Polite New Yorker

The Lying Lies of the MTA

2012-01-29T23:53:00.002-05:00

Living in New York City as a non-millionaire means learning to navigate the public transportation system in some form or another. And this means having to constantly adjust one’s weekend plans to account for service disruptions.

But while the Metropolitan Transit Authority that runs our trains and busses asks for passengers to plan ahead, it doesn’t inform its own employees or even provide accurate information during service disruptions. In fact it actively spreads misinformation during service disruptions, which makes things worse for everyone.

Example: More than once now I have seen MTA subway conductors tell people to transfer to the J train at the Fulton Street station during weekend service disruptions, when the J train doesn’t run to Fulton Street on weekends even when there aren’t service disruptions.

“You can’t take the J train from Fulton Street on the weekends,” I told one conductor on a Brooklyn-bound F train after he told people to take the J from Fulton Street. He had even misspoke once and told people to take the J train from Jay Street in Brooklyn, and the J train goes nowhere near that stop.

“I’ve been doing this 30 years! You’re going to tell me how it is?!” was his reply.

Also, the automatic subway announcements that inform passengers as to what trains they can transfer to at the given stations are not changed during service disruptions, and feed misinformation to passengers. And regular signs will lie to you also. For years, the signs at the 34^th St. A, C, E station tell passengers to use the center platform for “All A train service” when the A train usually stops on the local platforms between 11 p.m. and 6 a.m.

Don’t expect this to get better any time soon. MTA workers are now working without a contract and their union leaders are in a pissing contest with the city. The MTA is always short on money as well and is constantly cutting service and raising fares.

So make sure you get confirmation from multiple sources of information before you take the MTA’s word on anything.

It still makes more sense to ride the subways and busses, because driving in the city can be a real nightmare, but public transit is quickly catching up in terms of aggravation.

A Long Walk to White Castle

2012-01-16T15:10:00.003-05:00

Since yesterday was Sunday and I had some free time, I decided to treat myself to some delicious White Castle cheeseburgers and take a walk to the nearest White Castle, or at least the nearest White Castle in a good neighborhood, and walk to the one on the corner of Bell Boulevard and Northern Boulevard here in Northern Queens.

Each way was a three-or-four mile walk, and the long walk would assuage some of the guilt of eating the delicious White Castle burgers. I’ve been sick with a cold and so I haven’t been to the gym lately.

Queens can be a confusing jumble of streets, and I thought it would be better to take the back streets and learn my way around rather than simply walk down Northern Boulevard. I had driven down Northern Boulevard before so I had seen everything there was to see there between my street and the restaurant.

Along the route I often came across plots of land where once had stood a tasteful one-family home but was not occupied by a garish, oversized home replete with faux opulence that housed one or two or even more families. These “McMansions” are a blight everywhere they pop up and New York hasn’t yet found a solution to stopping them. It’s evidence that people are self deluded. If you live in Bayside, Queens, you are not an Italian count or, famous fashion designer, or oil magnate, and your attempts to make your house resemble a Mediterranean villa come to nothing when you live within walking distance of a White Castle. These McMansion owners only make themselves look foolish and their neighborhoods look ugly, but most seem not to care.

Some would argue that anyone who would walk four miles to a White Castle has no right to dictate taste, but you’re wrong. The White Castle at Bell and Northern Boulevards in Queens is in a commercial district and does not stand out as an ugly duckling among its neighbors. On the contrary, it’s a beacon of majesty among the more humdrum establishments.

I don’t know what there is to be done about the McMansion epidemic sweeping New York and the nation. Zoning laws can only do so much. The housing bust of 2008 slowed their construction to a certain degree, but once the housing market returns, what is to stop them from coming back? You can’t legislate taste and decency. It’s a sign that our ever-fracturing country may be slipping into the twilight of mediocrity.

Here’s hoping that future generations will care more about their cities and neighbors.

Riding the Bus Like a Schmuck

2012-01-10T22:59:00.001-05:00

Life and luck have recently caused me to move from Inwood, the northernmost neighborhood of Manhattan, to Flushing, in the northern reaches of Queens. I like my new neighborhood well enough, but I no longer live a quick walk to the subway. To get all the way home, I now have to take a bus.

No one would rightfully choose to take a bus when they can take a subway instead. With a bus, you get all the aggravation of being stuck in traffic with of the unpleasantness of public transportation. Subways also take your money before the train arrives. With a bus, you get to stand in line while old ladies fumble for Metrocards or exact change. Buses also make many more stops.

