The Bad First - Sorry!

Today I locked myself out of the apartment and had an hour and a half to kill, so I hung out at Spot and read Artvoice cover to cover. I think this week's issue is one of the better ones they have released in recent memory. Granted, it is, as always, loaded down with the predictable - hifalutin non-starters such as the Bruce Fisher article about spending $26 billion to clean the Great Lakes, which Democrat is going to suggest this (news flash - none of them), and the coup de gras - its Bush's fault that the Great Lakes are still dirty! I could spend an hour picking the article apart and highlight the fact that Democrat politicians that have been firmly entrenched in the Rust Belt political system ignored this problem for 40 years, including Dennis Kucinich when he was mayor of Cleveland and every single Mayor of Buffalo of the 20th century.

To suggest that this is a Bush problem is laughable. So is the suggestion of economic benefit from the investment - according to Fisher, the $26B expenditure will yield $80-$100B in economic benefits. Where will much of the money come from? C'mon guys - you've heard me say it for years so say it with me - higher taxation. This time, they say it with their own words. In particular, the investment and local cleanup would create higher property values, which would in turn generate more tax revenue for the local government. Thats right - the "economic benefit" would be coming out of your pocket. Only a Democrat would spend your tax money in order to attempt to take more of your tax money. These people foolishly believe such an idea would be a boon to our local economy - in fact it would only be taking even more desperately needed money out of the pockets of working people, while simultaneously exacerbating a problem that is already devastating our region - yet higher taxes which make companies laugh when considering locating here.

This is one of the reasons why our area is fucked and will never recover. People actually believe suggestions like this are good ideas, most of all the local politicians. As usual, they don't consider the consequences because the importance of the action (in this case, environmental cleanup) trumps any devastating consequences. Add a little dash of payola and you have Buffalo politics. Stupid people coming up with stupid ideas that will ultimately have long running negative consequences, and quite literally the only group to benefit is the government. The least capable people of the bunch. Byron Brown is a fucking joke - I can't even get started on him. All I have to say is that I didn't vote for him, so a big thanks to all the people who ushered him into office.

These people talk about constituents as if they are sources of revenue. They never talk about making the area hospitable to job creation. Job creation is a far more efficient, and for that matter a far more ethical way of raising tax revenue. Their answer to the "brain drain" is to raise taxes on some of the most taxed and economically disadvantaged people in the entire nation, instead of finding ways to attract jobs to the area.

I'll have left Buffalo long before things get really ugly because I love the city and can't bare watching this slow death. Sort of like my dear grandpa - I'd prefer to remember him when he used to bring Jay and I to McDonald's as 10-year olds than remember him as that emaciated dead man on the hospital bed when I was 24. I am the sort that would love to get involved and help our area, but if I am working with these types who are so utterly misguided and wrong about literally every single ill that has befallen our city, how can honest people with truly good ideas get any support here? Our area's system is too entrenched and I see it as irreversible as our state government. Forget climate change - it is Buffalo that is in irreversible decline. For now, I'll just make sure that my block is clean and safe for residents and visitors, make sure dog owners clean up their pet's shit and occasionally hose off the sidewalk in front of the house to remove cigarette butts from the cracks in the blocks.

My message to local politicians and would-be local economists - you and your ideas are the problem, not the solution, and your insistence and persistence with these bad ideas are going to force me to leave the region. I love Buffalo but not enough to deny myself a better standard of living, better job opportunities and less government hands in my wallet. I'm not the first or the last - get your shit straight or you are going to be smaller than Syracuse or Rochester in 50 years. What happens when most of the young people are gone and all the old people die? Who are going to pay all the taxes? I love Buffalo in the same way that James Joyce loved Dublin - it will always be a part of me but I'll be writing about it from afar rather than while I'm here. YOU are making it impossible for young people who have Buffalo in their hearts, that would otherwise stay here, to actually stay here. You are indeed offering NOTHING to us and are guaranteeing a harrowing future for our city. You sat by and did nothing during the supposed economic boom of the 90's and had the embarrassing nerve to ask why nobody helped us out. When we do leave, we don't want to return during Christmas and see visible proof that we were right. I don't want Buffalo to become merely the place I plan to bury myself when I'm gone.

