The Hayseeds blog, No. 115 for the week starting May 22, 2005.
May 8, 2005
Hayseeds No. 114
May 22, 2005
Hayseeds No. 115
May 29, 2005
Hayseeds No. 115
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Ultimately the decision will come from our favorite three men in a room, namely the ruling triuvirate in Albany, known by the names of Georgy, Joe, and Shelly. While I can not read any of those man's heads, I know that Shelly is downright opposed to building the stadium until the state funds the CFE decision adquately. I would not be surpised if Shelly kills the proposal, as anything in front of the board is decided by universal consent, and I don't think he is going to go along. We can never know for sure about deals going on in the background. Maybe NYC schools will get funded in a backroom deal and the Jets stadium will happen.
It used to be that in NYS and other states, you could not buy out of state wine except through going through a middle man that existed under the current law. It should be interesting on the effect of NY grape growers who will be more easily able to sell to other states. Out of state wine will likely have lower prices in NYS, making it's harder for NYers to compete.
Hopefully it will be better then yesterday, walking around the Capitol trying to avoid the bikers from Abate NY and the many jews celebrating the liberation of the concentration camps. Don't know what group is scarier, though the later took up far more room in the Well of the LOB. Both groups are neat in their own little way.
Yesterday, I tried out Route 19/Voorheesville that goes from the steps of the Capitol to the Park and Ride at the end of the Delmar by-pass, making it a short 12.6 mile drive from my house to the park-and-ride. It's kind of nice flying along the road, rather then stopping every three feet on Delaware Avenue. It's not much faster though, as there are limited buses—only two each way, so you end up waiting off the bus. At least it's a nicer clientel on that bus, and the stories from bureaucrats high up is facinating. I just prefer to be with more middle class people. My open racism and hostility towards (urban) African Americans might be unfortunate, but at least I am honest about it.
That means he won't be voting, and it looks like the Jet's mega-stadium that will sap money out of upstate NY will be dead at least for now. The hard-hats and sportsfans our now out on the West Lawn of the Capitol yelling and screaming for Shelly to take action. They certainly have the technology to make their point, including giant screens that are displaying their messages. Few ralleys have that kind of money. Then again, so much money has gone into the Jet's stadium.
The protestors can be heard screaming 14 floors above them in One Commerece Plaza (where I sit observing them): We Want Jets! We Want Jets! I guess that says it all. I see both the mountained police, biker police, and the statees out there patroling the crowd, and I'm sure there are guards in at all the locked doors, making sure that mobs don't take over the LOB or the Capitol (this was my experience during the giant SEIU/1199 protest of three years ago). No snipers on the roof of the Captol, but it looks like the State Police are standing in front and back of the crowds, and the cameras on the roof of the Capitol are firmly watching the situation.
There was a big police ralley, and probably more cops cars parked on city streets and in the plaza, then I've ever seen in my life. You've seen one cop car, you've seen them all, from Auburn to Cattaragus to Plattsburgh to New Paltz. From Encon to City to State to University. They had a really neat looking parade, complete with pipe-and-fife band, a ton of NYC police motorcycles, sierens, and other excuses not to do my job while watching from work. They're keeping the horse dung cleanup people really busy today, from the mountees from all over. Gotta watch where you step too.
At any rate, Capitol Hill is just sworming with lobbyists and people who want just about everything from government today. Lots and lots of fun.
No, this time we aren't talking about the police, but instead the students who live off-campus and lack any supervision, much less dignity. It seems that some students when they leave college, have so much money that they can toss their junk whereever and hope that the city picks up after them. Quite often it does, but soon thereafter sends a trash bill to the building owner, which hopefully gets back to the student and bills them.
There are many solutions to the problem: most of them are rooted in the city. First and foremost, they need to get out of the garbage business for residential property, and instead let private contractors compete. Apartment buildings and commerical buildings have never had city pickup. They also need to end their subsidized dump, and allow a private company to devise their own method of disposing of trash.
