Jimmy McMillan
On September 26, the Rent is 2 Damn High Party petition for New York Governor was held invalid. See this story. The story does not mention another ticket, the candidacy of Michael J. Carey under the label “Life & Justice”; but according to the New York State Board of Elections web page, that petition was also invalidated.
As a result, there are five candidates on the New York November ballot for Governor: Democratic incumbent Andrew Cuomo (who is also the nominee of the Working Families, Independence, and Women’s Equality Parties); Republican Rob Astorino (who is also the nominee of the Conservative and Stop Common Core Parties); Green Party nominee Howie Hawkins; Libertarian nominee Michael McDermott; and the Sapient Party nominee, Steven Cohn. Cohn’s running mate is Bobby Kalotee, who held himself out as the national chair of the Reform Party for a brief period in 2008. At that time, he proclaimed that the Reform Party had endorsed Republican nominee John McCain for President.
Cuomo says he believes any gubernatorial debate should include all five candidates. Astorino says he believes Hawkins should be in the debates.
I’m glad to hear that Cuomo isn’t pursuing blocking Hawkins from the debates.
Rent Is To Damn High needed to get something going on. Once, twice it was amusing. But it’s a very real issue in NYC and he could have made some real hay pursuing that. Especially the state and city working hard to dismantle rent stabilization laws and ordinances.But didn’t McMillan support the GOP in 2012? He’s always been a bit too mercurial for me.
Gregory Koch comments at BAN:
Interesting that the Green Party challenged [the other two parties off the ballot]. Normally third parties don?t challenge each other?s petitions as a sort of gentleman?s agreement ? if you don?t challenge ours, we won?t challenge yours. But now that the Green Party has major party status in New York, they don?t need to worry about that. Sad that it?s come to this.
Richard Winger replies:
I wouldn?t say that the Green Party brought the challenge. The challenge was brought by an individual who happens to be a Green Party member, but I don?t think he is a state party officer.
Readers may recall the flub in Illinois in 2012 when a Green Party county chair successfully challenged several parties off the ballot (he tried to withdraw the challenge at the last minute under pressure from other Green Party leaders but was not allowed to).
See
https://independentpoliticalreport.com/2012/07/statement-from-the-illinois-ballot-access-petition-challenger/
https://independentpoliticalreport.com/2012/07/together-enhancing-america-candidate-michael-hawkins-responds-to-ballot-petition-challenge/
https://independentpoliticalreport.com/2012/07/howie-hawkins-others-respond-to-rob-sherman-on-illinois-ballot-access-challenges/
https://independentpoliticalreport.com/2012/07/rob-sherman-explains-inability-to-withdraw-ballot-access-challenges/
Reading back over those old threads on July 5 2012 I wrote
“So, as if their job was not hard enough this year in getting on the ballot, Mr. Sherman has now increased the chances that they [the Greens] will have to work twice as hard next time or risk having all that work be for nothing due to a challenge.”
…And lo and behold, in 2014 the Greens submitted around 30k sigs, same as in 2012, got challenged and got knocked off.
July 12 2012 Mark Axinn wrote
“Thanks to Howie for his letter.
The GP has gone through quite a lot to finally obtain ballot access in NY two years ago. Hopefully we’re right behind them!
LPNY and GPNY never challenge each other. We leave those kind of heinous tactics to Republican and Democratic scum.”
Me via email:
I think the debate angle mentioned by ballot access news is interesting also:
“Cuomo says he believes any gubernatorial debate should include all five candidates. Astorino says he believes Hawkins should be in the debates.”
Presumably this means Astorino does not want McDermott or Cohn in the debate. However Cuomo is polling 2-1 over Astorino, so I would think Astorino would need the debate more than Cuomo does.. what do you think? Or is he so far behind that he doesn’t care too much and would find it more important to keep McDermott off the stage than to be on there himself? How likely is Cuomo to make including McDermott a condition of debating Astorino? Is it likely that he would need pressure/encouragement to do that, and is pressure/encouragement likely to help? Can Astorino be shamed to drop his objection? Would be interested in Mark’s thoughts on all this.