There is another article worth reading about how local corporations, including Kissling Interests, are taking advantage of the Empire Zone rules to create luxury housing that gives rich people tax breaks for being able to afford living there. Kissling isn't the first (hi Carl Paladino) and you can hardly blame them for using the rules to their advantage - after all, when the guys who voted for the Empire Zone legislation were too naive to see obvious loopholes (I'm talking to you Sam Hoyt so stop apologizing) who is more at fault - the businesses following the law or the people who created the law to begin with?

I'm scared for our city - this sort of disturbing corruption extends itself through all services, including public education. To see what I mean, read the blurb in the "recent news" section highlighting the nonsense at the Board of Education.

The Good - As Promised

This Wednesday at 8pm, on WNED, you'll find a production involving 26 students filming their impressions of the city of Buffalo. I think its an interesting concept, but I hope that it would be good enough to be valuable to an outsider. I'd like for something that shows why it is that we love and stick up for this old, worn out sweater we call home. Still, I'll approach this collective pseudo-documentary with a clean canvas. I'm really interested in seeing our city through the eyes of other residents. Our politicians suck, we live in one of the highest taxed counties in the single highest taxed state in the union, our jobs pay less than in other areas unless you are a slip and fall lawyer - but damn it, we do have each other. I can't wait to see how other Buffalonians view our city... particularly young people. Maybe you don't share that enthusiasm but I least wanted to let you all know about this upcoming show on WNED. There will be a replay on ThinkBright TV on the 23rd I believe, in case you wanted to see it but missed it.

Ha!



Josh

I wish I were kidding - congratulations to the people that run the Olympics for being a bunch of fucking assholes. I love people who reward historically proven brutality against their own people and now apparently animals.

I'm not gonna lie - this is disturbing.



Josh

Viva la revolucion!



Watch the video too.

You won't be hearing about any of this on Radio Havana Cuba, by the way.

Josh

EDIT: Interesting story about Obama's leftward-leaning economic policies and how even people sympathetic to him are beginning to worry - - I told you people he is naive.

1925 - 2008



Today is a sadder day in American life if you are into political and civic discourse. William F. Buckley, Jr. is one of the people that influenced my interest in politics. For many years he hosted a debate program on PBS called Firing Line, which was the best debate show on any network before or since. He routinely hosted legends of political, cultural, intellectual, political and academic persuasions - the roster of his past guests is without peer and is pretty impressive.

He was the only conservative in American public life for many, many years. He is generally credited with laying the groundwork for the modern conservative movement, which is something the evangelical conservatives have utterly, utterly bastardized and twisted around into an embarrassing mishmash of bigotry, hypocrisy and hubris. Buckley was famous for denouncing the John Birch Society and he was criticized by conservatives for doing so. If he's the grand poobah of the conservative movement, if you ask me which side I'd pick in a debate I'll take the guy who was the grand poobah of it all. He and Barry Goldwater were virtually identical in terms of political and philosophical outlook, although in Goldwater's case what he lacked in eloquence he made up for in humor.

Buckley was a Connecticut WASP, Yale educated and spoke with an aristocratic patois that you'd certainly pin to his upbringing... and you wouldn't necessarily be wrong. What people do not know is that English was Buckley's third language that he had learned by the age of 7. He had spoken Spanish and French prior to that, having lived in Mexico and France with his parents at an early age. As a result, his English accent was idiosyncratic and sounded somewhere between northeastern WASP and English. During his life he routinely described himself as a libertarian or a conservative, which in the absolutely purest academic sense of conservatism that he subscribed to, could ultimately be interchangeable terms although in today's society what it means to be a libertarian is defined a hundred different ways. When Bill Buckley was around, conservatism and the church were not intertwined as it is now.