There's also an unspoken aversion to taking the bus among New Yorkers. Even those who proudly boast they don't own a car and enjoy a smug self-righteousness about not polluting the Earth don't want to be on a bus. A city bus has no cultural cache. Trains, trolleys and ferries still have some scraps of glamor stuck to their fetid bones.

And in New York, bus riders get the shaft in many ways. Subway transfers are unlimited but bus transfers are not. There is no citywide bus map like there is a citywide subway map. City bus maps are only available by borough. And the bus lines are not depicted in consistent colors among the various borough bus maps, making it even tougher to navigate.

There are also many bus lines, particularly in the outer boroughs that are privately owned and appear on no official bus maps. The entire transit system is rigged against the outer boroughs, with subway lines almost all leading to and from Manhattan. If the other boroughs were similarly served, this would garner no complaint.

The New York transit store sells t-shirts emblazoned with your favorite subway line. I know of no such t-shirts for buses.

There are schedules posted at the bus stops that may be helpful to read but can also be quite maddening, as they are often not kept to and you can find yourself waiting about an hour or more for a bus in the late night/early morning hours. Some buses just quit running altogether for several hours, and their schedules will just show empty time slots where arrival times should be. Buses will also sometimes be on a “Limited” schedule, which means it makes fewer stops and the driver will drive right by your stop and possibly leave you far from where you need to go.

Bus passengers do have a smaller percentage of confused tourists. Most people who ride the city buses are locals who know where they are going or soon will. An elite order has formed among the riders of the special express buses. These are coach buses with nicer seats that make fewer stops and go greater distances. They cost $5.50 instead of the regular fare of $2.25, and these bus riders form their own subculture of regulars and tend to line up reliably. These are mostly commuters from the outer boroughs and suburbs who act with the experienced precision found only in seasoned commuters.

I am unavoidably among the cadres of working-class New Yorkers who find themselves on a bus every day. In my case it's either the Q44 or the Q20 (A or B, either stops in front of my building) or in some cases the Q34 in the mornings. I've decided to take a perverse pride in this. See you on the bus.

Happy New Year, Now Go Outside

2012-01-01T16:53:00.004-05:00

It’s now 2012, and I’ll make a bold prediction that most of the world will survive to see 2013. I’m not going to give much credence to catastrophic predictions from an ancient people who played soccer with severed heads.

I have the usual litany of New Year’s resolutions that I won’t bore you with, but share one that I suggest you adopt, which is to enjoy being a tourist in your own city or town. Go walking in places you don’t normally see or walk to because they are close by or you don’t think there’s much there. You’ll be surprised at what you find.

Today I went for a walk in my new neighborhood of Flushing, Queens. In addition to discovering more obscure roads and lanes that share names and numbers with nearby streets and avenues, I came across some interesting parks and memorials.

The first was a small park connected to Flushing Memorial Field, most of which is now dedicated to Flushing High School’s athletic fields. My fiancé told me that the park is usually full of angry old men and as a future angry old man I appreciate that there will be some public green space for me. The small park has a few rows of benches and grass and a memorial plaque that is relatively unassuming. The plaque was dedicated in 1935 to Flushing residents who died in the First World War. I noticed that there were two people named Frederick Nix listed next to one another and found that odd. A quick Internet search when I got home told me that both were Army Privates who died of pneumonia in October of 1918. Frederick A. Nix, from 289 Barclay St., Flushing, was with the Army’s 43^rdCompany. Frederick J. Nix, of 130 Washington St., Flushing, was with the Army’s 3^rd Company. Both died less than one month before the war’s end.

Walking down Francis Lewis Boulevard, we came across a faded street sign at a small, triangular island where Clintonville Street and 163^rd Street meet the boulevard. Upon closer inspection, I was able to decipher that this was Cpl. Larry Muss Square. I walked around the small mini-park looking for some information on who Corporal Muss was. Cpl. Larry Muss was a Queens native who was serving in the Army Air Corps during World War II. He served as a gunner on a B-29 fighter plane that crashed shortly after takeoff on a training mission at a base in Cuba in February of 1945, taking the lives of Muss and six other crew members. The local chapter of Jewish War Veterans of the United States, Post 145, is named for Muss.

