Author: buffalopundit

Discovery's Last Flight

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Space Shuttle Over DC

Courtesy mringlein on Flickr

Yesterday, a NASA Space Shuttle took to the skies for the last time in history. The Shuttle program came to be during the 70s, as I was growing up. Apollo missions to the moon had ended earlier that decade, and we were sending missions to Skylab, but the Shuttle held the promise of regular space exploration for decades.  It didn’t look like a spaceship or a capsule – it looked like an airplane – an everyday thing. 

I vividly recall watching the first Shuttle mission takeoff, and by 1986 they were so routine that our high school didn’t wheel out the TVs to watch the tragic Challenger explosion until after it had happened. 

But with all of this, it’s downright disappointing that the Shuttles have been mothballed, and NASA has nothing new in the pipeline to replace them. Certainly the technology to create a reusable spacecraft has improved since the mid-70s, and certainly we oughtn’t rely on the Russian space program to ferry astronauts to the International Space Station, and the private carriers are suborbital, not equipped for complex missions. 

Yesterday, the Shuttle Discovery was ferried aboard a 747 from Cape Canaveral to Dulles Airport in Virginia. Adjacent to Dulles is the Smithsonian’s Udvar-Hazy Air & Space Museum annex hangar, which houses all manner of historic aircraft from the time of the Wright Brothers to Concorde. It’s massive, majestic, and pure eye candy for a fan of airplanes. Discovery will replace a replica Shuttle that’s been there since the facility opened. 

Before landing in Virginia, the Shuttle flew by Reagan Airport and along the National Mall. People poured out of their offices and shops to watch the spectacle, and applauded.  It was a bittersweet event.  

We should have something new to applaud. I echo the sentiment expressed last night by comedian Lewis Black. 

[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/TheLewisBlack/status/192384427840643072″]


Today's Things

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1. The best thing to come out of yesterday’s Anderson Cooper / Dyngus Day flap? The Buffalo Outrage Twitter account. Check it out next time Buffalo gets indignant over real and imagined slights from national figures. 

[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/BuffaloOutrage/status/190103345762025472″]

I’d like to note that the point I made in my post about it yesterday – about my misgivings over the geography of the Dyngus Day festivities – was underscored by the fact that the Dyngus Day organizers held their faux-anger-at-Anderson press conference at Redlinski’s, which is not in the Broadway Market anymore, but instead located on Walden Avenue in Cheektowaga. I was pleased that the organizers didn’t overdo the outrage, and instead took it all in good humor and invited Cooper to the 2013 festivities. 

As for the geography, upon some reflection, I do enjoy the use of the Central Terminal as Buffalo’s unofficial convention center – the convention center that is architecturally gorgeous and begging to be used. But parading through a devastated community that hasn’t been Polish for decades still seems borderline insulting, and that’s what I object to. If Polonia is so great, why’d all the Poles move? 

2. What happens when a cow walks into the road and causes an accident – can the cow’s owner be held liable for negligently allowing the cow to roam around freely? Not in New York, and the Third Department’s Appellate Division took an unusual step and referred a case to the Court of Appeals, asking the state’s highest court to change the law. 

3. George Zimmerman, who shot and killed unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin was charged yesterday with 2nd degree murder. The case is rapidly becoming something of a circus, complete with the involvement of despicable judgment debtor Al Sharpton. At its core, however, the question of whether Zimmerman’s killing of Martin was justified is one a jury should decide – not the police.  In Florida, 2nd degree murder does not require premeditation; instead, a person is guilty if he commits a homicide, “with a depraved mind showing no regard for human life“. To my mind, when Zimmerman made the decision to exit his car to chase Martin – who was not committing any crime – he forfeited any right to a self-defense justification. Being black, wearing a hoodie, and looking at the overzealous neighborhood watch guy funny don’t justify homicide.  

Either way, both Trayvon Martin and George Zimmerman deserve this to be a fair trial by an impartial judge and jury. 

