Recent editorials of statewide and national interest from New York’s newspapers:
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The Post-Standard on the Trump administration’s policy of separating families at the border.
Jun. 19
Dear Vice President Pence,
Welcome to Central New York. Since we have your ear, we’d like you to deliver a message to President Donald Trump:
Stop separating children from their parents at the border.
It is immoral, inhumane and traumatizing to rip children from the arms of their parents and to hold them in cages.
It is reprehensible to intentionally harm children to deter legal asylum-seekers from knocking on America’s golden door.
It is wrong to use children as bargaining chips in the political negotiation over changes to our legal immigration system. It didn’t work with the “Dreamers” who were brought here illegally as children. It is unlikely to work with babies, toddlers and young children who also could not consent to being brought here by their parents, despite the peril that awaited them.
It is false to blame family separation on the law or on Democrats. The Trump administration made a policy decision to have “zero tolerance” for illegal immigration and to practice family separation as a deterrent. The Bush and Obama administrations operated under the same law, but did not separate families, even though they had the power to do so.
You know you are on the wrong side of history when this tactic is assailed by first lady Melania Trump, former first lady Laura Bush, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the Rev. Franklin Graham, conservative pundit Bill O’Reilly, former White House communications director Anthony Scaramucci and the United Nations.
Rep. John Katko, R-Camillus, for whom you are raising campaign money on this trip, says he opposes the president’s tactic of separating parents and children. Katko is leading the charge for an immigration bill in the House. If he means what he says about family separation, Katko should attach a provision to the bill that bars the administration from doing it. The problem is that the leaders of the Republican Party lack the backbone to stand up to the president.
A new Quinnipiac poll shows 66 percent of Americans oppose Trump’s family separation strategy. Yet 55 percent of Republicans polled support it. Family separation’s popularity with the base gives the president and GOP leaders political cover, but doesn’t make it any less cruel.
Laura Bush was right when she compared the current situation at the southern border to the internment of Japanese-Americans during World War II. It took decades for Congress to admit that was wrong. If Trump won’t halt family separations, Congress should do it — the sooner, the better.
Sincerely,
The Editorial Board
Online: https://bit.ly/2MIBEbQ
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The Albany Times Union on New York legalizing recreational marijuana.
Jun. 19
A state report recommends recreational marijuana be legalized in New York. …
As inevitable as the prospect seems, much work needs to be done before the state takes this giant leap.
In a dramatic reversal, Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s administration now seems to be moving full steam ahead toward the legalization of recreational marijuana in New York. To which we offer a word of advice: Whoa.
Just last year, Mr. Cuomo was still describing marijuana as a “gateway” drug to more dangerous, addictive substances. In January, he signaled a change of heart when he directed Health Commissioner Howard Zucker to study the potential health and economic impacts of legalization. Before that was even done, Mr. Cuomo declared in April that “the facts have changed,” reasoning that because neighboring states were legalizing recreational marijuana, “for all intents and purposes it’s going to be here anyway.”
Now, just two days before the end of the legislative session, Dr. Zucker said Monday that the report, to be released soon, finds “the pros outweighed the cons,” and that he will recommend legalization.
Though it would normally be too late for lawmakers to take up such a major issue before leaving town this week, the question seems to moving at an accelerated pace. There are plenty of big issues the Legislature should take up before the session ends. This one, though, deserves a lot more consideration than a last-minute rushed vote.
Top among the outstanding questions is what New York would do to keep the drug from adolescents, whose still-developing brains are highly susceptible to permanent impairment by marijuana use, according to credible scientific studies.
Law enforcement authorities would also have to develop and implement new programs to enforce laws governing pot use, especially prohibiting driving motor vehicles while under the influence of marijuana. Regulations governing the growing and sale of the marijuana would be needed as well. All this would no doubt be costly, requiring careful thought as to how taxes would be structured
The stakeholders on this issue are many. They include the medical community, the criminal justice system, educators, the business community and citizens, all of whom should have a chance to weigh in on their concerns.