Hands down - the best debater to ever have appeared on television. He was an intimidating person to debate against because of his deep intellect, verbosity, steely gaze and sometimes uncomfortable line of questioning. The Hoover Institution at Stanford University has archived his past television shows; links to 5-minute clips from various shows have been provided. Many of the shows topics are provocative and at least one should pique your interest. Click here -

In London they now charge $15 or so if you want to drive a car into the city center. A lot of people think its a great idea. Guess who proposed that 43 years ago when he ran for mayor of New York? He also proposed installing bike lanes. Bloomberg has been suggesting ideas like this for New York these days and people think he's a genius. Buckley finished third in that race.

The main reason why we are poorer for his passing today is because he was the last remaining credible debater/pundit who insisted on intelligent, polite, civil public discourse in our society (with the possible exception of the Gore Vidal debacle). The days where we could simply talk to each other seem so long gone when you watch Firing Line. We don't talk to each other like this any more. Buckley showed that it was good, even great, to argue with each other if we're going to thoughtfully consider the issues in our society. What makes him different from most is that he maintained great personal friendships with people he had vehement philosophical differences with. Its an incredibly telling thing, when you are greatly loved by people who otherwise would be considered an "enemy."

I don't know if we'll ever have people like this anymore. Its a shame because our country needs more people with the same outlook on how to proceed with civic discourse as he had. I hope its our generation that returns to this way of thinking and talking. And why can't we be funny about it? Buckley was interviewed in Playboy in the late 60's/early 70's and people wondered why he agreed to appear in a bawdy publication such as that. His response was classic - "to communicate my views to my son!"

I'll give you one guess as to who originally came up with this, but I was surprised to hear this "ad" on KGO 810 San Francicsco last night in the middle of liberal talk host Karel's show.



As for Nader - shrug. I think the liberals hate him despite the fact that he's done more good for the common man in America than they ever will. Like I always say, as a voter if you like to pontificate about how you hate the 2-party system, don't bitch when a third candidate actually enters the race! He will take Democrat votes, but how many remain to be seen. I think I agree with (e:james) in that he will have a limited effect, with the libs having been down this road before and feeling like they are hip to the political game. Then again, another side of me knows all too well that many Democrats feel beholden to vote for the party despite not really liking either Obama or Hillary... this I believe is why Nader entered in the first place. Throw in the independent vote and I could be totally wrong about Nader's effect in the election. He knows he isn't going to win, but he knows that he has a constituency that in his mind should be represented in the vote. Call it "spoiling" if you will but like I always say, if your case to the American people was strong enough to begin with then you wouldn't have had to worry about a Ralph Nader.

NEWSFLASH: The New York Times Serves Piping Hot Bile For Morning Reading

Why they will never learn their lesson, I do not know.



NYT has been guilty practitioners of partisan yellow journalism for decades. This is merely another example of a 100% unsubstantiated story based on "anonymous sources" with the utterly transparent intent to cause harm to John McCain's candidacy and to demoralize political enemies. Let me repeat it again - THERE IS NO JOURNALISTIC INTEGRITY ANYMORE! Under any definition of ethical journalism or journalistic integrity, the NYT has once again failed the American people. I won't be holding my breath for an attack on Obama that will never happen, by the way, and I have news for you - it ain't because he's clean as a whistle.

How many times have I written political blog entries telling you - my readers past, present, future, occasional, etc. - that liberal Democrats are not and never will be as good at the political game as the GOP are?

I see this article as an incredibly short sighted gambit that was going to blow up in their own faces the minute it was published. Journalists at the NYT are blinded by their partisanship and have convinced themselves that their partisanship is not in fact a detriment to their profession but an enhancement, which in any rational persons estimation is laughable. Its obvious why this has been condoned over the years, but the real interesting part of it all is how ideological partisanship has transformed the culture of the newsroom. The lengths to which these people go to justify their unprofessional behavior are interesting to watch. At times its like watching an accused criminal squirming in a chair at a police station while the detectives ask him uncomfortable questions. Other times the complaints are simply ignored, as if they owe no explanation to anyone.

