This semantic wankfest is irrelevant, tedious and even a tad elite.

Save it for a late night dorm room debate, would ya?

I'm trying to concentrate on the important stuff. It's hard enough as is.

- Barf.

I like Larry's "placard oligarchy", except it doesn't quite seem to roll of the tongue right. How about "driving royalty" or "placard royalty", to connote unearned privileges as well as an obnoxious sense of entitlement?

In other contexts, they are the "Pension, Sick Day and Overtime Oligarchy" and the "Stock Option and Trust Fund Oligarchy."

If I say someone is an elite athelete or elite scientist, that's not an insult, it's a compliment.

The "driving elite" as Aaron very aptly defines the political class as a whole in this city and state, that means something different. It means they are out of touch with the rest of the public on a basic daily issue that has a direct negative consequence on the rest of us.

It's similar to politicans that send their kids to private school (or went to private school themselves) and all their friends send their kids to private schools and try to understand their constituent complaints about the problems with the public school system. Call them the "Private school elite".

It isn't natives, it's insiders working the system. Most of the insiders are natives. But most of the natives aren't insiders.

And most of the natives and new arrivals who aren't insiders aren't so rich they have no need of benefits from the public sector they pay for in taxes, though they are less and less likely to receive them.

Here is a non-transportation example.

In NYC in 1990, the average non-Hispanic White high school dropout earned more than the average Black, Latino or Asian high school graduate.

The average non-Hispanic White high school graduate earned more than the average Black, Latino or Asian with some college or no degree.

And the average non-Hispanic White with some college earned more than the average Black, Latino or Asian with some college graduate.

True in 1980 too. Didn't have access to Census PUMS for 2000.

Looking industry by industry, in the high-paid finance sector and the low-paid retail sector, there were VIRTUALLY NO racial and ethnic distinctions in income by level of education.

What was driving those distinction were certain sectors where those with lower levels of education earn more than elsewhere, and virtually everyone in those sectors/occupations was White.

And all those sectors/occupations were in or related to or controlled by our political system. Your placard holders, and supporters of placard holders.

Most White people receive no benefit from these arrangements, just like most natives receive no benefit from the transportation policies of those in change in Albany. A few token folks from other racial and ethnic groups are in on the deal, but most aren't.

hmmmm...

the disconnect between New Yorkers and city politics has a lot to do with the last 20 years of gentrification.
In that many NYers are transplants, and believe they are leaving soon. Consequently they do not take part in civic society.
This allows the lucky Sheldon to continue

I believe that that's true of certain groups, but not "transplants," by which I take it you mean people from other parts of the US. I know many more people from non-NY America who want to settle here and live permanently than who are just here to spend their twenties in some Sex and the City fantasy.

Most of these transplants are in a very meaningful sense refugees - like my father was in 1955 - from parts of the country that didn't tolerate their particular religious beliefs, or lack thereof, or sexuality, or fondness for dancing. Or, you know, cycling, riding trains and buses, or walking. They can't go "home," because home would require them to drive. Seriously.

On the other hand, I know that there's a lot of mistrust from "native New Yorkers" towards people from other parts of the country. It crops up in the Curbed comments all the time, with people telling each other to "Go back to Ohio!" The congestion pricing debate was often framed as "real New Yorkers" against transplants.

I've gotten some of it, since people don't seem to recognize my Hudson Valley private school geek accent as belonging to New York. Just last month in a discussion of congestion pricing someone asked me, "were you born here?" As if that makes me somehow less competent to judge the merits of the plan.

For the record, yes, I was born here, and so was my mother, and her father, and his mother. My family's been here for over a hundred years. But that doesn't mean that someone who moved here from Rock Island (or Fuzhou, or Medellín) isn't here to stay, and deserving of a say in how the place is run.

The point about our delegation not representing their constituents while Brodsky represented his is very apt.

Let's say an honest "conservative" perspective is that people should expect less from government but should not be required to contribute as much to it. And an honest "liberal" perspective is that people should be required to contribute more to the government, but can expect more services and benefits in return.

Having the government become so unfair that even those with an egalitarian frame of mind turn against it would seem to fit the conservative narrative very well. As a former boss once told me -- government is corrupt, duh!

But why are New York's Democrats content to make deals and non-decisions that leave New Yorkers with less and less benefit from the public sector and less and less connection to it?

Because they and their insiders and supporters are too greedy to let ideology stand in the way of their greed, it seems. Just as the business class seems determined to destroy any confidence in business. Generation Greed.

Have you ever seen how many people vote in the Assembly primaries? A few thousand - maybe ten thousand if it's a really tough race.

Assembly members are paper tigers. A few thousand votes could sway an election.

Why not join us next week for a meet & greet with Paul Newell and Livable Streets Advocates next Tuesday? http://www.actblue.com/page/may_21st

Democracy requires competition.

I contributed to Paul Newell's campaign:

http://www.newellnyc.org/donate.html

Actually, everyting else they do is worse than the CP process, which at least involved a commission with public findings. If people only knew...

Most people are resigned to things as they are, and the special deals usually involve costs deferred to the future so they are unaware they have been sacrificed.

But while "a whole new generation of citizen activists" may be more aware in 2008, wait until 2010 when those bills come due. Will they get away with the propaganda that tax increases and service and benefit cuts are due to "circumstances beyond our control" again?