The Hayseeds blog, No. 224 for the week starting September 30, 2007.
September 16, 2007
Hayseeds No. 223
September 30, 2007
Hayseeds No. 224
October 7, 2007
Hayseeds No. 224
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It looks like the state decided to push forward with rules that would allow working families to be able to buy into Child Health Plus, much like poverty stricken families that make little more then the poverty level.
The only problem is that the state didn't get federal approval, to which the President stopped with new rules. That means that health insurance companies that administer Child Health Plus have been sending bills to make up for the difference, costing the poor potentially hundreds of dollars, and cause those who can't afford the difference to lose their insurance.
This was a stupid policy choice by the Spitzer administration, which should have been more on the ball and not gambled with people's money. Hopefully the state will come to the rescue and bail out people who fell into this trap—and figure out how to get the President to the right thing and sign a bill that would force him to allow Medicaid funds to be used for programs like Child Health Plus for moderate income families without health insurance.
For his part, President Bush in denying states the right to expand health insurance coverage to children who otherwise could not get it is terrible policy, based on a truly idiotic ideology.
The kids who don't have health insurance, typically have parents who work hard for small businesses or as independent contractors. These are the kind of innovation-based industries that our society should be promoting, and any attempt to ensure that such people be allowed affordable health insurance should be promoted—especially for kids, where access to a doctor might forever change their lives.
President Bush is right to say that big social programs are a drag on the economy and on the ability of government to do great things. However, so is the lack of universal health insurance, which either puts people at massive financial risk or drags people with massive health insurance premiums.
Or at least it appears that he thinks that Hillary will pick up the Democratic nomination and then lose her battle in the Presidential race.
That's not exactly a rocket sicence prediction, and one made by Karl Rove a few months earlier. Certainly, you have to question his motivations for saying that—he's probably betting on Clinton being a divise figure that his party can easily beat.
I don't disagree with him one bit on this point. Hillary leaves a bad taste in many people's mouths, a step back to the consumeristic and frivolous days of the 1990s. Bill Clinton, the standard barer for many years in the Democratic Party, did little to excite his own base. It just was Republicans where father lost in the wilderness then Democrats, and that Newt Gingrich could never make Contract for America go anywheres.
It's not that the Democrats have any real outstanding candidates for President this year. Obama does nothing for me, particularly after his foly with big coal, a key industry in his state of Illonios. But we will see how things paly out for him.
Who'd ever thunk that Giuliani would turn his back on gun control to get the Republican nod, by coming out in open opposition to the Tiahart admendment.
Basically, that admendment to the ATF appropiation bill prohibits the buerau from responding to freedom of information act requests and other demands for information on gun purchases, except for the procecution of crimes. The feeling is that depriving that information protects privacy and discourages fishing expeditions in civil cases.
Certainly many gun-rights advocates feel strongly about this admendment. They fear that some of this information may contain personally identifying information, and whose disclosure could violate the right to own firearms. And we know what big city mayors like Bloomberg would love to have this idea to sue everybody in a wild attempt to try to stop less then scrupless gun dealers from selling guns to criminals in their cities.
It's an odios solution to an odious problem. At any rate, Giulani has an uphill battle trying to appease his Republican base.
It looks like the Senate Republicans are making true to their threat to subpeona the governor's people regarding Troopergate.
At one point the Senate Republicans had a good point in investigating the matter, but now they are dragging the matter out without little evidence of any wrong-doing, except maybe—a definate maybe—for being too aggressive politically.
Albany District Attorney David Soares has a very different spin on the matter then the Senate Republicans and Attorney General Andrew Cuomo:
Based on the above, the Executive Chamber is responsible for the use of state aircraft. In furtherance of that responsibility, the Executive Chamber implemented a certification requirement on the transportation request form to ensure that the aircraft was being used for official purposes. Additionally, the Executive Chamber oversees the State Police, which is also responsible for the usage of state aircraft.
Moreover, the Executive Chamber and the State Police, as enunciated by the Legislature, have an obligation to account for the usage of that aircraft to the public. Thus, it would be within the authority of the Executive Chamber to collect information from the State Police concerning the usage of the aircraft. This authority would include gathering information on the ground transportation portion of a trip to verify that the aircraft is being used for official state business. Further, the Acting Superintendent of the State Police would be within his scope of duties by compiling this information in compliance with the Executive Chamber’s request.
