One person needed to fill a vacancy representing the NY 26th Congressional seat being vacated by Tom Reynolds.  The qualifications are as follows:

• Supports personal responsibility over government intervention.
• Advocates free-market solutions over cost-inefficient government solutions rife with unintended consequences.
• Works to abolish all laws that do not specifically protect the lives and property of individuals from others.
• Advocates a foreign policy based on free-trade and the protection of our natural borders.
• Places the control over education back in the hands of parents, where it belongs.  Public schools receive no preference in funding over private schools.
• Returns the accountability for health care costs to doctors and patients.
• Supports the Constitution.

If interested, please contact your local party.  To date, none of the interested candidates possess the ideas necessary to restore our country to a state of freedom.

Erie County, Government, Musings, New York State | No Comments »

Apparently there has been a bomb threat at Amherst High School a short while ago. The students have been relocated to Daemen College.

Erie County | 1 Comment »

The membership figures cover Meetup groups within a 50 mile radius of Buffalo, New York.

Ron Paul          255

Mike Huckabee  25

Barak Obama      6

The rest, including Hillary, Rudy, and Mitt, adds up to a big fat zip, nada, zero!

Buffalo, Erie County, National, New York State, Ron Paul for President | No Comments »

Leonard Roberto, of Primary Challenge, and Jim Ostrowski highlight one of the many reasons to support Ron Paul for President. The Estate Tax will provide a compelling reason for the estate of Ralph Wilson to sell the team. It is another unfair tax that places a heavy burden on families by taxing money that has already been taxed several times.

Ron Paul is in favor of abolishing this onerous burden.

The estate tax raises very little money. In fact, even at its height the estate tax accounted for only a little more than 1% of federal revenues. A congressional Joint Economic committee report estimates that Americans spend as much avoiding estate taxes – paying attorneys and accountants – as they do paying estate taxes. A study by a Stanford professor concluded that “True revenues associated with estate taxation may well have been near zero, or even negative.”

It’s no longer a matter of tax policy or economics – the arguments in favor of the estate tax have all been demolished. Instead, the estate tax survives purely because of politics.

The real motivation behind the estate tax is a deep-seated hostility to property rights, and a misguided fear of family dynasties. But people don’t keep money in mattresses anymore. Money inherited from an estate is either spent, saved, or invested – all of which are better for the economy than sending it to Washington, where bureaucratic overhead consumes at least 50 cents of every dollar.

If you truly own your property, you have the right to dispose of it any way you wish. You can sell it, give it away, or direct who will receive it when you die. This control is the essence of property rights. If you can’t control what happens to your property, you don’t really own it.  Click photos for large versions.

Technorati tags: Ron Paul, president, republican, libertarian, Buffalo Bills, Buffalo, football, taxes, estate tax, property rights, freedom

Erie County, National, New York State, Ron Paul for President | 2 Comments »

By and large, the people of Erie County are happy with the state of affairs.  I can only hope that the local economy takes a major turn for the worse.  Maybe then we can get some fresh blood in the Erie County Legislature instead of the same old crowd headed by Marinelli.

Chris Collins overwhelming victory is only a token cry for change from the voters.  If they really wanted change, it would have occurred in the legislature as well.

Len Lenihan’s suggestion that Collins won because of a Republican conspiracy to keep the city vote down is ludicrous.  If anything, it shows that the people who didn’t vote don’t believe Collins will affect them detrimentally.  Keane lost because he is Keane.  Enough said.

A bit of sanity prevailed in Amherst with the defeat of all three propositions on the ballot.

Buffalo, Erie County, Musings | 1 Comment »

After listening to Jim Keane on Hardwick this morning, there can be no doubt that he is nothing but a party/union hack.  Keane had the audacity to defend the apprenticeship law stating that it does not discourage companies from doing business in Erie County, and, that it in fact helps Erie County.  Keane’s definition of help must be to discourage employment for the under-employed and raise taxes for the residents of Erie County.

