The situation our transportation system finds itself in, as evidenced by the proposed 2008 to 2013 MTA Capital Plan, is in part an outgrowth of the broader generational war that has also affected federal, state and local debts of all types, labor deals featuring richer pension benefits for those cashing in and moving out and lower pay and benefits for new employees, and a general decline in infrastructure investment. But it is also the result of the capture of our government in Albany by producers of public services, in the public, private and non-profiteer sectors, at the expense of consumers of public services and taxpayers. If you want to be robbed by public employee unions, you are a Democrat; if you want to be robbed by contractors, you are a Republican; if you want to be robbed by the non-profiteers, you can be either. But if you don’t want to be robbed at all, you are out of luck. Given what contractors have been charging the MTA for capital projects, it is no surprise that money has been borrowed, because there is no way New Yorkers could have collectively afforded to spend so much in the past. Given that, how can we afford to spend that much and more, plus the interest on past debts, in the future?
The Latest
The 2008-13 MTA Capital Plan: Our Sold Out Future Is Here
|The 2008-13 MTA Capital plan, if one looks past the press release and presentation and reads the entire document, is a nightmare that implies the transportation system and New York region have little hope for the future. The MTA hasn’t even tried to hide it, perhaps assuming no one will bother to read the entire document and do a little math. The $20.2 billion “core” plan, supposedly intended to maintain what we already have, contains only $8.6 billion in money collected in the six years it would be spent, and almost all of that will purportedly comes from a federal government that may be in no position to deliver. The other $12 billion would be borrowed, and presumably be paid back over 30 to 50 years, adding to the $1.4 billion per year in debt service the MTA is already paying. Even with that additional debt for the Tier I “core” plan, for the absolute basics, the transit system will be subject to 1970s-like deferred maintenance on an epic scale, in the clear words of the MTA itself. And the major improvements, promised for so long, even as insiders in older generations had the government borrow money and in effect transfer it to themselves, will only proceed if another $10 billion is borrowed. And not all of them, just some of them — the rest are put off to a time when the MTA is certain to be bankrupt.
Memo to Hillary Clinton: “Requiescat In Pace”
|If you look up the word “mulligan” in the dictionary, you would find that it is a re-taken golf shot; or better still: a shot that- against the rules- a golfer allows an opponent to take again. Bill Clinton is known to take many mulligans when playing friendly games of golf; his wife (Hillary Rodham Clinton) seems to have learned this bad habit quite well. It is all about changing the rules in mid game, especially when things aren’t going their way. It’s about refining techniques that give them an unfair advantage in any competitive event. It is cheap, low and crass.
If Billary were to go to any toy store to purchase a device for their pleasure, what they would find is that in near all devices sold: “batteries are not included”. So after Tuesday’s primaries (Texas, Ohio, Rhode Island and Vermont), all rational Democrats need to emphatically make the case- to both Bill and Hillary Clinton- that mulligans (just like batteries) are not included in the rules of this year’s primary elections.
Will Anyone Come Out in Favor of Elections?
|We have two sets of election problems in New York State. One is that gerrymandering and campaign finance abuses make the number of legislative districts that are competitive between Republicans and Democrats slightly smaller that it would otherwise be, allowing the Republicans to control one small part of the government – the State Senate – despite a majority of the voters being Democrats. The New York Times and Citizens Union, among others, are passionate about this election problem and Governor Spitzer was willing to go to the mat for reform last year, before being thwarted by…Republicans in the State Senate. The second problem is that, gerrymandering or no, the majority of legislative and Congressional districts are not competitive between Republicans and Democrats, so there really is no election on Election Day. And given that running against incumbents in a primary is verboten for those who want to remain in good standing in the political portion of the ruling class, there aren’t any of those either.