Turning to the dissemination of the collected information to the media: The job responsibilities of the Executive Chamber’s Communications Director include “maintaining relations between the Governor’s Office and the various press media” (Executive Chamber Administrative Practices Manual 2007). As such, he would appear to be acting within the scope of his authority by turning over to the press information that the public has a right to know...
...The Freedom of Information Law (FOIL) is the bare minimum that the government must comply with in the release of documents to the media and public. There is nothing which prohibits the government from providing more than what the FOIL requires. Indeed, the Court of Appeals has stated that it has “consistently interpreted the statute liberally to implement” its broad purpose of governmental accountability to its citizens (Matter of Weston v Sloan, 84 NY2d 462, 466).
Further, the requirement that a FOIL request be made in writing is not an absolute. Rather, “agencies may choose to accept oral requests for records and act in an informal manner in their responses to requests for records” (Comm on Open Gov’t OML-AO-2791). Although the FOIL does not require an agency "to prepare any record not possessed or maintained by such [agency],” nothing in the FOIL prohibits an agency from so doing (Public Officers Law § 89 [3] [a]).
Reading that really changed my perspective on the issue of Troopergate. It's clear from that the Governor and his staff did nothing wrong, even if his attack on potential corruption in New York State Government was a bit too zelous. Still, complying records and exceeding the minimum of FOIL is what we would hope from government.
Of course Dicker says the Governor 'defanged' DA Soares' probe, and that they worked closely together to make it happen in a way that made the governor look good. Possibly phone calls where made, although I have a feeling that Soares' would not be stupid enough to fall into that trap.
That's what Attorney General Cuomo tried to do on Facebook with a great deal of success. He tried to show the quick and clean Facebook site still posed a risk to young.
Children in particular have to be concerned about social networking sites. I'm not all convienced that the young need to be using all this technology. It's one thing for a college age student to be on Facebook and using it for social networking, it's another for young children.
Apparently they are not getting the traffic they need to keep up with all the new projects they are proposing. They claim people aren't driving enough with higher gas prices.
Of course, nobody says anything about the canal authority or the sections of I-86 that are toll-free but maintance paid for by the the Thruway Authority. Or all the new projects that are being built or modified to deal with new capacity.
The Authority has never made a penny on the section of the Thruway from Albany to Buffalo. All the money for that area simply pays for toll-collectors. You have to hire a minimum of 5 full-time employees per exit/entrance to the Thruway, at a cost of $9 to $15 an hour based on seniority, and then pay as much as $15 an hour for benefits like state retirement and health insurance. That ain't cheap.
In 2006, Only 25% or $201 million of the Thruway's budget goes to actual highway and bridge work. In contrast, 40% or $319 million of the tolls and other income go to paying toll collectors and similiar operating expenses. Equipment and facilities—often duplicative of DOT facilities nearby, take another $56 million. The total budget was about $800 million.
After the bridge collapse in Minesota and with higher tolls going into effect next year, they want to spend $371 million this year on highway construction. That increases actual highway expenditures to about 36% of their budget—still a small fraction of their actual budget. Still, the amount of value people get from tolls is scandalous.
If the Thruway Authority where to be dissolved tommorow, it would require the state to raise taxes about $25 per person. Obviously, with progressive taxation, the burden would be less for average taxpayer—maybe $10 or so for most people. Assuming revenue growth in the state, there would be no actual tax increase. A half billion dollars a year is peanut change for a state with a 120 billion plus budget.
See the Thruway Budget Book.
It looks like that Pat Slavick is out of the race for Comptroller, gracefully quiting after losing the Democratic line in the recent primary.
It would have been hard for her to win in the general election. My own numbers suggest she'd need 75% of the registered in no-party vote for her win, assuming that three-quarters of registered in a party voters voted the party line. In other words, it would be impossible.
I think she did the right thing. Former District Attorney Paul Clyne made such a fool out of himself after continuing his bid for DA after losing in a primary to David Soares. The voters speak, and if they don't choose you as a major party candidate, then there is no real reason to continue. It's far better to persue other opporunties.
I hope Patricia Slavick will be back and continue seeking higher office. I could see her as a good candidate to replace Ken Runion as Guilderland Town Supervisor, or maybe even as the County Executive. A female and activist County Executive could do much to improve our county.
Not that this is really new but Assemblymen with the New York Thruway through their district want tolls eliminated in their district.
