On Primary Day, you want to know "who is winning?" Leading up to the general election, "What will the candidate be able to accomplish or block" needs to be among the questions posed. That means taking the Council into account.
“Will the candidate have enough Council support to back his initiatives and to block measures he wants stopped?”
What was striking last night was how many candidates didn't have the substance to fill even 30 seconds, or revealed in that time an under-appreciation of the problems that are going on. I remain convinced that candidates still treat a host of school-related issues as taboo.
There's a lot that doesn't add up, at least if voters want to be able to make informed choices. Many substantive issues remain unexplored or underexplored, and the rhetoric often doesn't match what the winning candidate would be able to do as mayor.
Most of the candidates running for mayor of New York City have explicitly described the Trump administration as creating an emergency for the city, including in their assessments the prospect of reduced federal funding. But it is unclear how much they appreciate fully the impact of what is likely coming. They do, however, appear to be united in not admitting that emergencies require sacrifice.
“What is clear is that they do not want to tell the voting public that emergencies often have deeply unpleasant consequences, not all of which can be warded off.”
Well, 50 actually (not including subparts). With a bunch of "why?" and "why nots?" Taboo breakers, too. Don't worry, though: I've thrown in some easy ones!
How hard should it be to get broad agreement on “unless and until you get the rules changed, follow them”? Not very. But achieving that consensus sometimes seems an impossible dream in New York City, a place where you’re generally not doing your rule-breaking in splendid isolation but rather in ways that have real impacts on others.
“Romanticizing and idealizing (go-to indulgences on the left) and grievance and demonization (animating principles on the right) are no small part of the problem.”
Harvard economist Gregory Mankiw, writing in The New York Times, wants you to believe that a worker's acceptance of a job for no more than minimum wage and a person's acceptance of a pre-ACA, bare bones insurance policy reflect voluntary arrangements. Even a moment's consideration shows there is nothing genuinely voluntary about either of these arrangements.
American Farm Bureau Federation study confirms agricultural sector's deep reliance on wildly underpaid workers. It warns that shrinking labor supply would spark "large-scale restructuring" of farm sector. But don't we need that if current system only survives by relying so heavily on unfree labor?
Yes, he’s a thug. Yes, he’s trying to change the subject. But isn’t there a lot more to report on about New Jersey Governor Chris Christie? Like the fact that he’s been guilty of wildly irresponsible and sometimes lawless behavior before. Two prime examples: In 2010, he killed the long-planned construction of a new Hudson River transit tunnel, and he's spent years sabotaging New Jersey's Council on Affordable Housing.
The City Council part of the mayoral equation
Mayoral debate on education: Fine question, largely depressing answers
Central paradoxes of the NYC mayoral primary
Do they know it's truly an emergency?
A few questions I'd love the NYC mayoral candidates to answer
Even the easy stuff isn't so easy
Speaker Adams opposing effective fair housing enforcement?
Equally free to sleep under the bridge
Economic disaster for agriculture or proof of brutality of current system?
Christie's bigger sins