In contrast, the state must not delay implementing Dr. Zucker’s other big announcement about marijuana this week - his endorsement of its use in the battle against opioid addiction. Medical marijuana and its derivatives have proven effective in pain management, providing a viable short-term alternative to opioids. The challenge is to ramp up the availability of medical marijuana to meet its growing demand.
On recreational use, though, New York should not rush to join the nine other states that already allow it, along with the District of Columbia. The legalization of a recreational drug is not so much a revenue issue as a public health one. Before New York forges ahead, lawmakers should have some certainty they are doing no harm, or at least as little as possible.
Online: https://bit.ly/2K17puH
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The Auburn Citizen on adjusting New York’s pension rules.
Jun. 17
Some may see it as a loophole.
Others may see it as being forced to jump through bureaucratic hoops.
What everyone should see is a system that’s not working as it should.
What we’re referring to is the state public employees pension system rules that say elected local officials cannot collect retirement benefits from their regular public-sector jobs if they are also employed in their elected positions. It’s a rule aimed at limiting the practice known as “double-dipping,” or collecting a taxpayer-funded retirement check and a taxpayer-funded employment check at the same time.
It’s easy to understand how double-dipping could be abused if it went unchecked. But it’s also easy to see that many municipally elected offices carry modest salaries on which many people would struggle to subsist if they were the only income source.
Such is the case with the handful of locally elected officials, including three Cayuga County legislators in the past dozen or so years, who have chosen to temporarily resign from their elected post just before their retirement from a full-time public sector job. They must do this in order to be able to collect the pensions they earned from the non-elected job.
Cayuga County Legislator Joseph Bennett was the latest example of this practice. The Auburn representative stepped down from the Legislature on May 30 so he could be eligible for retirement benefits from his job as a maintenance technician at Cayuga Community College. About two weeks later, Bennett’s colleagues on the Legislature appointed him to fill the vacancy he had just created. And now the law states that a special election must be held this fall to fill the remainder of the term for Bennett’s seat, which expires in 2019.
In Bennett’s case, we’re not talking about a ton of money, but it’s nonetheless going to require Board of Elections time and resources to process petitions for this special election, potentially hold primaries and then follow-up counting the votes and certifying the result.
There’s also the issue of representation. The reality is that Bennett’s district had none for 12 days. That’s never ideal.
We’d prefer not to see our local elected leaders who who hold additional public-sector jobs take this resignation step; ideally, they would run for office with a full understanding of how it could affect their ability to retire mid-term.
But we also realize it’s a fairly common practice. The unanimous reappointment vote for Bennett with no discussion at last week’s special Legislature meeting is a testament to that.
In order to keep these types of locally elected officials in their elected offices without interruption or disruption, it makes sense for state officials to come up with some common-sense reforms to the pension eligibility rules. Perhaps a law can be enacted to waive the requirement for retiring public workers in elected offices with a salary below some reasonable limit.
Without some change, we can expect more of these resignation games.
Online: https://bit.ly/2yyU0IW
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Newsday on Former New York attorney general Eric Schneiderman’s investigation into the Trump Foundation.
Jun. 19
They say no good deed goes unpunished.
But what if the deeds weren’t good at all?
The New York attorney general’s office is no stranger to going after charities that have behaved badly. But current Attorney General Barbara Underwood’s extensive, extraordinary lawsuit against the Donald J. Trump Foundation brings the meaning of self-dealing to a new level.
If the suit’s allegations prove true - and the evidence cited is strong - the foundation existed as little more than Trump’s personal, professional and political piggy bank.
Underwood’s allegations of flagrant disregard for state and federal laws would be stupefying with respect to any charity, but are particularly disturbing given the foundation’s connections to the president and his campaign. In the filing, Trump’s foundation is described as “an empty shell” without a functioning board of directors since at least 1999. It alleges that Trump used his foundation to settle legal claims against his for-profit businesses, including one with a golfer who sought winnings for making a hole-in-one at Trump National Golf Club in Westchester.
