Quick Takes (v61): When Soundbites and Facts Collide

On Wednesday, Andrew Cuomo, my Sonofa Gov, exerted his princely powers and declared a 'state emergency' and released a new seven-point-plan to address gun violence. He said that "we went from COVID to the epidemic of gun violence and the fear and death that goes along with it."  And, he said,

This is a national problem, I get it. But somebody has to step up and somebody has to address it.

Somebody does need to address it, there's no doubt about that. We can argue about whether Cuomo's the guy, or whether it's Congress, or whether it's local law enforcement... truth be told, it's all of them, I'd suggest, but it's not my place to try and steal Cuomo's thunder. After all, there are plenty of people around to do that. 

Like my Congressman, Rep. John Katko (R-Trump Wants Me to be Primaried). Katko's a former federal prosecutor; he helped take down some violent gangs back in the day here in Syracuse, so he has some experience in this area. He's also a Republican in a purple district, NY-24. He voted for the second impeachment, and led the charge to get a bill passed that would have established an independent, 9/11-style investigation into the insurrection. Neither of those have endeared him to his hard-core constituents. 

So, attacking Cuomo seems safe, and that's what Katko did, when he blamed state policies for the increase in violent crime.

Right now, in New York State the laws are terrible. Bail reform is a good example of that, and defunding the police. The fact that the governor is admitting that his policies have failed, the policies of the Democrats have failed, is a good step in the right direction.

Katko thinks we need a stronger stand against gang violence, and says that, while Cuomo's plan includes millions for jobs for at-risk youth, targeting high-crime areas and illegal gun sales, it might not be enough.

It’s better than nothing, but New York city defunded their police by one billion dollars with a 'b' and look what happened there, so he’s starting to understand that he’s got a mess on his hands that he helped make.

OK - those are the soundbites, here are the facts. 

According to Fox News, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo slammed the New York City Council’s move strip the New York Police Department of $1 billion in funding, questioning “what it means” and calling for concrete action.

"I don’t know what it means," Cuomo said during a press briefing Wednesday. “What does that mean? Does this mean I am less safe? Where did you take the billion dollars from? Does it mean I am more safe? Does it have any effect on police abuse? I don’t know what it means...”

The truth is, like many people, Cuomo thought calls to defund the police hurt Democrats in last year's elections.

I think 'defund the police' went too far. I think law and order makes a difference in people's lives... I think 'defund the police' was a really unfortunate expression. I don't think anyone meant it literally.

Yes, he wants police departments to reform. Yes, he doesn't think much of Bill de Blasio, and taking a swipe at him is good fun, but in the end, he's not a big gun behind the 'defund' movement - he favors rethinking policing, and required all departments in the state to submit community-supported plans to do just that, or lose state funding. Did Katko not know that?

And, let's look at bail reform, another Katko complaint, and some crime statistics. The truth is, bail reform - and COVID-related prisoner releases - are not significant contributors to the increase in gun violence. And that's coming from the NY Post, hardly a Cuomo-supporting media outlet.

While the surge in gunplay is undeniable, a Post analysis of department data found that most people released under the criminal justice reforms or amid the pandemic had no known ties to the bloodshed — with criminal justice experts saying the cops should focus on the flow of illegal guns into the city instead of playing the “blame game.”

Here are the details, from the NYPD's own data (emphasis added):

• There's been a 46% increase in shootings (528 this year through June 30th, compared to 362 in the same time period last year), but the NYPD has closed only 28% of them, about half the normal close rate.
• Of the roughly 11,000 released under the new bail laws, only 91 have any connection to a shooting, and only one person has been charged. Over half of them were either victims (25) or witnesses (24); the remaining 41 are documented as either suspects (31) or "perps" (10) in the NYPD data.

And for good measure, here are the numbers on COVID releases.

• 2500 or so inmates were released from Rikers to reduce overcrowding during the pandemic; some 275 have been rearrested (through mid-June), but only nine are linked to shootings. One was arrested, two are "persons of interest," and three are witnesses. The other three? They were victims of shootings.

If these are the facts, why do politicians (and law enforcement officials) insist on saying something else? Richard Aborn, who's president of the Citizens Crime Commission, thinks this is why.

There's a blame game going on, and I don't think it's helpful. I think it would be helpful if the NYPD [issued] a clear report explaining why they think the uptick in shootings is linked to bail reform.

