May 24, 2008

Well, it's cold up there anyway...

Congressman Jim Walsh has reversed his position and now favors drilling in the Artic Wildlife Refuge. Dale Sweetland and David Gay agree with his new decision. Dan Maffei is against. With apologies to Mr. Gay, I'm most definitely siding with Dan on this one. First of all I'm not sure I'd in anyway agree that having wildlife refuges would be against the bill of rights. Seems to me wildlife refuges have been a good idea. But basically I've yet to see how drilling in pristine wilderness is going to help with more than a few pennies at the pump. As our own gas tax cap showed, there's never a guarantee of any savings when it comes to dealing with oil companies. Not to mention that whatever amount of oil we get out of there is going to be like nothing compared to the amount we depend on every day from the Middle East. If we could throw some sort of guarantee in there, I might consider it but still feel dirty afterwards. And the destruction of our environment will create all kinds of havoc in the long run.

If we really want to do something about the gas price, lets get the corn the hell out of there. Corn-based ethanol doesn't work people, because it produces like almost no energy. It works great in Brazil because they use sugar cane and can actually run their country entirely on cane-based ethanol, but all the corn is doing is putting a high demand on corn, thus making our gas cost even more.

May 19, 2008

Reading the newspaper so you don't have to

Sunday, Sunday... The Post-standard had a few interesting news items. A non-profit group called Home HeadQuarters is buying up a lot of land around Blodgett School. The theory is that they'll make improvements and try to revamp the neighborhood. The potential problem is they've spent so much of their money on property that they can't revamp all the houses right now. Apparently they look to look for more money and also market the houses as is or with some improvements. Let's hope it works, cause at least 2.25 mill came from Rep. James Walsh's Syracuse Neighborhood Initiative.

And then from the opinion page. The paper is angry at judges for letting the lack of a pay raise interfere with their duties. Some of the judges are refusing to hear cases involving law firms that involve state legislators, citing conflict of interest since there is now a suit involving judge's pay. So the paper wants judges to get back to work and I agree with that. But the paper also declares that "Judges certainly deserve a raise," and here is where I will piss off my lawyer friends. The argument used is that the sharpest legal minds will leave because they can make so much more in private practice. This is roughly akin to saying we should start paying college basketball players because they can make so more in the pros. The fact that some lawyers make insane amounts of money is not the taxpayers' fault. Well, it probably is the fault of some of the taxpayers, but not all of them.

Additionally, the paper complains that Democrats haven't come up with a candidate to run against Defrancisco or Barclay, and again I agree with the first part. Then it says this is not to disparage the great works of either. Ok, he's got some things to work on, but I'll grant you DeFran, but Barclay? Really?

Finally, school board elections. Once again, budgets are increasing by millions, and I don't know about your district, but in Bville not one candidate said anything to the Post-Standard about trying to keep this in check. At the very least they should look at administration costs, because I know Baker High has like 82 vice principles (this is called hyperbole, do not send emails correcting me). Everyone complains about property taxes, so I urge you to start doing something more than complaining. Write to your school board urging them to keep up education while still keeping taxes in check, it can be done! And stop voting in every incumbent and voting yes on every budget without seeing what's up first.

May 6, 2008

I suppose I should post...

Forgive me, I've been on vacation.

First of all, the sewage plant in Armory Square is completely nixed, and thank goodness.

Venturing to the things to be less thankful for, except maybe for humor value, the Post-standard reports that our man Dale is "on a roll." Assemblyman Bob Oaks withdrew from the race for Walsh's congressional seat. And Walsh endorsed Sweetland, which of course makes me like him even less. Walsh then asked David Gay and Mark-Paul Serafin to drop out, and they told him to suck it (I may be paraphrasing). David Gay, by the way, seems to have posted a response to this site. That, or someone posing as him. Either way, I'm happy. Dave, if you'd like to do a short post summing up your reasons for running, so that my reader(s) may know a thing or two about you, that would be alright. As for Sweetland, well, a Miss Carrie James, speaking for the Maffei campaign, seems to have summed it up nicely, calling Sweetland "a status quo politition (who) sat idly by and watched 20000 Central New Yorkers leave the region." Plus he really doesn't know how to campaign. So naturally he should run for Congress.

