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Post by dave on Oct 7, 2013 23:09:03 GMT -5
"Personally, I'm not fond of the idea of paying more to drive to Syracuse or Buffalo in order to subsidize other people's trip across the Hudson." You're also funding all the private yachts on the Barge Canal, now owned by the NYS THruway. Originally built as the Erie Canal to stimulate trade by providing a better path into the country from New York's seaport ... and it did a great job of it ... the three or four times I've stood at a set of locks or biked a trail down the side of the canal in the pat ten years I think I've seen only one commercial craft carrying any goods. Everything else was private craft.
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Post by clarencebunsen on Oct 8, 2013 5:51:15 GMT -5
Well, that's the right button to push to get me started first thing in the morning and I haven't even read the funnies yet. Putting the Barge Canal (which is essentially recreational) along with its associated bike trail under the ownership of the Thruway Authority was just a way of taking the costs "off book." I have no fundamental objection to government ownership and operation of recreational venues but to hide the costs in the operational costs of a highway is dishonest.
NY's system of Authorities serves as a source of patronage jobs and back door borrowing not efficient government.
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Post by dave on Oct 8, 2013 7:36:19 GMT -5
Yup, they wanted to spend money on the canal ... I think it was in the 90's ... so they put it under the Thruway so that it was sheltered under an Authority. All very Back Door. NY State doesn't consider that dishonest, like a murderer doesn't consider killing you a bad thing.
Back Door Borrowing was probably invented by Rockefeller* in the '60's when he wanted to build the Taj Mahal "Mall" in Albany, Egg and all, but knew voters in Cheektowaga would flip him a rude gesture when asked to approve it in the voting booth. So he arranged for Albany County to borrow money from the State to build the Mall and lease it back to the state since the state did not need voter approval for leases. It cost taxpayers just as much ... maybe more ... to do it that way, but they were relieved of the decision of whether they wanted it. And after that Erastus Corning got what he wanted from the State for life, which wasn't that long, come to think of it. Erastus II ran Albany for years. CB, you should not consider dying in New York State, which will make you a native, without reading William Kennedy's (Ironweed) non-fiction "Oh, Albany." It's about Corning and other notable politicians. You'll swear you're reading The Godfather at times, but these guys were treated better by the newspapers.
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Post by dave on Oct 8, 2013 7:58:22 GMT -5
Sitting here chuckling to myself. My favorite William Kennedy story involved his fellow professor at SUNY Albany named Ivan Steen. Steen was in the History Department and if I remember correctly Kennedy was in the English department. Steen considered himself to be Corning's official biographer. (I was amazed a few moments ago to check and find Steen is still listed with the department. He's got to be creeping toward 80.)
I never met Kennedy, who continued to teach classes after he became somewhat famous, but I interviewed Steen one afternoon while I was considering more graduate study when I retired from my first career in 1993. I happened to mention "Oh Albany" and Steen had all he could do to keep from exploding in wrath. Here he had spent years researching Corning (evidently from afar) and along comes this (relatively) young twit from the English department who writes an entire book about the man who was the great grandson of the founder of the New York Central Railroad. Erastus Corning II was the mayor for 40 years! He could butter your bread with both hands tied behind his back. Ivan Steen's assessment was that Kennedy's information was not the most accurate, certainly not as accurate as his. But I'm sure Kennedy's book was more entertainng than an historical tome. My late daughter-in-law grew up next door to Professor Steen (he and her Dad were teaching colleagues at Albany) and when I told her the story with a few details I didn't add here, she said it sounded just like him.
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Post by clarencebunsen on Oct 8, 2013 11:09:25 GMT -5
I see it's available from Amazon as a paperback. It doesn't appear to be available as an ebook.
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Post by dave on Oct 8, 2013 14:46:18 GMT -5
Interesting. Probably only the newer books wind up as e-books. They have to be re-formatted, at least the ones I do through Createspace, and I guess publishers can't go back and do that for every book that was ever published. I don't remember the copyright date, but I'd bet it was in the 1980's. Unless you really like using your Kindle or Nook or I-something, you can buy a used copy through Amazon for a penny plus shipping.
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Post by clarencebunsen on Oct 8, 2013 16:33:46 GMT -5
I'll probably go for the paperback the next time I order something from Amazon. I'm probably split about 50/50 between reading physical books and ebooks.
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