Read More →

The folks at My Food. My Choice bring us word tonight of another instance of politicians not knowing the limits of government.

New York Assemblyman Felix Ortiz (D-Brooklyn) wants to ban the use of salt in preparation of restaurant cooking.

You know salt right? Sodium Chloride? It’s one of the tastes our tongue can detect and it helps bring out other flavors? Yeah, that one — the one that brought us the word “salad”, which came from the Roman Empire habit of putting salt on leafy vegetables.

What an idiot.

Media Matters and the leftist crowd out there took me on last year when I asked, in relation to a report from Washington State that people were crossing state lines to buy dishwasher detergent after Washington State banned phosphates, “at what point do people revolt?”

They tried to make it out as a lunatic question to ask, but more and more people are getting really hacked off by the small burdens imposed on them by out of touch government. The accumulation of small things — the tyranny of small things — will be what decent and calm people eventually blow up over.

At what point do people go back to tarring and feathering politicians? It is stupid little things like this that will do it. Remember, the Brits thought the Stamp Act was a rather innocuous piece of legislation too.

At least this hasn’t been put into law. We can hope it stays that way.

New York is full of brilliant ideas these days. Let’s look first at the suicide sculpture metaphor, then the economic reality.

From Wednesday’s New York Times:

Statues Seem Ready to Leap, but Police Say They Won’t
By MICHAEL S. SCHMIDT
Published: March 9, 2010
They stand about six feet tall and look like naked human beings. Over the next few days, 27 of them will be scattered across rooftops and ledges of buildings in Midtown Manhattan — including the Empire State Building — as part of a public art exhibition.

About the same time that the first figure was placed atop a four-story building at 25th Street and Fifth Avenue on Tuesday, the Police Department issued a statement reassuring New Yorkers that the figures are not despondent people on the verge of leaping to their deaths.

Police officials said they were trying to prevent an overwhelming number of emergency calls from concerned pedestrians or office workers. Nevertheless, they said that all emergency calls about a potential suicide would be taken seriously — even those from places where one of the figures is located.

“We are going to respond no matter what because there could be a jumper at the spot,” said Paul J. Browne, the department’s chief spokesman.

The figures, which are anatomically correct, are modeled after the body of the artist Antony Gormley, who created the exhibition, which is being presented by the Madison Square Park Conservancy.

Gormley did the same thing in London in 2007.

Is anyone surprised that lots of people would call 911? Does anyone think that clogging the 911 line is a good idea? In a nanny state government that forbids toy guns, why is this OK? How much did this guy earn for this “art”?

Stupidity all around, but that’s not surprising for New York.

Moving on to suicidal economic news, the New York Times loves the proposed soda tax:

Editorial
Healthy Solution: Taxing Sodas
Published: March 8, 2010
Seldom does one idea help fix two important problems, but a proposal to tax sugary soft drinks in New York State is just that sort of 2-for-1 solution. The penny-per-ounce tax on sodas and other sweetened drinks is a way to raise desperately needed money for the city and state in a bad economy. It also could help lower obesity rates, which have soared in recent years.

The Legislature in Albany should adopt this tax quickly.

Increasing New York taxes to support outrageously generous public union pensions — bless your hearts, New York Times and Mayor Bloomberg.

What is the other solution to New York’s fiscal crisis? Billions in increased borrowing, of course:

Paterson’s No. 2 Sets Broad Plan on New York Fiscal Crisis
By DANNY HAKIM
Published: March 9, 2010
ALBANY — New York could borrow billions of dollars to address its urgent budget shortfall and a financial review board would be established to impose new discipline on future spending under a five-year financial rescue plan that Lt. Gov. Richard Ravitch will present Wednesday.
(…)
Mr. Ravitch, who was asked by Gov. David A. Paterson to draw up the blueprint, is seeking to curb the runaway spending that has helped plunge New York into fiscal crisis. Despite the recession and talk of fiscal austerity, state spending this year soared by 10 percent over the previous year’s budget.

Keep on spending!

The state faces a $9 billion shortfall for the fiscal year that begins April 1 and a $15 billion gap for the following year.