In an effort to get more readers, I did contact syracuse.com to try to get in their upstate blogs list. I was told they'd try and get me up in a week or so. This was more than a week ago.

April 4, 2008

Go, go,go

I seem to be handing out kudos to people. Weird for me.

Of course the first one for the day is no surprise. Kudos to Tom Buckel for asking AG Cuomo to look into the fact that we trimmed our gas taxes and gas prices, relative to other areas, stayed exactly the same. Who could have predicted that would happen (hint: ME)? On a related note, a letter to the editor seems to complain about County Executive Mahoney for allowing the gas tax cap to expire and the legislature shifting this to a property tax rebate. The argument of the letter seems to be that leasers will not pass the savings on to leasees. So the writer doesn't trust leasers to pass on savings, but does trust big oil. Hmm. Yeah.

Second, kudos to Congressman Walsh. Wait, what? Yeah, you heard me. Kudos to him for standing up to China and their numerous human rights violations by supporting a bill banning President Bush from Olympic Opening Ceremonies in Beijing. As someone of Asian descent, I state firmly that the problem has been we've let China have too much of their own way.

April 3, 2008

Well, I do have to admit...

Two things this county has done that I did not think were good ideas are the cap on the gas taxes (no guarantee that we get any savings) and the plan to put a sewage treatment plan in Armory Square (just dumb). Well, she may not have gotten my vote at the time, but County Executive Joanie Mahoney has indeed taken a stand on these two issues, and its the same stand I had.

With regard to the gas tax, one county legislator that was opposed actually had the nerve to state that there was no evidence the gas cap had not saved people money. Let's go over that again. There is NO evidence it's NOT saved money. How about evidence it actually has saved anyone money dangit! Also there is evidence. One of the news channels looked at our price of gas vs Rochester. Before gas cap, few pennies less here. After gas cap, few pennies less here.

Regarding the plan to put a sewage plant in Armory Square, Mahoney has stated "I think we can do better." Not only that, her plan to is to see if we can relieve the need for such a plant by using green technology. All I can say is thank goodness.

Jumping to things I am really not so thankful for, Mr. Sweetland has formally announced his campaign for the 25th Congressional. I can't wait to see his 852 point plan for the country.

40 Below is looking for people to tout the Syracuse area. Apparently there are prizes involved.

March 30, 2008

Ask and you shall receive...

Well it seems I have some sort of effect on Republicans, because the day after I post for people to go for Walsh's spot, several of them do. Including this blog's old friend Dale Sweetland. Because there's nothing that prepares you for running for Congress like losing a primary for a County Executive spot. Maybe we can get those wonderful "architectural windmills" all across the country. I also like the Post-Standard's description of another contender: "A 26-year-old punk rocker, David Gay, of Syracuse, who was the local coordinator of Ron Paul's presidential campaign, declared he also will run as a Republican." Gay is apparently a Medicare claims entry clerk who plans to primary for the spot if it isn't handed to him (when it isn't, perhaps). I admire the cojones, but there is also something to be said for the old start small and work your way up approach.

Nancy Lorraine Hoffman isn't running. She basically says the party leadership told her not to. A pity. I'd actually have to consider voting for her. I'm not saying I would, but I'd look into what she was saying.

Apparently some sort of free tuition program for Syracuse City school grads stalled in the state assembly. Some people would say, why just the city, and there is some validity to that question, but clearly something has to be done to fix inner city schools and since several colleges were already signed on board by Ms. Nancy Cantor, then I think it sounds like a good idea on it's face.

Interesting poll results in today's opinion section. When asked their opinion of Gov. Paterson, 51% said they didn't have enough info to have a favorable or unfavorable opinion. But when asked if he'd do an effective job, 75% said he'd govern effectively. So, does that mean like at least 26% didn't have enough info to form an opinion, but think he'll do a bang up job? And the more important question, how many of those people vote? As to my opinion of our new Gov? The only concern I've got so far has to do with a prior bill he proposed that advocated cops should shoot to wound. Anyone with even a slight knowledge of guns or law enforcement should be aware that would be totally unfeasible and would cost lives (certainly on the cop side if not on both sides).

