Column by Adrian Kuzminski for November 2, 2018 Gerrymandering Takes Away Our Right To Representation The most remarkable thing I’ve seen in this year’s midterm election campaigns is Chad McEvoy’s op-ed in the New York Times. The headline says it all: “If I win my district, I’ll get rid of it.” That’s the 101st Assembly District, a model of gerrymandering, which snakes in a narrow strip from New Hartford near Utica through part of Otsego county to the Hudson Valley.…
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Column by Mike Zagata for November 2, 2018. Is Upstate Downbeat? Blame Slow Recovery According to a newly released report from the Empire Center for Public Policy, “New York’s Uneven Economic Recovery: A Tale of Two States,” those of us who live in Upstate New York escaped the real estate/housing bubble that led to the economic crash in 2008. Why? Because our economy was so bad that we didn’t experience a bubble like the rest of the country. How’s that…
AllOTSEGO.com, HOMETOWN ONEONTA, FREEMAN’S JOURNAL ENDORSEMENTS The Center Will Hold – If You Vote Nov. 6 As voters – in Otsego County, the 19th Congressional District and nationally – struggle to make the right decision in the Tuesday, Nov. 6, midterm elections, a study, “The Hidden Tribes of America,” surfaces with a conclusion that has been widely commented on nationally: “A majority of Americans (61 percent), whom we’ve called the ‘Exhausted Majority,’ are fed up by Americans’ polarization. They know…
Column by Mike Zagata for October 26, 2018. Science Can Be Political Tool, And Even Worse, Up For Sale I read with interest and admiration the article in last week’s paper about the different kinds of “truth.” Objective truth is the “truth” that is supported by fact. Subjective “truth” is what circumstances point toward or what we want, based on the information we have at our disposal, to believe. The Senate confirmation hearings for judge, now justice, Kavanaugh were used…
Editorial for October 19, 2018 Justice Must Be Done, And SEEN To Be Done The truism, “not only must Justice be done; it must also be seen to be done” – actually, it’s a famed quote from a 1924 British legal case – should apply to court proceedings and – if credibility is to be maintained – to democratic government generally. With intent interest, the citizens of Otsego County have observed the wheels of justice turn since Memorial Day Weekend…
Column by Adrian Kuzminski for October 19, 2018 If We Can’t Agree On Basis Of Truth, Nation In Trouble In any war, as the saying goes, truth is the first casualty. That’s become the case, unfortunately, in the war of the sexes as well. It’s turned into a war because the abiding injustice women have suffered from men resists resolution through institutions mostly created and sustained by men. What counts as evidence, or sincerity, or credibility may have more to…
Column by Mike Zagata for October 12, 2018 Natural-Gas Issue Is A Ruse; Real Intention Is No Growth Apparently something happened to The Professor during her youth to cause her to come forward during the confirmation process for The Supreme Court Justice, but we’ll never know for sure exactly what happened, nor will we know who was responsible. That wasn’t the intended outcome of the public spectacle we’ve been subjected to. The intended outcome was to delay the confirmation process…
Editorial for October 12, 2018 Uncreative? With Full Plate, That Might Be Just The Thing ‘I’m not creative,” Otsego Now CEO Jody Zakrevsky told the Otsego County Board of Representatives at its October meeting on the 3rd, as he began to deliver an “economic update” on the economic-development organization’s 2018 accomplishments. While lacking creativity, Zakrevsky continued, he said he has the capacity to embrace someone else’s ideas and carry them to fruition. Credit Zakrevsky with self-awareness and frankness, both virtues.…
Editorial for October 5, 2018 Isn’t It Time For City To Act, Or Get Out Of The Way? You know, of course: Creativity is making something out of nothing. Or, better, recognizing potential where nobody else does. The scoop in last week’s paper is a case in point: A group calling itself The Market Street Alliance is proposing a distillery in the former Oneonta Ford building, that dreary, long-empty, black-painted hulk at the foot of Chestnut Street, across from Foothills.…
Column by Adrian Kuzminski, October 5, 2018. Natural Gas Is A Bad Investment It’s obvious we have to get off fossil fuels, yet we keep hearing that fossil fuels – natural gas in particular – are essential to local economic growth. While “solar and wind would be a viable source for electric,” Otsego Now CEO Jody Zakrevsky wrote in The Freemans Journal & Hometown Oneonta in the Aug. 30-31 editions, “it (the solar and wind source) does not currently provide…