There will be plenty of things this year for you to not care about. We’ll see our share of manufactured outrage on both the left and the right as the presidential election goes along. Our celebrity-obsessed culture will generate more ridiculous non-news that people win inexplicably give a shit about. Make an effort to take some time to learn something about the world immediately around you. You will learn interesting things and be glad you did.

Escalators 101

2011-12-28T01:22:00.002-05:00

It’s time to start enforcing the law of escalators. That law is: When riding an escalator, stand on the right and walk on the left. This is by no means a law exclusive to New York. It applies anywhere in the world there are escalators. Stand on the right. Walk on the left. It’s easy and simple.

No one is required to walk up the escalator if they don’t want to. By all means, relax and enjoy the ride if it amuses you or if you are injured, elderly or just tired. But be sure that you stand to the right to let others pass. Your condition is no excuse to deprive others the precious freedom of movement or delay their getting home to their loved ones.

And when someone says “excuse me” on an escalator and you’re standing on the left, move. Step immediately to the right and let people pass. I don’t care how much luggage you have or how much you like standing next to the person you’re with, move. Tired after walking all day? Move. Don’t understand English? ¡Muévete! Bougez! 이동! Muoviti! 移動！Move immediately and without complaint or accept being shoved or trampled. A good rule of enforcement is to say “Excuse me” politely three times. If the person is still in your way, knock them to the right where they belong or stomp them down so you may walk over them.

Think of our sidewalks, stairs and walkways as roads with lanes. Just as the left lane is for passing on our highways, it’s for passing on our walkways as well. You know that horribly frustrating feeling you get when some doofus is driving 55 miles per hour or slower in the passing lane? Imagine that same feeling amplified 10 times when you see the train you are trying to catch and a polite “Excuse me” goes unheeded several times.

I understand that New York is filled with many people from parts of the country and world where escalators may not be common. When I worked at JFK Airport, the escalator in the American Airlines arrivals terminal would be shut off when the flights from Haiti arrived because passengers from those flights were so unfamiliar with escalators. People from the third world or rural parts of the U.S. get a six month grace period to learn how to use an escalator; that’s being generous.

Let’s educate our fellow man and enforce the law of the escalator with sharp elbows and steel-toed boots.

Merry Christmas from Queens

2011-12-25T12:49:00.003-05:00

Last month I said a fond farewell to Inwood and moved to Flushing Queens, where the Korean restaurants are open 24 hours and the Cherry Valley Deli is a short distance away. I am making Double Satanic Deviled Eggs—listening to SLAYER makes them Double Satanic—to bring to a family gathering later.

Flushing is imbued with the Christmas spirit like other parts of the city. There are plenty of lights and other decorations about, though the decorations here cannot hold a plastic candle to some of the over-the-top light displays that have made some New York neighborhoods famous.

Queens is New York’s largest borough. Like The Bronx, Queens was a jumble of different towns and villages before it became part of New York City in 1898. It maintains that scattered identity, though people from Queens are proud of it and the borough has produced some of our most talented New Yorkers. Queens gave the world both The Ramones and Run DMC.

With the exception of Astoria and maybe Long Island City, the neighborhoods of Queens have not acquired the kind of cultural cachet that parts of Brooklyn have acquired. This is a great hidden blessing, as Queens has maintained much good New York character and not suffered from price-inflating gentrification that has eaten away the many once working-class neighborhoods of Brooklyn and Manhattan.

I miss Inwood and its many unique features but Flushing is an interesting place as well and there is a lot to discover here too. This has been an interesting year and 2012 promises to be interesting too.

I hope you are all taking the time to enjoy the holidays. Those of you in New York City, don’t forget to enjoy the holiday scenery and don’t be ashamed to be a tourist in your own city.

A Final Farewell to ZAK

2011-11-04T17:19:00.003-04:00

Joseph Bernard Zak, more affectionately known as ZAK, was a poet and songwriter who dedicated his life to writing poems and songs.

One day in 1997, ZAK went to a photocopy shop to make copies of some of his song lyrics. At the same time, members of a punk rock band named Team Spider were there making copies of fliers for an upcoming concert. ZAK struck up a conversation with the band and soon had an invitation to come to their show and recite poetry. He began reciting poetry at the band’s shows and Team Spider made him a member of the group. He performed with them for nine years until shortly before his death in December 2006.

ZAK was 80 years old when he died and didn’t join the punk band until he was 71. He was an unlikely and inspiring presence on stage and became a revered figure in the New York punk scene.