Finally, I was going to end this post with "And in case you didn't dislike him enough already," and link to an article on how Walsh is considering becoming a lobbyist in retirement, but I couldn't locate the article online. But it was in the hard copy of the Post Standard. So that's that.

March 26, 2008

Well, if you're not doing anything this fall...

It appears Peter Capucilli will not be running for Jim Walsh's current congressional office. Believe he cited illness. And Randy Wolken has stated he will not change his previous decision to withdraw. Which means the Republican side of this race is completely open. It takes an election cycle to switch parties (as I found out), so that means both I and Tim Green wouldn't be able to switch in time (not that I for one would do such a thing), so if you're Republican and have plenty of time available this fall, I suggest you see what needs to be done to get you in this race. But if not and Dan Maffei just takes the spot I'm okay with that.

March 15, 2008

Travels...

Well, I'm out of town for a week for training, no access to a computer, but what really could go on in the CNY and related politics scene, except for ELLIOT SPITZER RESIGNING due to his involvement with a high class prostitute service!! Quick, someone get me internet access!

Seriously though, I was just talking the weekend before, with one of my friends who is a conservative (yes, I can be friends with conservatives) and we both stated we don't really like Governor Spitzer. And I think we both voted for him. Although the friend more to move Spitzer out of the AG's office, but still. For me though, it wasn't "Troopergate" that made me dislike Spitzer, as that didn't really surprise me. It wasn't the giving illegal immigrants licenses, as I saw that mainly as helping ID people and encouraging them to pay insurance, just poorly timed. It was Spitzer continuing Pataki's trend and NY's trend of slipping taxes and fees onto everything we buy. NY's taxes are among the highest in the nation anyway, and to slip in little fees on things that don't count as taxes but still chip away at our income is to continually doom the NY state economy.

So who exactly is David Paterson? I had no idea. So I did the obvious. I googled him. And I still have not much of an idea. But here's what I got. Before he was Lt. Governor, Paterson was a State Senator from Harlem. He was Senate Minority leader, which meant he had to be willing to negotiate with Joe Bruno in order to get anything accomplished. Yeah, Bruno isn't the guy I'd most like to negotiate with, but doing son in NY state is currently a prerequisite to moving things along, and Spitzer had already pissed Bruno off to no end, so this could be a positive for Paterson. Patersonfornewyork.com, which I'm assuming is an old campaign website (but don't quote me) lists that "Paterson has already ready made great strides in the area of Minority and Women Owned Enterprises, Stem Cell Research, Renewable Energy, and Economic Development." All things I'm generally for, although I'm not 100% sure on the stem cell research. Here is his Wikipedia page. I encourage you to look him up yourself and see if you can find more, although as always, pay attention to the source and make sure it's legit.

March 2, 2008

I also, will not seek my party's nomination...

Bob Andrews has told the Post-Standard he will not run for the 25th Congressional district spot opened by the retiring of Walsh. I'd just like to state that I will not either. Bob is supporting Peter Cappuccilli. As important as I think fried onions and other fair food is, I'm still leaning toward Dan Maffei at this point.

Apparently there is some sort of delay, and County Exec Joanie Mahoney may be able to rethink her predecessor's plan of putting a sewage treatment plant in our most vibrant area of Syracuse. Good.

State Senator DeFrancisco sent some sort of survey to my house. I'm going to go online and fill one out, because it never hurts to voice your opinion, and because there have been a couple of things I've meant to voice my opinion on and never gotten around to contacting politicians about.

February 22, 2008

Word

The post-standard ran a piece stating that NY state is in fact planning to crack down on empire zone abuse. Good. That's all I got to say about that.