The Governor and the Times are less concerned with the second problem. The former seems more concerned with winning swing districts from Republicans than creating election challenges in one-party districts for Democrats and Republicans alike. The latter would prefer more primary challenges in one-party districts, despite the fact that only members of the dominant party can vote in those elections, and only insiders and grifters tend to show up and do so. As a resident of a one-party district, I am much more concerned with the second type of problem. While I have either been a non-affiliated voter or minor party enrollee for my entire voting life, I don’t have a problem with the two-party system. It is the one party system I have a problem with. Is anyone willing to do something about it? Governor Spitzer, how about you?
One Farce Ends – New One Begins
|As someone who has blogged for over year that Mike Bloomberg was not a serious candidate for President, I’m happy that the local press has now decided that Mike saying in print the same thing he has said out loud for two years, that he was not going to run, means that he is not going to run.
However now that one farce has ended a new one has started.
We will now be bombarded with endless stories about who Mike will support for President.
Today’s NY Sun starts the new mania by interviewing Bloomberg pollster Doug Schoen, who as part of the PR blitz for his latest book, talked about a bunch of other thing Mike could do to help a Presidential candidate.
Are You An American, in Any Meaningful Sense?
|Four years ago at this time, I decided to do something I never imagined I would do – run for state legislature, with no chance to win, despite the fact that doing so would mean losing my job (per my employer’s policy), putting a burden on my family until another one could be obtained, and exiting the public sector. Nothing else had had an impact, including writing reports like this one, writing letters to the editor, feeding information to reporters for articles like this one, and trying to point out the winners and losers in the state’s priorities in city publications that I was asked to write sections of, but which no one ever read. Voting did not and does not matter, because aside from a few districts competitive between Republicans and Democrats, there is generally only one name on the ballot (or only one who actually campaigns) for state legislature (and, for that matter, Congress) in November, and few primary challenges as well. After years of complaint about public policies that sold out our common future to benefit insiders today (if you’ve read posts here you know what those are; if not you can still read my platform here), simply complaining and not doing anything became morally unsupportable.
So after a few years of trying to convince people “someone should do something about this,” I decided that if no one else would, I would try. I didn’t make much of an impact, as I explained here
Just Imagine
|The following appeared on The Politico.
Imagine if the names were changed from Rick Renzi to Charlie Rangel (or any NY Democratic Congressman) and from John McCain to Hillary Clinton?
Wouldn’t this be a much bigger story?
Tempest In A Teapot Report
|After almost a week of uninformed comments by conspiracy theorists and some reformers, the New York City Board of Elections has released a report on the tempest in a teapot concerning the short fall of Obama votes on Super Tuesday.
No New York City newspaper other than AM New York has yet to post the story on the report on their websites.
The gist of the report is that in 35 cases, Board of Elections’ employees made mistakes, in 20 instances Police Department employees made the error and in 27 election districts there was no mistake and Obama did receive no votes.
Memo to Bill Clinton: Review the tapes of Sonny Liston v. Cassius Clay (second fight)
|When Hillary Clinton was a teenager in the nineteen-sixties, a young black boxer named Cassius Clay was streaking undefeated towards the heavyweight crown. This young man later changed his name to Muhammad Ali, on his way to becoming the most popular international sports-figure in history. Next Monday (25th) will be the forty-fourth year anniversary of one of the greatest challenges Ali ever faced. It was the first title fight between the mean and surly champion named Sonny Liston and the charismatic Ali himself. It was the first of two meetings between these boxers. The Liston v. Clay saga is being re-played today folks; right before our very eyes; only the names have changed.
A Tale Of Two Cities
|One of the more predictable results of the tempest in the teapot story in last Saturday’s New York Times about inaccurate unofficial results from the New York Presidential Primary was the renewal by some to fix things by removing those pesky politicians from the elections process.
Certain reformers think that a non-partisan approach to running elections rather than the bi-partisan system we use in New York will be a vast improvement.
Now I admit to being a defender of the New York City Board of Elections from unfair and just plain stupid attacks but I will admit that they are not perfect and can be improved.