He had no real family, having been sent to a boys’ home during the Great Depression by his parents. Team Spider became his family. It was members of Team Spider who visited him in nursing homes when his health began to fail. It is members of Team Spider today who maintain a storage space filled floor to ceiling with boxes of ZAK’s poems and song lyrics.

And it was Team Spider who recently laid ZAK to rest, almost five years after his passing.

ZAK made most of his funeral arrangements himself. A devout Catholic, he arranged for his funeral to be held at Our Lady of Peace Church on 62nd Street. He asked that he be cremated and his ashes be scattered at sea.

Not content to let ZAK’s ashes be spread anonymously or comingled with the ashes of others and unceremoniously jettisoned from a plane or commercial barge, the members of Team Spider early on decided they would spread their former band mate’s ashes themselves. Lead singer Chris Ryan very deftly swiped the ashes from the church at the funeral. The funeral director on hand, who was supposed to take possession of the ashes, caught up with the group outside the church, where he told them it was OK for them to spread the ashes themselves, so long as they did so in a way approved by law etc.

You could say that the arrangements of ZAK’s final resting place were made in PRT, or Punk Rock Time. A boat was chartered in 2009 but fell through at the last minute. Other things got in the way. Chris and his wife Allie were married in 2010. Other members have been busy with other bands. Life just got in the way of putting closure on ZAK’s death.

The band invited me along to help them say farewell, an honor I am very grateful for. After meeting at bass player Dave Satkowki’s apartment, a small group set out by car to the Marine Basin Marina near Coney Island, Brooklyn. It is a small marina tucked away in an industrial part of the Brooklyn waterfront. Chris brought ZAK’s ashes along with flowers and video and audio recording equipment. Team Spider hosts a cable access TV show and documents everything.

We met up with the boat captain and boarded the boat, and soon set out for the Atlantic Ocean. We made our way out of the marina where boats with festive names like ‘I’ll Go’ and ‘Why Not’ rested. It was early October and the weather was summerlike and several people were enjoying the last of the summer season, with many apparently living on their boats.

We motored into New York Harbor south of the Verrazano Narrows Bridge and went east past the community of Sea Gate and Coney Island and out into the ocean. We continued on until the nearby boats became fewer and the shoreline farther away.

ZAK’s ashes were put in a basket and covered with rose pedals. A few ashes were saved to be spread in Tompkins Square Park. The basket was set on the deck of the boat next a chair that had a framed photo of the departed on it.

Chris gathered everyone on deck around ZAK’s ashes and portrait. We said a few words about ZAK.

Team Spider guitar player Sam recalled one of his fondest memories of playing with ZAK happened in Tompkins Square Park during an outdoor concert the band performed there. While playing the song, ‘Know That I Love You,’ a group of young punk rockers climbed on stage and surrounded ZAK. They began chanting “We fucking love you! We fucking love you!”

I mentioned how when I first saw ZAK at a show at CBGB, I thought he was someone’s grandfather there to see someone play. I mentioned how ZAK did what he was driven to do creatively, not what people expected him to do as an elderly person.

After everyone had said their piece, the boat’s captain lowered the basket into the water. As it began to sink, one of Team Spider’s members pulled a rope attached to the bottom of it, letting the ashes go in a cloud just beneath the water. The rose pedals floated on the water and we each threw a rose into the ocean.

As we watched the roses and pedals float farther out to sea, the ocean was quiet and calm, and buoys in the distance chimed like church bells.

After a little while, we began our way back. A few of us had to go our separate ways, but the Team Spider members met up to have a remembrance dinner for their lost band mate.

Joseph Bernard Zak was an extraordinary man who lived his life to create and found a family among New York’s punk rockers. The members of Team Spider gave him a send off worthy of the beauty and creativity that he brought to the world.

Know that we love you, ZAK, and always will.

Following the Footsteps

2011-09-28T01:48:00.003-04:00

This past Sunday I participated in the 10^th annual Tunnel to Towers Run held in New York to commemorate the heroic service of Firefighter Stephen Siller on September 11, 2001, as well as everyone else who gave their lives that day. The run traces the route Siller took from Brooklyn to the World Trade Center.

A water taxi from Wall Street took us to the Ikea parking lot in Red Hook, Brooklyn and a staging area for the race. It’s several blocks away from the starting line, and we spent at least an hour or more standing on a crowded street waiting for the race to start.

Once it gets under way, there are a lot of ceremonial things happening before the race starts, with plenty of breaks in between to allow for television coverage and its commercials.

