If the Democrat and Chronicle were genuinely interested in solutions to traffic problems, instead of using the subject as a pretext to give free publicity to a dishonest candidate, it would analyze innovative solutions being tried elsewhere.
Like the one in this public service announcement from the Danish Road Safety Council.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Spirit of Innovation
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Imus Untimeous
OK, so it's not local. But we find disturbing and wrong the prospect that disgraced -- for so we should regard him -- radio host Don Imus may soon be back on the air.
Imus used a racially-tinged insult in referring to a largely African-American women's college basketball team. The words themselves may not have been as blatant as the racist tirade of comedian Michael Richards about a year ago, or as Mel Gibson's anti-semitic rant about the same time. But we think they earned Imus a permanent place in life's penalty box of social ostracism along with Richards and Gibson.
When someone pulls a stunt like Imus or Richards or Gibson, our reaction is pretty consistent. After the initial shock at the sheer ugliness of the thing, we have to wonder: Who do these people think they are to talk that way, either to or about someone else?
The racism alone is bad enough. But the attitude makes it worse. A member of the Michael Richards audience, interviewed by CNN, nailed it:
Basically: "I'm rich. I don't care what you think. I have enough money to have you arrested."
It's a form of bullying. Imus has the power of a national microphone. He wielded it rudely, recklessly disregarding the feelings of some young women who had just accomplished something challenging and admirable.
Then this moron unloads. We use the term deliberately, for Imus is of the age, has the experience, and knows of the responsibility demanded by the power of his microphone, to have known better. This idea of the powerful man deliberately upsetting young, powerless women is what bothers us as much as the racial tinge of the insult. It's what places Imus in the same category as Richards and Gibson, though his words themselves may not have been as inflammatory.
Call us old-fashioned. You'd be right.
And Don Imus should be off the air for good.
Wednesday, October 10, 2007
Pimp My Candidate
e have a warmer regard for the editorial side of our Newspaper of Record than for the paper's news-reporting side. For example, Saturday's lead editorial called for clean political campaigns, urging local candidates to refrain from "misleading advertising about opponents."
We endorse this view. But its implications must be resented by the leaders of the paper's news side, News Editor Karen Magnuson and Publisher Michael Kane. For Karen and Mike have worked hard to do for a local candidate with a problem what Xzibit, raffish host of MTV's Pimp My Ride, does for the old wrecks brought into his body shop.
Not that the candidacy of one Democratic candidate for county legislature isn't in need of some heavy-duty pimping.
When Ted Nixon ran for the same seat in 2005, the Fair Election Practices Committee (FEPC) found him guilty of two ethical violations: falsifying a quotation he attributed to his opponent; and attributing to his opponent words that were not the opponent's in a way intended to create a false impression.
Those aren't our words; they're the words of the FEPC's decision. You can read it here.
For these stunts he got caught, and called out by the Fair Election Practices Committee.
It means that, so far this year, of all candidates for County legislature of both parties, Nixon's the only one who has been found guilty of campaign ethics violations, breaking the Fair Campaign Pledge and misleading voters.
A public image disfigured by such behavior badly needs what Xzibit would call some "pimping." That's where Karen Magnuson and Mike Kean went to work.
Boisterously uninhibited by such antiquated constraints as professionalism and journalistic ethics, Magnuson and Kane ran a gratuitous front page puff piece on Nixon about a month ago. On the urgent subject of . . . traffic on residential through streets. Above the fold. Complete with photo of candidate and wife on page 1.
With no mention that this is a candidate for office of any kind. Just a concerned citizen worried about that scary traffic. And how we ordinary, non-political citizens -- just like Ted! -- have to do something.
You have to admire the Democrat and Chronicle for its forthright brazenness. An open promotion of a candidate in a contested race. An absurdly transparent fig leaf of news value as a pretext. Forget that old nonsense about "Dog bites man isn't news." It is news at the Democrat and Chronicle -- as long as it's in the right cause. Cars have been traveling on residential through streets for as long as there have been cars. And people who live there have disliked it for just as long.