The plan, which requires legislative approval, seeks to address New York’s immediate cash needs by permitting the state to sell bonds to help cover operating expenses.

Keep on borrowing! Does anyone want to buy a bond from a bankrupt state run by David Paterson?

If the Madison Square Park Conservancy wants to add some art, why not ditch the suicide sculptures and have a replica of the Diana sculpture that once graced Madison Square Garden? The Roman goddess Diana was an emblem of chastity.

Suicide sculpture — an urban metaphor for these times? Why not move them from Madison Square down to Wall Street?

New York Democratic Rep. Eric Massa may not be ready to leave Washington, hinting in an interview he may rescind his resignation, scheduled for 5 P.M. Monday.

On his weekly radio show, Massa, one of thirty-nine Democrats who voted against last year’s health care bill, said House leadership was orchestrating a public relations campaign against him for the sake of accelerating his resignation and lowering the number of votes Democratic whips must secure for health care’s passage.

“Mine is now the deciding vote on the health care bill, and this administration and this House leadership have said, quote unquote, they will stop at nothing to pass this health care bill,” Massa said. “And now they’ve gotten rid of me and it will pass. You connect the dots.”

Reports surfaced Wednesday indication Massa was retiring, citing recurrence of cancer, while others still said the freshman Democrat was under review by a House ethics panel for sexually harassing a junior male aide.

Read More →

Does it surprise you that New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg just loves the soda tax? Does it surprise you that the teachers unions want to get in on SEIU’s act and take part of the dough?

From Monday’s New York Times:

Bloomberg Says a Soda Tax ‘Makes Sense’
By A. G. SULZBERGER
Published: March 7, 2010
As the battle over the state budget and the looming multibillion-dollar gap becomes more intense, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg has stepped up his call for the Legislature to pass a penny-per-ounce tax on soda to stave off major service cuts to education and health care.

During his weekly radio address on Sunday — a day before a symposium on the topic — Mr. Bloomberg noted research suggesting that such a tax would reduce consumption of the sugary drinks, driving down obesity rates and the accompanying medical costs. Yet his main thrust was on finding a quick source of revenue for a city in serious need of one.

To Michael Bloomberg, almost any tax makes sense. (In 2005, when I ran for Manhattan Borough President, I think I was the only Republican on the Republican ticket.)

“In these tough economic times, easy fixes to our problems are hard to come by,” he said. “But the soda tax is a fix that just makes sense. It would save lives. It would cut rising health care costs. And it would keep thousands of teachers and nurses where they belong: in the classrooms and clinics.”

Whoa! Wait a minute! We know that the “soda tax” goes almost directly into the coffers of SEIU. Now the teachers (perhaps an even more powerful union than SEIU) are getting a cut?

From the Staten Island Advance:

Mayor backs tax on sugary soft drinks
By Peter N. Spencer
March 08, 2010, 1:58AM
Mayor Michael Bloomberg promised he would not to raise taxes in the first year of his third term — but that apparently does not mean he can’t lobby the state to raise one for him.

In a reversal of his position from a year ago, the mayor urged the state Legislature to pass a penny-per-ounce soda tax and use that money to pay for education and Medicaid, in his weekly radio address yesterday.

“An extra 12 cents on a can of soda would raise nearly $1 billion, allowing us to keep community health services open and teachers in the classroom. And, at the same time, it would help us fight a major problem plaguing our children: Obesity,” Bloomberg said.

The soda tax, the mayor later warned, could help stave off “severe public health cuts, big teacher layoffs, or big new property tax bills.”

The universal law of taxes. One-half of one cent an ounce on sugary soft drinks is proposed. Now it’s one cent an ounce. First, it was to benefit SEIU. Now money goes to the teachers. Tomorrow, the tax will be on other drinks, then ice cream, then donuts, and the list will never end. Once in the door, the tax will expand like wildfire.

Taxes like this hurts all people who eat and drink, but it mostly hurts the poor and middle class, whose dollars are more scarce.

How about a truth in labeling law? Why not put NYC teachers pensions and salaries on the label of every soft drink that is charged this tax?

