Stuffing Waffles

6 comments

Next week is Thanksgiving, during which we give thanks for our good tidings in a reasonably non-theistic way. Over the years, I’ve come to the realization that roasted turkey sort of sucks. It’s not whether it comes out dry or moist – it’s just that it’s a somewhat flavorless bird whose preparation we often overcomplicate. Remember a few years ago when everyone was buying the massive Ziploc bags and brine kits from Williams Sonoma? All it did was make the bird exquisitely salty. 

My wife agrees with me about turkey, so we’ve been known to substitute out a lobster dinner or a beef Wellington or something because you don’t need a turkey to give thanks, and even Tevye was pragmatic enough to eschew tradition. 

I do, however, enjoy the accouterments – the stuffing, the cranberry sauce, gravy and whatnot that goes with the turkey. But to top it all off, I came across a recipe in Serious Eats (from which I got the whole Kettlepizza/Baking Steel idea) that we are absolutely trying next week, and I pass it along to you, so it might become “viral” as the kids say. 

Stuffing waffles. Not stuffing made from waffles – waffles made from stuffing. Here is what they look like, served with some gravy and maple syrup (because maple syrup goes wonderfully with many savory foods): 

Via Serious Eats

Writer Kenji Lopez-Alt’s favorite Thanksgiving thing is stuffing, and his favorite part of the stuffing are the crispy edges. So, if you take a sausage stuffing recipe and use it in a waffle iron – presto, you get the best thing the best way. The article that describes the process is here.  Here is the recipe for the process itself. Here is the recipe for the underlying sausage stuffing recipe. Here is the recipe for his simple turkey gravy. 

Enjoy and let me know if you try it and how it comes out.

SHOCKER: American Children Compelled to Swear Loyalty Oath to N0Bama Regime

23 comments

Last night I was listening to Michael Caputo filling in for Tom Bauerle on WBEN, and the topic of the Common Core curriculum came up. Admittedly, I don’t know quite enough about Common Core to be strongly for or against it – I know that there are concerns about excessive testing, and this is troubling to me. 

However, one of the callers likened Common Core to Mein Kampf (OF COURSE) because, although the new school curriculum doesn’t call for, e.g., the extermination of international Jewry, it was implemented under Indo-Kenyan socialist Hussein N0bama. 

The wildly inappropriate Hitler analogy was prompted by a sentence culled from a textbook on grammar that reads as follows, 

The commands of government officials must be obeyed by all.

It’s a simple active/passive voice exercise, but people can find anti-American outrage EVERYWHERE. I mean, if you look at that sentence, it’s palpably true, in 99.9% of instances. If a cop orders you to pull over, you’re supposed to obey. If a government official is carrying out the law, within the bounds of his authority, you’re generally supposed to obey the command – to be drafted, to pay taxes, to stop at a red light, to show your passport at the border, etc. It is a completely uncontroversial sentence that helps instill the notion of civic duty in a kid. Back in the allegedly “good old days”, this is precisely what was taught.  

Furthermore, there are myriad textbooks and materials from which school districts can choose, and if a particular district doesn’t like the way its grammar exercises are set up, it can pick another one. 

Now, if you look at the insane lunatics at Infowars, you find that it wasn’t developed by the Chavista cadres of Obama’s cabinet, but by a massive private corporation. (I’m not linking to Infowars, sorry). 

This country is so fundamentally sick, I think it’s beyond help. It’s not sick because of idiots being outraged by a sentence in a textbook; it’s sick because everything is perceived to be a Stalinist/Hitlerist assault on God Bless America. 

