Is it time to file a Lawsuit against Albany?

RusThompson.com ^ | Nov 5, 04 | Rus Thompson

[The Mayor]

Is it time to file a Lawsuit against Albany?

While the majority of the country is moving forward, New York is still in reverse. The same old people, with the same old baggage are once more on their way back to Albany. Their Mission this time, Reform Albany, in other words, " to fix what they broke" ...

20 years and 2000 re-election campaigns only 30 incumbents have been defeated and not one on time budget... Their #1 job is to pass a budget. And they are going back to fix and reform the legislative process?

The Albany Legislators continue to circumvent the Law and fool the people. We do not have a Representative form of government as designed, In reality we have a dictatorship, a three men in a room dictatorship. I wish I could sit down with everyone in the state and explain it, funny thing is, when I have a chance to talk to people with an open mind it's fairly easy to get them to understand. But to put into words on a website it hard.

Our dictators are Sheldon Silver, Joe Bruno and The governor, name of the governor doesn't matter, they all serve in the same capacity just happens this terms Gov De Jour is Pataki, last one was Mario Cuomo...

The individual legislators are virtually useless, we don't need them. If we want to keep this form of government we can save 100's of millions of dollars a year by eliminating the Assembly and Senate, all their staff, their lawyers and their special perks.

It is time that we file a lawsuit to regain representative government in New York State. I am absolutley serious about this.

It is absolutley useless to send these people back to this form of government. The individual assemblyman and senator are powerless and are cut out of the legislative process so we have no voice. Legislators only support what their political leaders tell them to support.

The leaders are Silver and Bruno, they and they only control everything in their individual houses. Since each has total control of each piece of legislation that is introduced in their own house, each has equeal to the Governor concerning legislative matters.

The leader of each house also appoints the committee chairman and can remove and appoint a chair at any time, there by controlling each committee and the outcome .

So when we hear that something is stuck in a "committee" we should know who controls the committee and it's not the chairman, it's Silver or Bruno. The chairman serves only at the pleasure of the leader.

The Brennan report found that the States legislative committees do little real work, have few hearings on Bills and release almost no reports to it's members making voting decisions.

The leader also appoints all staff, attorneys and appoints members from their own party to the committee. The leader controls pork barrel funding and re-election campaign funds.

So to be a successful legislator all you have to do is suck up to your leader, do what he tells you to do. Then you will get pork money for your district and re-elected. Talk about incumbent protection.

So why, why do we even need all the senators and assemblymen. If they go back and vote for the same leaders and same process we need to file a lawsuit to regain representative government in New York State.

The economy of New York State is not the Presidents fault as the democrats would like you to beleive, the economy was lousy here when Bill Clinton was in office.

We have missed every upswing in the national economy for decades and the only place that is responsible is Albany. The only people responsible responsible for the disastrious condition of this state is all the people we have sent to represent us to Albany.

I would like to Thank The Brennan report and Duane Motley from New Yorkers for Constitutional Freedoms for the information.

[The Mayor]

The main problem I see is the complete lack of debate in the assembly.

The assembly is where the main problems are as I see it.
Sheldon Silver controls "everything", he and he alone controls the chairman and agenda of the committees, thereby controlling the out come of issues.

There is NO open debate on issues on the floor, No open votes on issues.
All the votes on the democrat side are controlled by silver.

This is the major issue, One person cannot control the agenda, vote and outcome of all issues.
Sheldon needs to go, leave on his own, relinquish his power, or if need be somehow get removed by a court.

It all boils down to running the government the way is supposed to be run, as the constitution says.
We are supposed to have a Representative type government.
Not a dictatorship, and this is what we have.

ALL issues and I mean ALL issues need to come to the floor for open debate and vote without the threat from silver to punish a legislator. Silver controls Everything.......

He controls the pork money for every district in the state.
He controls the votes in the committees.
He controls who is the chair of each committee.
If the chair of the committee doesn't do what silver say, silver replaces him with someone else.
It is all up the the dictators discretion.
He controls the money that is from the party for the re-election of assembly members.

Sheldon Silver is the most powerful politican in this state.