Here’s a little article that ‘Tax Hike Mike” Bloomberg probably doesn’t want you to see:

Mayor Warns on Pension Costs but Gave Pay Deals
By MICHAEL BARBARO
Published: June 22, 2009
(…)
But interviews and budget records show that the Bloomberg administration itself is responsible for much of the growth in city pension costs over the last eight years, and has repeatedly missed opportunities to rein in the spending.

Since Mr. Bloomberg took office, city contributions to the pension system have jumped nearly five-fold to $6.3 billion, from $1.4 billion, and they now account for one out of every 10 dollars in the city’s budget.

A major reason: the mayor has given the city’s 300,000 workers generous pay increases, guaranteeing that they retire with bigger pensions, which are typically 50 percent of salary. Such raises force the city to make heftier payments to the pension system now.
(…)
“You have a mayor who says that pension costs are unsustainable, that they will bankrupt the city, who has willfully increased the city’s pension liabilities,” said Nicole Gelinas, a senior fellow at the conservative-leaning Manhattan Institute who focuses on New York City’s finances.

So Bloomberg (who was endorsed by many of these unions) now tells you to pay more taxes–it’s unavoidable. Plus, it’s good for your health!

Spare us the concern for our health, Tax Hike Mike.

I voted with my feet and moved out.

David Paterson appears to have some ethics problems.  From allegations of interference in a domestic abuse case, New York’s governor has moved right on up to accepting gifts.  Allegedly.

From the Watertown Daily Times:

New York’s Public Integrity Commission has charged embattled Gov. David Paterson with an ethics violation involving a gift of free Yankees tickets for the 2009 World Series that could cost him nearly $100,000 in penalties.

The commission states Paterson may also have given false testimony in the case now being turned over to the Albany County District Attorney’s office for possible criminal prosecution.

So the question now is, in the midst of all this scandal, is he even capable of performing the duties of governor?  The state is in the midst of a major budget crisis.  Already economically depressed areas are being threatened with further cuts and job loss by the State — his latest budget includes dumping a prison facility near the NY-Canadian border, and the hundreds of jobs that go with it — and it would seem that, what with the allegations and investigations and all, he may not have time to deal with everything.

At this point, politics has to take a back seat.  We need a governor in New York who can deal with being a Governor.

(Cross posted at The Minority Report)

So, it’s reported that they’re trying to ease out Gov David Paterson of NY:

Democratic Party officials are putting pressure on New York Gov. David A. Paterson to resign from office as additional details emerge about his alleged effort to intervene in a domestic-violence case involving a senior aide.

The state Democratic chairman, Jay Jacobs, headed to Albany Tuesday morning to meet with Mr. Paterson and encourage him to step aside, according to a source. Mr. Jacobs declined to comment, as did the Paterson administration.

(Via AoSHQ) For those keeping track, this would mean that if Paterson resigns (and people are trying to get him to go) New York would have its third governor in two years, and its first completely unelected governor since… well, I think since William Tryon, Royal Governor of New York.  And next January, NY would have had four governors in three years.

The question is whether it’d be a fourth Democratic governor.  I understand that AG Cuomo is eager for the job (in a suitably deniable fashion), but at some point we have to ask: just how many politicians will NY Democrats get to cycle through before the electorate gets tired of the game?  We started this particular run with a crusading district attorney, and look what happened to him.

Moe Lane

PS: Yes, yes, yes: Cuomo’s a shoo-in over, say, Rick Lazio.  He’s at Martha Coakley-levels of inevitability at this point, in fact.

*And one who needed a court decision to be seated.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

For a year, the Democrats have done all they could to get David Paterson to go under the bus. They have attacked him anonymously and on the record. They have used Barack Obama to drive the bus up to New York. They’ve done everything.

Finally, finally, they called in the reinforcements at the New York Times to run daily hit pieces and keep scandal stories going and going and going. Paterson has had enough. He will not seek re-election.

Gov. David Paterson has told Democratic leaders that he won’t seek election to a full term amid a roiling scandal over whether he and his troopers intimidated a woman who’d reported domestic violence against one of his top aides, The Post has learned.