Maybe Rep. Katko would consider doing the same?

The Irony Board: Time to Fold the Laundry

Looks like I've got quite a pile building up on the Irony Board. I guess it's time I took care of at least the stuff that's related to the COVID-19 pandemic.

First up? Science!
Isn't it at least a little bit ironic that so many science deniers, whether it's climate science or vaccine science or teaching science in schools, are so eager to see people move forward with experimental uses of drugs to fight the coronavirus?

And also isn't it at least a little bit ironic that the folks who say the virus is "a deep state hoax" and "the numbers are a lie" are also gung ho (on social media, anyway, where everything is true...) about drugs like remdisivir? Why would we need to work so hard to solve for something that isn't even a problem?

And isn't it also ironic that, when people are so demanding of other scientists, across a wide spectrum of applications, even down to their political affiliation, none of the same people seem remotely concerned that the tests we're seeing for these drugs frequently don't include control groups, so we don't really understand how they're working compared to people getting a different drug or a placebo?

I totally understand the desire to have some kind of therapeutic meds available to help treat people who end up getting infected with the coronavirus, but I also think that we should practice good science, including informed consent, and trials done under commonly accepted scientific practices - not just fast science, no matter how good the intentions.

Next up? Geography!
I find it at least somewhat ironic that the people who have long complained about how upstate New York - the real upstate, which includes Central NY, Northern NY, the Southern Tier, Western New York, the Fingerlakes region, the Adirondacks, and the Capitol District -  is constantly being screwed and all our money is being stolen to pay for New York City and so on, to the point where we should split the state to get away from downstate  are now all up in arms about two things that happened long ago, but only suddenly are hot topics.

The first issue? Gov. Cuomo not purchasing 16,000 ventilators back in 2015. These folks would have been apoplectic at the thought of the Sonofa Gov spending more than half a billion dollars on ventilators that would be sitting in a warehouse somewhere, doing nothing for who knows how many years, absent a pandemic like the 1918 flu, which at the time was nearly a century back in our rear-view mirror. But because Donald Trump said it on a Fox Town Hall from the Rose Garden, this is now a fact - Cuomo failed to by ventilators.  Never mind the "empty cupboards" of the Strategic National Stockpile, which the current administration failed to refill - because that's different, or something.

The second issue? The realization that many hospital beds have been closed in New York, most of them in New York City where the impact of the coronavirus is being felt most intensely. The anti-Cuomo, anti-downstate folks have been complaining about that as well, because the virus is only an issue there, it's hardly having any impact here and now we are going to have to take their sick people because there aren't any hospital beds for them.

And why aren't there any beds? Here's an op-ed in the NY Post from 2013 on hospital closures, written by the chair of the Pataki administration's Berger Commission, who said that (at that time) 18 hospitals across the state had been closed, including 12 in New York City. That's something that people up here would have been happy about, no longer throwing good tax dollars - good upstate tax dollars - out the window.

But now, also from the NY Post from March of this year, we learn that NY has thrown away thousands of hospital beds and that's going to make it harder for the state to deal with the pandemic.

New York has lost a staggering 20,000 hospital beds over the last two decades to budget cuts and insurance overhauls, complicating local and state efforts to battle the coronavirus, according to records and experts.

Both articles are good reads, presenting the arguments for and against doing something in each of these cases. And in each case, our elected officials, representatives of both major parties, made decisions they thought best for the citizens and taxpayers of New York.

What can we learn from these at least a little ironic lessons?  A few things, I think.

• Irony is everywhere.
• What we don't want today we might need tomorrow, so when we get what we want, we may come to regret it. 
• Our elected officials are human - and imperfect - as are we.
• Many times, the ideas of one party are the ideas of the other party.
• We'd probably be better served if we focused more on the ideas and less on the people.
• 'We' includes me. 

