Called “pugnacious” by The New York Times, former New York State Senator Pedro Espada Jr., was found guilty of padding his personal life with proceeds from the Soundview Health Center he operated since 1978 in the Bronx.
Mr. Espada’s lawyer, Susan R. Necheles argued “so what if he wants to live the good life?” And. “If he was entitled to the meals, then who cares what kind of meals he had?”
And, why not, when Mr. Espada, as a politician from the other side of the tracks, competed in the well-funded political game where allies aren’t cheap since the cost of living is so really high? His publicists have probably already planned how to revive Pedro’s career. Painting him as a Boss Tweed, who while he skimmed for himself spread more to the public than the skin-flints of Manhattan before and after Boss Tweed of Tammany Hall, New York City.
Aspiring to big and powerful is presumably how Mr. Espada got himself in his mess on the government’s bad side after throwing his vote in 2009 with the New York State Republicans making theirs the majority party and him Senate Majority Leader Espada. Though the Times cites the government had been after him on those charges for ten years, the case seemed to find momentum after Mr. Espada became a political star.
The dynamic political move was his Waterloo and points all too clearly to how if you think you’re powerful enough you can get away with anything.
America is a wonderful country and Mr. Espada luckily probably won’t have to serve the full ten years for each count he could be sentenced. Negotiating down from forty leaves a solid eighteen months, or thirty years of parole, or a lifetime of heartache? Nah, Pedro’s a politician. He could be doing Jay Leno before we all wake up tomorrow.
5/15/2012
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Ex-New York State Senator Guilty of Skimming From His Own Nonprofit
5/15/2012 concluded: ... Nah, Pedro’s a politician. He could be doing Jay Leno before we all wake up tomorrow.
December 9 - 18, 2015
Not exactly funny. But Jay Leno before we wake up tomorrow could be relatively amusing. In fact polish before substance is par for the course when resurrecting an image? Although now the sarcasm would be directed at The Tonight Show current host's own constant sycophantic laughter substituting for ongoing conversation or other gesture the craft relies on. At least(?) The Late Show's Stephen Colbert is only a half-step off that sales-pitching pace of back-slapping claptrap people apparently take to the office in agreement to undermine the careers of those who do the real work and can't be bothered with the nuance-less politics of back-stabbing career preservation glad-handers excel in. But, as with Pedro's problem, the reality is no one survives without enough allies. So Pedro's mistake was fighting his way up from the less lucrative Bronx? Rather than a better-funded Brooklyn or Manhattan fiefdom. If only there'd been a bigger mass of money behind him he'd still be standing? But Pedro was simply a victim of his own ego as most people are.
Well while looking through Wikipedia there was no mention of Sigourney Weaver's father Sylvester Weaver creating The Tonight Show as well as Today although his personal page credits him. Even Wikipedia hides individuals in corporate America's construction of entertainment reality? So only commercial interests still dictate what's seen, as, for instance, in the case of the Corporation for Public Corporate Broadcasting? But it was Sylvester who'd worked for Young & Rubicam who separated the advertising business from direct influence on what was broadcast. A seemingly useless pursuit but he tried. While, once again, advertising isn't necessarily evil as it did reduce the public's direct cost of entertainment, but made up for in the loss of independent voices. Yeah Murrow's lineage, though those exceptions to the rule floundered as pieces of the action were withdrawn from real skeptics.
For instance what a fawning disappointment 60 Minutes has become. The new profiled Drug Sap, (who doesn't like the drug czar name but if the shoe still fits), director of National Drug Control Policy, Michael Botticelli accurately derides the negatives of alcohol and appreciates his own happy recovery from said drug but still wants marijuana to remain the linchpin (lynchpin) in the Criminal Enterprise System while making treatment for addicts rather than criminal prison our great social breakthrough. No doubt facilitating a nation of finks as William S. Burroughs warned and even 60 Minutes profiled the week before. Elitist morality still better than the pitiable falling victim to their adventures? The pity quotient to the point of making sure the law and disorder people maintain respect for each other. Gutless. Period. But my disappointment isn't just with the President's riding along. It's with Americans who love lounging on thrones. Pretentiously damning others for a profit as per usual you heartless land of hypocrisy. That really doesn't have to be.
And 60 Minutes paragon Charlie Rose lauding the great English Formula 1 driver, Lewis Hamilton, is fine and the billions that industry circulates between themselves. But a real 60 Minutes would condemn their not using and helping develop alternate fuel as was racing's original role in developing the automobile industry. Excusing relentless selfishness and being above criticism is no way to live and people should stop living for that satisfaction.
RETIRE FOSSIL FUELS? WHILE AMERICAN NETWORK NEWS PIPES THAT FUEL'S AVAILABILITY AND FALLING PRICE IS NOT GIVING A DAMN. MONEY TALKS B___S___ AND FREE ENTERPRISE SHOULD KNOW BETTER.
Another industry (conspiracy of individuals) deciding God's judgement for themselves?