Journalists, YOU ARE WRONG and your profession is dying because of your lack of ethics and your inability to restrain yourselves when a juicy rumor comes around. Aren't you the same idiots that believed Bill Burkett in 2004 and ran with it because it was, as they say, sympathetic to the cause?

Journalists believe that anonymous reporting is essential to their work because otherwise they would not be able to report stories that are of vital importance to the American people. This is marble mouthed idiocy that I simply cannot tolerate as a person who refuses to allow an insult to his (and by extension, your) intelligence go unnoticed. That is merely an attempt to justify a complete lack of journalistic integrity, pure and simple.

The bottom line is this. Can you trust a paper that as standard operating procedure prints controversial and accusatory articles, knowing that they are unwilling to publicly substantiate what it is that their printing?

This is classic journalistic muckraking, but the joke isn't on John McCain.


Why They Got It Wrong - 2008's Biggest Political Miscalculation Thus Far

The title of this journal entry is provocative but is ultimately true. I truly believe that the NYT has made a colossal mistake that may end up costing the Democrats far more than it will cost the GOP. Read on to find out why.

The essence of the gambit the NYT has played is this. Who do conservatives hate more - McCain or the New York Times? The liberals making the decisions at the Times have severely miscalculated how efficiently their own behavior galvanizes conservatives across America.

Trust me on this - I know these people like I know every inch of my glorious naked body. Conservatives will never believe anything that the New York Times prints and will never hold up an article from the NYT as evidence that John McCain is the GOP version of Bill Clinton. Siding with print from the New York Times is simply not part of the equation and never will be. The NYT has made an assumption about how readers perceive them that is ultimately inaccurate. They have undermined themselves in a most stunning fashion.

NYT has risked waking the GOP up merely because they wanted to play what will widely be perceived as a transparently dirty trick. I am not saying that conservatives will be in lockstep with McCain, but they certainly will not allow a sworn political enemy like the NYT to slander McCain. This sort of thing is going to affect how many GOP voters come out in November, I guarantee it. It just won't be in the way the NYT were hoping for. Things just got more interesting. Is it possible that this year the candidates will be civil but the press will not?

Democrats

I think its fairly well established that John McCain will be the nominee on the Republican side and is now only a matter of academics. Since this is incredibly boring, I'm focused more on the Democrats. The delegate count difference is only 70 or so despite Barack Obama winning 10 straight primaries. This is scaring Obama supporters because of the DNC's arcane "superdelegate" model, which in my estimation is going to cause Hillary Clinton to get the nomination in August unless Obama wins Ohio and Texas in two weeks.

Before I continue, I want to say that I think this year's Democratic convention could potentially be as troubling as the 1968 convention because of a clear lack of understanding of how the rules in their own party work. Why is it that liberals never find fault with the system until for some inexplicable reason, their candidate loses or may lose? Its incredible to me how panicky Obama liberals are - it is becoming almost conspiratorial in tone lately... and this is a primary for God's sake! Democrat against Democrat. When Democrats eat their own, as they routinely do, bad things happen.

A lot of liberals are out there who typically do not participate in primaries, and as a result have not considered the rules for their own party. Winning primaries does not get you the nomination - gaining delegates does. This is done differently on a state by state basis - for example in California delegates are broken down by district and are divided proportionally along percentages. In other states the "winner takes all" approach is employed. The bottom line - if you do not lay out a strategic plan to gain as many delegates as possible, you are actively working to lose. Period. End of story. One thing that is blatantly obvious is that Obama and his people are political amateurs in comparison to the Clinton camp, who are loaded down with people that worked in previous Democrat administrations. I should emphasize that I say that with some hesitancy, since you'd expect the Clintons to know better than to let Slick Willy routinely act agitated to potential voters and single handedly torpedo her candidacy. Which brings me the question - could Slick Willy ever play second fiddle to his wife if she won the election?

