PATH To Staten Island

Interesting idea from Cap'n Transit to improve SI's terrible transit accessibility.  Not ready to endorse, but certainly worth considering.

Along the Chemical Coast to Staten Island

"Right now there are PATH trains from 33rd Street to Hoboken, from the World Trade Center to Hoboken, and from the World Trade Center to Newark. But the train from 33rd Street west stops at Journal Square, presumably because there isn't enough ridership to run the trains all the way to Newark. This train can be extended to Staten Island - or else it can be extended to Newark, and the trains from the World Trade Center can be extended to Staten Island. How would they get there? On the Chemical Coast. The Chemical Coast Line is a freight railroad with a wonderfully evocative name, originally part of the Central Railroad of New Jersey. Like the Arthur Kill Lift Bridge, it is lightly used. We wouldn't want the PATH trains to share tracks with chemical tank cars, but there is plenty of room in the right-of-way and on adjacent properties for two tracks of dedicated passenger service."

http://capntransit.blogspot.com/2014/06/along-chemical-coast-to-staten-island.html

The Shaolin could use some better train service.

An Incredibly Savvy and Well-bred Grifter

Tim Geithner. And he's not the only one.  I've said a thousand times, the original sin of the Obama administration was the appointment of Summers and Geithner.

The Con-Artist Wing of the Democratic Party | VICE

http://www.vice.com/read/tim-geithner-and-the-con-artist-wing-of-the-democratic-party

More Bergdahl Hypocrisy From Right-wingers

Seriously, you can't make these ridiculous people look any sillier than a side by side comparison of their own words.  It's fascinating and creepy.

Angry Conservatives Forgot Their Old Angry Tweets Supporting P.O.W.

Conservatives want you to know they're simply telling an inconvenient truth about the bad behavior of U.S. soldier Bowe Bergdahl and the Obama administration's effort to get him back from Taliban capt…

http://gawker.com/angry-conservatives-forgot-their-old-angry-tweets-suppo-1586150981?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+gawker%2Ffull+%28Gawker%29

The Bizarre Hypocrisy of the GOP and Their Right-wing Allies

The hypocrisy and cognitive dissonance these people exhibit is baffling to me.  I'm beginning to wonder whether conservatism should have a DSM-IV designation.

Frank Rich on the National Circus: Bowe Bergdahl and the Messy End of America's Longest War

Every week,  New York  Magazine writer-at-large Frank Rich talks with contributor Eric Benson about the biggest stories in politics and culture. This week: the controversial homecoming of Sergeant Bow…

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/06/frank-rich-bergdahl-and-forever-war-fatigue.html

This is a deeply weird and creepy phenomenon.

Who You Punish When You Don't Vote: Yourself

I've never actually read this in a newspaper or seen it on TV, but is the full and honest truth.  

Every candidate has limited resources and focuses them on the people they know will vote.

We ignore people who don't vote. We stop caring about you. So vote. by @DavidOAtkins

"For the rest of you, this is why the people who say they're going to "punish" politicians by not voting are just deluded. You're not punishing anyone. You just fall off our radar. We stop caring about you at all. As campaign workers, we sort voters a number of different ways, but the most important beyond partisanship is voter frequency. If you're a Democrat who voted in the last 3 major elections, we call you a "3x3" voter. We know that you're almost certainly going to show up and we know you're almost certainly going to vote for the Democrats on the ballot; all we have to do is make sure you know who all the Democrats are in the non-partisan races, which Democrats to vote for in the primaries, and which initiatives to vote for. If you voted in 2 out of the last 3 major elections, we have to spend more money on you--not to convince you how to vote necessarily, but to just make sure you get out and show up to vote the right way at the top of the ticket. If you're 1x3, we will call and harass you almost endlessly, because you're unreliable. Do you know what happens to 0x3 voters? We just don't care about you. You're not worth the time. We don't read your facebook posts or internet comments about how much you hate both parties for the NSA or Afghanistan or whatever. You're a cipher. You have far more impact on us if you're a 3x3 conservative Democrat who threatens to leave the Party and start voting for Republicans, because then we both lose your vote and our opposition picks up a vote. You would have far more impact by being a regular voter and threatening to leave and vote Green Party, but since the Greens aren't exactly going to pick up any seats, all we've done is lost your one vote. Which sucks, but not as badly as losing someone to the Republicans does."

http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2014/06/we-ignore-people-who-dont-vote-we-stop.html

When I ran for office, we had a tight budget.  Whose door do I knock on?  Who gets mail?  Who do we call?  You start with super-prime voters and go from there.  There is no time or money to waste on people who don't vote.