On the local Republican news front, Randy Wolken has officially put his name into the mix for the race for Jim Walsh's spot. For those who don't know who he is, the post-standard states he is "a Central New York business and civic leader." More specifically he is the president of the Manufacturers Association of Central New York, which seems a better qualifier than a certain other Republican candidate's credentials.

We had another Young Democrats meeting last night. Big plans in the mix, including a potential Democratic candidate symposium thingy in the summer, which we hope could lure some big names and not just locally, the posibility of doing some community service stuff as a group, maybe even doing some joint stuff with young Republicans. Sounds like good things to me, I'll try and do a better job of keeping everyone posted on all events (IE telling you about the meeting before I go to it instead of after.)Also there was a candidate for Surrogate Judge. I'll consider coming back to this topic if I can form more of an opinion of him and also read up on exactly what Surrogate court does.

It seems perhaps 2 guys are running for a State Senate seat in the 48th. I don't know a lot about either, but Will Barclay has been my assemblyman, and of what I know, I am not a fan. Either way though, if you live in the 48th, make sure to vote Tuesday.

Spitzer says he won't put state tax on the federal rebates that should be coming, which is the kind of good common sense thing you can usually expect NY not to do.

February 10, 2008

edits and editorials (further editorials of course)

Seems I was incorrect in stating Capucilli was running for Walsh's spot, he's only announced interest. This makes Dan Maffei still the only one to have officially announced. Everyone else is letting the suspense linger. I personally have decided I'm definitely maybe going to consider thinking about a run.

Elliot Spitzer has been proposing alternate taxes lately. First he wanted to tax fruity alcoholic drinks like liquor, raising the tax on a 6 pack of Smirnoff from 6 cents to over a dollar. Now he wants to tax things we buy on the internets. Taxes seem to be high enough already in New York State. Also with the economy the way things are, I think the idea right now is we're supposed to encourage people to start buying things, not stop.

An engineering firm has suggested that because not enough people are using the garages, the city should up the price of parking. Uh, yeah. As a former engineering major I am not surprised that it's a group of engineers that came up with this. This won't make people use the garages, it'll make people go somewhere else! Which is already the problem.

Anyway, I have to go ponder a congressional run.

February 7, 2008

Big goings on

Although mostly nationally.

I meant to put a post telling all registered Dems and Republicans to vote on Super Tuesday, but I didn't get a chance to come online until like 8, which seemed a bit late.

Bill Fitzpatrick has decided not to run for Congressman Walsh's seat, which means I can't vote against him this year. Peter Capucilli is the first Republican to announce a run for Walsh's spot, because running the State Fair is a good proving ground for helping run the country. If only he could run against Dan O'Hara.

State Senator DeFrancisco's office sent me info on the school bill he proposed. I've yet to have time to decipher it. Once I do I'll post again.

Now to venture into national news for a moment, and give some reasons why Barack Obama will be better against McCain than Hillary: 1)Momentum: Barack's is up, Hillary's is down, and it's because most people have already formed an opinion of the Clintons, while Barack is conatantly bringing new folk to his crowd. 2)Reaching across divides: It's the strength of both McCain and Obama, but Barack can do it better because McCain had to sacrifice his party's base. Might some conservatives vote for Clinton? Probably not. Obama? More likely. At the very least, McCain might have some conservatives who just don't vote if they don't feel a true conservative choice is available, but Obama manages to reach across the aisle while still appealing to his base. Anyway, that's what I got. Go make your own informed decision.

January 27, 2008

First, the good news...

10 term congressman James Walsh has announced he will not run for reelection. (insert trumpets)

Of course that makes the race a bit more wide open on both sides of the aisle. Dale Sweetland has been mentioned (windmills for America?). I don't think he would win, but the mere mention still scares me. On the Democratic (technically) side, Tim Green was mentioned, and that scared me until he said no.

What about those who might actually be the candidate? On the Republican side, Bill Fitzpatrick is the most notable name. Yes, after having been DA forever he's managed to get a lot of people who hate him and not just the criminals, but he's also got lots of money having never really had a well funded opponent. In fact he's been so over funded he apparently can buy really nice dinners. Add him to the list of people who's names being mentioned scared me.