It’s a warm and crowded race, and you can’t help but elbow and be elbowed in the course of it. But it is the friendliest big city crowd you will ever be in. There’s a great feeling of camaraderie and patriotism. Chants of “U.S.A.! U.S.A.!” broke out along the route, and the run is a tribute to the resilience of New York and America itself, but there were plenty of non-Americans there, including firefighters from Germany and the U.K. running in their full gear.

The Brooklyn Battery Tunnel gets pretty hot when thirty thousand people are running through it, but once you’re through the tunnel, it’s very pleasant. And when the Finish Line is in view, it motivates you to sprint to it.

On the Brooklyn side before you go into the tunnel, firefighters lined along the route shout encouragement from their trucks. On the Manhattan side, firefighters in dress uniforms line the route, holding banners representing each of the 343 firefighters lost in the September 11^th attacks. Another long line of firefighters hold 343 American flags. It’s a moving sight.

I did not personally know anyone who perished in the September 11 attacks. But I do know the punk rock band The Bullys and love their music. One of their founding members was Firefighter John Heffernan, a member of Ladder Company 11 and died in the South Tower of the Trade Center. I wore my Bully t-shirt as a tribute and when I came upon the Firefighter holding his memorial banner on the Manhattan side of the Tunnel, I high-fived him. Before the race, I was heartened to see a young woman with a Dead Kennedys tattoo getting ready to run. I hope to be back next year with a small army of Bullys fans, maybe some will have big Mohawks.

There are marching bands, cheerleaders from around the country, rock bands, tourists, yachtsman at the Battery Park Marina tooting their boats’ horns for you, and throngs of well wishers along the route applauding your efforts. It’s a great cross-section of New Yorkers, Americans, and people from all over the world.

The run encompasses all that is great about New York and drives home the point that no matter what horrors strike our city, New York will bounce back and we can’t be shaken.

I finished the run in 43 minutes and 52 seconds and came in 8,877^th place. Volunteers were handing out water and bananas after the finish line. I took some water and ate a banana; it was the most delicious banana I have ever eaten.

See you there next year.

A Better Way to Remember September 11

2011-09-24T00:16:00.004-04:00

This was the first year I skipped going to Ground Zero on September 11 since I’ve had the chance to go. I was working out of town on Sept. 11 in 2001 and 2002, and that solidified my desire to go to the commemoration, which is usually easy to do since I have worked close to the site of the attacks since late 2002.

When I first began attending the moments of silence and reading of the names at Ground Zero, there were lots of regular citizens with no personal connection to anyone lost in the attacks who came to pay their respects.

Things took a turn in 2006 at the five-year anniversary of the attacks. Multitudes of conspiracy theorists showed up in obnoxious matching black t-shirts and banners; the somber memorial became more of a circus after that, and the authorities began allowing less room for the general public each year, and now the general public is thoroughly discouraged from attending the ceremonies. Victims’ families are allowed into a restricted area for the ceremony, but there is little space near the site for the general public.

Last year was pretty discouraging. There seemed to be few people there to pay their respects and lots of people there for other reasons. Mennonites handed out literature and had their choir singing while the names of victims were still being read. Tourists dumbly snapped photos. People handed out fliers opposing the Islamic center planned to open nearby or else prepared to rally for or against it.

This year I didn’t feel bad about skipping because it promised to be even more of a circus thanks to it being the 10^th anniversary and the attendance of President Obama and George W. Bush. The police locked down the city pretty tightly and let it be known that travel would be misery. I had no desire to give credence to any politicians in town to capitalize on the event or be a lost soul amid the circus that has become the commemoration of the Sept. 11 attacks.

But I will not let this anniversary pass unobserved. The September 11^th anniversary requires our attention, especially for New Yorkers. Hundreds of people sacrificed their lives that day in service to our city and country; hundreds more were victims of a horrific death.

Do not let the fact that the attacks have been exploited and abused discourage you from attending a memorial event. That our political leaders have done wrong by the September 11 attacks doesn’t absolve us from the responsibility to pay our respects to true heroes who gave their lives to save others.

You can visit the Ground Zero memorial, which is newly opened and in the footprints of the twin towers. Everything I’ve heard about it is good.

And if you haven’t heard of it before, I invite you to join me in the Tunnel to Towers Run. The Tunnel to Towers Run honors the memory of Firefighter Stephen Siller, who ran from Brooklyn through the Brooklyn Battery Tunnel to the World Trade Center on September 11^th. He ran more than three miles with more than 60 pounds of equipment on his back.