People who leave piles of trash around in the city should be procecuted under various misodeanor and felony statues that deal with that subject. Arresting litter-bugs really leaves a strong message, as does leaving them with criminal convictions (you can do it David!). The city can't create new criminal statues, but they can enforce the existing law (such as creating a pollution event).
I guess the reason this bothers me so much is it represents such a waste of materials and an uttercarelessness. People who have money don't have to worry about reusing the scraps of things. I just would hope that people would be more careful about there things, and rather then tossing would reuse them.
It's great to see that the residents of Massachussets have been allowed this essential civil right, to get married regardless who you choose your partner to be. Too often in our society we create artifical bariers that limit our liberties, for no reason but to protect our igornance. It is concerning how other states have slipped backwards, and how NYS has made no progress on gay marriage, but we can hope.
Tommorow would be Thursday. A quick run down of the news. George Pataki was in Albany this morning to add the new names to the EMS memorial, then was up to SPAC to announce that he was giving them more money to renovate that beautiful theatre. I really hope that SPAC can return to it's greatness of yesteryear.
In other big news, they're out there looking for a firebug in Albany that likes to burn down many of the run down houses in Albany. Barn burners are interesting people, and I used to know a psychitrist who worked this rehabiliating this people. For the rest of us who love to watch things burn, we just do it with brush or going the fire department. Let's hope we get this moron quickly (dead or alive—the prior might be cheaper), as it's simply not a good thing when people are destroying property, and eventually somebody's going to hurt.
That's how the Republicans plan to do away with the filibuster on judical nominations with the nuclear option. More specifically, a member is going to raise a point of order, and note that filibusters are inheritaly unconsitutional (as the consitution doesn't specfically mention them), and as per Senate rules, they just need a simple majority to agree with them.
It's not a rule change per se as the Republicans certainly do not have the 60 votes to do away with the rule that allows for unlimited debate. Instead, they plan to do a quasi-judical proceding to declare the rule unconsitutional and incompatible with precedence. They are claiming that the consitution says the Senate must confirm the President's judical nominations, and they may not delay such nominations with the threat of a filibuster. No filibuster has ever been used since the 1964 Civil Rights filibuster, but there have been a lot of threats that have derailed many pieces of legislation since then.
Right now, you can't filibuster a budget bill in the Senate, and the number of votes to end a filibuster is down to 60 from the orginal 67 or 2/3 majority. Those changes where made over the years since the sixties, but they always involved an actual 2/3 vote for a Senate rule change, and not this archic method of claiming a filibuster is unconsitutional or contray to the precedence of the Senate. The second is particularly invalid in the sense that the Senate has filibustered many nominations in the past such as Abe Fortras to the US Supreme Court as presiding justice (eventually Nixon would win in '69 and appoint Warren Berger).
The filibuster has always been a check of the minority power. It required us to carefully evaluate and modify the potentially bad Civil Rights Act and other bills of similiar ilck. Ultimately, good prevailed and a Civil Rights bill was passed, but only after much modification that in the end strenghtened the legislation. When the Republicans controlled the Senate, they used their powers to kill Clinton's nominations through procedural methods such as tabling his nomination in committee or otherwise blocking the vote.
I am a Democrat, so it's not surpising that I am opposed to the nuclear option. I dislike it mostly on procedural grounds, and the dangerous precedence that it sets not only for the Republicans now, but for the Democrats later when they regain control. I think Owens might be an acceptable justice, despite her idiocyratics and her often rather right-wing conservative views (though she has supported civil liberties in many controversal cases), but I think the Democrats can't afford to let the Republican win. Once you start to blink on the nuclear option, Republicans will just threaten to rule filibusters as out-of-order, and they will always be able to nominate the most extreme judges.
Finally, the pundits that claim that Democrats are going to be pacified by losing this power are wrong. If anything, they will simply be more inflamed and likely to fight harder for what they believe to be right. They might try to use all kinds of procedure to punish the Republicans for doing away with the filibuster, but the American public might get tired of them if they go too far. Did I hear a slow roll call for naming that post office in Nebraska? It is a delicate balancing act for sure.