Paterson communicated his intentions to top advisers and supporters, saying he’ll make an announcement today, multiple sources said — confirming a Post report.

Paterson, who took over the state’s top spot when Eliot Spitzer resigned after it was disclosed that he had sex with a prostitute, is expected to say he won’t resign.

Yes, to make things delightful for the Democrats, Paterson is refusing to step aside now. His governance of the state has repeatedly been called into question by the Democrats. They don’t like him. But like the crazy uncle who insists on showing up at every family reunion, Paterson is going to keep showing up to veto, threaten, and misgovern.

The race may finally come down to Andrew Cuomo and Rick Lazio, but Paterson will be the donkey in the room everyone on the left pretends not to see. Oh the irony.

Not a good time for Speaker Nancy Pelosi:

The House ethics committee has found Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel, a New York Democrat, violated House rules by failing to properly disclose financial details of trips to the Caribbean, senior congressional officials said Thursday.

After several months of investigation, the ethics panel determined Mr. Rangel didn’t inform the ethics committee of the corporate source of funds for trips that took place in 2007 and 2008. The panel determined his staff knew the trips were paid for by corporations, and found that Mr. Rangel—who says he didn’t know—should still be held accountable, officials said.

…and you can read that any way that you like. If the Speaker does nothing to censure, punish, and/or admonish Rangel, you can be assured that the GOP will helpfully point that out in summer/fall campaign ads across the land. But if she does do something, Pelosi will get a good deal of grief from the Congressional Black Caucus, which is by the way giving her a good deal of internal support for the more progressive items on the Democratic agenda. For that matter, Charlie Rangel is a power in the House, and he is naturally disinclined to have to suffer from the consequences of his actions*.

So how does this get resolved? Well, there’s always the fine old Congressional tradition of trying to have it both ways and hope that nobody can raise a large enough stink. How well that works in the YouTube era… well, it has been established that it doesn’t work at all; but most of our older politicians really haven’t internalized that yet.

Moe Lane

*The fact that he should have to so suffer is just your Western Civilization’s overarching ethical matrix talking.

Is New York Governor David Paterson leaving? Can Charles Rangel also go? Do I have to tell you that they’re both Democrats?

From Friday’s New York Daily News:

Gov. Paterson declares he has ‘open mind’ on quitting race as allies continue to abandon him
BY Glenn Blain, Elizabeth Benjamin and Kenneth Lovett In Albany and Celeste Katz, Rocco Parascandola and Helen Kennedy
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS
Friday, February 26th 2010, 5:08 AM
His political career imploding spectacularly around him, Gov. Paterson insisted Thursday night that he’s still running, but for the first time said he’ll consider calls to step aside.

Allies abandoned him as the scandal over his involvement in domestic abuse allegations against a top aide also sucked in the head of Paterson’s security detail: State Police Maj. Charles Day.

Paterson’s criminal justice czar also abruptly quit, enraged by her boss, and a host of Democrats declared that, at the very least, his hopes for election are shot.

At worst, they said, he could be forced to resign, be impeached, or face criminal charges.

“I am not suspending my campaign, but I am talking to a number of elected officials around the state,” he said. “I’m obviously listening to them.”

Friday’s New York Post editorial makes it clear that Paterson must go:

Enough, governor
Posted: February 26, 2010
It’s time for David Paterson to close out his role in one of the strangest epi sodes in New York history — and turn over the affairs of state to his lieutenant governor, Richard Ravitch.

We don’t prescribe this lightly.

But new developments make it painfully clear that the accidental governor lacks the credibility to effectively see New York through its current crises.

And that he has no hope of gaining it.
(…)
David Paterson is not qualified to be governor of New York. And he can spare the state he has sworn to serve a lot of unnecessary turmoil and pain by simply stepping aside.

Without further delay.

Richard Ravitch is the guy who recently implemented the failed MTA tax that didn’t come close to saving the MTA.

Don’t look for a Chris Christie or a Scott Brown here. New York’s GOP is in shambles.

If this is the Empire State, the “empire” has fallen.