Every year near the anniversary of the attacks, the Stephen Siller Tunnel to Towers Foundation holds a running race that traces the footsteps of its namesake hero. Many firefighters run in their full rescue gear, as Siller did. The foundation focuses on helping children who have lost parents. They hold other events during the year and running races in other places besides New York but the New York run is the cornerstone commemoration.

The Tunnel to Towers Run is a way to honor the heroes of September 11^th, 2001 in a way that is positive and free of political exploitation. It raises money for a worthwhile charity and it’s a way for ordinary New Yorkers to pay their respects to those we’ve lost.

This year the run is being held in New York this Sunday, September 25. You can register at the last minute. See you there.

40%

2011-09-10T14:29:00.004-04:00

A few years ago, I went to Battery Park in lower Manhattan to attend a ceremony unveiling a flag that honored those who died in the September 11 attacks but whose remains were never recovered. There were no more than a few dozen people there, if that. It was fittingly held at the Korean War Memorial.

The organizer was a Marine Corps veteran who had been active in many veterans issues and other patriotic, flag-waving efforts. It was all good and fine, though it bothered me that no television news organizations, not even New York 1, bothered to show up.

But the part of the ceremony that hit me like a sock full of concrete was when the mother of a firefighter killed in the attacks spoke. She mentioned that 40% of those families who lost a loved one in the September 11 attacks had no remains to bury. No evidence of almost half of those lost that day exists.

Bone fragments from victims of the attacks were still being found years later in some of the buildings near the site. In the initial cleanup, debris from Ground Zero was taken to the Fresh Kills land fill on Staten Island and sorted for human remains. People are still working to identify small bone fragments found at the sites of the attacks.

“Our loves ones' remains were taken to a garbage dump,” said the grieving mother, her voice strained with simmering anger.

How we treat the bodies of our dead is important. It reflects the love and respect we had for them in life, and signifies the pledge we make to keep their memory alive. For nearly half of those who lost someone in the attacks, there is no gravesite to visit, no picturesque site where ashes were spread, nothing for them to point to say that this loved of theirs lived and is still with us in some tangible form today.

Survivors of the attacks have been given short shrift also. People who worked there and have since been stricken with cancer are still not covered under legislation specifically enacted to help them.

Tomorrow, as political officials flock to the site of the attacks and heap encomiums on the first responders— some of whom haven’t been invited to attend—please remember that as a city and a nation we have not done right by either the living or the dead.

Staten Island Yankees: Baseball Done Right

2011-09-04T17:07:00.003-04:00

Discouraged from travel outside the five boroughs by various obligations and the fact that much of upstate New York and New England is still damaged by tropical storm Irene, my woman and I decided to remain in the city for the Labor Day weekend.

Friday we spent on Coney Island, where I accomplished all my goals, which included riding the Cyclone, eating at the original Nathan’s, and seeing the Coney Island Sideshow.

Last night was for baseball and a trip to Staten Island to see the Staten Island Yankees play.

The Staten Island Yankees, a minor league team for the New York Yankees, play right next door to the Staten Island Ferry, which is free. It is an easy walk from your poor-man’s cruise of New York Harbor.

The stands were filled with the kinds of working people who used to frequent the major league ballparks until attending them with regularity became prohibitively expensive. The family next to us was part of the special all-you-can-eat deal and arrived at their sets with a cardboard box filled with cans of soda, burgers and hot dogs and bags of potato chips. The concessions were overpriced but not to the extent they are at major league ballparks and it’s damn affordable.

Richmond County Bank Ballpark is not a fancy place, but it fulfills its basic function as a ball park and allows for attendees to see the entire game, which is more than anyone can say for the monstrosity now calling itself Yankee Stadium in The Bronx. There’s not a bad seat in the park. You also get a view of New York Harbor and the lower Manhattan skyline. There was even a fireworks show after the game.

Sadly, the SI Yankees did not do as well on the field that night. They lost to the Brooklyn Cyclones by a score of four to 11.

But get yourself to Staten Island for a good time and a taste of what going to a baseball game is supposed to be like.

Hurricane Blue Balls Thanks to Irene

2011-08-28T19:07:00.003-04:00

Our soggy city is both frustrated and thankful after the recent passing through town of a storm named Irene.