Ranting and Raving (v5): Pandemic Pandemonium

Boy, don't you love a good pandemic and the pandemonium it causes? I sure do. We've got the quote-unquote #fakenewews reporting actual data and actual news and we've got people who don't know the difference between news reporting and opinion columns conflating the two and losing their minds over the WRONG thing when the right thing is sitting right in front of them, and we've got the president reporting #fakenews and his feelings and his #stablegeniousity and the rumblings in his gut and that's what his supporters are hanging on to and EVERYTHING IS GREAT because there are FACTS when the are none and the are LIES when there is truth and those people (yes, I said 'those people') are now promoting #FireFauci on Twitter because the virus-fighting doc who has served not one, not two, not three, not four, not five but SIX six presidents (and no, the best was not saved for last), is doing doctor-talk and science-speak and truth-telling and mostly because he had the audacity to correct the #fakenewspresident, the #Trumpeters are trumpeting that THE DOC HAS TO GO and there's a chance that he will be fired because as we know, the #celebritypresident likes nothing better than bigly good numbers on social media - he's #1 on Facebook and ratings for his daily failed #socialdistancingexercises are through the ROOF! - he has to do what his Keyboard Kops tell him to do especially if #FauxNews aka #TNN (Trump News Network) picks it up and oh by the way, someone apparently told Trump if he #wenttoJared and dragged him out on the rally stage the heat would be off, which it was, and that allowed Trump cover to fire the ICIG who said that the #whistleblower was telling the truth and provided proof that it was (but I digress) so NOW, we have Pence and Jared and Navarro and Gaynor and Adams and SnittySnittyBillBarr (what the hell was HE doing up there?) and people think the GOVERNORS are being childish because they're complaining about not being able to get straight answers???? Dear Lord, this really low bar administration sure can raise the bar on chaos, can't it? (Takes breath and stiff drink) And SPEAKING of the governors, most of whom (all of the Blue State ones for sure) are doing a better job than the point people and the president, some of them (Red State ones for sure) are getting MORE supplies than they request, and they're getting more, MORE THAN ONCE and meanwhile, the governors and the county execs and town supervisors and mayors ('mares' as the president calls them - time for him to take a 'Bare' aspirin or something) are doing one helluva job trying to keep their people safe and not feeding us a boatload of BS from a rotating cast of characters on a stage where social distancing apparently doesn't apply. They tell us what we need to know, and they explain why they're making decisions and yet - AND YET - there's crap like what a semi-local radio host posted, that our Sonofa Gov Andrew Cuomo (I'm very more often not a fan of his, so don't start with me) is apparently doing everything he can to make sure that the folks who are dying from or with the #coronavirus are people who VOTED FOR HIS OPPONENT - I kid you not - because Cuomo said he was going to sign an executive order and have the National Guard take PPE, supplies and yes, probably 500 or so ventilators, maybe less, that are less likely to be needed upstate, or not needed right now, and deliver them downstate where the people are dying in numbers that are horrifying, that are are mind-numbing, that are stomach-turning and somehow we're supposed to get on board with the radiojerk's theory that he's signing our death certificates and committing EXECUTIVE HOMICIDE by working to figure out where people have things that they don't currently need (and may not need for the pandemic) and moving those to the place of greatest need IN THE ENTIRE COUNTRY -- but that's wrong? #WTF is he supposed to do, just let people downstate die? Would that make all of the haters happy? I mean, it's mostly just those immigrants (legal or otherwise) that are getting sick and dying, right? It's not like they're humans who had jobs and families and aspirations and dreams and birthdays and upcoming weddings and family reunions and what not, right? "Those people" that's who they are, right? Because here's the deal (as the radiojerk says all the time), the deal is, the morgues are full, people - FULL - and there are dozens and dozens of refrigerated trucks parked on the streets in NYC stacked high with bodies of the dead and we are anticipating that another 85 TRUCKS are going to be coming to NYC to hold more bodies of the dead and if you think that's happening here where we sit, let's put on our cloth facial coverings and go for a ride and SHOW ME THE BODIES piling up in Buffalo and Syracuse and Rochester and Watertown and Albany and Auburn and Oneonta and Penn Yan and Herkimer and Saratoga and Cortland and Webster and Henderson and Oswego and Cooperstown, show me the trucks full of bodies and convince me that the supplies are better sitting here, just in case, than they are down there where, literally (not just Joe Biden Literally) the bodies are piled high and THEN tell me that if the situation were reversed and it was up here where all those trucks were parked in neighborhoods near our hospitals and the morgues were full and every bed was full and every hallway was full of patients and the parking lots were all full of medical tents, you tell me that you wouldn't want said Homicidal Maniac Executive er, Executioner, sorry to do WHATEVER IT TAKES including sending in the National Guard to get whatever supplies we could get our hands on, for Pete's sake are you even listening to yourselves? And why is it I keep noticing that the same people spitting this stuff, include many Republican politicians,  are the ones echoing the 1,000,000,000% partisan political hack that we have as president telling us we all have to set politics aside and come together and blahdittyblahblahblah because we know he is mentally and morally incapable of doing that - and won't even try, doesn't even care enough for one Pearl Harbor Moment - but because HE says it THEY all say it and wave their flags in our faces? (Takes breath and stiff drink) Could the Sonofa Gov had done this differently? Sure, there's always a better way to do something, and he SHOULD have done it differently, but is he taking every last mask, face shield, pair of gloves and ventilator and wandering through hospitals checking voter registration data on downstate patient bracelets looking to buy one last vote and screw the Republicans who can't find a halfway decent candidate to run for anything in this state - ANYTHING - when he's not up for re-election until 2022? Stop it. Just. Stop. It. Is Cuomo the greatest thing since sliced bread? Of course not: everyone knows that Reese's Peanut Butter Cups are the greatest thing since sliced bread but oh -- by the way-- for the most part, ALL of the governors are doing the same thing, getting supplies from place A in their state and moving them to place B in their state, because what good are the supplies if they're not being used or are likely to not be needed to the same degree as they are needed NOW in other areas? And you know what else? Those other governors are SENDING SUPPLIES TO US and they're sending medical professionals to us, because THEY understand that the place of greatest need is where we need the greatest good, and because they know that New York would do the same for them, under the same circumstances, whether upstate folks like it or not, whether Republicans like it or not and honestly a Republican NY gov (yes we've had them before) would do the same thing, or he'd be called out for not doing the same thing by EXACTLY the same people who are bitching about the Sonofa Gov and you KNOW I'm right. So yes, regular readers, at this moment I'm actually siding with the politicians and yes, there's a chance that a little bit of hell might actually have just frozen over, but have no fear - there's more than enough hatred and fear and ill will to thaw it out pretty darn quickly and now I'm going out in my garden and getting the heck away from all this BS and pulling the weeds I can pull, vs. staying inside trying to pull the ones I can't control. (Takes breath and stiff drink).  Have a nice day. And don't forget to wash your hands.