And of all the through streets in western New York, the D&C just happened to pick the one where there lives a Democratic candidate who needs help with his image.
And of all the people who live on that particular street (we consulted a map -- it's a long street), the D&C just happens -- in an amazing, totally random coincidence -- to anchor the story on that very candidate.
And of all the moments to pick to focus on the ground-breaking and highly topical issue of traffic -- which we're sure no one has ever reported on before -- the D&C decides to do it at the very opening of campaign season, right around Labor Day!
And the issue of traffic on that one street is so urgent and so compelling that the paper's local section -- even its cover page -- just won't do! It's got to be in Section 1! And on the front page! And above the fold! With picture! And not a picture of those pesky cars, but of that candidate who was picked totally, accidentally at random! With picture and name repeated on the carryover page, just in case you forgot who he was or what he looked like in the time it took to turn the page!
And in another completely coincidental turn, the D&C just plain forgot to mention that its randomly selected poster boy for traffic worrying is currently a candidate for public office! A piece of information that the Democrat and Chronicle itself had known for months, and had published months before.
So, while the D&C's editorial page editors call for ethics in political campaigns, the D&C's news staff abandons even the pretense of ethics or professionalism in journalism. Nothing they may say can explain their way around this one.
All that's left to wonder is this: what kind of influence does this candidate have over the Democrat and Chronicle to pull this off? Is there yet a deeper level of Nixonian skullduggery we haven't learned about?
Metaphorically speaking (to use a metaphor of recent memory): how many times did Ted Nixon have to tap on the bathroom floor -- and next to whose stall -- to get the Democrat and Chronicle to turn its front page over to him, and its integrity to the garbage?
Reckless Driving
Visitors to Mustard Street know that we're strong supporters of Governor Spitzer. The road to salvation for New York depends on more of the Spitzer touch, not less. We'd be sickened by the hypocrisy of an old-school political hack like Joe Bruno excoriating the Governor on the much overblown "troopergate" matter, if we weren't distressed instead by its potential for distracting the Governor from his agenda.
One such distraction is the State Department of Motor Vehicles' poorly-conceived plan to give drivers licenses to illegal aliens. In the face of Bruno's onslaught, the Guv supports this in order to shore up his base, since the proposal really has little to do with driving and everything to do with registering illegal aliens to vote. The only document needed in order to register is a drivers license.
Why so many Democrats assume that convicted felons (to whom they also want to give the vote) and other lawbreakers such as illegal aliens will all vote Democratic is a mystery. Maybe it tells us more about what some Democrats really think about their party than they'd want us to know. We asked the lovely Miss Lucy, Mustard Street resident and proud -- though independently-minded -- member of the party of Jefferson and Jackson. Lucy says it makes complete sense: "Democrats talk about redistributing wealth. Criminals go out and do it."
Maybe there's a philosophic kinship we hadn't thought about.
On the local scene, calmer heads are responding. County Clerk Cheryl DiNolfo, whose office issues drivers licenses, has said she won't issue licenses in contravention of state law, which is what the State DMV's edict would have her do.
County Legislator Dave Malta introduced in the Monroe County Legislature a resolution preventing the County Clerk's office from using County resources to issue licenses in violation of law. It passed last night with bi-partisan support. One source relates that it was Democratic legislator Ted O'Brien -- himself a lawyer -- who made the case that state law forbids the Clerk to issue licenses to illegal aliens. O'Brien pointed out that if the state DMV wants to change the license-issuing policy, then the state legislature needs to amend the existing law. But that unless and until it does, the County Legislature's action last night calls on DiNolfo to follow the law.
O'Brien, joined by the two other Democrats running for office this year in competitive districts, then voted in favor of Malta's resolution to withhold county resources (e.g., taxpayers' money) from issuing drivers licenses illegally.