Here’s how easy this is: 

The results of a Buffalopundit investigation reveal that children throughout Obama’s America are forced to swear a loyalty oath every morning. This loyalty oath is directed to a multicolored piece of cloth that the innocent children are told represents the government; the “Republic for which [the piece of cloth] stands”. But our exclusive investigation of the content of this loyalty oath also reveals that the children are forced to swear fealty to the government itself; “…United States of America, and to the Republic…” 

The oath goes on to shunt aside the rights of the individual, instead claiming that they are part of an “indivisible” “one Nation” collective taken right out of Marx’s Das Kapital. That collectivist agenda is tempered somewhat by the addition of the invocation of the Judeo-Christian deity, in whom some of the individual taxpayer-children in the crowd may not believe. 

We don’t know what kind of “liberty and justice” the totemist-communard loyalty oath anticipates, but it’s clear that Obama is indoctrinating America’s children into something that mirrors his particular anti-American agenda. 

The Pre-Obamacare Trainwreck

36 comments

Obamacare-symbolSome of my friends are conservatives. Shocking, I know. They occasionally post things to social media that are critical of people whom I support, and policies with which I agree. Occasionally, I will argue or even troll, but once in a blue moon, I will try to present a reasonable counterargument that is factual and not particularly argumentative. Rare, but it happens. 

On Tuesday, I saw a post linking to this article. My Facebook friend annotated his post by declaring that “progressives…really do all suck”.  I read the article, which detailed the travails of a single mom trying to buy insurance on the Washington State exchange, and having problems with bad advice and equally bad results. I feel horrible for her and anyone else similarly situated. The new insurance mandate, and the fact that the policies have to maintain a minimum standard of coverage means that some people are paying more, and the subsidy schemes are complicated. 

But it’s the “Affordable” Care Act. Not “inexpensive”, not “cheaper”, not “free” – affordable. But once you argue the semantics, you’ve lost. People’s perception is that everyone’s cost would go down, and whenever this proves not to be the case, it gets blown up into a scandal. 

So, let’s take a step back for a second. The Affordable Care Act – Obamacare – is not what I think is best or perfect for this country, but it’s 1,000x better than the utter trainwreck that preceded it. Here’s what I posted as a comment to my friend’s Facebook indictment of “progressives” in general and Obamacare in particular: 

At some point between 1990 – 2009, the Republican Party decided that universal health care coverage was no longer a societal goal, regardless of how it was to be implemented. When “HillaryCare” was proposed, conservatives pushed as an alternative the model now known as RomneyCare and ObamaCare – a regulated and partially subsidized marketplace of private insurance policies that you are (a) mandated to participate in if you have no employer-based coverage; and (b) meets some minimum standard of what qualifies as “insurance”. 

Now that we have Obamacare, which is a regulated individual marketplace of policies, different in each state, conservatives have not just refused to go along with it, but have actively and passively worked to sabotage it. 

Big laws that do big things aren’t going to be perfect in an imperfect world. Under normal circumstances, we would at least have consensus on “everyone should be insured” as a societal goal. We don’t even have that starting point, so everything else must fail. But even if, hypothetically, Republicans did agree that we should all have decent health coverage, under normal circumstances and in a responsive representative democracy, they would work to help fix problems that arise. This, too, we don’t have. That’s why things that have come up as problematic now have to be amended through regulation and executive rulemaking. 

If the right wanted to present an alternative to Obamacare – which is itself the alternative to HillaryCare – then they should have done so. They never, ever did. All they’ve done is try to block it, then sabotage it when they weren’t done repealing it. Oh, sure they bleat on about “tort reform” and the anti-federalist notion that policies should be one-size-fits-all across the country to enhance “competition”, just like the Telecom act of 1996 enhanced cable TV “competition” and the breakup of Ma Bell enhanced telephone “competition”. Just like the merger of Exxon and Mobil or United and Continental enhanced “competition”. 

In the end, government exists, in part, to fill in the holes that private industry can’t – or won’t – fill. Our private health insurance system in this country is unique in its user-dissatisfaction, physician time-sucking, inefficiency, and waste. It has proven to be almost completely unworkable in contemporary society, and its problems are underscored by the fact that no other country in the world sees fit to implement anything resembling it. 