The first thing that needs to happen as soon as the assembly goes back into session is this.
#1 The assembly has to vote for another speaker and do it by secret ballot.
This is the only way that they can vote without the threat of shelly's revenge.
#2 They have to change the way issues are handled.
Open floor debate on the floor of the assembly.
Television cameras need to be there to record the debates.
Votes need to be taken from the floor, without intimidation or reprisal from the assembly speaker.
#3 all issues need to come out of committee and voted on.
The smoking ban, gay marriage ban, tort reform etc are held up supposedly in committee.

When the speaker controls the votes within the committee nothing will come to the floor for open vote unless he wants it to, and the outcome is already known.
The issue will pass or fail they way silver wants it to.

Plain and simple.
If the assembly votes for silver as leader we are screwed because nothing will change.
They will make little changes to make it look like they are reforming, but in reality nothing will change and silver will still control everything.

[The Mayor]

PING!

[AirForceMom]

Thanks for the ping!

[clyde260]

New York Minute BTTT

[NYFriend]

That's what I'm thinking. I believe you're exactly right. All it takes to kill something in Albany is for one leader to say know. The Speaker is that guy more often than anyone else. A budget has to pass both houses. I remember a year where the Senate was sending negotiators to an empty auditorium to sit with the Governor's people and wait for the Assembly to send his negotiators. I don't remember the problem, but the Speaker was saying that he wasn't going to send anyone to talk about any budget proposals until he had a promise on some other budget issue. That's just one example. There have a been other similar cases.

The Education funding issue was along the same lines. He wouldn't negotiate the budget this year until the NYC education funding dispute was settled. But, he knew there was a magic date where the courts would take over. The courts had already decided that NYC was entitled to more money, and the people bringing the suit were asking for billions more than the Governor of the Senate were talking about. If he negotiated an agreement, the State might have wound up spending some of the new education money outside of the City. The courts weren't going to do that. You can bet that the court decision is going to give more to NYC than the Senate and Governor proposed, and the Speaker won't have to agree to spend money anywhere else on anything else. It's a win for NYC and NYC alone. So why would he negotiate an education agreement? He wouldn't and he didn't. Plus, he said no budget till the education thing was worked out, so No Budget Either. That's the problem. (I know, the budgets were late before Silver was Speaker, but I think he was Way and Means Chairman during all or most of that time, the guy who shares responsibility for the Budget.) I guess until people start going after Assembly Democrats, they won't see a reason to oust the Speaker. If Assemblywoman John lost, that might have sent a message, but I guess she's won this year. Maybe the Assembly will get sick of holding up everything that could help Upstate, but as long as there are getting health care and education money for NYC, who knows?

[The Mayor]

NYC pays 19 cents per dollar for education.....

The rest of the state pays 37 cents per dollar...

what's wrong with this picture..

Look here
http://www.NYTabor.com

It is no longer an option.
Sheldon Silver must be removed from power!

[NYFriend]

Thanks for the link. There's a lot there too. First, your right about education, and as I see it, the Senate and Governor could have shut down government by not passing a budget (which would have resulted in eternal Democrat control of the State after the next election) or done what they can to slow the money going to NYC. I think what they did is best. I also think consolidation is good, sort of. There is a lot of redundancy in local government. Why a State DOT, County Highway Dept. and Town Public Works Department? The Public Policy Institute (run by the Business Council, wrote a report this year that suggested reducing LOCAL government employment to the national average would save Upstate taxpayers $4 billion a year. Big money, if they're right.

As far as spending instead of cutting taxes, you're right there too. People in NYS expect a lot (overall). That's driven by Downstate, and up here, people would rather have taxes cut. It will be an eternal fight, but the only hope are Upstate and Long Island (although it works out differently) Republicans. After this Speaker retires or goes to lobby, or whatever, things will probably get better. I've heard he also has a personal problem with the Governor, but I don't know. Maybe the new Upstate Democrats will change things for the better. I don't really think so.

I do want to point out that there are some very conservative Democrats in the Buffalo area. There is an Assemblyman and a Senator, both Democrats, both from around Buffalo, whose names escape me, that are pro business and social conservatives. The Assemblyman is anti-tax, I don't know about the Senator. I wish I could remember their names. They are kind of unusual names. Both are supposed to be good guys. But, for the most part, the Dems are Downstate Liberals.

So, the questions is, how do you force a change in the Assembly Leadership?

[The Mayor]

So, the questions is, how do you force a change in the Assembly Leadership?