Among Democrats, Dan Maffei is the only name on either side to say that he's in, having said that quite a while ago and amassed quite a warchest after his last run for the office pulled up just short. Our term limited Mayor hasn't said if he'll run for the congressional district, rating his odds at 50-50. Either one would have good odds at the seat going into the race.

An additional positive, apparently Governor Spitzer vowed to take away Empire Zone benefits from places that haven't created jobs. About time. Somehow I missed the article in the paper and only now noticed it online while looking for something else.

That something else is the bad news. Spitzer has apparently agreed with Bruno to include a pay raise for judges in the budget of 24% and an undisclosed % pay raise for legislators (Bruno asked for 21%). The judges tend to make in the $90k to $140k range, plus they get to be called your Honor and throw people in jail for disrespecting them, but apparently this is too little to get by on. Legislators, essentially a part time job, as many of them are also members of law firms, earn a starting salary of $79k, with more if they are on committees or hold other positions. I'm sorry, but on my current salary I just do not feel their pain. This is an outrage, and I fully intend to formulate a plan to tell my legislators what I think of this. Stay tuned for details. Offers of assistance appreciated.

January 22, 2008

Is our children learning?

I'm sure I'm missing plenty of political news while I'm off in Rochester for job training every other week. If I miss anything vital, I'd like to ask my reader to notify me.

One thing I did catch is that Senator Defrancisco came up with a new school funding plan. If a democrat had put up such a plan, I would comment, so I'll play fair. School funding in New York state is definitely something that needs to be looked at, but it's hard for me to grasp what this bill means without some more raw numbers. So I emailed his office asking what the difference would be in state money for Syracuse city schools, New York City schools, and the total difference statewide. I'll post any response I happen to get.

The last young dems' event got some good coverage, with a nice newspaper article before and after, and some TV coverage even. More great things to come.

January 11, 2008

Quick update...

New job, new training, less time for posting. Sorry. Also local politics has been largely overshadowed by national politics as of late, but the one major event is the YOUNG DEMS FUNDRAISER TOMORROW. Again, Palace Theater, 6-9:30. $35 for food, carving station and open bar. The mayor's going to be there, we got some news stations (without even contacting them ourselves, work smarter, not harder... or just get lucky), got around 90 yes RSVP's. Should be a good event. Come on down.

There's been some news about new jobs local, and more news about less jobs local. I noticed Nancy Cantor in the picture regarding the new jobs, apparently she attended the announcement. Again, SU's one of the best things we got going.

Speaking of opening jobs, State Supreme Court Judge Robert Julian's spot is now open. Apparently he's quiting because his $136,700 plus salary needed a raise. My favorite quote is "On a personal level I am unwilling to further deplete my savings and reduce my lifestyle to continue in this office." The man's a supreme court justice and therefore should be addressed as your Honor, and therefore I will not say what I think of his lack of a raise. I'd gladly take his job, but they'd probably want me to have like a law degree or something.

On the humorous front, I seem to be getting emails from some NY state assembly Republicans committee. I know I said I'm open to the idea of supporting a progressive Republican, but in general I think these will not be productive emails for those assembly members.

That's all I got. See some of you folks tomorrow.

January 2, 2008

Happy New Year!

Venturing into national discussion for just a bit, I find myself excited that it's Iowa Caucus Eve. Yeah, it's that whole political geek thing again. Go Obama!

The Post-standard reports the city is not backing up its Tomorrow's Neighborhoods Today program. An audit by city Auditor Phil LaTessa found that the full slate of representatives that should be at the meetings, 1 from each city department, was only at 16% of the meetings. Apparently the law states that they should have the full slate at all the meetings. So the good news is we're only 84% illegal.

The audit also showed that the plans the groups formed were often outdated and incomplete, the city was slow to implement those plans that were submitted, and staff members were being overpaid. So this sounds like another thing that needs some managing.

A new year brings a new County Exec, and I for one am looking at my job with a fresh perspective. Or at least I got an email asking me to do so. Really.