By the same token, the German, Swiss, French, British, and Canadian models are also imperfect. They do, however, produce better results for far less money – and they do it in a way that satisfies the health care consumer. 

ObamaCare’s lack of situational perfection doesn’t take away from the fact that you no longer face lifetime policy maximums; you can no longer be denied coverage due to a pre-existing condition; insurers can no longer arbitrarily drop you when you get sick and use your coverage; preventive care and immunizations will be free of charge with no co-pay or deductibles; females are treated equally now; myriad consumer protections are put in place to help people appeal adverse insurance decisions. All of these changes are significant – so much so that it’s disgusting that these sorts of things were not implemented before. 

But, you know, glitchy website. 

Yes, I’m disappointed that ObamaCare isn’t perfect. But that disappointment is tempered by my disgust with the pre-ObamaCare status quo. I would much prefer a hybrid NHS single payer system that had public care with private sur-care policies. This will not happen in this country in my lifetime unless it’s proposed by a nominal conservative. In the meantime, have fun pointing out the problems that 1/300,000,000th of the population has with an individual policy under a state-run scheme and not only indict the federal program, but anyone who supports it, as horrible.

This Post Matters

43 comments

1. George Zimmerman seems to have a thing for using a firearm to menace innocent, unarmed people. That’s a fetish that’s going to prove to be expensive. At a bare minimum, he seems to have a bizarre fetish whereby he tries to solve everyday interpersonal conflicts with a gun. A bit excessive, and, you know, someone could get hurt. He’s now charged with a felony and, ironically, this could finally enable the government to take this lunatic’s guns away. Even in Florida. This gun matters. 

2. There’s a fine line, I suppose, between a police department enforcing nuisance laws and blatant racism. The owner of Ying’s Wings and Things is accusing the Tonawanda police of targeting his restaurant’s DJ nights because they attract black kids. The police say the crowds are too noisy and rowdy. Like – oh, just about everything – attitudes about race in western New York are rooted firmly in the 50s, to everyone’s detriment. In the meantime, Ying should hire some security to keep his patrons safe, to keep parking lot nonsense and shootings to a minimum, and to document it all. This 18+ DJ night matters. 

3. Kaleida has a plan to redevelop the site of the former Millard Fillmore Gates hospital into a ~$60 million complex of housing, offices, and retail space including a large complex for seniors. It would attract hundreds into a city neighborhood now occupied by a nondescript, empty white box. There’s no damn way this goes smoothly. This lot matters. 

4. Looking for a Christmas gift for your kid? Depending on age-appropriateness, how about a construction kit of the Anne Frank House, showing how the secret Annex was connected to the house and kept hidden from the Nazis for most of the war. With shipping, it costs a little more than $50, but it’s cheaper than airfare to Amsterdam. This house matters. 

5. This idiotic incident will result in a lawsuit being brought against the rail-slider and the Bills and everyone else. Was a Bills Mafia dummy’s reckless tumbling from the 300s into the 200s – and onto another person – foreseeable? When a football spectator buys a ticket and takes his seat, does he assume the risk that someone might fall on top of him – is spectator precipitation a risk inherent in football? This is why we have lawyers and lawsuits. This jurisprudence matters. 

6. Rob Ford is now, effectively, the figurehead mayor of Toronto. Yesterday, the city council voted 37-5 to strip him of practically all his powers. As the drama unfolded, Ford was defiant and managed to, among other things, knock over a council colleague while charging towards a heckler. Of course, the conservative Toronto Sun gave Ford and his brother, Doug, their own TV show. This crack matters. 

AwfulPAC Hilarity in Rochester

5 comments

In the news: Kristy Mazurek and her AwfulPAC claim to have helped elect the next Mayor of Rochester, Lovely Warren. Warren responds, “who?” 

But as Warren sought to pivot from the campaign, a Buffalo activist behind a political action committee under investigation for election law violations claimed last week that her group was “representing” Warren in the election.