New York City was not thrown into a panic, but we were braced for a huge hurricane and got only a tropical storm. Rapid-fire announcements on Friday of closures and cancellations in preparation of the hurricane ruined most everyone’s weekend plans.

The biggest horror most New Yorkers will face is tomorrow morning, when several million people attempt to go to work with limited or no public transportation. After the disastrously slow and inept response to the early snow blizzard this past winter, the Bloomberg administration was eager not to get caught being unprepared again. If anything, authorities overreacted in shutting down mass transit to the extent that they did. And it wouldn’t surprise me to find they had some kind of ulterior motive for it, perhaps doing a system-wide security scan in preparation for the tenth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

There were several things that New York City did right. It opened more shelters than it needed and helped the elderly and infirm get to them. It allowed drivers to use the bridges and tunnels that were open without paying tolls. Sandbags surrounded sensitive transit and power gratings in downtown Manhattan as early as Friday afternoon. The city identified and evacuated the most flood-prone areas quickly.

The Internet was alight with people’s criticism of Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s (dubbed “El Bloombergo”) speaking Spanish at his press conferences. I understand we have a large Spanish-speaking population here, but they have numerous media outlets where they can get information from people who speak the language fluently. And besides, he is the mayor of New York City, not Mexico City.

But New Yorkers are thankful that things were not worse. The storm claimed several lives on the East Coast. Friends of mine in New England are without power and may be without power for several days. And having an over-prepared mayor fumbling his way through pidgin Spanish is better than an unprepared city with a high death toll.

Graceland Too

2011-08-28T17:30:00.002-04:00

I was the only sober being in a packed Chevy Suburban careening down the dark highway outside of Memphis, Tennessee. I maneuvered the Suburban through numerous highway construction sites to Holly Springs, Mississippi, where we stopped by a 24-hour service station before continuing on.

It was nearly two in the morning when we stopped by the service station for a much-needed restroom break. Several newspaper delivery workers were stuffing newspapers into plastic bags beside their cars, a few cops chatted in the snack area of the service station, and our rag-tag group made our way to the restroom before buying some snacks and leaving. It had rained recently, which had cooled everything off to where it was tolerable to stand outside for more than a few minutes.

Our group consisted of two punk rock bands—Blackout Shoppers (that’s mine) and Skum City—that had just played the Hi Tone Café in Memphis. Most of us had flown into Memphis from New York that morning. A sane group of people would have gone straight to bed, but Graceland Too was calling to us.

Graceland Too is an Elvis Presley museum that is open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year and is run by owner and Elvis fanatic Paul MacLeod. Everyone who had been described it to me as a very weird experience that words could not do justice, and they were right.

I first learned of a place called Graceland Too two years ago from The Beast, Blackout Shoppers’ drummer. He had been there twice and on this, his third visit, he would become a Lifetime Member, meaning he could visit Graceland Too any time without paying the $5 admittance fee. He was very much looking forward to attaining this membership.

With expert, smart-phone based navigation from guitar player Mike Moosehead, we got to Graceland Too at about 2 a.m. It is a two-story house pained blue with a blue fence surrounding the property, except for a higher chain-link fence that guards the driveway. In the driveway is a large pink Cadillac. Two lion statues, pained blue and ringed with barbed wire (also pained blue) stand guard before the stairs to the front door.

We banged on the front door and waited for quite a while. We paced outside the house looking for some signs of life or activity. Through a small window on the front door we could see that the foyer of the house was lighted, but no other activity was going on as far as we could see. We hoped we had not made our journey in vain.

All the windows of the house visible from the sidewalk have been either pained over or shuttered shut. When Skum City singer Marc Sucks jumped the fence along the side of the house, he saw proprietor Paul MacLeod through the one visible window. MacLeod was in his kitchen preparing for the tour he was about to give.

A few minutes later, MacLeod opened his front door and greeted us. He is an elderly man with white, slicked-back hair, loose dentures, and a wild-eyed demeanor. He was wearing a short-sleeve, button-up shirt, dark slacks and black sneakers. Since at least one of our party still held an open beer can in his hand, he reminded the group that no beverages were allowed inside. Our party quickly finished the last of their beers and we were welcomed inside.

The foyer of Graceland Too is a space completely covered in Elvis photos, cardboard cut-outs and press clippings. There are other cardboard cut-outs and photos as well, such as that of Marilyn Monroe, who MacLeod is quick to note had sex with Elvis. The staircase to the upstairs is unusable as all the stairs are covered with boxes of Christmas decorations and the top of the stairs are blocked off with a rack of clothes and more cardboard cut-outs and photos. A sign made from large, mailbox-type letters on the staircase reads “GRACELAND TOO - THIS IS ELVIS LAND.”