Republicans

John McCain has all but won the nomination. Mike Huckabee, a Republican I will never vote for, remains in the race. Presumably, he is staying in the race to let the conservatives know that there is another choice more suitable to them. I think he's doing it simply to stick it in McCain's eye - Huckabee has no legitimate shot at the nomination.

To put it plainly, many conservatives are panicking and threatening to separate from the Republican Party because McCain is winning. You've never read a strong criticism of conservatives from me - here we are. I'm angry with conservatives because of their recent petulance - if they don't get their way, they want to pick up their ball and leave the playground. What the fuck? For years the conservative wing has marginalized moderates in the party, myself and my brother included. We were told in 2004 to vote for President Bush, even if we didn't like everything about him, because the alternative was, well.. John F-ing Kerry. Fair enough - I do not want a staunch liberal to ever be the President of the United States, and when push comes to shove, I only support less than a handful of liberal social initiatives. Now that the shoe is on the other foot, look how they are acting... its a god damn pitiful shame. What is good for the moderates is not good for the conservatives. This is what happens when one element of your party is dominant for many years - these people feel entitled to boss the rest around and dictate to their EQUALS how the party should vote. Christine Todd Whitman wrote a book called "Its My Party Too." Conservatives laughed at her and called her a RINO. Now who is laughing?

This is why I've just finished filling out the forms to switch my registration to independent. Thats right - I'm disassociating myself with the party, or any party. I'm deeply unsatisfied, and to be perfectly honest, I don't have a home in any party at the moment. I'm not even sure I have a presidential candidate to support - we'll see how the chips fall over the course of the next eight months or so.

This is the story - conservatism right now is not palatable to Republicans, let alone independents or conservative Democrats. If you ask conservatives who is at fault for their situation they blame moderates. Can you believe that? These are the same people who have always told liberals that if you complain about losing, don't blame the voters or the system; blame your own inability to convince the voters that your ideas are better. Now conservatives are losing the battle of ideas even within their own party and arrogantly refuse to blame themselves. They are wrong and I won't associate myself with them anymore. As of whenever the ECBOE gets my form, I'm now a registered independent.

Our Future

So, for those of us who follow the political scene how will the next eight months shape up? I predict that we will only know the Democratic nominee when the delegates are counted at the August DNC convention in Denver. I hope I am wrong about that because I really believe that such a situation will bring chaos. I'm also predicting that we will have the least negative general election in decades. If you ask me for one positive that I truly believe will come to fruition it will be this, and to that extent I think voters will punish any candidate that plays dirty. Picking on McCain's age will yield him a victory in the same way that it benefited Reagan 25 years ago. I don't believe Obama would pursue that angle. In fact, I don't know why Obama doesn't copy Reagan and ask the question, "are you better off now than you were 8 years ago?" I won't bother with Hillary - she is hanging in there. She knows how the system works. Everybody knows how the Clintons operate. Nuff said. Because the delegate count is so close, Hillary doesn't have cause to believe her candidacy is over. However, where the momentum lies is obvious. If Obama can win big on March 4, I don't think Hillary will have much of a say in the matter anymore and we can move on. We have two candidates who believe they are the heirs presumptive to the throne, based on puzzling and narcissistic presumptions of having destiny and history on their side. Watch this space.

