Deal breaker
So what just flew past our window from the three boys in Albany? What did they do to warrant all this back slapping, “bi-partisan” victory lap around the media boasting about changing life as we know it with a big deal tax package?
Okay, just think about that time at the beach when the big guy walked past your blanket looking like he had a really big package in that brief bathing suit. And it wasn’t until later — in the room — that you found out it was really a sock in his Speedo. Not that size is always the determinant, how you use what you have is always a factor. Well the “three boys in a room” have failed to provide a satisfactory climax yet again. Puny package and even lousier delivery.
The earth did not move, your life remains the same, your family finances are still in the toilet and the rich are still having multiple orgasms. The much-hyped Cuomo tax package gives you a couple of hundred — if you’re lucky — and won’t stop your property taxes from taking away a couple of thousand more. But I’ll give good odds that the increase from those making the biggest bucks will end up in corporate welfare and go to the CEO’s so they’ll get it all back again.
Like with the Godfather, if you want to know the supposed liberal pols and consultants who are bought and paid for by the mega rich, they’ll be the ones telling you they scored this deal for you.
Sure they did. And it sucks.
Gioia Shebar, Gardiner
Occupy everywhere
I attended an Occupy New Paltz General Assembly meeting last night. I was very impressed, as I have been by all the “Occupy” events that I’ve attended, beginning with Occupy Wall Street in New York City. A lovely mix of awesome people show up. It’s better than a cocktail party because everyone is sober and inspired. At last night’s meeting in New Paltz, a short lesson on communication was given. Hand signals communicate agreement, disagreement, a need to speak. There is one person in charge of making sure that no one person dominates and that people with less power have an equal chance to speak. This person looks for timid hands, unseen hands, voices that have not been heard and points them out to the speaker. An extreme effort at democracy is ever present. Now, locally, there are General Assemblies in Kingston, Saugerties and New Paltz. A Facebook page has been set up at Occupy Hudson Valley. Check us out. We are the 99 percent.
I also went to Noam Chomsky’s speech to honor historian Howard Zinn at SUNY New Paltz last Sunday, Dec. 4. Fifteen-hundred others joined me, overflowing Lecture Center 100, then the crowd overflowing 14 additional rooms with a screen feed of the event to each room. No one that I asked could remember a larger audience at SUNY. The people are hungry for information that will help us to understand and to be a part of fixing our economy and our country.
Join the conversation and the action.
Karen Cathers, New Paltz
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