|
|
| |
What Sets Council Candidate Kevin Kim Apart?
By MICHAEL SCHENKLER
Follow me on Twitter @QueensTribune
The Tribune takes endorsing candidates for office very seriously.
Previously, we have endorsed Mike Bloomberg for Mayor and on our edit page this week, we endorse John Liu for Comptroller and Eric Gioia for Public Advocate. We also endorse in a handful of Queens Council races where we believe we might be able to make a difference.
I’d like to share some thoughts on one of those races.
First, a disclaimer.
The Tribune has an affiliated company, Multi Media which provides, print, direct mail, design, editorial, and consulting services to business, not-for-profit and political clients.
During this election, our affiliate has provided a variety of services to nine different council candidates in Queens. Three of them were only minor print jobs to date. Of the nine, it appears only two -- one minor customer and one significant customer -- will receive this newspaper’s endorsement.
There is no relationship between business with our affiliated company and our recommendations for elective office.
That being said, there is one candidate whose business we did pursue. We did so for the purpose of helping get him elected.
Let me explain.
As our readers are aware, Congressman Gary Ackerman founded the Tribune in 1970. Gary, my close friend, has not been involved in its operation since his election to office in 1978. Likewise, he has not been involved with our editorial position or endorsements.
However, I reached out to him relatively early for his opinion in this election.
Actually, when I heard that an Ackerman staffer – Kevin Kim, his Deputy Director of Community Affairs – was running for City Council from the 19th District in Northeast Queens, I called.
First I called Gary’s District Manager Moya Berry. Moya is wonderful – a longtime Ackerman staffer with wisdom, concern and sensitivity.
“Moya, tell me about Kevin Kim?” I asked.
“I don’t speak for Gary,” she responded, “but Kevin Kim is someone who I want to and expect to be in touch with for the rest of my life.”
Knowing Moya, that said it all.
But I followed up with a call to Ackerman.
“Gary, I haven’t met Kevin Kim, but tell me about him,” I asked.
“Mike,” Ackerman responded, “help him if you can; he is special and deserving and can make a difference.”
The next step was to meet Kevin. He came to my office; we spent some time chatting and I was sold. So was Mike Nussbaum who heads up our affiliate company, Multi Media.
I’ve become friends with Kevin – a bit on Facebook, a little in person, and a little Twitter. But I’ve gotten to know him and all that Moya and Gary said is true and much more.
I was impressed with the first story Kevin told me. He met singer John Legend and his manager at an airport. It didn’t take Kevin long to arrange a charitable concert in Korea and take Legend there to perform for the benefit of three local orphanages.
I felt like an extended part of the family when Kevin’s wife Clara gave birth to their first child last month.
I’ve gotten to know Kevin as a gifted and rare individual and believe he will be the first Korean-American to leave a significant mark on New York City electoral politics.
To me, this election will be a seminal event for New York and Queens. Once in a generation, an individual comes along with the ability to bring together cultures, to advance the assimilation of a growing immigrant group into the fabric of our multicultural weave. Kevin can not only change perceptions of his race and culture, he can transform the Korean-American’s perspective of our government.
At the same time, Kevin has the intellect, understanding, skill and compassion to make significant contributions to government and the entire community.
The tasks I describe are not easy to achieve. It takes a gifted individual like Kevin. A graduate of Stanford and Columbia Law, he gave up his private practice in order to work for Congressman Gary Ackerman serving the people and giving back to the community.
After three years with Ackerman, Kevin is ready to step out on his own and offer the people of the 19th Council District an intelligent, driven public servant committed to working for the common good of all in our City.
After interviewing a field of impressive candidates we have decided to endorse Kevin Kim.
If you are a registered Democrat and live in northeast Queens, vote for Kevin Kim for Council. Otherwise, tell your friends to support him.
Follow him on Facebook or Twitter.
Please check out his website: votekevinkim.com.
Remember his name.
Kevin Kim will be the story of New York in years to come.
I’m proud to call him friend.