Sunday, September 30, 2007
Paradise Lost
Commentators on the local scene frequently note what admirers call the focus, and detractors the lockstep mentality, of Republicans in the Monroe County Administration and especially in the County Legislature. By implication, perhaps on occasion directly, these comments suggest that County Legislature Democrats are lacking in this regard.
It's a suggestion both wrong and unfair.
No politically knowledgeable critic of our Legislature in recent years can overlook the focus or determination of its Democrats in pursuit of their prime objective: to force Maggie Brooks to increase the property tax, and Republican legislators to vote for it. For this reason, County Democrats attack any proposal that could meliorate the County's fiscal position.
Showing similar discipline in proposals of their own, legislative Democrats hew to a rigorous protocol:
1. Propose no measure that, if permitted by law, would reduce costs or otherwise improve the County’s financial position.
2. Propose measures that would help, but are legally prohibited.
3. Propose measures that conform to either rule above, and would pit Republican constituencies against each other or otherwise help Democrats politically.
These principles emerge from Democratic policy statements at democraticledger.org.
Some examples illustrate the point.
One. Early in her term Maggie Brooks tried to extend county funding for City school nurses. How? Brooks liked a new State Comptroller’s program to refinance a portion of existing debt at a lower interest rate. Same amount of debt. Same length of indebtedness. No “closing” costs. Only change: lower interest rate. Result: enough savings to pay for nurses.
As with all bonding measures, it required a two-thirds vote in the County legislature. Rarely an issue because both Democratic and Republican legislators routinely vote for bonding resolutions. But this one wasn’t routine. In addition to funding nurses, substantial additional savings would have accrued to the County for some years to come.
Joe Morelle himself was there for the vote, to hold his troops against the measure. The former county legislator who told us of this episode recounts that, when a member of the county employees’ union complained to Morelle, Little Joe shot back that his job isn't to fund nurses, it's to make Maggie Brooks look bad.
Two. Legislative Democrats stated their agenda for Monroe County in a “Blueprint for Progress.” It follows so scrupulously the rules noted above that it amounts to a Blueprint for Bupkis.
The centerpiece is a plan to reconfigure paying for Sheriff’s services. Democrats claim it would save over $20 million annually. The details show it would save nothing. It would shift the cost of paying for Sheriff’s services from all the towns to just a few of them (all with Republican legislators). But the County would take in the same revenue to pay for the Sheriff’s department, and the County’s cost would stay the same. No improvement to the county budget.
The Democrats argue that towns without police departments should foot the entire bill for Sheriff’s services. A great point to demagogue, and one that could pit Republican towns and legislators against each other: some represent towns with police departments; others don’t. Democrats were humiliated when they finally introduced it late last year. Undersheriff Daniel Greene rolled out data showing that the City and town police rely heavily on Sheriff’s deputies, both on calls for service and having Sheriff’s cars and deputies as backup, thereby allowing towns to staff police at affordable levels, and that nearly all “road patrol” deputies comprise the staff of special services that each local police department uses directly.
So much for examples of the main point: that Monroe County Democrats have shown discipline in working to force Maggie Brooks closer to having to raise property taxes. As Medicaid expense keeps rising, as the County gradually runs out of budget cuts and other revenue sources, Democrats have moved ever closer to their goal.
This explains their near-hysteria at the special meeting last Wednesday that adopted Maggie Brooks’s budget plan on a party-line vote.
The Holy Grail had been almost in reach. A $50 million projected deficit. No obvious way out. Mere days before the clock ran out on being able to pay Medicaid with sales tax.
And remember, paying for Medicaid with sales tax -- by itself -- would reduce funds going to the Towns, the City and school districts outside the City. Democrats in the Assembly thought they had this wired, by blocking the sales tax increase that Brooks wanted to use to compensate the other municipalities. County Democrats were starting to warn about a big property tax surprise in the budget to be introduced in November.