Warren will become the city’s first female mayor when she takes office in January. She defeated Mayor Thomas Richards and challenger Alex White last week after a lengthy campaign that saw considerable involvement by individuals and groups outside the candidates’ own campaign committees.

Richards had an unofficial campaign spring up weeks after he ended his own. Warren had close friend and Albany lobbyist Robert Scott Gaddy drop more than $40,000 on radio ads in the days before the primary. Then last week, activist Kristy L. Mazurek, the co-founder of the Western New York Progressive Caucus told WBEN930 in Buffalo on Thursday that the caucus was “representing” Warren in her mayoral campaign. No contributions are shown in either the PAC or Warren’s financial disclosure statements, however.

“I don’t even know who that is,” Warren said when first asked about Mazurek.

When later provided a description, she recalled meeting Mazurek at a luncheon days before the election but said they had no contact before or since. The luncheon was a fundraiser hosted, she said, by Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown “and his team.” Brown reached out after the primary to offer his support, she said, and he along with Assembly member Crystal Peoples-Stokes, D-Buffalo, (who also assisted Warren in the primary) offered to do the fundraiser.

AwfulPAC: Being awful since August 2013, and now under investigation. 

One Region Forward Community Congress Workshops: This Week

9 comments

This week, “One Region Forward” will be holding a series of workshops, soliciting public input regarding planning for a sustainable future for Buffalo and western New York. 

One Region Forward is working to create a long-term vision for making Buffalo Niagara a more sustainable and equitable region by helping inform decisions on how we use our land, coordinate housing and transportation decisions, prepare for climate change and grow and distribute food locally.

Community engagement is critical to this initiative, and One Region Forward has stressed the importance of one-on-one interactions by traveling across the region this year to hear how Buffalo Niagara residents view sustainability in their lives (a full list of engagements to date can be viewed here).

Starting tonight and continuing on through Saturday the 16th, One Region Forward will be hosting five Community Congress Workshops across the region. These workshops will involve a hands-on mapping exercise where small groups of people will be asked to work together to map what they think the future of Buffalo Niagara should look like while answering questions like: How will we get around? Where will we live? Where will we work? Where will our food come from? What will we protect?

To provide some context for the Community Congress Workshops, preview the “What the Data Tells Us” data story, which explores the trends of the past and projects what Buffalo Niagara might look like in 2050 if we keep doing things the way we have in past decades. Also, check out an update on Regional Vision & Values, which summarizes the feedback we heard from citizens at the initial Community Congress meetings in early 2013.

One Region Forward Community Congress

//www.scribd.com/embeds/183570294/content?start_page=1&view_mode=scroll&show_recommendations=true

Workshops will be held as follows: 

11/12/13: Amherst Central High School 6pm – 8pm

11/13/13: City Honors Buffalo 6pm – 8pm

11/14/13: Parkdale Elementary School East Aurora 6pm – 8pm

11/15/13: Starpoint Central High School, Pendleton: 6pm – 8pm

11/16/13: Niagara Power Project Visitor Center, Lewiston 12 – 2pm

 

Collins’ Food Stamp Cuts and Welfare for Billionaires

2 comments

In September, Representative Chris Collins voted to cut $40 billion from the American food stamp program, which helps to feed underprivileged and poor Americans.

The Congressional Budget Office has estimated that the House legislation would deny benefits to 3.8 million Americans next year and save $39 billion over 10 years, or roughly 5 percent of the SNAP program’s cost in that time. Enrollment doubled to 47 million in the wake of the Great Recession as incomes plummeted and more Americans qualified for benefits, which average $133 per month. Most beneficiaries are children, elderly or disabled.