MSchenkler@QueensTribune.com
|
|
|
| |
Will They Dance When Autumnal Zephyrs Blow?
|
| Henry Stern
|
By
HENRY STERN
For several months, starting with the June 8 coup, we have written about the iniquities and deficiencies of the State Senate, a gerrymandered legislative body in which, for the first time since the 1964 Johnson landslide over Barry Goldwater, a Democratic majority was elected in 2008. The selection, by each party, of majority and minority leaders is usually made before the legislature assembles during the first week in January. This year the process went down to the wire as the newly empowered Democrats squabbled over leadership positions, which are accompanied by substantial lulus and extra staff.
An uneasy truce held for five months, during which Senator Pedro Espada made substantial financial demands for newly-created agencies in his district. When Malcolm Smith, the elected Dem leader balked at the $2 million that Espada wanted for his fifedom, Espada and his co-conspirator Hiram Monserrate (whose trial for allegedly slashing his girlfriend is scheduled to begin Sept. 14) converted to Republicanism and created a 32-30 GOP majority.
Smith was dumped, Espada was made president pro tempore, which made him the immediate successor to Governor Paterson, and Dean Skelos, a Nassau County Republican, was made majority leader, a post he held in the previous Senate after the resignation of Senator Joseph Bruno.
Having deposed Smith, Espada exulted and Monserrate returned to the Dems, where his lulus and chairmanship were promptly restored. His leap created a 31-31 Senate tie, so no quorum could be assembled nor any business transacted. To take action requires 32 votes, a simple majority, which neither party could assemble.
On July 9, Espada returned to the fold and was richly rewarded for his epiphany in discovering that he was a Democrat after all. By this time, Governor Paterson had purported to appoint Richard Ravitch as Lieutenant Governor, who could theoretically break the Senate deadlock. This ingenious stratagem has so far been rejected by a trial and an appellate court, the Court of Appeals will consider the matter Sept. 11.
The significant issues that the state faces, particularly the mounting budget deficit, have not yet been addressed seriously by either the governor or the legislature. Like Pauline, star of the eponymous movie serial who was periodically tied to a busy railroad track, the legislature could rely on a white knight, possibly the U.S. Treasury, arriving, like the cavalry, just before the day comes when New York will be unable to pay its employees because it has no money in the bank. In the past, the state has managed to escape insolvency by various fiscal devices. There is always hope that those who juggle the books will succeed again in postponing the crisis.
It is political tradition to take unpopular actions in non-election years, so that by the time the people vote they will have forgotten about the tax increases and service cuts that were required to balance the budget. We are approaching September of the non-election year, and so far there is not a glimmer of agreement on any plan to deal with the crisis.
We are quite curious to discover how the legislature, which appears barely capable of deciding anything, even electing their own leadership, is going to handle the deficit for the 2009-10 fiscal year, which for the state ends on March 31, 2010. The bottom line has less to do with what services can be maintained at what levels than the question of who will be laid off.
It is the usual intention of elected officials to keep as many voters on the payroll as possible. Men and women who have lost their jobs are highly unlikely to cast their votes for the administration that fired them. That is human nature, and it is entirely understandable.
Sadly, these circumstances lead to fiscal subterfuge and uncontrolled borrowing. This has been the case for many years, since Governor George Pataki’s first budget in 1995. He abandoned his resistance to spending in his 11 subsequent budgets. We have learned that, in a capitalist economy, government revenues rise and fall, depending on business activity and profitability.
Government expenses, however, rise almost all the time, faster in good times and slower in bad times. The result is that the perennial and structural gap between income and outgo increases almost every year. This has led to ever more ingenious schemes to conceal the shortfall from the public, the press, and the state’s creditors.
There is a certain resemblance here to the Madoff and Enron cases, as well as many lesser examples of manipulation or fraud. However, as this fiscal flim-flam is the work of lawmakers, their actions are presumed to be legal under the laws they write. The only illegality that may be found lies in the legislature’s disinclination to give reasonable pay increases to the judiciary, and who do you think will make that finding?
At this point, the kettle is merely simmering. With the expectation of rational behavior, the pot will still come to a boil, or at least start to bubble, in a month or so. But there is so much abnormal behavior just waiting to be acted out in Albany that no one, at least not we, can predict what will take place when impending insolvency intrudes in the palace of pork and privilege.
StarQuest@NYCivic.org |
|
|
Not4Publication.com by Dom Nunziato |
|
|
|
|