Then Brooks pulled the rabbit from the hat. Her plan uses the new Medicaid payment option, compensates all municipalities but suburban school districts for any loss of revenue, looks to record increases in state funding to school districts to take care of the districts. The cruelest blow of all: Brooks caps off her plan with a property tax decrease.
Monroe County Democrats felt political paradise at their fingertips. On Wednesday it became a paradise lost.
Of good and evil much they argued then,
Of happiness and final misery . . .
Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy!
Milton, Paradise Lost, Book ii, lines 562 - 565
Will They Respect Us in the Morning?
We’ve lost our virginity on Mustard Street. We attended a meeting of the Monroe County Legislature.
In separate postings we’ll be looking, first, at the political background to Maggie Brooks’s “FAIR” Budget Plan. Then into the Brooks Plan itself, political ramifications of it and reactions to it.
First, though, a few random comments on Wednesday's meeting and some of the players.
Some Democratic legislators seemed on the verge of hysteria or panic or both. Notable exception: Legislator Ted O’Brien, who was calm, professional and focused in his comments and throughout the meeting. Why isn’t this guy the Democratic leader?
Republicans should view the impending retirement of term-limited Majority Leader Bill Smith as coming none to soon. Making a “point of order,” or point of something else that sounded irrelevant, Smith stepped on an answer coming from a Brooks Administration spokesman about the effect of the plan on some tax credits. An answer that, it turns out, would have been favorable to Brooks and her plan. With friends like this . . .
Democratic legislators made a stupefying blunder in voting against funding the City and Towns to compensate for effects of Brooks's Medicaid payment plan. Even O’Brien, who otherwise seemed to have it together in this meeting, voted against restoring funding to Irondequoit, the town he represents. There was no “poison pill” in the resolution, just a straight-out refunding of monies lost due to the Medicaid plan. Yet every Democratic legislator voted against restoring funding. Note to Democrats: Republicans will be writing their own campaign mailings against you. You don’t have to do it for them.
Thursday, September 27, 2007
If Your Name Were Joe Morelle ...
Wouldn't you really, really wish today that you had run someone for County Executive?
Sunday, September 16, 2007
No Vice
The late, great, Quentin Crisp said of himself, "I don't fly to extremes. I live there."
We were reminded of this by an especially good analysis posted yesterday on Rochester Turning by the essayist Exile on Ericson Street.
Responding to a newspaper editorial, Exile considers accusations of "extremism" and whether that term has value in understanding a political position or the person who supports it. One of the larger points we take away from the essay is that imputation of political "extremism" can tell us at least as much about the imputer as about his target.
Is it "extreme" to be fully committed to a position or principle? To be a passionate advocate? That seems enough to trigger suggestions of "extremism" from self-identified moderates.
We've wondered often, with respect to important public issues, just what there is to be moderate about.
Suppose you believe the death penalty is morally wrong. A reasonable person holding this view should oppose all executions. Yet if we apply to this position the standard employed by newspaper editorialists, we conclude perforce that opposing all executions is "extremism."
But isn't that the only rational position that derives from a belief that executions are immoral? That, then, makes a person extreme?
It's because editorial writers typically don't characterize opposition to executions as extreme that we choose this example to show where the regulation-issue take on "extremism" can bring us.
Approach the same issue from another angle. You believe the death penalty is morally wrong. But you don't want to be an extremist. What then constitutes "moderation?" That we execute half the people sentenced to death? That we leave the rest alone? That doesn't make you a moderate. It makes you a nut.
A burning building contains 10 people. You rescue them all. Are you an extremist, when you could have been moderate by saving 5?
Consider examples from the historical annals of extremism. Exile cites Frederick Douglass and Susan B. Anthony. Here's another:
"No State shall . . . deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws."
Fourteenth Amendment, U.S. Constitution.
Anyone insisting on legal enforcement of these words risks branding with the Scarlet E. And usually with another label even worse. This is because of the implications for preference-based affirmative action programs if we were really to require equal protection of law.