Last thing. I am picking on Obama supporters for freaking out over the DNC's superdelegate rules, but in all honesty they are right. I've talked with (e:jason) about this many times and we both believe that no voter should even be in the position to have to understand such bizarre rules and regulations. It should all be scrapped - ALL OF IT. Superdelegates, the electoral college, all ridiculous rules both within each party and in general elections. The reason why these rules were created are transparent - aspects of the government (and in the case of the feds, the founding fathers themselves) did not believe that the people have the intelligence or the ability to choose the leader of their own country. Any scenario in which the popular vote loses to the electoral college vote is unacceptable to me and should be unacceptable to all Americans, because in fact a majority of the country (when Bush won in 2004 liberals referred to this as 'mob rule') did not vote for the person who is taking the office. Bottom line - that is not democratic and everybody knows it. So many people missed the point in 2000. Four different independent organizations certified the Florida results, yet to this day many liberals argue that Bush somehow stole the election. The crime wasn't that President Bush won through a flawed system - the crime was that the system was flawed in the first place.

Lately I've been looking into participating in a community supported agriculture program with a local farm, and while doing research I thought it would make for a great journal entry. For $16 a week you can get enough organically grown produce to feed 2-4 people. The best part? You don't even need to pick up your produce at the farm - chances are you can pick up your produce at a close and convenient location. Do you like the idea of buying conveniently picked up organic produce at a more than fair price with enough variety to keep your culinary imagination going, while directly supporting the operation of a local farm? Read on, my run-on sentence loving friends... this may change the way you think about where your food comes from.

CSA - A Primer

Community supported agriculture - Wiki - is essentially a method by which consumers and farmers can forge a mutually beneficial partnership. This not only stabilizes local farmers early on in the growing season when cash can be short, but guarantees you a share in the crop harvest on a weekly basis. You can read the Wiki page if you want more details, but I will briefly overview how it works.

Small family farms are a dying breed, just like the mom and pop stores we used to see prior to the advent of large corporate chain stores. As I alluded to you earlier, CSA is a clever scheme by which small farms that focus on organically/ethically produced foods can mitigate financial risk by approaching consumers directly and asking them to purchase a "share." Typically a "share" costs around $300-$400 per growing season, and many farms offer a variety of options. Want your 22-week season to start in the summer, or do you want a winter citrus package, or maybe you want to participate year round - no problem. As consumers, we outlay this cash to the farms, who then use the money to stabilize their businesses early on. Our return on investment yields a share in the crops - every week for 22 weeks your money buys you a variation of different fruits and veg, depending on what is being grown.

I should stress the mutual risk and reward element of this idea, and the concept of eating seasonally. You eat what the farmers are able to grow - you may still find yourself trailing off to Weg or the Co-op if something you really want isn't grown locally but is shipped from Chile to be sold here. Yield may vary as well, but farmers are incredibly good at knowing how much they will need to grow and how to achieve it. However, the benefits of eating seasonally and sourcing from local, organically focused farms who know what they are doing can yield you some truly amazing, restaurant grade (if not better) produce.

So - you help local farms sustain themselves, and in return you get to pick up a load of fabulous produce every week for 18-22 weeks. For less than $20 a week all the thinking you need to do (with the possible exception of making a substitution in your share because you hate radish) about your produce is that you need to go pick it up. I'm thinking about doing this for the summer. There is a farm that allegedly does pickups at (e:drew)'s church but I cannot confirm that, and I need to do some more research before I'd make a recommendation. I'd prefer to just have a list of local farms that have a program such as this and allow you to choose for yourselves.

EDIT: Buffalo Rising article from Sept.

And since I wouldn't endorse visiting links from their site -

Porter Farms -

Native Offerings -

I am not informed enough to suggest one or the other - check out the different options, pricing, etc. and see what is best for you. Sure, $350 up front (or more if you want the larger share) may seem like a lot, but in the context of your entire summer food budget is it really that bad?

I just got this 404 message on a website I frequent - and no, it doesn't happen to be from a porn site.

Once upon a midnight dreary while I pr0n surfed, weak and weary,
Over a many a strange and spurious pr0nsite of hot XXX galore;
While I clicked my fav'rite bookmark, suddenly there came a warning,
And my heart was filled with mourning, mourning for my dear amour.
"'Tis not possible!" I muttered, "give me back my free hardcore!"

Quoth the server,
404

If you didn't get the Poe reference... I don't think I can talk to you anymore.