Sunday School 3/22/20

I visited three classrooms for you today; we'll see how much fits here and anything that doesn't, I'll move to an Extra Credit post for all of you distance learners.

Let's start with Dr. Anthony Fauci, who chatted with Margaret Brennan of CBS on Face the Nation.  

Brennan asked if we were on the same trajectory as Italy, which has had more deaths than China. Fauci said not necessarily. He suggested their situation might be because they were not as quick to shut down travel from China as we were, adding

...I don't know why this is happening there to such an extent, but it is conceivable that once you get so many of these spreads out, they spread exponentially and you can never keep up with this tsunami, and I think that's what unfortunately our colleagues and our dear friends in Italy are facing. They are very competent. It isn't that they don't know what they're doing. 

He went on to say that he hopes we won't be in the same situation, but reiterate that "we're going to get hit. There's no doubt about it." 

Brennan wondered if the virus was mutating or changing; Fauci said that, as an RNA virus, it will change but it's not changing the way it's actin, which is something they're watching. She also wondered about the high numbers of young people being affected in Europe and here, where 20% of those hospitalized were in the 20-44 age bracket. 

Fauci said "it looks like there's a big difference" between what we saw in China and what we're seeing in Europe. It's possible the people have underlying conditions, but

if they don't... that will be something we have to really examine as to why we're seeing it here, but we didn't see it in China. So we're going to look at that very closely.

She also questioned the whole issue of whether Trump has actually invoked the Defense Production Act, (he's said both that he had, and that he will if needed). Fauci said they're coming forward on their own and stepping up to make "not only masks, but PPEs and now ventilators." Brennan pushed back, quoting NYC's Bill De Blasio saying his city will run out of equipment in as little as two weeks. Fauci tried to clarify things, noting that

...obviously, New York is the most hard hit. So not only is New York trying to get resources themselves, but we're going to be pouring it in from the federal government. So it would be a combination of local and federal...

On the new drug combos, Brennan wondered who Trump was listening to, if not Fauci, and if there was a concern about those drugs being used for COVID-19 cases, potentially causing a shortage for people who need the drugs to treat other illnesses now. In reference to the anecdotal reports that get mentioned, he said

So I was taking a purely medical, scientific standpoint and the president was trying to bring hope to the people. I think there's this issue of trying to separate the two of us. There isn't fundamentally a difference there. He's coming from it from a hopeful layperson standpoint. I'm coming from it from a scientific standpoint. 