Buffalo’s Delaware North is estimated to earn about $2.6 billion this year. The Buffalo News writes that Delaware North is looking to move its downtown Buffalo headquarters a few blocks over, 

Delaware North is asking for an exemption of $807,000 in sales tax for building materials, but it has been questioned by some critics because Delaware North is a global company with $2.6 billion in revenues. However, Richard M. Tobe, deputy county executive and chairman of the ECIDA’s Policy Committee, noted Thursday that the request is consistent with what ECIDA typically approves.

But the larger plan has faced heavy opposition because of the unusual nature of the tax assistance that Uniland, in particular, is seeking. Besides sales and mortgage tax breaks, the developer proposes paying full property taxes but diverting a significant portion of them to finance a five-level parking ramp and then getting reimbursed by the state because Uniland says the property qualifies for special brownfields credits.

Mayor Byron Brown and Representative Chris Collins wrote a letter together, urging the Erie County IDA to hook Delaware North up with some tax breaks: 

Byron Brown’s and Chris Collins’ letter to the Erie County IDA

//www.scribd.com/embeds/182622891/content?start_page=1&view_mode=scroll&show_recommendations=true

So, Chris Collins opposes feeding the poor, but supports tax subsidies for billionaires to relocate to a new building a few blocks away, under threat of departure. 

Frankly, I think it would be tragic to lose Delaware North, but the chutzpah here is unbelievable. He’ll shut down the government to make sure you can’t get affordable, quality health insurance and then pretend he didn’t do just that. He’ll take food from the hands of the underprivileged and poor to help subsidize a billionaire. 

$807,000 is 0.031% of what Delaware North pulls in per year. These tea party princesses all think that charity should replace welfare. Maybe Collins can cover this out of his own pocket. 

The Politics of Resentment

8 comments

What does the Rob Ford scandal have to do with Erie County politics? At first glance, there are no similarities. 

While Buffalo’s mayor is a mild-mannered, African-American professional who has henchmen and cronies to do his dirty work whilst he is out cutting ribbons, Toronto’s mayor is a blond-haired, 300-pound, lying, crack-smoking drunkard who is as completely in denial as he is out of control and enabled by his own henchmen and cronies. 

As Buffalo struggles to find its way amidst a storm of population loss, educational crisis, crime, lack of jobs, and crushing poverty, Toronto is now the 4th largest city on the continent and growing. Toronto’s boom over the last 30 years has been amazing to see, and the city has invested in the infrastructure and quality of life changes that attract residents and businesses. It’s as if the Swiss ran New York City. 

Rob Ford, however, would not be mayor of Toronto if that city hadn’t undergone a change in the mid-50s to regional government, culminating in amalgamation in the late 1990s. Rob Ford is a politician who is of, and for, the Toronto suburbs. His home and political base of operations is in the western suburb of Etobicoke (the k is silent), which was dissolved as a separate political entity in 1998 and became part of Toronto. 

Ford’s refusal to resign has to do with his loyal fan base, known as “Ford Nation”. Xenophobic, urbanophobic, and virulently anti-tax, Ford Nation will back Rob and his city councillor brother Doug without question. This constituency sees in them the only hope for reducing government waste and lowering taxes; it is, simply put, a tax revolt cult of personality. 

No longer run by the Swiss, Toronto is instead being run by a loud tea party addict. Rob Ford has the personal cult and conservative anti-tax ethos of a Carl Paladino, the in-your-face obnoxiousness of Chris Christie, and the personal problems of a Marion Barry, Chris Farley, John Belushi, and Artie Lange. 

The City of Buffalo has almost nothing in common with Toronto, except perhaps a Great Lakes locus and climate, and having “City of” preceding its name. Toronto is a world-class city with a booming economy based on knowledge and creativity, while Buffalo is a grande dame-turned -provincial backwater with a struggling economy based on government handouts and nostalgia porn. Amalgamated Toronto has 44 city councillors, each representing about 55,000 residents, and a non-partisan city council, overseeing an $11 billion budget. 