Yet, just as opposing all executions is the only rational consequence of believing the death penalty to be immoral, opposing programs that assign preferences on the basis of race is a rational consequence of believing in "equal protection of law."
Apologists for these programs tell us they're necessary -- to compensate for historical injustice, or to offset effects of racism. Supporters of the Patriot Act tell us it's necessary to reduce the risk of terrorism. But the Patriot Act's unconstitutional, too.
The point is that to label as "extreme" opposition on constitutional grounds to race-based preferences or the Patriot Act, or on moral grounds to executions, is to render the term "extremist" meaningless. At least for much of our political discourse.
Which returns us to the conclusion of Mr. or Ms. Exile: that the epithet "extremist" is useless for reasoned consideration of political issues.
To which we'd add the corollary: except as understood in a defined context. In a room full of drunks, the teatotaler's an extremist. (For further elaboration, consult H.G. Wells's The Country of the Blind.)
This spares us from the error that no one properly might be deemed extreme as long as he's sincere in his principles, consistent in applying them and vigorous in asserting them. That describes the Unabomber. But that's why the corollary about context is important.
We think the commenter to Exile's posting got it right who invoked Patrick Henry's famous dictum, “If this be treason, make the most of it.”
Calling something "treason" or "extremism" doesn't make it wicked. Whether it's wicked depends on the relative merits and demerits of the argument and of the goal. Understanding that lets you turn the argument around.
And for turning the argument around, maybe no one since Patrick Henry has said it better than this:
"Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice; and . . . moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue."
Nor are they today.
Thursday, September 6, 2007
The Left's Insurmountable Problem
"...self interest and family orientation is not the product of capitalism, but is human nature due to selection from evolutionary pressure over billions of years."From an essay by University of Chicago Professor Gary Becker.
Monday, September 3, 2007
Taking on a Sicko
Our focus is local, but now and again something turns up that's not, that interests us and that we haven't seen elsewhere. Mustard Street resident Lucy found this gem today, after reading a story on NPR's website about Fred Thompson.
Thomson criticized socialist icon Michael Moore for visiting Fidel Castro. Moore then challenged Thompson to a debate on health care and criticized him for smoking Cuban cigars, thereby violating the trade embargo.
Something appeals to us about a person armed with the truth, the courage of his convictions and a "right back atcha" chutzpah. (We're calling it chutzpah because Lucy calls Thomson a real mensch.) All three are displayed in Thompson's delightful response to Moore.
Fred, you're our new bubbee.
Saturday, September 1, 2007
Pittsford "Damsel" Outed by WXXI
Pittsford, Pittsford, Pittsford ... why is so much happening in a place that never offered political excitement before?
The Brighton-Pittsford Post reported recently on a Michael Slade, who shot video at a Pittsford town council meeting, doctored it and posted it to YouTube. Finding the taped events too tedious to make council members look bad, Slade added titles and comic music to help matters along. The video features dialogue during a public comment session between the Supervisor and one Gerry Minerd, who the titles describe as a "Damsel in Distress" because of the Supervisor's questions. Just a guileless, ordinary citizen getting what's claimed to be a hard time.
For all we know, maybe she was. Video snippets can never convey the full story, even if unedited and presented straight. Beyond that, our view of public comments at government meetings is that they're for members of the public to speak. The elected officials should be listening, not (for a change) doing the talking themselves. They're lucky that people can attend meetings and clue them in on some things.
Of course we checked out Slade's video. The discrepancy between the actual events and superimposed titles made us understand that the real story here isn't about a town council, but about an eccentric with time on his hands. One YouTube commenter hit it right on the money:You might as well film a Mayor walking in the town's 4th of July parade with titles saying "The Fuhrer leads his troops against Poland."
That might have been the end of it. But here on Mustard Street we're early birds. We caught the WXXI local newscast last Wednesday shortly past 6 am. Reporting on an anti-war protest in Brighton, WXXI identified the speaker in its soundbite with the following words: "Gerry Minerd is with MoveOn.org, a left-wing activist group."