Erie County | No Comments »

The art of government is to make two-thirds of a nation pay all it possibly can pay for the benefit of the other third.

— Voltaire

Buffalo, Erie County, National, New York State | No Comments »

I do not agree with the action taken against students for under-age drinking.  The incident did not occur on school grounds or at a school function.  The parents are responsible for disciplining their children, in a manner they see fit.  Schools are not parents and should have no say about what happens outside of the classroom or school property. 

(Grand Island, NY, October 5, 2007) - - A number of Grand Island students face athletic suspensions because of a weekend party involving under-age drinking.  News 4’s Melissa Holmes reports in our newsroom with more on the story.

Grand Island School officials say a student’s birthday party over the weekend turned into an underage drinking event with as many as 150 students from six school districts.  School officials say the parents were present as students arrived with alcohol.

Superintendent Robert Christmann says Erie County Sheriff’s Deputies broke up the party but did not make any arrests or issue any tickets.  After an extensive school investigation, 19 student athletes learned Thursday that they will be suspended from some of their games.

WIVB TV: News, Weather, Sports for Buffalo, Niagara Falls, and all of Western New York | Grand Island High School Suspends Students for Under-age Drinking

Erie County, Government, Rants | 3 Comments »

This is exactly what I wrote about here. 

The Buffalo News: Home: Area economy ripe for environment-friendly development

Shibley said in time, with proper government planning, the pendulum could swing back to favor cities in the Great Lakes basin.

What a crock of (fill in the blank)!

A bunch of bureaucrats will sit around deciding who is worthy enough to receive cheap electrical power.

Instead, just dismantle the New York State Power Authority and evenly distribute the real cost of power to all businesses and residents in the area.  Individuals will spur an economic upturn by having more discretionary funds.  Businesses will all benefit and the competition will result in stronger, financially sound companies.

I am already fedup with paying more money for beef and other food because the government wants to subsidize ethanol.  That is a waste of good money.

We do not need a bunch of suits trying to second guess the market while handing out benefits to their cronies.  For once, take the politics out of this whole issue and the result is a no-brainer.

Buffalo, Erie County, Government Waste, National, New York State | No Comments »

If you want to vote in the upcoming September 18 primary election, you only have a few days left to register or re-register, if necessary.

Voter registrations must be postmarked no later than August 24 or delivered in person to your County Board of Elections no later than August 24.

You can download the voter registration form from this link and also find the address of your local board.

If you are a Ron Paul supporter, and need to re-register, or register as a Republican, to vote for him in the 2008 Presidential Primary, now is a good time to do it so you don’t forget.

If you are not familiar with Ron Paul, check out his website.  You will find a straight talking candidate who doesn’t pander to any special interests.

Buffalo, Erie County, National, New York State, Ron Paul for President | 1 Comment »

It is bad enough the government uses our money to support businesses that would otherwise fail or never open, now we are faced with supporting artists and cultural institutions without having any voice.  An artist could be producing pure crap, yet have a nice lifestyle paid for by the taxpayers at the whim  of government officials.  The same goes for cultural institutions and their well connected administrators. 

Cheered on by their allies in government, cultural leaders tried in the late 1980s to snare a fraction of Erie County sales tax revenue as a permanent hedge against budget uncertainty — their own and the county’s.

They asked that one-eighth of the “temporary” eighth penny per dollar that had been added to the sales tax to bail the county out of fiscal hot water in 1984, and subsequently extended by the Legislature, be dedicated to the arts. The effort ultimately failed because of legislators’ concerns about the county’s bond debt and the wisdom of setting aside millions of taxpayer dollars for a particular cause.

Almost 20 years later, the cultural community is gearing up to try again.

Leaders will march in lockstep Friday to the Legislature’s Community Enrichment Committee to ask that 3 percent of annual property tax revenues be set aside for the arts. That projects to about $5.4 million, based on current sales tax receipts, or roughly the amount currently allocated to the arts.