But the lessons Toronto teaches us are the perils of regionalism, and the ugliness of the politics of insular suburban resentment. Rob Ford ran on a platform whereby he attacked former mayor David Miller. Miller was a charismatic Harvard-educated lawyer who cleaned up the lobbying system, rejuvenated Toronto’s waterfront, improved public transit, attacked unaccountable public authorities, demanded that landed immigrants be enfranchised, and made huge investments in public housing, child care, and other civic services. 

But with taxes being spent on social services for inner-city poor, the Ford Nation backlash came in 2010 with Ford’s platform of, “putting people and families first, focusing on the fundamentals, reducing waste and eliminating unnecessary taxes”.  He would do all this without cutting services. 

There’s nothing magical about suburban politicians sowing resentment against inner-city poor. We know that sort of thing all too well in Buffalo.

I’m not a big fan of the suburb/urban divide, and firmly believe that it’s incumbent on everyone to realize that our shrinking, poor region sinks or swims together. Toronto is swimming. At best, Buffalo is treading water. In a storm. Without a life vest. In winter. 

But what we saw on election day this past Tuesday was primarily brought about by one thing – low turnout. For the vast majority of people who aren’t political junkies, Tuesday’s elections were hardly exciting or compelling. Races for sheriff or comptroller don’t bring out the non-prime voters. When you add to the mix the fact that Byron Brown’s conspiracy with the county Republicans to completely ignore Republican Mayoral candidate Sergio Rodriguez helped to depress city turnout, Republican countywide candidates could be guaranteed an anemic Democratic turnout.

This wasn’t a campaign season based on ideas as much as it was based on tactical cynicism. So, Democrats had a bad cycle and will have to endure another year’s worth of concern-trolling from nominal Democrats who actively and passively helped to sabotage Democratic candidates to gain some unknown advantage in an internecine war they could end tomorrow. 

The only mandate anyone can claim based on Tuesday’s election is that people are so unmotivated and uninspired by local politics that 70% of them stayed home. “None of the above” won in a landslide, which allowed flawed incumbents to skate without breaking much of a sweat. 

Who can blame them? Who cares? What’s Stefan Mychajliw going to do? Chase headlines for 1 or 2 more years until he finds himself a promotion. Tim Howard will sit there and wait to collect his pension. The County Legislature will fight with Poloncarz over the small fraction of the county budget over which they have discretion in spending. They will demand more money for suburban roads and less money for things that people in the city count on, like culturals and social services. Our own Ford Nation will cynically deepen further the chasm between the city and suburbs – a chasm that distracts from ways to bridge the joys and richness of city living with the good government and prosperity of the suburbs.

The “us vs. them” mentality rings about resentment and bad policy in Toronto, as it does here. Urbanist philosopher Richard Florida is promoting a governmental “rethink” as he watches Toronto’s mayor embarrass itself with no recourse to deal with the problem. Part of this has to do with the new suburbanization of Canada, 60 years after America’s. Canadian commentators call the anti-urbanist suburban political blocs as the “New Hosers” with hockey commentator Don Cherry as their lord and king. 

Florida says cities succeed when they embrace diversity and creativity. He says that “creativity is the new economy“. He has a point, and Toronto is still growing and thriving in spite of its political problems. Buffalo, by contrast, has a political and regulatory system that stifles growth and creativity. It has a horrible transit system and dumb infrastructure. But most importantly, it is busy looking for silver bullets and attracting outsiders instead of making life better for the people already there. The schools are a Ford-like embarrassment on a daily basis, crime hasn’t been meaningfully addressed, there is no opportunity for poor residents, and jobs are few, far-between, and pay too little to attract talent to town. 

A good start would be a regional vision and plan. One that lifts all boats and reduces achievement gaps and resentment. A good start would be to focus on people’s quality of life and figure how to achieve the bare minimum of what constitutes good government.  Let’s give people good schools, safe streets, and fewer barriers to prosperity and growth. 