GOP Strategists Pushing Bergdahl Attacks

I don't know what to make of this whole situation yet.  But this looks like a despicable, cynical move by a desperate party. 

Attacking Obamacare and Benghazi turned out to be failures, now they're grasping at any straw they can find.  Because they've got nothing to run on. Nothing.

Republican Strategists Are Helping Bowe Bergdahl's Critics Get Their Stories Out

"On Monday, troops that served with or searched for Sergeant Bowe Bergdahl in Afghanistan came forward to publicly express their anger at the American POW. In interviews with several media outlets, they accused Bergdahl of desertion and blamed him for the deaths of soldiers who were involved in the effort to retrieve him after he was captured by the Taliban. For the most part, they seemed intensely focused on their personal feelings — and not on the increasingly partisan discussion of the prisoner swap that led to Bergdahl's release — but, as the New York Times first reported, "Republican strategists" were responsible for putting some, if not all, of those soldiers in touch with reporters. On Tuesday, BuzzFeed revealed that one of those strategists was Capitol Media Partners' Richard Grenell, who previously worked as Mitt Romney's foreign policy spokesman and a Bush administration–era aide to U.N. Ambassador John Bolton. When reached for comment, Grenell's partner, Brad Chase, acknowledged they were helping the soldiers "in getting their story out." He also objected to the characterization of his firm as "Republican," since he himself is not a Republican, though a media booker told BuzzFeed that Grenell was the main point of contact."

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/06/gop-strategists-helping-bergdahls-critics.html

The cynicism is enough to shock even me.

Rally for LICH 9:00am Tuesday On Supreme Court Steps

The ongoing legal saga continues tomorrow morning with a hearing on our motion at 10:00am.  The broad coalition of community groups and medical personnel that then Public Advocate de Blasio brought together to sue to preserve healthcare in our community will come together once again on the Court house steps to support our legal team in the fight to keep healthcare alive at LICH.

SUNY wanted to put the padlocks on LICH a year ago.  Time and again they have flouted the community, the laws, and the judiciary.  Help us keep them honest.

Where:  NY State Supreme Court Steps (near intersection of Court Street and Montague)

When:  9:00am, Tuesday June 3, 2014

Who:    Anyone who cares about preserving healthcare facilities in our community

As usual the Brooklyn Eagle's Mary Frost keeps us all up to date on the situation:

Advocates for Brooklyn’s Long Island College Hospital (LICH) say they’re fed up with the State University of New York’s (SUNY) RFP “manipulations” that have left the hospital closed and without a real ER.

Attorney Jim Walden, of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, told the Brooklyn Eagle that the LICH community filed a motion at state Supreme Court in Brooklyn on Friday to throw out the rankings turned in by six of the hospital bid evaluators. Supporters say these evaluators did not follow instructions to award more points to full-service hospital proposals, the key feature of a landmark legal settlement.

One panelist gave no points at all to any of the four hospital bids, but the full 70 points to a developer, Fortis Property Group. Earlier this year, Fortis was SUNY’s first choice to buy the LICH campus, but that deal was scuttled when the the settlement was reached.

SUNY lawyers say that they designed the RFP to have wiggle room. During a May 21 hearing, attorney Frank Carone told state Supreme Court Justice Johnny Lee Baynes, "When we structured the elements, the language we used was artful.” As an example, Carone cited wording on the RFP to the effect that proposals offering a hospital "will be eligible for a higher technical score," though not necessarily entitled to one.

State Supreme Court Justice Johnny Lee Baynes, who has been overseeing the LICH fight for more than a year, will consider the petitioners’ motion Tuesday morning.

LICH supporters are expected to show up in force before the hearing for a 9 a.m. press conference to demand that the court enforce the settlement.

Click through for her comprehensive (much longer) updates.