Makes Bloomberg look strong for a run in four years against a blind black man. Patterson should not be underestimated though, the worse the better for him.

Transportation history is written by disasters way more often than by sincere policy advocacy. You never know how this will end in the long run, the fiscal crises are what they are and the needs of the people are as well.

In the short run though, forget the moralizing reformers.

We are facing a disasterous fiscal situation, a crisis, which was hardly even addressed by the proposed budget.

I’m talking short term, right now, as well as the long term debt and pension issues that could, and probably will doom us in the long run.

Congestion pricing needs the full throated support of Spitzer and Silver. Spitzer is now no longer in a position to “steamroll” Silver and the Assembly. Meanwhile, the uproar in Albany gives the Assembly cover to table congestion pricing until after the federal grant deadline of March 31st. And Silver doesn’t have to get exercised pushing his membership.

This is so tragic. Congestion pricing dies not in a debate over its merits but in the ashes of a Governorship imploding from a sex scandal.

I don’t think you’ll see them coming out in favor of a higher tax on wages, as Mr. Fidler has, though that is more likely that having them come out in favor of any tax on investment income or retirees.