Richard Ravitch is an honorable and accomplished man whose statement that he wants to help Gov. Paterson address the economic crisis deserves to be taken at face value. Pedro Espada, who has flipped himself back after his friend Hiram Monserrate, and into the undisputed position of Senate majority leader, is an able player by Albany rules. Democrats are back in charge of the Senate, and government can function again -- in fact they are passing bills at midnight as I write this (watching online). So why don't I feel like dancing?
It's not just that the Ravitch appointment appears unconstitutional. New York courts have often brushed aside constitutional concerns in order to appease the power structure. Nor is it the legal problems of Espada and Monserrate, which I, along with every senator of both parties, am prepared to overlook. It's more a question of whether legislative action is, on the whole, going to make things better or worse.
Take this warning by E.J. McMahon of an upcoming bill that would "effectively authorize billions of dollars in new state and local borrowing over the next decade, which both houses of the Legislature have approved in a snap vote, without debate or a public hearing, and which the governor apparently is poised to sign as soon as he can." (Second update, Friday morning: Fred Dicker just said on his Talk 1300 radio show that he thinks this was voted down on the floor. That would indicate a welcome outbreak of democracy in Albany. Further updates from Liz Benjamin and Danny Hakim. The latter thinks the vote was less about policy and more about slighting the state comptroller for withholding senators' paychecks during the long stalemate.)
On the positive side, in the voting going on now, they are laying aside some controversial bills, including a couple sponsored by Assemblyman Peter Abbate, king of the public pension sweeteners. Also, just after midnight, President Pro Tem Malcolm Smith promised Senate rules reforms will soon be adopted. Republican leader Dean Skelos spoke after him, seemingly confident that the Senate will pass "historic reforms... next week." Maybe they will, which is a consummation devoutly to be wished.
Also on the plus side, the sun finally came out but it wasn't too hot as I took a walk Thursday afternoon in Washington Park with a nonpolitical friend, and we had lunch on Lark Street, and it was a beautiful day in Albany.
Update: The 6 percent Albany County hotel tax bill, a percentage point of which helps fund the convention center project, passed again, as did Power for Jobs. This time their passage appears more legal that the previous votes in the Democrats' Frank Padavan walk-through session, but I'm not quite clear why everyone has now decided the Senate can legally pass bills in an extraordinary session when it was being widely questioned before. (Further update on the last point. An informed source writes: "Last night's Senate session was not extraordinary. They gaveled in and out of the special, and then gaveled back in regular session yesterday afternoon. Then, they stood at ease for a few hours so everyone could hold their press conferences -- then they went back into regular session.")
I happened to be flipping around late last night when I stumbled across the legislature channel and the senate was passing the non-controversial bills at breakneck speed. All of the ones I saw passed either 62-0 or 61-1. I think each bill took about 10-15 seconds to complete.
I was barely able to avoid gagging while listening to Smith's disingenuous call for unity and Skelos' political attack and both their insistences that none of the last month was about their own power but about that most abused of phrases: The People's Business (tm).
Yet the very events of last night proved the opposite. All of these non-controversial bills could've been in one day any time in the last month... but neither side was willing to do The People's Business (tm) as long as their own personal power wasn't decided.
I know you're happy that things like the gay marriage civil rights bill won't pass but just remember that democracy (or lack thereof) cuts both ways.
Posted by: Brian | July 10, 2009 at 03:30 PM