looking at what they will pay and get in the future, and deciding they will be ripped off. So they no longer want to be part of the common future.

Well guess what. As a result of those costs from the past, all of us will be ripped off in the future. Every part of the state, country and, if the scientists are right about global warming, world. Those who got the benefits in the past, and those that didn’t, alike.

“If I have to bring Carter with me — to an event, to City Hall for an emergency session — do I have to think twice about being accused of using him as a political prop, or do I decide to take whatever comes because I need to do what's best for my kid? Do I heed the advice of political consultants who tell me I should mention being a mother as much as possible? Having conceived through in vitro fertilization, do I answer personal questions from reporters who ask about Carter's parentage? Regardless of whether I answer or choose not to, I run the risk of having my answer become politicized.” –City Councilwoman Melinda Katz in the Huffington Post.

This year’s race for City Comptroller, like those held in the past, features a groups of candidates virtually no one cares about flailing about desperately for attention. Each of the Comptroller candidates has at least one notable quality which separates them from the rest.

In matters of information and culture, governments in the United States have generally provided financial support only to those sources and styles that no longer appeal to popular audiences but still appeal to elite tastes, even if the elites are more affluent than those who get their information and culture without subsidy. Thus, when a jazz venue was added to Lincoln Center, you knew jazz was on its last legs as popular music. Also on its last legs, suddenly, and seeking some kind of bailout are local newspapers.

The newspapers argue that they have a critical role in investigating and counteracting the disinformation provided by the powerful, political and otherwise, in their own interest. They would have more of a point if the research behind a typical newspaper article, after all the staff cuts, didn’t consist of a press release issued by someone with the money and motivation to have a public relations staff, along with some balancing quotes from some usual suspects. “Balanced” reporting today consists of “he said she said” not “he said and we looked into it and here are the facts.” Were the news media to rely on government support, moreover, it is doubtful it would retain credibility as a check on the government-provided information. There are those who believe that even now newspapers’ dependence on automobile and real estate advertisements limited their objectivity in the housing bubble and SUV fad. The newspapers, however, are not without value and not without a point, particularly since many “internet news” sites generally merely redistribute newspaper content for free. So I would like to propose a “bailout” that does not involve a subsidy.

THIS IS THE FINAL DRAFT OF CANDIDATE ROCK HACKSHAW’S PLATFORM FOR REAL SOLUTIONS IN THE 40th COUNCILMANIC DISTRICT IN BROOKLYN: ROCK HACKSHAW BELIEVES THAT AS ELECTED OFFICIALS GO, “WE CAN DO BETTER.”  
 

PREFACE:

Too many candidates for the New York City Council tend to focus their campaigns on issues of the district in which they are running; this is a bit too narrow for my liking. As a council member I believe that you are one of 51 members charged with helping the mayor and council speaker run this city, and as such you should always take a macro approach to problem solving and public policy. Accenting only those issues relating to your district -and isolating the potential solutions without sensitivity to the overall impact on the city- is myopic at best; keeping a narrow-minded focus on issues pertinent mainly to your district, and becoming demagogic when the issues are of the “Not In My Backyard” (NIMBY) variety is exactly what we don’t need in the council. The problems facing us cannot be solved in isolation. We need team players; elected officials with the ability to think creatively, and the willingness to be open-minded. We need people who are both developed and experienced. We need people who have shown independence during their tenures in politics and community activism.  

Let me preface this column by stating (again) that I am a not only a passionate fan, avid supporter and effusive admirer of Barack Obama, I am also one of his honest critics. I hope my past writings on the man have proven this enough. And yet, as I write this column, more than 1.1 million black males are languishing in jails, prisons and penitentiaries all over the U.S.A.; this is about half the number of black males incarcerated worldwide. And as I write this column, President Barack Obama has been in office for more than one hundred and one days. After I post this column, I would like to hear Mr. Obama talk more than 1.1 times, about what’s really going: relative to the state of black males in the USA. His silence on this issue is deafening.  