Mark Axinn replied:
Redlich disputes that the debate was a major factor for him, citing his radio ads instead (I think both were important).
I’m glad to hear that McDermott is being invited to inclusive debate(s) but I think my questions are still valid given that we don’t know which other candidate(s) will agree to debate him.
Warren’s superb performance and the added exposure in the debate encouraged more people to contribute to his campaign, which allowed him to spend more on radio advertising.
The two are hardly contradictory; both were essential. By being in the debate, Warren was able to advertise or capitalize on his presentation therein to the degree he did in the final month of the campaign.
I agree.
There’s a court date on the lawsuit against Gigi this AM. I’m planning to post an update this evening (if the info is available to me).
Deran – “rent stabilization” laws – aka “rent control” – are the main reason housing costs are so high in New York City. Since rent control does not apply to higher end apartments, only higher end apartments are being built. At the same time, if an apartment is subject to rent control, then as soon as it becomes vacant and the rent can legally be raised, it is raised to as high a dollar value as possible, since it will be controlled at the price for some time after it is rented.
Paulie–Glad to see I wrote two years ago that GP and LP should not challenge each other’s petitions to get on the ballot. Of course, I still feel the same way.
Jill–The lawsuit against Gigi was not dismissed but was transferred to Albany County for any further proceedings as that is where the State Board of Elections is located. Today, Gigi received the formal written notification from the State Board that she is on the ballot.
I should be more precise:
The lawsuit against Gigi was not dismissed on jurisdictional grounds (we claimed defective service and defective verification of the petition) but was transferred to Albany County for any further proceedings as that is where the State Board of Elections is located. Today, Gigi received the formal written notification from the State Board that the administrative challenge to her being on the ballot was denied as the State Board found that she has 3,074 valid signatures.
To be continued….
Gene Berkman. I haven’t lived in NYC in 22 years, but I lived in a “rent stabilized” apartment, which at the time was legally different from “rent controlled”. Rent stavilized applied to multi family dwelling of a certain agae. Rent stabilization meant that rent could be increased every year by several percent. And if the landlord did improvements or replaced aging appliances, which our landlord did, then rent could go up an additional level that year. Rent control only applied to a small set of apartments that were built before WW2, rent control became a failed policy because it allowed people to actually inherit the apartment from the previous, deceased tenant. Rent stavilization allowed non-rich families to create a stable life where they know what the rent can increase every year, thus they can budget etc My landlord loved rent stabilization because it made his tenants want to remain in the buildings he owned. Thus creating a stable income for him. He did not approach real estate as a speculatory investment, rather as bonds used to be – totally secure (people need places to live) and a gaurunteed amount of income increase per year.
Now my friends in NYCX who live in rent stabilized apartments are essentially trapped in slums because alomost all large apartment buildings are opwned by investment cabals that are not interested in stable income, who are speculators in search of maximum short term profits. And so these REITs are not interested in keeping tenants so they do not repair or keep clean the buildings so as to drive out tenants so the REITs can then jack the rents to”market” (ie what the 5% can afford) levels every year.
Oakland California is actually a good working model of rent stabilization (as compared to “rent control” as practiced on a small number of apartments in NYC.
Rent is excessive in NYC because the Democrats and Republicans sought to recreate NYC as an enclave for the 1 and 2 percent. New York State, under both Democratic and Republican admins has repeatedly worked to dismantle rent stabilization. They have already pretty much ended rent control.
Rent stabilization, control or whatever you want to call it is a huge part of why rents are so high, why so many apartment buildings degenerate and/or get abandoned or torched, and contributes to homelessness and overcrowded housing. It makes it to where it becomes unprofitable for landlords to maintain and improve buildings, so they let them go to shit, abandon them, or hire criminals to “convince” people to move out or if that doesn’t work just to torch the place. The remaining apartments that are not rent controlled or stabilized are in short supply relative to demand so the prices go sky high. That causes people to pile multiple extra people into apartments without telling the landlords, sleep in cars, parks, SRO bum hotels, and homeless shelters, or spend long hours each day sitting non-productively in traffic with long commutes, adding to the pollution problem and increasing their stress and dissatifaction with life, which causes many physical maladies as well. Other people end up in government housing projects, which has its own set of problems as well.