The Buffalo News: City & Region: Cultural leaders want property tax revenue set aside for the arts

Buffalo, Erie County, Government Waste | 4 Comments »

The Erie County Industrial Development Agency on Monday approved a $115 million pollution control abatement bond issue involving NRG Energy Inc.’s plan for the Huntley Plant. The new plant, scheduled to open in 2013, will create more than 1,000 construction jobs and 100 more permanent full-time jobs.

To sum up, we, the taxpayers, are paying $1.15 million per permanent job being created.

The bond issue represents part of an economic enhancement model to make the project viable.

Translation: The government will gladly confiscate your money and spend it to prop up a business that would normally fail. The moral of the story is that a good business model is not needed, just the right government connections.

Erie County, Government Waste | No Comments »

Today in Buffalo Business, is an article about the difficulty in wooing retailers to Buffalo. One of the reasons cited is our region’s relatively low average weekly wage of $689. I’m sure a large number of private sector workers are looking at that figure and saying, “holy shit, I don’t make anywhere near that much money!”

Government employment accounts for 17% of local jobs. The Buffalo area not only has some of the highest paid government workers nationally, it has an abnormally large number of public employees per capita.

Chances are good that if you make the average salary for the area, you are a government employee. If you make more, the chances that you work for the government are greatly increased.

The private sector economy has basically become a serfdom working for low wages to support the 17% who work for the government. That is why few people have enough discretionary income to lure Ikea and other large retailers to Buffalo.

The politicians make it look like they are doing you a favor by luring Bass Pro. The truth is, they need to use $25 million of your money to get them here because it wouldn’t be financially reasonable for Bass Pro to locate here without massive subsidies. The politicians are not helping the economy with subsidies and redistribution of wealth, they are just trying to protect their own asses by putting up the appearance of doing a good job. Yes, Brian Higgins, that means you.

Not to single out Higgins, most local politicians are playing this game, it is just that Higgins has moved on to the next level. If the politicians wanted to actually do something to improve our economy, they would have to acknowledge the need to slash the size and compensation for local government.

The voters bear much of the blame because they keep voting the same people into office.

[tags]Buffalo, New York, economy, government, employees, salaries, compensation, Brian Higgins[/tags]

Buffalo, Erie County, Government Waste | 1 Comment »

I wrote a couple of weeks ago how their roadrunner service doesn’t hold a candle to the overall performance of DSL. Last week I experienced 4 hours of not being able to open a web page. I never had a total of 4 hours of down-time during 5 years with Verizon DSL.

Today the cable is out. I called their number provided for business accounts, since that is what I have, went through the prompts a total of 4 times, and was disconnected each time at the point I should have been holding for a live representative.

Now I have been on hold for 43 minutes. I called and followed the prompts for new service hoping that would get me to a live human quicker. No dice!

I’m going to be in bed tonight trying to sleep while hearing the following phrase running through my head.

“We apologize for the delay. Please remain on the line for the next available representative.”

At least I can have them on speaker phone while I listen to the automated apology.

[tags]Time Warner Cable, Roadrunner, Internet, service, poor[/tags]

Buffalo, Erie County, Rants | 3 Comments »

Joel Giambra has come up with some very good ideas, such as the consolidation of ECC downtown.  Today is not one of his good days.  He is advocating a dedicated source of funding for the arts from real property taxes.

Government funding for the arts and culturals is a bad, whether it is dedicated or budgeted annually.  It results in more people being indirectly employed by the government and distorts the true value of art and culture.  People sitting in a room doling out money to support cultural activities, sight unseen, is ludicrous at best.  Taxpayers are forced to pay for art that they may deem garbage.

If the government would just stop sticking its nose in everything and trying to control society through myriad funding projects, taxes would be lower and people would have the money to voluntarily support art and culture based on their perception of the value.

Art & Photography, Buffalo, Erie County, Government Waste | No Comments »