The more alarming accusations claim the foundation engaged in political activities connected to and coordinated with Trump’s presidential campaign. If proved, that’s a clear violation of federal election law, as well as New York’s election law.
Remember Trump’s hyped fundraiser for veterans in Iowa before that state’s 2016 caucuses? In the days after the event, the lawsuit alleges, campaign staff, including then-campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, directed how and when charitable contributions from the foundation to veterans charities would be made. Large checks bearing the foundation’s name were presented at campaign rallies.
In a world where Trump’s many business interests are intertwined with his presidency, where his fixer, Michael Cohen, is accused of making payments through a shell company to hush a porn star who says she had an affair with Trump, and where Trump’s children’s business dealings have come under fire, this monkey business with his charitable foundation might seem like just another day at the office. It’s not.
Online: https://nwsdy.li/2tqwEzu
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The New York Times on U.S. policy with No
Well, that was easy.
After a single meeting in Singapore, President Trump has, in his own fantastical telling, rendered North Korea “no longer a nuclear threat.” Never mind that North Korea still has as many as 60 nuclear weapons, scores of ballistic missiles and an untold number of facilities that are producing plutonium and enriched uranium.
Unfortunately for the president, containing a nuclear power requires more than just one meeting. Negotiating an end to North Korea’s nuclear threat will take deliberation, political courage - and time.
The broad outlines of an agreement would be similar to proposals and pacts the United States has developed over the decades to restrain countries with nuclear ambitions: In return for curbing their nuclear programs and allowing international verification, such countries are offered economic, political and security benefits.
That was the core of the 1994 Agreed Framework between the United States and North Korea, which fell apart by 2003; a 2006 proposal to Iran by France, Britain, Germany, Russia, China and the United States that went nowhere; and the far more rigorous 2015 Iran deal that involved the same five powers and that Mr. Trump reneged on.
With North Korea, there are two unique complications: It already has an arsenal of nuclear weapons and missiles, including an ICBM that can reach the United States, and the locations of many its nuclear sites are unknown, making verification hard if not impossible.
And since Mr. Trump has denounced the Iran deal, with its uniquely intrusive inspections and strict requirements for significantly reducing nuclear fuel and other nuclear-related components, as the “worst ever,” he has set quite a high bar for an accord with North Korea. In fact, he says he is insisting on “complete, verifiable, irreversible denuclearization,” presumably meaning eliminating all of North Korea’s atomic weapons and production facilities. That outcome would be an extraordinary achievement.
But Mr. Trump has been known to underdeliver on his grander promises, and no nation with a nuclear program this advanced has ever disarmed so completely. So what would a more plausible yet still positive deal look like?
SCOPE: In the Iran deal, Tehran agreed to strict controls on its nuclear program in exchange for economic benefits - sanctions relief. Mr. Trump could seek a broader deal with North Korea by offering wider benefits, not just sanctions relief but also security guarantees and full diplomatic relations. This would allow the administration to pursue curbs on North Korea’s missiles, chemical and biological weapons and technology exports, too. The president has said of Kim Jong-un, “I will guarantee his safety.” That is a ridiculous commitment no president could keep, or want to, since it would have the United States protecting one of the world’s worst human rights abusers. Instead, the administration could promise not to try to overthrow Mr. Kim and could reiterate the pledge the United States made in the 1994 Agreed Framework, to work toward peace on the Korean Peninsula. In exchange, North Korea would curb those other weapons and perhaps resolve the fate of South Korean and Japanese citizens North Korea has abducted. A peace treaty to resolve the Korean War 65 years after an armistice was signed could be considered, if it wouldn’t bog down the nuclear negotiations. …
Online: https://nyti.ms/2K5URlM
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