4. Last week, Capital New York’s Reid Pillifant published excerpts from an interview he conducted with Gingrich supporter Carl Paladino. Some key passages from the pride of Buffalo: 

“Unlike these other pussies that are saying, ‘Oh, we don’t want to have a brokered convention, oh’—they’re a bunch of pussies, OK? Those are the ones that are the establishment boys that think they’re still viable with the people. They’re not viable with the people anymore. Those are the control boys. All they’re about is keeping the status quo and the status quo is not real anymore for the Republican rank and file nationally.”

and 

Paladino also criticized Romney for his offshore investments, which the Washington Post reported yesterday still aren’t fully known, because the campaign is utilizing an obscure exception in federal ethics laws.

“Yes, he may be doing it in the letter of the law, in hiding his money overseas, to not pay taxes to the government that he now wants to run,” Paladino said. “Sounds sort of like [Jeff] Immelt at G.E., you know, they hold all that money offshore and, ‘Oh, I’m an American.’ He’s not an American anymore. He’s a fucking two-faced cock-sucker that shipped the x-ray division over to China last week.” 

Paladino is on a kick to grow his power statewide, and I don’t recall him using such colorful terminology on the record when dealing with local or regional matters. Part of me thinks it’s too bad, because that sort of language is seldom appropriate, but never more so than when talking about our local political establishment. 

5. Thursday in at the Square will be permanently moving from Lafayette Square to Canal Side.  More room, nice location, something to do by the water – everybody wins. 

6. Adding to the groups the Republican Presidential nominee is happy to alienate and offend, the homophobic National Organization for Marriage endorses Mitt Romney for President. NOM’s Twitter account was hacked yesterday, with hilarious results. 

7. I just saw the first pro-Romney SuperPAC ad on Channel 4, from the “Restore our Future” PAC, so named because apparently Kenyan Indo-Muslim Socialist Usurper N0bama has taken it away. 

8. The right wing hates not only Obamacare, but also Social Security. The 2008 financial meltdown apparently taught them nothing at all.

9. Turns out, James O’Keefe’s and Hannah Giles’  prostitution “sting” of ACORN wasn’t too far off the mark – problem is, Andrew Breitbart was the pimp, and O’Keefe and Giles were the whores. 

10. Here is Anderson Cooper putting himself on the Ridiculist after yesterday’s giggling fit over Dyngus Day. 

 

It’s nice when people can have a sense of humor. 

Saving Trico & the Leadership Vacuum

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It’s only been a few short weeks, but I’m already absolutely sick & tired of hearing about, talking about, or thinking about the decaying, unusued Trico factory. Empty now for a decade, it stands as an overgrown, brown headstone honoring the memory of industries lost to the cheap labor and lax environmental regulations of Mexico’s borderlands. Trico assembles wipers in Matamoros. Trico is dead. Oishei so loved Buffalo that they moved the wiper business – which employed people and created local wealth and economic activity – and set up a foundation. 

Battle lines have been drawn, and the forces of “preservation” have selected an old building as a “must-save”, and will go to every length to prevent even the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus from demolishing and replacing the dormant Buffalo factory building. This despite the fact that BNMC is driven by innovation and knowledge, and employing people in something other than piddling service jobs or anachronistic assembly positions. This despite the fact that much of what BNMC has built in recent years has been architecturally as innovative as the work done within the buildings. 

Sure, I could point out that the work that BNMC and its people do is today’s version of building wiper blades, but that doesn’t matter. Trico must be saved! I could point out that the cavernous Trico building’s design could just as easily be described as an eyesore as it can be held up as an example of a factory design that was innovative 100 years ago, but that doesn’t matter. Trico must be saved! Even hypothetically – if a company was saying it wanted to move to Buffalo and create a zillion jobs at $50,000 per year, but wanted to be downtown on a large plot of land and build something designed by Frank Gehry on the site of the mothballed Trico site, and it wouldn’t matter. Trico must be saved!

This despite the fact that Trico has been sitting there for a century, and it is so significant and historical and historically significant that there exists nothing on the books that would legally prohibit its demolition. 