I don't mind a hopeful layperson, but I do mind an argumentative deep-stater acting as a wartime president.

Brennan mentioned NYC Mayor Bill De Blasio; he was on Meet the Press with Chuck Todd and Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan this morning. Todd asked the mayor how things stood this morning in the city.  De Blasio pulled no punches. 

Chuck, the truth is -- and New Yorkers and all Americans deserve the blunt truth, it's only getting worse. And in fact, April and May are going to be a lot worse. Right now, we are a third of the cases in the country. That's going to get worse. We're about two thirds or more of the cases in New York State. That's going to get worse.

And, he said, he's not getting any help from the president, who is a New Yorker himself.

...he will not lift a finger to help his hometown. And I don't get it. I don't get it. Right now, I have asked repeatedly for the military to be mobilized, for the Defense Production Act to be used to its fullest to get us things like ventilators so people can live who would die otherwise. Chuck, I can't be blunt enough. If the president doesn't act, people will die who could have lived otherwise. Senior citizens, folks who are members of families. And we can't get action from the president of the United States.

And what could the military do for him?

...All military personnel who are medically trained should be sent to places where this crisis is deep, like New York, right now. The military is the best logistical organization in the nation. If there are ventilators being produced anywhere in the country, we need to get them to New York. Not weeks from now or months from now, in the next ten days. And the only force in America that could do that is the military. Why are they at their bases? Why are they not being allowed to serve? I guarantee you they're ready to serve. But the president has to give the order.

And on how he'll enforce his 'shelter in place' order? 

Chuck, people really do get it. I've been around my city the last few days. They're getting the message more and more. Also, we will use the NYPD and other agencies to go out and remind people. Educate them, break up groups of people if they're congregating. It'll take a while for people to truly get it.

And one last time, aiming a shot at Washington.

...I'll tell you one thing, everyday New Yorkers, everyday Americans, are much farther ahead of the curve in terms of understanding this crisis than anything we're seeing from the White House. And that's troubling, to think the people that have the power are not using it, when everyday people get right now, shelter in place is necessary to protect our families.

Turning to Gov. Hogan (who's an R, by the way), Todd brought up the absence of social distancing in DC and Virginia, where either people aren't paying attention or restrictions haven't been issued, and wondered if Hogan was hoping that everyone would get on the same page. Hogan said that he's been meeting with the others, "taking actions an trying to work together." And, he added

But yeah, the social distancing is not being enforced. And it's a little crazy to see the kind of crowds at the cherry blossoms. I mean, people have to listen...

He said they're cracking down in his state, 

...limiting people to groups of ten. We were chastising all these spring breakers that came back from partying in Florida. And we told them they need to self-quarantine for 14 days, otherwise they're risking the lives of their parents and their grandparents and their friends because this no longer is just about older people. People of all ages... We had a ten month old, a five year old who have gotten this disease. So people are kidding themselves if they think that they should just go on spring break or enjoy being out there just as business as normal. We've got to get people off the streets and out of these crowds. It's absolutely essential.

Turning back to De Blasio, Todd wondered about folks who are doing what they've been told, who are home and watching numbers get worse and worse, and he wondered what progress would look like. 

Real, consistent social distancing being enforced, people living with it. And hospitals that can function. People seeing that their health care system is actually holding because we have the supplies and the personnel. And I think that's going to be a national reality, Chuck. Medical personnel are going to have to be taken from one part of the country to another as this crisis deepens.The supplies, the equipment have to go where the needed is greatest. If people see the system holding, that will be progress...

Hogan was asked the same question, what would progress be.

...progress is going to be if we can somehow bend this curve down, wherein we can start to stop that spike that's going so we don't overload the health care system. You know, people are just going to -- look, it's very disconcerting. People's lives are disrupted. It's scary. And I understand people out there are concerned about when is it going to look better... What it takes is every one of our citizens is a part of this. And we can't stop it without them cooperating -- but it's going to be a while. We don't know how long or how long it's going to be. But it's going to continue until we can get it stopped. And we're just going to keep fighting 24 hours a day until we could get it done.

That's all we've got room for tonight. We'll look at the rest of it tomorrow.

