Congestion pricing in NYC- A good idea?

 As of this past midnight, Congestion pricing is in effect in the southern part of Manhattan, below 60th St. During peak hours, The additional toll for most drivers of private passenger cars will be nine dollars.

The stated goals of this program are to reduce congestion in the central business district, and to use the toll  monies To fund needed mass transit infrastructure work. If these Two things happen – that congestion is reduced, and that all the money is efficiently, used for transit infrastructure, then I’m for it.

You would never know that anyone is in favor of it if you listen to the New York Post and WABC AM talk radio. They’ve criticized congestion pricing endlessly.

I think that any normal person Who works normal hours and who drives into Manhattan every day is probably a complete fool. I’ve driven into Manhattan during peak hours a few times, it is no fun at all.

But for some – medical workers, and first responders who work Unpredictable hours, Or those blue collar workers who live in places like Northeast Pennsylvania that don’t have good transit options, The additional $45 a week toll will bite hard. 

I think that similar congestion pricing plans have worked fairly well in places like London, and in the well run city of Singapore. Let’s See this scheme in New York really does what it’s supposed to do.

Jimmy Carter RIP

 It has often been said that Jimmy Carter was “the worst president in American history”. But many things that are often said are not true, and this is one of them. 

In my opinion, Jimmy Carter was a very good foreign policy president. 

He officially normalized relations with China. 

He brokered the Israel/Egypt peace  treaty, a  deal that has stood the test of time.

 And he pushed through the Panama Canal treaty, which in my opinion was a deal that was good for the US, and good for our relations with Latin America. Things in that part of the world could’ve gotten very bad if the US had insisted on holding onto the Canal.

Carter had the bad fortune of being president when the Iranian revolution, and the hostage taking of US Embassy personnel took place. And he took office not long after the Vietnam war came to an end for  the USA, but not for the unfortunate populations of Vietnam and Cambodia.

Unlike Many presidents and former presidents, I didn’t see Jimmy Carter trying to cash in on his time in  office. He did many Weerth file things after leaving the oval office. 

We saw  him organizing and getting his hands, dirty and building houses for low income people in various places all over the US with Habitat for Humanity. When there was a major hurricane in Florida, The roof blew off many buildings, but not from the Habitat for Humanity houses built there by Carter’s organization. The Habitat for Humanity houses were built properly, with the right amount of nails.

Syria Falls, Bad news for Iran and Russia

 The most important story in the world today is the fall of the Assad regime in Syria. You’d never know it by watching Sunday morning US TV news shows, where 99% of the reporting is on Trump, this and Trump that, along  with an update on the hunt for the guy who murdered the insurance executive.

The Bibi government in Israel Seems to be pretty happy with the  fall of Assad. I’m not sure that I would celebrate anytime soon. The largest part of the rebel force, HTS ( formally known as the Al Nusra front )  was once a part of Al-Qaeda. That is a pretty bad history.

The big losers this weekend are Russia and Iran, both of whom supported the Assad government.

Russia has a  Navy  base in Tartus, Syria, which they should lose now. If they do lose that base, they won’t have any naval facilities in the Mediterranean. And the Russian ships now in the Med will not be allowed to go into the Black Sea,  as Turkey  will not permit them to transit the Bosphorous. Those ships will be without a port, unless they travel all the way up to Saint Petersburg. 

Iran has projected power in The past years by Supporting Hamas, Hezbollah, and Assad. Now, Israel has broken the back of Hamas and Hezbollah, And  Assad is bye bye.

Iranian and Russian power looks to be much weaker in the region that it was even six months  ago. That is probably good news, but let’s see what Syria looks like a couple of months from now 

Election – what lessons have been learned?

I didn’t expect this result, and I don’t think that most of us did either. I think that the Democrats expected to win a close election; while a lot of Trump supporters were more confident, but still nervous.

Trump didn’t sneak in the electoral college way the way he did in 2016, this was an impressive majority vote in the majority of states. 

Even in deep blue New York City, Trump got significantly more votes than he did eight years ago. Trump had a double digit gain in votes in Brooklyn. He won an overwhelming majority of the orthodox Jewish vote.

I don’t think that this was so much an endorsement of Donald Trump as it is a  rejection of Kamala Harris and the Democratic Party.

I’ve spoken to a number of Trump supporters who agree that he is personally dishonest, generally a man of low character. But they voted for him because he was strong on the issue of border security, and because he was perceived, as being stronger on the economy. 