There is no winning in this argument. Only headaches. Buffalo’s activist class have temporarily united to combat anything but Trico’s adaptive reuse. Even Rocco Termini – whose entire business model is based on (a) being friendly with Byron Brown; and (b) using subsidies to render adaptive reuse economically feasible shamelessly says he has a dollar in his pocket to buy Trico and then save it – using government subsidies to do so. 

There seems to be a belief that because Trico can be adapted and reused, it must be adapted and reused. I don’t think that’s true, but it doesn’t matter. Trico must be saved!

Usually, when populations and stakeholders have some sort of disagreement, political leaders will step in and show some leadership on the issue. Not here. Anyone know where Byron Brown stands on this controversy? With whom will he side – with jobs and innovation, or with the defenders of a “daylight factory”, which was innovative in its use of windows?

Buffalo Rising’s April Fool’s joke involved Trico “saving itself”, and flying away because the city is so mean to it. I wish it were true. I wish we could ship our unused industrial detritus elsewhere, but we can’t.  We can either turn it into the “Trico lofts”, or tear it down. But a vocal and well-organized minority has decided that Trico is important and must be saved – not because it’s in any way attractive, but because of its “good bones”. Because of a leadership vacuum in City Hall and no one much caring, BNMC will be bullied into submission. There will be no peace until the state subsidizes cut-rate rental apartments, maybe offices, and vacant street-level retail space in that massive building.  Or perhaps BNMC will decide to put its 21st century people in a century-old factory. 

In inadvertently picking a fight over historic preservation, the BNMC – the future of Buffalo – never had a chance. 

The Senecas' Buffalo Creek Casino Re-Design

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Have you seen it?

Aim Low.

 

Aspirational

I hope to move my way up from “surface parking” to “valet parking”, and someday aim to join the “chairman parking” elite.

It’s good to aspire to excellence. The whole plan – is it serious? Is it a massive “f you” to the earnest people with dubious means of support who fought to halt it and its predecessor plan a few years ago?

It’s magnificent, if you agree with Xzibit: 

Let me know what Harrah’s is trading at today, as that may have some bearing on how aggressively this plan will be fought. 

Fear & Propaganda

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Lost amid the sound and fury of the race for the Republican nomination is how candidates Romney, Santorum, Gingrich, and even former candidates like Cain, are really focusing on issues and not engaging in race-baiting or hyperbole. 

Nah, I’m just kidding. The issues are secondary. This is all about how Obama has destroyed / is about to destroy America, grandma, apple pie, and Chevrolet. Why, yesterday Obama got caught on a hot mic telling Russian PM Dmitry Medvedev the truth – that missile shield talks need to wait until after the election, at which time Obama will have “more flexibility”. 

Given that Mitt Romney went on record yesterday all but demanding war against Russia, Obama’s position is a bit more sane. 

So, here are some pretty awesome advertisements that Santorum and Cain’s PAC have put out in recent days. I’d call these “blatantly false propagandistic fearmongering”, but Limbaugh and his clones tell me only Democrats do that. 

 This one is from Rick Santorum. It’s got everything – how Obama destroyed the economy while he was President in 2008, how Ahmadinejad is going to rocket-destroy America and, like, take it over – maybe with Obama’s help, because he’s a seekrit Kenyan Mooslim!

Herman Cain isn’t going to be outdone by the patent insanity of a Rick Santorum. So, he’ll start out by displaying his hatred for “stimulus” by having a little kid kill a goldfish: 

And, not content with sanctioning the killing of a 10-cent fish, Cain pays for some really poor CGI showing a guy shooting a bunny rabbit in mid-air. 

Because nothing says, “I disagree with Keynesian economic pump-priming” like blowing a rabbit into little bits!

Your 2012 GOP: Totally out to lunch!

Explore 'n More Should Be At Canalside

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When Chris Ostrander sharply criticizes the placemaking fraud that has has supplanted top-down planning with a bottom-up feelings-based lack of planning, he is exactly correct. Deck chairs, hot dog shacks, and happy feelings aren’t going to organically develop the inner harbor, and I’ve written before that all we’ve done is nominally exchange a political/business elite planning scheme for a cultural elite planning scheme. 