See you around the virtual campus, and remember - social distancing and hand washing save lives. 

Quick Takes (v46): A Victory Lap?

There's MATH, the Andrew Yang tag for Make American Think Harder, and then there's math, the kind that says that getting 6% of something is just as good as getting 100% of the same thing., which is the kind of math Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is proudly trying to sell us.

AOC is tweeting about a "victory lap" because Amazon, which is not building its 25,000-job second headquarters in Queens in part because of her efforts, is instead is adding 1,500 employees in leased space in Hudson Yards. In the article linked above, we learn that

"The giant online retailer said it has signed a new lease for 335,000 square feet on the city’s west side in the new Hudson Yards neighborhood, where it will have more than 1,500 employees,” The Wall Street Journal reported. "Amazon is taking the space without any of the special tax credits and other inducements the company had been offered to build a new headquarters in the Queens neighborhood of Long Island City, the company said."

That's right: 1,500 jobs instead of 25,000; leased space instead of new construction, and no incentives - well, none that we no of for Amazon anyway.

The developers of the Hudson Yards project, however, are getting nearly twice what Amazon would have had for their HQ2, according to this piece in the New York Times.

But with far less public attention, the city government has for more than a decade been funneling even more aid to Hudson Yards, a 28-acre complex of gleaming office buildings and luxury residential towers that is one of the nation's' biggest real estate projects in recent years. 

In all, the tax breaks and other government assistance for Hudson Yards have reached nearly $6 billion, according to public records and a recent analysis by the New School.

And Amazon may still be able to get some breaks here if they qualify for a "discretionary tax credit" that three other companies mentioned in the article are eligible for; the credits, if fully realized, would be worth over $40M for those companies alone.

Also happy about this bullet-dodging announcement? State Senator Michael Gianaris, the guy who was put on a team that could kill the Amazon project, and when they pulled out, was abruptly removed from the group. From a NY Times article yesterday here's what he said in a statement.

Amazon is coming to New York, just as they always planned. Fortunately, we dodged a $3B bullet by not agreeing to their subsidy shakedown earlier this year. 

Gianaris and AOC seem convinced that the $3B would have gone to Amazon whether they had created 1 job or 1 million jobs, but that doesn't jive with multiple published reports, including this one in the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle.

As part of the deal, New York state taxpayers will be on the hook for up to $1.525 billion should Amazon meet its 25,000-job pledge, pay an average salary of $150,000 and occupy at least 4 million square feet of space within the next 10 years, as promised. That number would increase to $1.7 billion if Amazon exceeds its goal and gets to 40,000 jobs by 2032.

The D&C report is consistent with the Agreement which shows the job creation incentives are entirely dependent on the jobs actually being created within the specified timeframes.

And yet, even today, AOC was tweeting something completely different. Take a look.

While we’re here, let’s clear up some GOP disinfo: - “It’s 1500 jobs vs 25,000”: The 25,000 jobs figure was a 10-20 year fantasy # from Amazon, not a promise or agreement. In exchange for that lack of commitment, they wanted billions of public $. Their Y1 jobs projection was 700.

Those subsidies are a "10-20 year fantasy" if Amazon doesn't deliver the jobs, as far as I can tell. And of course I'm not an expert on how to read these things, but the table in the agreement seems pretty clear. 

And I get that economic development deals are messy and that there are always opposing viewpoints on them. I get that I live upstate not in Queens or in Hudson Yards, and so wouldn't have felt the pain of the HQ2 deal, even though I would have felt the benefits. But as a New Yorker, I'd like to see politicians doing less patting themselves on the back for killing a deal the size of Amazon's HQ2, and see them be a little more honest in their communications. 

There'll be plenty of time for patting themselves on the back when, for example, they fix the corporate tax code so that companies like Amazon don't get to pay $0 in federal taxes. 

Just a thought.

Quick Takes (v40): If True, Dems, Shame on You

I've long complained about the hypocrisy of this president calling for unity and love, and claiming he wants to be the president for all of us.

I find those comments ridiculous, given his daily rhetoric and attacks on anyone who so much as whispers anything less than fabulous about him, and also given that some of those comments come when he's in his 'good people on both sides' mindset, which I also find ridiculous.

In fact, just this morning I called him out for an apparent lack of comity with Democrats, which I discovered on one of my meandering trips through the propaganda pages on the White House website.