A remarkably candid acknowledgement of ideological motive for public radio, where (to give you WHAM listeners an example) its network reporters refer to the Cuban dictator lovingly as "Fidel." So remarkable that we wrote it down word-for word when we heard it, recalling the name Gerry Minerd from the YouTube video.
The "Damsel in Distress" was a ringer.
The ringer in a staged performance by a left wing group to evoke a response, any response. Apparently Minerd and Slade came with a group that arrived together and left together at the close of public comments. Minerd wasn't just another citizen addressing her town council but a performer, in a piece of street theater choreographed with the person doing the filming.
Ms. Minerd was last heard from in the letters column of this week's City News, praising the "soundness of moral character, uprightness, and honesty," of the only political candidate in the history of Pittsford to have been found guilty, by the Fair Election Practices Committee created by the Interfaith Alliance and the League of Women Voters, of campaign ethics violations -- in this case of lying to voters.
Almost makes even Fidel look good.
Tuesday, August 21, 2007
Silhouettes on the Shade
There’s an old song in which a guy walks by his girlfriend's house and sees, on the window shade, the silhouette of a man and woman embracing. Assuming it's his girl with another man, he reacts:
Lost control and rang your bell;Have a listen; maybe you've heard it before.
I was sore.
"Let me in or else I'll beat
Down your door!"
Then two strangers who had been
Two silhouettes on the shade
Said to my shock,
"You're on the wrong block !"
This sentimental old relic came to mind while reading yesterday’s column in the Democrat and Chronicle by one Michael D. Connelly. Representing a group calling itself “Declaration of Peace,” Mr. Connally was among the people who occupied Randy Kuhl’s congressional district office in Fairport two weeks ago.
You can see photos of the incident and its protagonists at Rochester Indymedia. (Thanks to The Fighting 29th for bringing this link to our attention). In the photos you'll see some of the usual suspects who pop up around Rochester now and then to profess hatred for this country, most of its people and most of their values.
Now, understand that here on dear old Mustard Street we advocate pulling American troops out of Iraq. We view this war as, in the first place a mistake, and now a lost cause. Americans don't and won't support long wars. When the public doesn't support a war, this country can't win. And Americans don't support the war.
This puts us in bed, on this issue, with some of the more regrettable elements in the political culture. But our motives are very different from theirs, which are illustrated so starkly in the following photo excerpt from a July 3 D&C article.
Nevertheless, we're talking today about tactics, not motives: about how to get our government to pull out of Iraq.Which brings us back to the stunt at the Congressman’s office.
When our fellow-travelers on the Iraq issue – International Socialists, Declaration of Peace declarers, Death For America cultists and others of like persuasion – took over Kuhl’s office to end the war, they made the same mistake as the guy in that old song.
We must tell you -- to your shock -- you were on the wrong block !
Republicans lost control of the Congress last November. Apparently while you weren't looking. Kuhl's in the minority now. His party can't do anything in the House.
Saul Alinski no doubt thought it too obvious to include in his book, but what with standards plummeting everywhere, we suppose it must be stated explicitly. So here's a new rule for radicals: When you occupy a Congressional office to force action, go to the officials with the power to act.
Today there are 162,000 American troops in Iraq, the most ever.
You occupied the wrong office. You went to the wrong address.
Here’s the right one:
Kenneth B. Keating Federal Office Building
100 State Street
Rochester, NY 14614
- Congresswoman Louise M. Slaughter -- Room 3120
- Senator Charles Schumer -- Room 3040
- Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton -- Room 3280
Your crew from Rue de Moutarde will do the cooking. And of course, we'll bring the mustard.
What makes it all the more interesting is that back in March, a group organized by Declaration of Peace actually did occupy, or tried to occupy, these very offices in the Federal Building. So why are they now wasting time at Kuhl's offices in Fairport and Bath?
At the very least, the next time you take over a congressional office, try to show up at the right place.
Randy’s just a silhouette on the shade.
