I figured I would do my bit for the environment, and not vote. No point in firing the car up. For the past week alone showed how farcical these “elections” are, and now, in my 57th year of living in North Hempstead, perhaps no single week has exposed this charade so glaringly.
There was the announcement of Northwell’s billion-dollar endowment program. In a nation with such a dysfunctional health care system, the largess devoted to this tiny corner of the country is jaw-dropping.
While hospitals in other areas across the country shutter, once more, we see how wealth concentration is itself, a cancer. Moreover, it seems no one is noticing that if a Democratic majority is elected, the cult of the (sic) “non-profit” hospital could be obliterated. “Medicare for All” mandates that doctors will be paid what Medicare pays them now, and pay hospitals 110 percent of what they’re paid now. I don’t see how these structures survive in that form. It is said that over 2 million jobs will be made redundant if we go to “M4A.”
That’s only a slice of the bloat built into the system. We could be setting ourselves up for an implosion.
In contrast, it is amazing how the medical monopolists are allowed, if not outright encouraged, to build to the sky in Nassau County, but if someone proposes constructing a 14-unit apartment building, a swarm of flying monkeys from the North Hempstead Noise and Traffic Prevention Brigade descends on Town Hall to stop it.
The County Executive had great news: her committee on shared services will save us a whopping $7.3 million next year. What an accomplishment in a $3.6 billion budget! Don’t upgrade that kitchen yet. And don’t expect any savings, because expanding headcount and bloat is the Prime Directive for both parties.
For example, there was the reopening of the Sixth Precinct. Originally opposed by Ms. Curran, she was somehow gulled into changing her mind. Nothing more than a payroll padding putsch staged by the town with the connivance of other actors, it won’t occur to the gleeful ribbon cutters that the costs of opening and operating this money pit will exceed the costs to the community by ten thousand fold from any actual crimes committed.
That’s because there aren’t too many crimes committed to begin with.
The Town of North Hempstead trumpeted its AAA bond rating. When you can raise taxes by fiat, which it just did to pay for a few patronage hires, that’s not an accomplishment.
The pruning of our SALT deduction slammed almost all of us. Would anyone care to do something about it?
The Herricks School District finally settled on a contract. Negotiating terms are kept secret from taxpayers, despite the school tax being the single greatest line item we pay. Now they can get back to teaching instead of intimidating students. Remember, when it comes to the profession as it practiced here, education is a distant second to pay and benefits.
If anyone doubts that, visit a NYSUT message board for a demonstration of the utter contempt and belittlement for taxpayers they openly display. Mirroring our hospitals, teachers across the country are reduced to crushing poverty, but thanks to the perverse governance in our County, here, the teachers do the impoverishing.
It’s 2019. In an era where money is transferred in a nanosecond across the world, do we really need to elect a Receiver of Taxes? It’s like electing a cash register. What possible policy differences could opposing receivers have?
Sen. Kaplan will go back to Albany just to vote unanimously with her 61 colleagues of both parties, with “legislation” already teed up for her.
The County Legislature will go on pretending it’s “fixing” the assessment system that’s bankrupted the county while simultaneously annuitizing campaign contributions for itself, and you’re simply handed drone candidates who are chosen for docility, not competence.
You vote for nothing. You vote to employ a vast army of self-serving chiselers and sycophants who feed off each other and gorge on the fruit of your labors.
When I am given genuine candidates to elect, as opposed to a collection of play-actors, I’ll deign to pull a lever. But I’ll be damned if I’m going to participate in this farce.
As you were, everyone. Back to sleep.
Donald Davret
Roslyn