“Key lawmakers from both parties (but one generation) have held tentative talks about overhauling the Social Security system,” the Washington Post reported. A likely plan would “include lower benefits for wealthy Americans, a higher retirement age and additional revenues.” Action is needed because “projections show that the system, which has brought in more money than it pays out, will begin to need at least small infusions of cash from the rest of the government.” And those in power presumably want Social Security to continue to bring in more that it pays out, so the money can be used to cut other taxes and increase spending elsewhere, as it has been since the last deal to “Save Social Security” in 1983.

Now I’m a realist about this. I know that no matter what the numbers are in the Social Security “trust fund” all the additional dollars collected in the past have been spent in the past, that older generations have made out on the deal (some more than others), and that younger generations are screwed, and something must be done. The details are summarized here.  But the attitude of those planning to repeat the 1983 generational betrayal is galling nonetheless. Americans, Senator Lindsay Graham said, “are ready to make some hard decisions for the benefit of future generations." For the benefit of future generations! Almost makes it sound like current generations, older generations, are going to the ones making the sacrifices, doesn’t it?

The usually perceptive Steve Kornacki of the NY Observer has already written off Governor David Paterson’s chances of getting re-elected.

Sunday’s New York Times reported that the MTA, in order to save money, has discontinued the Long Island Railroad express train to Belmont Raceway.

One paragraph in the story jumped out at me:

“Racing association officials, who lobbied against the elimination of direct train service, estimate that the park will lose more than $5 million this year because of the cut, while the authority says it will save about $112,000.”

A person doesn’t not to have to have the business expertise of a Warren Buffet to propose a winning bet to the New York Racing Association  – give the MTA $112,000 so they keep running the train so you can keep $5 million you say you will lose if the train stops.

TOM HAGEN: Senator Cauly apologized for not coming personally — he said you'd understand.

             — The Consiglieri reporting (to the protagonist of Rudy Giuliani's favorite film) a dear friend's expedient absence from a wedding.

Congratulations are in order to Jon Cooper, the Majority Leader of the Legislature of Suffolk County, New York, upon his marriage in Connecticut to his longtime companion, Robert Cooper. Under normal circumstances, this would be the most interesting political story in the Style Section of this week’s Sunday New York Times, and certainly, it is the most interesting one which has come out of the closet. But this week’s Style Section also takes note of a another Connecticut same-sex wedding of two New Yorkers, the coverage of which fails to acknowledge the elephant in the room.

The most telling chart in the Mayor’s budget presentation does not concern public policy or government finance. It is the chart on page nine that shows the U.S. personal savings rate. And it shows that the generations recently retired and now in their peak earning years, unlike the “Greatest Generation” that went before them, have been unwilling to save for their own personal futures. The majority wanted what they wanted when they wanted it, and didn’t concern themselves with the consequences. Is it any surprise, then, that in their collective choices they also were unwilling to make any of the changes needed to free the United States from energy dependency? That they raised the payroll tax on the less well off to “save Social Security” for the next generation in 1983, and then spent all the extra money on themselves in the years since? That they awarded themselves richer public employee pensions, deferred the cost, and when money got tight cut wages and benefits for future hires? That they ran up massive public debts, and allowed the infrastructure to degrade? And getting back to their personal lives, that so many were unwilling to put up with the obligations of permanent family relationships for the benefit of the children? And that those who could drained public corporations of their futures by extracting undeserved money in the present in excess executive compensation?

Guess what sort of people are in the New York State legislature, from which our current Governor and former Governor Pataki emerged? For two decades, since I didn’t share the values implied that chart, I looked at the actions of politicians such as Pataki, Silver, Bruno — not to mention George Bush and the Republican Congress — with growing outrage. And since no one bothers to vote in elections that (aside from a few higher offices) in reality don’t take place, I assumed “the people” weren’t making those choices would also be outraged that their future was being destroyed if only they knew. Perhaps I was wrong.