What set me off? The president's comments at the swearing-in ceremony for new Defense Secretary Mark Esper, who was approved by the Senate in a 90-8 vote. Take a look, particularly at the parts I italicized:

THE PRESIDENT: Well, thank you very much everybody. We have a very important moment in our country’s history, actually. And we had a lot of our great Republican senators in the White House, and I invited them over and many of them wanted to be here. And as you probably heard, the vote just took place, and it was 90 to 8. That’s a vote that we’re not accustomed to, Mark, I have to say that. So congratulations, that’s great.

So, Esper was approved on a 90-8 vote? That is great (and it's about time Trump put up a reasonable nominee). Now, there are 53 Republicans and 47 Democrats in the Senate this year. If he was the unity president, as he pretends he is, Trump should have invited every single one of them and 90 of them should have showed up, right?  But he doesn't say he invited all of the Yes votes to the ceremony - just the "great Republicans," which is his standard practice.

But then I read about a Rose Garden ceremony today where Trump signed the bill that extends until 2092 the 9/11 Victim Compensation Fund. The bill passed the House by a vote of 402-12 and the Senate, 97-2.

Of course, during his remarks he had to make sure we knew that he, too, played a role in the aftermath of the attack.  In case you were unaware, he was very engaged. Listen - he'll tell you.

I was down there also. But I'm not considering myself a first responder. But I was down there, I spent a lot of time down there with you.

I suspect many will find that to be just another in a long line of appalling "look at me!" statements, another blatantly self-promoting lie. And you'd be right; after all, Trump lies like the rest of us breathe - but his absurd comment isn't the real shocker from today's gathering.

Nope -- this is the real shocker (emphasis added):

No Democrats attended Monday's event, according to a guest list distributed by the White House, but an official said that every member of Congress was invited. 

If that's true - that they all were invited and none of them attended - shame on them.

Shame on every single one of them.

I get that half of them are running for president and there's a debate on Wednesday and all that, and I get that there is literally no love lost between Democrats in Congress and the president, but "come on, man!" as one House member recently said.

Choke back your bile and show up for something that matters. Show up and respect the first responders and families of those who have passed, who were at the ceremony. If they can do it, certainly a bunch of politicians can do it to.

Be the better person, Democrats - the better person, not the bigger jerk.

The Update Desk: Amazon in NYC

I wanted to provide some additional information on the Amazon/NYC deal, specifically what's been going on since the darn thing failed last month. The NY Post has been doing a lot of coverage, naturally, and so I'll share some of the updates they've been focusing on.

First, the Sonofa Gov has been working his tail off, trying unsuccessfully to get the giant company to reconsider its hasty decision to back out of the deal. He even called Jeff Bezos himself, and that wasn't enough to swing the deal.

Even the New York Times got into the aftermath, publishing a full page ad that was paid for by the Partnership for New York City and signed by a bunch of current and former politicians, labor leaders, business leaders, and educators.  That, too, will likely fall on deaf ears, but at least it shows other companies that the folks in NYS and Albany aren't complete idiots.

Please, Say it Ain't So!

If you're a New Yorker like me, these can be crazy times.

• Our Sonofa Gov has his lowest favorability rating I think since he took office, even though we've now got a trifecta state government (single party control of the whole shebang) and the agenda is moving forward at a pace described by one member of the media as 'drinking from a firehose'; 
• Our senior senator suffers as well from poor ratings;
• Our our junior senator announced her candidacy for president and, in doing so, branded herself a liar; 
• We're doing our taxes and feeling the pain of the Christmas present the president and the Republicans gave us back in 2017; and
• We're maybe going to blow the Amazon deal. 

That's right - we're maybe going to blow the Amazon deal, which will bring one of the company's new headquarters locations to Long Island City (the other is being built in Arlington VA).

What does this Amazon HQ2 deal mean for the two areas?  Here's a snippet from CNN back in December. that touches on what the deal means, and what the selected cities need to be working on - now.

The to-do list for both locations includes making sure there's enough housing for new hires, improving the local transportation and infrastructure and adding nearby schools. The company says it will invest $2.5B in each place. Both will have more than 25,000 workers over time, and hiring starts next year. 

And, as that article noted, "there's still plenty of work ahead for New York and Northern Virginia."

So, Virginia is moving forward full steam ahead but what's happening in New York?