In New York City, we still have approx. 50,000 rent controlled apartments (apt. built before 1947 and tenant in continuous possession since at least 1971) and approx. 1,000,000 rent-stabilized apartments (multiple dwelling with 6 or more apts. built prior to 1974 and not subject to rent control).
As Hazlitt wisely points out in Economics in One Lesson, rent control laws are just another form of governmental-imposed price controls, which are entirely antithetical to the free market.
I represent several property owners in NYC. Interestingly, some of my clients have to afford their stabilized tenants preferential rents (especially in the outer boroughs) as the stabilized rent amounts they could legally charge are more than the market will bear.
Bottom line: If rent stabilization was eliminated tomorrow, some people’s rents would go up and some people’s would go down and the unintended consequences and what is unseen (such as people who want to rent in NYC and cannot afford to do so) would greatly improve with more available housing stock, more transient tenants, etc.
That would mean lower prices on average, given more supply to meet the available demand.
Back to politics:
I have been advised that the military absentee ballots have already been printed, with Gigi Bowman included as the Libertarian candidate for the 5th SD.
Every day that goes by makes it that much more difficult for Marcellino to kick her off.
That’s good news!
You also informed me on email of the following
http://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/Madam-Kristin-Davis-Eliot-Spitzer-Sentence-Sell-Pill-Drug-Court-Jail-277761201.html
I was asked to not post a different part of that conversation, but I assume that a headline from another larger public news source is not what I was being asked to not repost. I won’t repost the rest of that conversation.
Looking at that story it seems to identify Davis as a former LP candidate, which she never was – at one point she sought the LP nomination, but did not get it and ran under a different line. The language is ambiguous enough to be open to interpretation but it does convey that impression. And I don’t understand what the hideous Phil Spector prison photos (not mugshots as they are incorrectly identified) have to do with the story. Seems like a bit of a smear.
Two years is a really crappy deal for some prescription pills. And WTF was she peddling? I did not recognize any of those drug names, even with my many years of drug abuse, drug dealing, and later drug policy related research and activism.
I did not know those names either, but from the time of the indictment I recall she was dealing ecstasy and perhaps the “date rape” pill–not sure but easy to find. I think IPR covered it and I know I sent out a bunch of emails.
What ever happened to good old Quaaludes? 🙂
The Phil Spector photos made no sense. Finally, Kristin was endorsed briefly by for NYC Comptroller but the Convention was suspect and a new one was held at which she was not nominated and then she got indicted and dropped out of the race.
Davis was originally indicted for selling Adderall, Xanax and Oxycodone.
IPR covered it here:
https://independentpoliticalreport.com/2013/08/breaking-kristin-davis-reportedly-arrested/
Of course, Sundwall had the funniest comments.
Jed and Paulie–
Just to close the loop, is that a pen or a syringe that Jimmy is holding in the photo at the top of this article? 🙂
The date rape pill is rohypnol. Ecstasy is MDMA (MethylenoDioxilatedMethAmphetamine). Maybe some of those drugs have lesser known names that are used in the article, since prescription drugs typically have more than one name (for example vicodin is hydrocodone).
Quaaludes (methaqualone) disappeared, as the legal manufacturer stopped making them in the US in 1985 due to the street abuse and apparently demand dried up (not sure why, I kind of liked them) and illegal labs in Mexico stopped making them in the early 90s. However, apparently they are still popular as a street drug in India and Africa, in a form which is smoked in a mix with marijuana. It’s also still used as a prescription drug in Canada, but apparently there’s not enough of a market in the US for anyone to bother smuggling ludes anymore.
It’s a container of deadly neurotoxin. When he receives the order from his Manchurian handlers he will open the cap and release a cloud of it into the audience.
The NBC New York story seems to be written in a way to smear the LP without saying anything technically false. Yes, those are pictures of Spector, although it has nothing at all to do with the story, and yes, Davis sought the LP nomination and arguably received a nomination from one group claiming to be the LP at one point.
I looked it up. Alprazolam is better known as xanax, zolpidem is ambien, and carisprodol is soma, which are all drugs I am familiar with, I just did not know those other names.