First we have to vote the ones that are in cahoots with Silver out of office...
OOOPS, that didn't work.

The only option at this point is to file a lawsuit, fight fire with fire..

It boils down to the way NYState gov't is run..
It is being run as a dictatorship and not a representative gov't....

as I said above, if they go back and vote for silver we will have no choice but to impose the peoples will upon them and the only way this can be done as I see it is through the courts.

Sucks that we have gotten to this point..
I live on Grand Island, are you local too?

[clyde260]

Please add me to your NYS Ping list.

Now that the election is over I/we have made our State the next big focus. Lots of grumbling to that end has already started.

[The Mayor]

OK, I got you down!

I am sending this link to a local show right now.
930 wben AM

This needs to get out there!

[The Mayor]

This is the NY Map, Bush is in Blue the way it used to be..

[clyde260]

Thanks. We are already with you. Going to turn excerpts from this thread into a nice little handout, get people motivated.

[The Mayor]

Excellent!!

Thank you so much!
I will run against Hoyt again. 144th district..

[NYFriend]

Just to be clear, people need to understand that most of the Senate and Assembly Republicans are doing what they can. The Assembly Republicans have almost no power, but they do raise a fuss over the way that house is run. They just don't have the numbers to do anything about it, but it's not for want of trying. Assemblyman Prentiss is a an example of what not to do. Blaming him for the gridlock in Albany is ridiculous. He didn't support Silver, the Assembly Minority has been pushing for reform for years, and that's why the don't get money from the Speaker for staff or computers or anything.
Likewise, you can't blame the Senate for late budgets in recent years. The Assembly just refused to negotiate in a reasonable time and a reasonable way. The Senate and the Governor can't do anything. I guess that's not true. They could just give in, and support universal health care (Medicaid for everyone), another $7 billion for NYC schools, a minimum wage that is consistently $2 higher than the federal minimum, abortion on demand, drug sentences that are half as long as the are now, with twice as much drugs needed for a conviction of a given offense, etc. If you don't want the Republicans to give in, you need to understand that things are going to move really slowly, and they are going to need to trade for things like tort reform, Medicaid reform, scaffold law reform, Wicks reform, workers' comp. and all the other things that need to be fixed to get jobs back into Upstate.

By the way, I'm in Colonie, but I've lived around the state.

[The Mayor]

I openly have agreed with assembly republicans. As a matter of fact I have received a bunch of info from Charlie Nesbitt, he sent me some stuff in snail mail concerning issues he wants to do..

I have met him and Jim Hayes, another good guy.

Me and Gov Pataki

Me and Joel Giambra

[NYFriend]

Well, there you go. There a good Republicans in State Government. Voting everyone out will end Republican involvement in state government for the foreseeable future. New Republicans will not be elected in the first go round and they'll never effectively unseat the new Dem incumbents.

What kind of law suit against the Assembly are people thinking of? What changes, specifically, are people going to ask for? It's an idea. I don't think you'll ever vote in a Republican Assembly Majority. I don't think that's reasonable, unless there was a major scandal like with Nixon. So, people need to come up with another option and a lawsuit demanding reform is a new idea. So what's up?

[The Mayor]

This is from post 37..
The lawsuit will mainly be for the restoration the Representative government and not a dictatorship..

The first thing that needs to happen as soon as the assembly goes back into session is this.
#1 The assembly has to vote for another speaker and do it by secret ballot.
This is the only way that they can vote without the threat of shelly's revenge.
#2 They have to change the way issues are handled.
Open floor debate on the floor of the assembly.
Television cameras need to be there to record the debates.
Votes need to be taken from the floor, without intimidation or reprisal from the assembly speaker.
#3 all issues need to come out of committee and voted on.
The smoking ban, gay marriage ban, tort reform etc are held up supposedly in committee.

When the speaker controls the votes within the committee nothing will come to the floor for open vote unless he wants it to, and the outcome is already known.
The issue will pass or fail they way silver wants it to.

Plain and simple.
If the assembly votes for silver as leader we are screwed because nothing will change.
They will make little changes to make it look like they are reforming, but in reality nothing will change and silver will still control everything.

[Revolting cat!]

[NYFriend]

Gotcha.

[The Mayor]

I don't know if you saw this article..