WE ARE GOING THROUGH a real transitional time because of the Covid-19 curse. It is assumed by some that when this thing is over, everything will be back to normal. Of course, that is not true. Depending on whether this particular pandemic fully goes away, our circumstances may change a lot or a little.

Take education, for example. We know that Governor Cuomo is talking about cutting back our state school allotments by 20%. If our kids are packed into rooms that may each have 40 students, one can only wonder how our kids are going to learn anything. I confess that when I was falling behind at PS 75 in Manhattan and my mom, an educator herself, saw the reports, she went out and got me a tutor. That tutor and the Hardy Boys incentives surely saved me. Most people reading this will say, “But what about the rest of the kids?” That’s exactly my point. Many of those kids packed into the too-small classrooms may never catch up. From a statistical point of view, they will not get the reading proficiency that will be needed in our demanding world. If you are a kid sitting in the back row of that classroom, particularly if you are as short as I was, you’re screwed. Read more…

IN THIS CORNER, Donald J. Trump, aka “The Orange Bully.” And in that corner, Andrew “Street Fighter” Cuomo. Look, it really isn’t hard to figure out what’s going on. Consider the concept of good vs. evil. Let’s face it–Trump is as close to pure evil as this country has ever seen in a president. We’ve had stupid presidents and lazy presidents, but we’ve never had a president who is this fundamentally bad. He’s easily characterized as evil because he doesn’t give a damn about anyone except himself. Just look at his relations with Putin and the Russians. There is a lot of speculation about ex-KGB colonel Putin and what he could possibly have on Trump that makes the president heel like a dog on Putin’s leash. Some people believe that Trump is in the pocket of the Russians and does what is good for them. He has signaled this from the very beginning of his electoral college-won presidency. Mostly, Trump determines who is good and who is bad based on what they can do for him. That’s where his latest fight with Andrew Cuomo gets interesting.

Cuomo has never really been on Trump’s bad list. From time to time, the two men will say nasty things about each other and circle like fighters in a cage. Trump, of course, holds the greater power. Part of this is because he has the power to print money. The federal government can do this, but the states are not supposed to. Cuomo desperately needs the money from the federal government that Trump has (or can print) in order to maintain all the functions of state government. Up until now, it has been pretty obvious that no matter what Cuomo, as the leader of a state that hates the president’s guts, thinks of Trump, there is only so far that he can go in calling Trump out. If he ticks Trump off too much, his chances of getting that federally-printed money are not good. While Cuomo denies that he has been pussy-footing around with Trump, it seems to me that he has been doing exactly that. But now, someone has flipped the switch. The two guys from Queens are in a real street fight. Read more…