"We're not going to get out of this quagmire we've built until we reduce our spending."
EJ McMahon said it appropriately "Paterson's straight talk is a refreshing contrast to the mushy evasiveness of George Pataki and the preening self-righteousness of Eliot Spitzer. And it's the furthest thing from the cult of fiscal victimhood promoted by Mario Cuomo during the crisis of the early 1990s. "
The bottom line is budget cuts for the special session are not going anywhere.
The Democrats, such as Sheldon Silver, who earlier this year denounced the severity of the situation and even failed to put his list of cuts on the table this round are simply playing politics, typical Albany style.
Speaker Silver, Minority Leader Smith and Comptroller DiNapoli are simply attempting to box in the Senate Republicans with the various comments these three have made, yet Smith or Silver have failed to produce a proposal of cuts from there respective sides.
- Smith -
"The Senate Democratic Conference supports his efforts and asks for the support and unity of all New Yorkers as we make the difficult decisions necessary to get New York working again. The Senate Democratic Conference is considering a number of proposals to help meet our financial challenges. We remain committed to working with the Governor, Speaker Silver and our legislative leaders to cut wasteful spending while preserving money for vital services and growing the economy."
Where is his proposal of cuts?
- Silver -
"On November 5th, the Assembly released its Mid-Year Report on Economic Forecast and Revenues in which we projected an even larger deficit than the Governor projected today, in both the current fiscal year and the year beginning April 1, 2009. We also project that the overall economic outlook for the state for 2009 is bleak."
Where is his proposal of cut?
This is the type of partisan rhetoric that earns Albany its appropriate label of the most dysfunctional state legislature, this is nothing more than a showdown that will produce little of no results next week. Neither Silver and Smith are not operating out of any sincerity of doing what is right for the taxpayers, they are simply walking in the land of OZ, making this a political show and the Republican Senate will dig in and resist.
10 comments:
Massive spending, massive foreign borrowing, massive deficits and massive out of control budgets ARE the culprits ... our national fiscal crisis underscores that with a huge RED LINE.
Hi
There will be budget cuts--BIG ones--but not in the special lame duck session. The politics are
super simple. If the soon to be
expired Republican majority in the
Senate won't agree to any cuts
Why should the dems propose any now and just tick off their various constituencies without good reason in an untimely way. The special session isn't going to work because the lame duck Senate republicans won't
forward the cutting agenda. Simple as pie. This doesn't require an advanced degree.
I guess you missed Skelos, Libous and the Senate GOP saying they were refusing to make cuts. Interesting that would have missed that, since it was in all the real news outlets today. I guess that was just not partisanly beneficial to you to include.
More a STATE problem than a NATIONAL one Dan. Always has been a problem more close to home than we have wanted to admit.
Ted, there have never been cuts before. What makes you think there will be now? Answer, there won't be. You can package it any way you want, but the donkeys are in control, and they won't cut anything. But never fear, it will be a long time before any voter puts two and two together. Chances are they never will here in NY. Special interests rule. And I'm happy about that. Retirement awaits.
I wanna keep going as we have in the past.
Children first.
This is gonna be fun.
They still won't cut anything.
Told ya. And I'll be writing
"told ya" for a long, long time.
Anyone else see a trend? Republicans get elected and spend and cut taxes. Democrats get elected to fix the mess. Voters get pissed off at Democrats and Republicans are elected again. Republicans spend and cut taxes...repeat.
I respect your view, PCS, but see it a little differently.
I see a trend in that we spend, elect one, spend some more, elect the other, now keep right on spending. And we've now settled in with the the best spenders, donkeys. I have to respect them as the champions of all special interest groups. If you really care about something, anything in particular, you're a donkey.
Now we have entered dangerous area. The elephants tried to compete, but can't. Too many people have a check that is endorsed by donkey's. But we're in a spending cycle we cannot continue. In other words, it is a train wreck. So grab some popcorn, read the bs in the Watertown Times/established media, try to avoid as many taxes as you can by whatever legal means you can (we all do), and hope you have your nest properly defended from a benevolent government. One that cares greatly about YOU, and the Children of course.
pcs is right. Look how the Republicans turned on George Bush I, when he worked with Speaker Foley and Maj Leader Mitchell to put in the tax and spending plan that Clinton gets credit for.
It balanced our budget and rebuilt our economy. Oh, but then Clinton's second term he started chipping away at it and GWB obliterated it. Look where we are now.
In our state, it was Pataki who built a government on borrowing and at some point those debts have to be paid. We're in rough shape because of Pataki and Joe Bruno and Shelly Silver. That's fault from both parties, but that's two out of three Republicans by my count.
You keep talking about higher taxes and fees, but you forget that when Pataki was in office, he claimed all sorts of tax reductions, while he raised fees to new levels to accomodate spending.
Pataki avoided what would have been an easy monikker, Pataxi, but he should be referred to as Patakfee.
pcs is right. Look how the Republicans turned on George Bush I, when he worked with Speaker Foley and Maj Leader Mitchell to put in the tax and spending plan that Clinton gets credit for.
It balanced our budget and rebuilt our economy. Oh, but then Clinton's second term he started chipping away at it and GWB obliterated it. Look where we are now.
In our state, it was Pataki who built a government on borrowing and at some point those debts have to be paid. We're in rough shape because of Pataki and Joe Bruno and Shelly Silver. That's fault from both parties, but that's two out of three Republicans by my count.
You keep talking about higher taxes and fees, but you forget that when Pataki was in office, he claimed all sorts of tax reductions, while he raised fees to new levels to accomodate spending.
Pataki avoided what would have been an easy monikker, Pataxi, but he should be referred to as Patakfee.
That's an interesting view.
But where we are is where we are.
The real question is what do we do NOW.
We cannot continue to spend as we have, but we show no sign of being able to cut anything. Your analysis is interesting. But how are we to force spending cuts in an era of all-powerful special interests and complicit, dishonest media?
Post a Comment