 I disagree, however, with Ostrander’s criticism of the proposed Children’s Museum. Such a museum will involve an outlay of public money for construction, and likely will be operated by a well-respected current operator of a children’s museum facility – Explore and More – that is in deep need of a new facility. Ostrander writes: 

I’m condemning the thought of trading the space previously reserved for Bass Pro for a children’s museum. My problem with Bass Pro was that the store wouldn’t capture an entire audience nor cohesively bring the neighborhood together. Now the approach is to use the plan with the least amount of risk. Literally. This plan is being adopted because there is little, to no risk involved. Instead of taking a major step and hitting a home run, Buffalo will be forced to accept a sacrifice bunt, just to advance the runners.

Ostrander misapprehends the size and scope of the Children’s Museum, and what is to happen with the Aud Block and the “space previously reserved for Bass Pro”. 

Regardless of the solar carousel vs. Bass Pro argument, Canalside needs to be a 4-seasons, all-ages place to go. I’m not a fan of the whole “story of Buffalo” programming BS that’s suffused the whole project, but Ostrander is misstating the extent of the Children’s Museum in his piece. 

The image above is a rendering of the current plan for the Aud Block; it isn’t going to be replaced with another huge building fitting its footprint.  What was once the Aud will be chopped up into smaller parcels, footpaths, and canal-shaped reflecting pools. The Children’s Museum – pretty much the only cultural programming at Canalside that I think isn’t a horrible joke – will only take up a small portion of that location, and that’s ok. 

Turning the “story of Buffalo” into a 4D motion ride and costumed people strolling around what should be a shopping & entertainment district is what deserves criticism. Moving Explore ‘n More to the Inner Harbor is one of the better ideas to have come from all of this idiotic turmoil. 

 

Who's Ahead?

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The sole debate between former Higgins staffer Chris Fahey and Common Councilman Mickey Kearns took place yesterday in the Buffalo News’ newsroom. The two were questioned by veteran reporters Bob McCarthy and Brian Meyer, but the vast majority of the questions surrounded horse race crap. Why is Kearns running as a Republican? Fahey is Silver’s puppet! Kearns is Paladino’s puppet! Kearns has kids! By the way, did you know he has a wife and kids? Downstate Interests! Republicans! Sheldon Silver! 

Incidentally, a Democrat running as a Republican whose sole platform plank involves not voting for Sheldon Silver as Assembly Speaker is utterly useless. Seriously, if elected to the Assembly, Kearns will be able to hone his Sudoku skills and little else. (This is why we need a nonpartisan, unicameral legislature and a completely new Albany political structure, but that’s something for another time.)

Horse race inside baseball who’s up, who’s down crap is McCarthy’s specialty. He doesn’t seem to understand or care that the horse race is just the path to attaining and exercising some sort of political power. 

Discussion of actual issues was almost non-existent. The handful of people who watched this mid-day screw-you-no-SCREW-YOU brawl learned almost nothing about the candidates’ positions or platforms. 

This state has some problems. This region has some problems. What are your priorities to fix some of them, or at least ease them? Maybe next time someone ask that. 

Outrageous Outrage 2: Lloyd's Taco Truck

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A couple of weeks ago, Lloyd’s Taco Truck began a Kickstarter program in order to raise enough money to make a down payment on a second truck. They have just under 20 days to go, and are about 1/2 the way there. 

But people have denigrated Lloyd for seeking a “handout”, and expressing disapproval over a for-profit company “begging” for money from people without, e.g., offering a share in the business. 

So, here’s a fact-check. 

1. If you don’t want to participate in the Kickstarter, you don’t have to. No one’s making you. 

2. Kickstarter was created precisely so that for-profit entities can raise funding that they can’t come up with themselves, and can’t get a traditional loan for, so that the path from idea to reality is made easier. 