Some will call Trump a racist, But it’s hard to Square that opinion, with the fact that Trump sharply increased Republican, share of the Latino vote, while increasing the small Republican share of the black vote.

Bill Maher, the comedian is as committed a Democrat as there is, But he has for some time Been disturbed by the thin, lipped intolerance of many Democrats, and their embrace of lunatic cultural positions. Months ago, on his HBO program, he wondered why The left wanted to die on the hill of minors ( supposedly) changing their sex, without the consent or knowledge of  their parents. ( see the bill that Gavin Newsom signed in California ) 

Some have said that Latinos wouldn’t vote for Kamala Harris, because she was a woman. That’s hard to believe, when they voted for Hillary Clinton, and at a time when Mexico now has a woman Prime Minister. Latinos And other Americans aren’t anti-woman, they just aren’t insane. They don’t want boys in the changing room, and they don’t want an  uncontrolled border. 

The backdrop to all of this is that Joe Biden was seriously impaired for years, and the Democratic Party power structure and all of the Democrat friendly media, covered it up, and lied about it. How can you trust a party that does a thing like this?

 We have a mentally impaired president right now for the next two months. Whose fault is that?

But also, you can’t avoid the fact that Kamala Harris was just a god awful candidate. In my opinion, she is a  vacuous, unserious person. 

Some said that she Moved to the center, but she did no  such thing. A couple of weeks ago, she said that the concept of rate operations for slavery “ should be studied” . That means that she’s for it, I don’t see too many former slaves when I go about my day, and I don’t think that any of the slaves that did exist 160 years ago were held in captivity by the US government. 

So we are now about to be ruled by an evil, probably  the lesser of two evils, but evil still, supported by a meek, subservient , Republican house and Senate. 

Heaven help us all.

Photo taken yesterday afternoon in Dyker  Heights Brooklyn. American flag, Madonna, Trump poster. 

No one to vote for

 Yesterday, at Fort Hamilton high school, I voted early for the first time. 

I am in a Democratic, one party state, so I really have no say in this presidential election. I don’t like this fact. But it does allow me to be a free agent. I don’t have respect for either Trump, or Kamala Harris, He is wildly, undisciplined and divisive; she is stealthy and divisive, a wolf in  sheep’s clothing.

 I voted for neither one of them. 

Both camps sound  pretty confident. 

I think that Trump will take the state of Georgia, which he lost last time around. If he is also able to take Pennsylvania, he’ll win the election. 

Box of Rain

Phil Lesh of the Grateful Dead has passed away.

I have long admired “ Box of Rain “, From the Dead’s  “American beauty “album. 

It was created by Lesh and Robert Hunter. Phil wanted to create a song for his dying father. He composed the music,  Robert Hunter supplied the lyrics. Lesh rehearsed the song as he drove to see his father in the nursing home.

I just discovered this cover by Steve Forbert, I’m happy to see tis still around.

October 7 2024

It has been one year since Hamas crossed from  Gaza into Israel, killing about 1,200, most of them Israeli civilians. 

October 7 was not the beginning of the Arab/ Israeli conflict, But it certainly was the first page of a horrific chapter.

The Hamas supporters in America and in Europe chose October 7, 2024 to have their celebratory commemorations. Not on the one year anniversary of Israel’s invasion of Gaza, but On the one year anniversary of the murders, the rapes, the abductions. I think that tells you everything you need to know about these demonstrators.

This evening, I watched a documentary on Al Jazeera TV about  what has gone down over the past year. 

Al Jazeera’s report began with the Hamas attack, but at no time did it  mention the large scale murders, or the  sexual assaults. 

There was plenty  of footage of Israeli soldiers mistreating captives in Gaza, Of large groups of Gazan Civilians being marched out of their neighborhoods, of the demolition of apartment houses in Gaza, while Israeli soldiers cheered on and sang songs about it.

If you are an American, who gets all his news  from The likes of MSNBC or Fox News, you won’t be well informed about this war at all. These stations devote The majority of their programming to Democrat versus Republican, cops and robbers. 

CNN or BBC will do a better job of reporting the overall picture.

But you will understand things better if at some point you watch  Al Jazeera, Israeli TV, or Israeli, talk radio. These sources from within the region will absolutely be slanted, will absolutely exaggerate some things, and leave other things out, But they also give you glimpses of the terrible situation on the ground.