The media and press are awash with scandal. Politicians are at it again...draining the last vestige of faith in the "political process" from the hearts and minds of the public. Like vampires they seduce us with the promises of wonderful things that they never mean to keep. They then leave us cold and numb in a cemetary of lies, bereft of any faith in our fellow man, consigned to walk the earth until we die, not trusting anything or anyone.
Bad leadership is the great existential crisis of our time. How are we to be led into the future if true and good leadership, which by its nature imbues trust, has ceased to exist? We are not by nature anarchists. We cannot as a society or a civilization survive in a state of ethical chaos. The inmates, as they say, cannot be allowed to run the asylum.
New York State is now grappling with so many problems great and small, that one feels like the possessed girl in "The Exorcist" with ones' head spinning around. The MTA is broke and must make service cuts so drastic that the very economic life of the city and its suburbs are endangered. The solutions put forward are higher job killing taxes which as a cure may be worse than the disease. The people in charge don't seem to understand what being in charge means.
A long term NYC Councilman from the Bronx who has literally spent his entire adult life on the public fisc is indicted on thirteen counts of larceny by the US Attorney from the Southern District. One of the allegations is that he took a bill for a Bagel sandwich and a Coke for $7.00 and changed it to $177.00 for reinbursement purposes. This of course only serves to give one the flavor of the remaining charges. These contain what has become an almost formulaic involvement of a not-for-profit organization, set up by the accused for noble purposes that have apparently not come to fruition but has managed to give fairly lucrative jobs to wife, family and mistress.
A key leader in the State Senate and his colleague, a US congressman from Queens are up to their necks in a project to create a "Racino" at Aqueduct Racetrack sponsored by the State Government. This award worth at least $300,000,000, was won by a consortium that also included a former Congressman who is a very powerful Minister/Developer/politician . The bidding process seems to have been in the opinion of one of the losers akin to trying to hit a moving target since the rules seemed to change as the process moved along. The one thing that didn't move however was that the Governor needed the support of all three of the gentlemen for reelection which he apparently got a scant three days after the award was announced. Since then stories have appeared alleging that the slot machine operator chosen by this consortium does not operate in Las Vegas but instead is confined to smaller Nevada venue where their Casinos apparently are unclean and second rate. Oh yes...the the State Senator and the sitting Congressman also have several not-for-profits, one of which was set up for giving aid to victims of "Katrina". They apparently collected over $31,000 but only distributed a little over $1300. no one knows where the rest of the money went.
The Mayor or those close to him distributed $1,200,000 to the Independence Party, on whose line he ran, for pollwatching and other assorted Election Day tasks via an entity created under law a month after the Election was over. The head of the party claims not to know anything about it. The New York County DA wants to know everything about it!
For the last five days the NY Times, has dangled a juicy tale of sex, drugs and presumably Rock n' Roll before the public. Allegedly it involves the Governor and the Governors' mansion and women not his wife. The story has yet to run, so this is the "Empire State" version of "death by a thousand cuts". In other words the rumor of the story has now become the story. The governor, no stranger to strange women by his own prior admission, has denied all. After the prior Governors' daillance with $4500 "ladies of the town", the voters are frantically seeking a "castrato" to run for the office if only to eliminate one barrier to putting full and devoted energy into the "peoples" business.
Another State Senator who was a former Police Officer, beat and cut up his girl friend so badly that she required surgery and a post assault order of protection from the courts. The attacker was tried and convicted and is awaiting appeal. The State Senate convened a Commission to decide what to do with this thug and eventually they recommended he be expelled. Yesterday they voted to do that even though by so doing, the Democrats would lose temporary control of the Senate. This is actually positive so why am I including it in my list of misery? Well the Senator was a Latino and other Latinos are outraged by this punishment even though the woman victim was a Latina. Apparently ethnicity and a deranged sense of victimhood trumps justice and moral principles. This is not just sad ...it is disgusting!
All of the above has hit us within the last week. The 15 inches of snow we got yesterday was in some way a repreive from God that has nothing to do with climate change. It stopped the miscreants from doing damage for a 24 hour span of time. This is a good thing. God apparently reads the papers also. The fact that sucessive "snowmageddons" has shut down Washington for most of a week is also good. It is costing us $100,000,000 a day but when the Government is functioning it costs us billions and sometime trillions. Hmm... perhaps a way out of the deficit...ya think?
I have to laugh because if I don't I will scream. Where is the leadership that can help us thread our way out of this thicket of corruption and idiocy? It's not only my country, state and city at stake...it has become personal... it is my sanity at stake as well. I'm not looking for a savior...I'm just looking for integrity! Why does this appear so hard to find?
ERLANDSSON
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