3. If you click on the prominent link at the top of the Kickstarter page, you discover this self-explanatory text: 

Kickstarter is the world’s largest funding platform for creative projects. Every week, tens of thousands of amazing people pledge millions of dollars to projects from the worlds of music, film, art, technology, design, food, publishing and other creative fields.

A new form of commerce and patronage. This is not about investment or lending. Project creators keep 100% ownership and control over their work. Instead, they offer products and experiences that are unique to each project.

All or nothing funding. On Kickstarter, a project must reach its funding goal before time runs out or no money changes hands. Why? It protects everyone involved. Creators aren’t expected to develop their project without necessary funds, and it allows anyone to test concepts without risk.

Each and every project is the independent creation of someone like you. Projects are big and small, serious and whimsical, traditional and experimental. They’re inspiring, entertaining and unbelievably diverse. We hope you agree… Welcome to Kickstarter!

4. So, it’s specifically for creative projects, including food projects, is completely voluntary, and frankly will enable a very good, very popular local food business to expand by one truck and better serve customers. 

5. If you think Lloyd’s has made a lot of money in its first year, what with legal wrangling over city permitting, limited locations to set up, crappy weather during the winter of ’10 – ’11, and occasional truck problems, you’re wrong. It’s a tough slog, and no one’s getting rich. They need twelve grand to buy a new truck and expand – if you like tacos, you may choose to give them money and get a thank you gift in exchange – it’s win-win, as Lloyd’s gets to go more places, and you get to eat more Lloyd’s.  

6. Thousands of for-profit projects exist on Kickstarter, all of which can be subjected to the same criticism as Lloyds, yet there they are.  I mean, do you need a device that will remotely print stuff people tag on Instagram? Probably not,  but if you’d like one, or like to see one on the market, here you go. $100,000 worth of people have donated. 

7. Everyone just relax. It’s a taco truck. I’m a fan, and I’ve participated in the Kickstarter because I’d like there to be another one to patronize. Because the Lloyd’s guys are friends of mine, their food is good, and they’re pioneers of sorts. Other people have pledged money for their own reasons. If you don’t think it’s fair or right, then don’t participate. What I don’t understand is the outrage and, frankly, hatred I’ve seen in many online comments about this program. Even here at Artvoice, the weekly arrow up/arrow down roundup gave Lloyd’s an arrow down because they have the nerve to use an online funding service in exactly the way it’s intended to be used in order to ask fans for money they can’t raise any other way, at least not now. 

8. Lloyd’s isn’t the first local for-profit food-based business to use Kickstarter to help fund its growth and expansion, yet it’s the first to get a barrage of criticism. 

Wednesday War 'n Politics

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1. Congratulations to Mitt Romney, who won a couple of states in last night’s Super Tuesday. He appears to have become, at long last, the Republican’s nominee to take on Barack Obama in November. Santorum won a handful of states, and Gingrich won Georgia, which is enough to keep them around and just demolishing Romney day in and day out, but they don’t really have anywhere to go.

2. Incidentally, did you know that the Paladinoist / Palinist wing of the tea party club here in WNY held a Presidential straw poll of its own? Although Romney is very likely to win the New York primary, our plucky band of angry local wingnuts picked Rick Santorum.

3. The debate over what is to become with the Trico building is going to be the big development/preservation fight for the first half of this year. It’s already getting going, as an earlier post will attest. What’s unique about this particular battle is that most people agree that the Trico building is an historically significant landmark, and also that the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus is something that’s great for the community and the source of a great many good jobs, and of a knowledge-based future Buffalo industry. It’s going to be a tough battle because it’ll be particularly hard for anyone to demonize or belittle anyone else. It’s also yet another ad hoc battle that we’re so used to, which pits people against each other, creates loads of rancor, and is generally sad and discouraging, regardless of who wins. While I recognize the historic importance of Trico, and the importance of its former factory, I also recognize that Trico is long gone, headquartered in Michigan, and making blades in Brownsville and Matamoros. The building is, to me, subjectively hideous – an eyesore, and refurbishing a former factory – regardless of how historically important – into a medical research facility is impractical, and something the BNMC simply doesn’t want to do. They want a 21st century facility, not a 19th century facility. This is before we even get to the environmental cleanup that any adaptive reuse would entail. My sympathies default to people, jobs, and the future.