Independent Tim Gordon of Bethlehem said that with gas prices “much too high, government should be looking for ways to make traveling cheaper for motorists, not more expensive.” Gordon has proposed a bill that would allow short-distance commuters a toll-free ride between Exits 22 (Selkirk) and 24 (Albany). There’s now a toll-free hop between 24 and 23A (I-88)
Republican George Amedore of Rotterdam, too, opposed the idea of higher tolls, lower or eliminated E-ZPass discounts, and went a step further in his proposal for toll-free rides, saying they should apply from Exit 23 through to 29 (Canajoharie/Sharon Springs).
It certainly is an inconvience to commuters, and encourages people to take city streets and minor roads to avoid paying tolls, creating more grid-lock and pollution. Toll booths indeed seem to be the major bottleneck on the Thruway.
Governor Averril Harriman in 1955 also promised New Yorkers that by 1959 the Thruway would be a Freeway. That of course was an ignorant position, forgetting that bureaucracies like to perpuate themselves, even after they aren't needed.
Plus, it makes budgeting easy when all that debt and highway maintance expense ($345 million) is all off the state budget. That makes it easier for the state to balance the budget on the backs of commuters.
The Assembly repeatly passes Assemblymember Tim Gordon (Albany), Bill Magnarelli (Syracuse), Sam Hoyt (Buffalo), and former Assemblymember Paul Tonko (Amsterdam) bills that would exempt certain commuters from having to pay tolls. Of course, that would bankrupt the Thruway Authority, and the State Senate doesn't touch those bills with a ten-foot poll.
This story shocks the conscience and is worth a mension, particularly as we live in such a place of freedom of religion, speech, and idea—even for people we despise like President Ahmadinejad.
Why is it so hard to attract businesses to New York? One writer for the Times suggests the problem is a lack of fairness when it comes to distributing incentives.
Maybe. But corporate hand-outs, be it by a fair and equitable handouts or patronage handouts, only work to overcome more serious structural problems when it comes to the New York State that is a mix of both culture and governing structure.
New York has always had a belief that bigger is better and that progress can move everybody forward, regardless of the costs and destructiveness of progress. This is the belief of Hamilton, and it was followed up by all modern Governors from Alfred E. Smith to Averril Harriman to Nelson A. Rockefeller to Mario Cuomo to George Pataki.
It's not limited to a single ideology. Everybody wants to expand government, and spend more money. To get the revenue for our lofty ambitions we tax everybody in every imaginable way. We have the highest park fees, the highest parking fees, the highest property taxes, the some of the highest income taxes. When businesses have to pay so much to keep such a massive system balanced on their sholders, they prefer to go elsewheres.
That's not to say that what New York does is at all wrong. We have one of the best state university systems, most beautiful buildings, most advanced and best maintained highway systems, best art-work, greatest parks, and highest quality of life. But all those taxes hurt, particularly as our infrastructure rusts as we have to cut spending to keep up with supporting social programs for those who are in badly need of our state's social services.
Unless your advocating on cutting health insurance for children, providing services for the elderly, and so many other very worthy causes, it's going to be very difficult for our state to save moeny. Just because other states don't do as much as we do, doesn't mean we should be treating people as poorly as those states.
This is not unique to New York. All of New England's economy, and that of the Midwest is largely in the crapper. Nothing goes as well as we would want to go. All of these states expanded their social and physical infrastructure too fast in the 1960s and found an economy that left them for the warm south.
That's what Governor Spitzer has ordered the NYS DMV to do which has many Republicans seriously up in arms who believe it's AMENESTY.
The commonsense proposal by the governor would create a form of automobile-use only licenses to provide those who can show proof of identity but lack proof of citizenship or residency. The idea is not to cottle criminals, but to ensure that as many people as possible on the roads have a basic compentence on driving skills and insurance to protect the public should an accident occur.
Illegals and temporary vistas being prohibited from getting licenses, and driving cars without insurance or any knowledge of the rules of the road is a huge problem across our state. It drives up insurance costs, when preventable accidents occur, and when people response for an accident have no way to pay.
The idea that illegals would use this ID to get on planes or register to vote is absurd. This badge would be clearly marked as being solely for driving purposes only, and not as an official form of ID. Those who take it as an official ID should be fired from their jobs for incompetence.
He says that if you feel like blowing up a building, hijacking an airplane, or doing something stupid, there is a hotline you can call for counseling services.
In related news, our President says that we should set voluntary standards for global warming, and hope somebody pays attention, at least those do-gooder people. In other words, don't bother trying.