Climate change conferences etc. sound like facing reality. But what about actual remorse? China that was already riding bicycles over twenty years ago copied AMERICA. The bright and shining beacon on the hill that will either show the world what really facing the truth is, or lazily keep grinding the whole she-bang under in the belief we're sorry mistakes happened rather than really being remorseful. Realistic? Bah, humbug.
Now back to the essay's original political sphere, there's the bringing down of New York state powerbrokers Sheldon Silver and Dean Skelos. Pitched as a corrective for statehouse outside skimming while briefly-in-the-extreme Silver's was exposed as inflated real estate being behind him. News that dropped down the rabbit hole with the rest of the secrets about how everyone's become cheaper against skyrocketing costs. Bet even the real estate industry would feel more comfortable about being just real estate than the greasing of pockets it has come to mean. As always though, the tragedy's the power Silver's district once had that may never be seen again until another celebrity veneer's constructed. Democracy a fight for power among elites is what communism's distortions were too. Yeah? Governor "my golden path" Cuomo is going to end seat of the pants capitalist corruption that's really not that different than his glad-handing friendships Silver's goals were plated with. Geez, too many sentences ending in a preposition? Throw more fuel on the barbie and burn this shrimp alive?
Political corruption's a tidy package. Hardly a transparent label. But out of control now that financial interests are in such a gear "legal money" today would have the past's most corrupt salivating them from their sleep to the trough every morning before their supposed working people allies eat their first piece of toast.
Paying the police better than the crooks was always the solution and not really bothered with years ago because under-the-table bred such prosperity without much actual work. But now morality is the line to tow so it's essentially corrupted too. The fix is in money's narrow circulation. Instead selfishness preserves its exclusivity at the top. People would just like to think its a growing pain in Africa yet entrenched all over the world.
Paying the police better than the crooks was always the solution and not really bothered with years ago because under-the-table bred such prosperity without much actual work. But now morality is the line to tow so it's essentially corrupted too. The fix is in money's narrow circulation. Instead selfishness preserves its exclusivity at the top. People would just like to think its a growing pain in Africa yet entrenched all over the world.
"Sit down Mr. Espada. Make yourself at home. How's things now that space can't even be bought to frame your image better in the public eye?
So now the New York City Council that had no power to stop the exaggeration of the New York City real estate market wants raises to keep up. Ooo. Minimum wage criers, then as inflation reigns it all in and out of reach once again who has the real power for those raises all over again? The legal padded system.
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THE ROOTS OF CORRUPTION
As the lights rise erasing darkness the stage reveals a den. Men. Laughter. People whose introspection was the darkness so light never fully arrived. The corpulent one behind the large desk, streamlined by diet industry interests, offers cigars with a nod since none of the others wanted to be seen as the gopher and so there they sat till a servant was called to hand them out so they could all grin with satisfaction. Smoking tobacco on a strived for pedestal too token to appeal to actual pride but backbones for those who'd never face themselves.
"So," their leader snickered, "whose report will cheer me up most and whose will lie that I'm less exposed?" Stalinesque introspection.
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Trump's a problem? Smoke and mirrors at its finest. Muslims a problem? What about the tribalism at the religions' roots? Allah/God's chosen over others in battle? The very cause and still just really a complete mistake blaming these things as God/Allah's idea or fault. Rather they're ours not getting past what's really seriously silly, utterly ridiculous jargon.
Allah For Everybody! All is God. Our portion should straighten up on principle and stop scapegoating the other side's responsibility.
Justice? Don't kid yourselves that Robert Durst is finally facing justice. In his mind he got away with murder. Now he's old, declining and it clearly just doesn't matter to him while other vultures are sure of getting their piece. Not that lawyers or the law is evil, it's just don't be confused revenge is a solution. Justice should have meant the victims are still living or at least lived out their lives as Robert Durst pretended.
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HELP WANTED
Film: Robert Redford. 1998, his publicist announced Mr. Redford's interest in portraying Dr. Armand Hammer if the right script came along because he'd studied the man. Making sense for The Hammer and Cycle Messenger Service, I never forgot. But I'm satisfied for history's sake the book's obscurity will fit well opposite Mr. Redford's legacy as a liberal icon. Unfortunately, I guess, as dedicated as I've been, this marks the end of my giving a rat's a__ one way or the other. Professionals claim interest in the world's intellectual growth, then that's what should be remembered. Along with Andrew Wylie I think of "movie" industry movers as people whose word is reliable only for being mistrusted. Despite all the success in BREAKING IN by Nicholas Jarecki. Although my book's deserving, my feeling is there's many who're not honest enough with themselves to see jackals in the mirror when they wake every morning. Or are extremely proud of it. Either way, I put in half-a-century on what privilege's not BIG ENOUGH to tackle. Representing an industry where puckering's an art and truth, liability. Satisfied, no. Acceptable, no. Inevitable, no. So pucker, the rat's on retainer.
Good night Chet. Any day now look for the Miss Stein's Drawing Room
Interview in The Wolfian.
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