4. The Valenti/Brocuglio dynamic duo is back in / still in WNY, depending on whom we’re talking about, and their residential landlord got shafted at Eden court in her eviction effort. The former owners of Valenti’s restaurant have until the end of March to move out of their home, and Judge Zittel did not order a judgment for back rent dating to December.

5. I remember watching the Little Rascals after school when I was a kid, those little unsupervised, depression-era scamps were often tussling with the truant officer. Perhaps it’s time that school districts with big absentee problems revisit this idea.

6. There was a lot of hubbub yesterday about a map released by a special master appointed by a federal judge to try and resolve the ongoing fight over congressional redistricting in New York. Locally, the issue was the fact that both Brian Higgins and Kathy Hochul reside within the redrawn 27th district. Suffice it to say, the court’s map is not in any way final, but it will be the default map should the parties be unable to come to a separate agreement. It happens every time, and acts as a catalyst to move negotiations forward. What does seem likely, however, is that Louise Slaughter’s district will be re-drawn to return her influence to the Rochester area only, and out of the Buffalo metro. NYS Judicial Redistricting Map

7. Ron Paul has won a whopping 47 delegates during this primary season. The margin of Romney’s lead over Santorum in the delegate race is more than 200 delegates. Why the hell is he still in the Presidential race?

8. In response to news that the government is looking to get rid of over 800 jobs at the Niagara Falls Air Reserve base, Republican Congressional candidate David Bellavia tweeted this:

[blackbirdpie url=”https://twitter.com/#!/DavidBellavia/status/177124836504645633″]

Well, not really. I received a press release that Schumer, Gillibrand, Hochul, Slaughter, and Higgins jointly released, reading as follows:

“We call on the Air Force to reverse this decision and to identify a new mission for the Niagara Falls Air Reserve Station. As a united delegation, along with the support of Governor Cuomo, we will continue to fight to protect this base, the positions it supports, and the thousands of Western New Yorkers that rely on its services.

“The Niagara Falls Air Reserve Station is an essential part of our nation’s military force, and we will not rest in the effort to find a new mission.”

Furthermore, Republicans are usually very, very opposed to things like government stimulus of the economy and government employment vs. private sector employment. Somehow, those principles get thrown out the window whenever we’re talking about military spending. The truth is, the air base has a stimulative effect on the regional economy, and losing it diminish that. Also, it’s false to suggest that the local delegation isn’t working to keep that stimulus spending here.

9. Barack Obama is going to have an easy time running on his international affairs record, and sought yesterday to calm the rhetoric coming mostly from the right, agitating for a new war in the Persian Gulf, this time against Iran. Speaking of the unemployed Santorum, Gingrich, and Romney:

The president was withering in his retort. “Those folks don’t have a lot of responsibilities,” Mr. Obama said. “They’re not commander in chief. When I see the casualness with which some of these folks talk about war, I’m reminded of the costs involved in war” — for those who go into combat, for national security and for the economy. “This is not a game,” he added. “And there’s nothing casual about it.”

“If some of these folks think that it’s time to launch a war, they should say so, and they should explain to the American people exactly why they would do that and what the consequences would be,” he said.

We need another war like we need another 2008 global financial meltdown. But not to be outdone, Senator John McCain suggested that we ought to bomb Syria due to the political and humanitarian crisis being created by the fascist Assad regime’s brutal crackdown on a months-long popular uprising. It may soon become time for military intervention in Syria, as we took part in in Libya. However, this would need to be a multilateral effort, with the Arab League taking the lead in demanding the intervention. Efforts to do that through the UN Security Council were unsuccessful, due to China’s and Russia’s positions as the permanent member protectors of brutal authoritarian regimes, and the veto that goes with it.

10. Jim Heaney interviews former ECHDC / Sabres guy Larry Quinn, who has some choice words for the risible “lighter, faster, cheaper” method of planning for the inner harbor.

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