I had about as much luck at the ballot box yesterday as I’ve had with my NFL picks this season. Each candidate I voted for was defeated, many soundly. I protested on the race for Brooklyn DA, where Charles Hynes, a lifelong Democratic, ran on the Republican and Conservative lines. His opponent, Kenneth Thompson, has proven corrupt even before taking office. I wrote in Rudy Giuliani. I was on the winning side of at least one proposal, defeating the move to raise the retirement age of judges to 80. 70 is old enough. Step aside and allow others to move up. If a judge wants to continue working, he/she should try to enter the private sector. I don’t object to gambling, but I did vote against the measure to allow casinos in New York. This is the same lazy intellectual measure as lotteries. I read several articles on the history of the subject, and each claimed the ensuing revenue failed to meet expectations and is offset by the social blight engendered. How lame is it that gambling and not fracking, one of the few businesses keeping the economy afloat, was on the ballot? What a great example of free market economics it is, and hardly anyone is articulating it. I suppose New Yorkers would have voted it down, but it would have been nice to have an opportunity to vote for it. As for national trends, this is what I see -- the march toward socialism has continued. Tea Party influence seems to be waning. I gauge this on the results of the gubernatorial race in Virginia, where Clinton crone Terry MacAuliffe won a squeaker. The other telling sign, although it wasn’t surprising, was New Jerseyians approving the raising of the minimum wage to $8.25. Governor Chris Christie is much ballyhooed in the press, which will turn viciously against him if he runs against Hillary. Question: if he is such a great leader, why has he utterly failed to change the political culture of New Jersey, which recently elected one of the biggest phonies, Cory Booker, to the Senate? The Republic Party is divided among those who favor the go along to get along status quo and conservatives. Its only hope for ascension is if ObamaCare continues to be a debacle, and if the press doesn’t manage to pin its failure on them, which is not out of the question. In NYC the GOP always faces long odds. Mike Bloomberg was a RINO -- Republican in name only. Two eminently qualified candidates, Joe Lhota for Mayor and John Burnett for Comptroller, were trounced by liberal hacks. I think Bloomberg fatigue and backlash against the government shutdown doomed the former, as well as the fact that Democrats outnumber Republicans by 6-1 in the city. Will the city return to the gloom of the Dinkins era under Bill de Blazio? Time will tell. On his radio show on WOR-AM, Mark Simone has pointed out that 40% of the current population was not present for the pre-Giuliani years. They have no idea what it was like. As a fiscal conservative, I’m disappointed. I hope the majority of Americans is imbued with a wisdom my apparently meager faculties lack. When the President was re-elected, I considered selling many of my stocks. I'm glad I didn't, as the FED has continued it policy of Quantitative Easing, which has failed miserably to stimulate the economy but which has driven the DOW to an all-time high. Investors have few options other than the stock market to make money. I'm thinking about selling again, wondering how long before the bubble bursts and how long it would take for a rebound under present economic conditions. With that in mind, I've decided to bid no more than $20 for Twitter.
Congratulations to the lady from Belize, who yesterday passed both her citizenship and GED exams, and my thanks for buying the Spanish-English dictionary. And thanks also to all those who bought and donated books today. A woman gave me a bag o' John Grisham paperbacks. He, along with Danielle Steel and James Patterson, are the authors people ask me for most.
Vic's 4th Novel: http://tinyurl.com/bszwlxh
Vic's 3rd Novel: http://tinyurl.com/7e9jty3
Vic's Website: http://members.tripod.com/vic_fortezza/Literature/
Vic's Short Story Collection (Print or Kindle): http://www.tiny.cc/Oycgb
Vic's 2nd Novel: http://tinyurl.com/6b86st6
Vic's 1st Novel: http://tiny.cc/94t5h
Vic's Screenplay on Kindle: http://tinyurl.com/cyckn3
Vic’s Short Story on Kindle: http://tinyurl.com/k95k3nx
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