Election Day Gif Recap (Apologies to @goosesroost)

15 comments

Yesterday, elections were held. With apologies to the Goose’s Roost, a gif recap. 

It was a bad night to be a Democrat in Erie County. I haven’t yet decided what it all means, except that the Republican candidates and messaging resonated with voters, while the Democrats’ didn’t. 

After years of concern-trolling then-Comptroller Mark Poloncarz’s lack of accounting credentials, the Republicans have re-elected a guy with no financial or legal credentials of any sort. 

To top it off, they viciously and dishonorably attacked a civic activist who has a 20-year record of working outside the political system to help reform Erie County government and make it more efficient. 

After all, he committed the sin of “paying off a tax debt over time”. It was like saying someone defaulted on buying a couch because they bought it on credit. 

Republicans are also big fans of the “rule of law”, “term limits”,  and the “constitution”. That’s why they re-elected Sheriff Tim Howard to a third term. 

This is the same Tim Howard who mishandled the Joan Diver investigation, mismanaged the holding center, and saw numerous escapes, including Ralph “Bucky” Phillips, who went on to murder some more. 

But this year, Howard demagogued the NY SAFE Act, appointing himself a de facto Supreme Court Justice and declaring the law unconstitutional before the Court of Appeals ever saw it. 

For their part, the Pigeon cabal that helped to sabotage the Erie County Democratic Committee’s endorsed Sheriff candidate with $112k in likely illegal spending completely abandoned their pick, Dick Dobson, when he outlived his usefulness. 

We also saw a Republican legislative majority emerge yesterday, and time will tell how this will play out. After all, the legislature only has control and discretion over about $100 million; 10% of a billion-dollar budget. I expect more calls for road repairs and less money for social services and things that matter to poor urban residents. 

In particular, Ted Morton, who lost his job and the license to do his job was elected, after launching a despicable, ugly, and dishonorable smear campaign against Wynnie Fisher. In fact, Fisher’s malevolent neighbors defamed her to the Pigeon-backed guy she beat in the primary, who then turned the information over to the Republicans. Hey, Ted Morton, Kristy Mazurek, and Wes Moore, 

Same thing in Orchard Park, where a nasty smear campaign against Republican Pat Keem seems to have backfired on incumbent Janis Colarusso, removing her from office. 

 

On the bright side, although unsuccessful, Republican Jen Stergion ran an energetic and – more importantly – honorable race against Lynn Marinelli.  I hope to see more from her in the future. 

Mark Manna was unsuccessful in his effort to unseat Dr. Barry Weinstein as Amherst town supervisor, but we haven’t heard the last from him, either. 

The Pigeonistas stayed home after helping to sabotage the primaries in September. It’s not about good government or a strong Democratic party with them – it’s about subterfuge and helping Republicans. 

Barbara Miller-Williams was elected to the county legislature again, and it will be interesting to watch and see with whom she decides to caucus. They might want to hire Cash Cunningham to help with this free-for-all. 

And now that the Republicans control the legislature, the patronage gravy train is going to have a brand-new terminal station. 

jetsons

Oh, Byron Brown won re-election to a third term. Our caretaker mayor will take care of ribbon cuttings and patronage hires for another 4 years. 

Sergio Rodriguez, for his part, ran an honorable race and talked about the issues that the big money and elites in Buffalo would prefer to ignore. After all, we have some Wrights, sunsets over water, a suburban office park near downtown, and the best street grid, ever. Sergio, thank you for your efforts and for talking about the real issues that aren’t being addressed meaningfully in city hall. 

Thanks anyway, voters! 

I’ll be joining Mike Caputo on WBEN 930-AM at 10am Wednesday to talk about all of this nonsense.  Here’s audio of me with Mike Caputo on WBEN from this morning: 

http://audio.wben.com/audio-embed/83538187/embed.htm?width=500&height=350“

1 … 84 85 86 87 88 … 165