We all signed the guest book, paid our $5, and the tour began with MacLeod taking multiple key rings out of his pocket and claiming he had 35,000 keys as he searched for a key that would open a locked door there in the foyer. He also rattled off numerous media outlets that had come to visit his museum.

Each and every room is lined completely, floor and ceiling, with Elvis photos and memorabilia. There is no Elvis photo or mention too trivial to merit inclusion in Graceland Too. I learned, for example, that Elvis’ karate nickname was “Tiger” and that Elvis died while on the toilet reading about the Shroud of Turin.

While Graceland Too is a monument to Elvis Presley, it is more accurately a monument to Paul MacLeod’s obsession with Elvis and his own sacrifice. Various articles mention that his wife left him over his obsession with Elvis, and while MacLeod frequently mentioned his son as someone who helps him run Graceland Too, there seemed to be scant evidence of him around. A Salon article references the younger MacLeod helping give tours as recently as 1997. A USA Today article published last year said he moved to New York in the 1990s.

At one point he asked one of our group to pick up a three-ringed binder that sat nearby. Each laminated page in the binder documented a TV program’s mention of Elvis Presley, including the exact time and channel. He said he had several large storage containers filled with these binders that documented every mention of the King of Rock and Roll on television for more than a decade.

MacLeod’s mannerisms are bizarre and it often seems like his mouth can’t catch up with his mind. “Keep up with me now; I’ll drive you nuts,” he often said. He will frequently accentuate what he is about to say by pounding his fist on a nearby piece of furniture, tapping someone on the arm or shoulder three times or grabbing your arm in his strong grip. He made lots of claims involving large numbers. He claimed to have thousands of Elvis’ firearms and other items belonging to Elvis. He will go off on tangents with certain items, claiming to have received very large offers of money for them.

“I drink a lot of Coca-Cola, it makes me horny three times a day…”

“We were so poor growing up, we spelled ‘poor’ with 10 Os,” he said, showing the word ‘POOOOOOOOOOR’ spelled out on a large board that held other photos.

“You ask me how fast I was when I was younger,” he said, although I don’t think anyone had asked about how fast he was when he was younger. “I was faster than a black mamba snake, a rattle snake, a Colt .45 and Bruce Lee…”

We stopped by a large stereo and he sang some Elvis songs. He told us several times that he once found $10,000 in cash in a bag in the trunk of one of the cars in his driveway. He’s met with two U.S. presidents (or was it three) and three presidential daughters. He had photos of himself impersonating other celebrities. If he told you the story behind every photo and item in his place, you would never leave. He’s had tours that have lasted hours and hours.

He showed me a plastic zip-lock bag that contained tabs from at least two dozen soda cans. “This is what I drank just today before you got here,” he told me. It was nice to meet someone else who enjoyed drinking copious amounts of soft drinks. I thought about asking him his opinion of Andy Kaufman or eXtreme Elvis, but thought the better of it.

When The Beast was made a lifetime member, MacLeod photographed him in a black leather jacket, white belt and pink guitar that he had there. A hallway was lined with multiple photos not only of lifetime members but of groups that had visited. We posed for photos both on our own and with MacLeod, and were happy to know that at some point our photo would be on display for others to see.

“I shouldn’t tell you about all the crazy stuff they do out here. You better cover her ears,” he said, referring to the one female member of our group, Skum City bass player Xtene Moosehead. Since she’s written songs such as ‘Eat My Fuck’ and ‘Supercunt,’ no one covered her ears. “They’ve got cocksuckers, clit lickers and professional shit eaters, but that’s just Mickey Mouse shit!” exclaimed MacLeod, who went on to describe even more bizarre things that included someone drinking the contents of a sanitary napkin.

When we got to the final room of the tour, MacLeod unlocked the door he had tried to open at the start to reveal a room covered in records, mostly 45s, mostly Elvis. He asked me to lift a concrete statue of a frog using only my thumb; it was difficult. The frog is a reference to the Elvis song ‘Mississippi Bullfrog.’ He mentioned his collection of firearms again and pulled a two-shot Derringer out of his pocket. His finger wasn’t on the trigger but the business end of it was pointing at our friend Jon K, and it was quite unsettling. But the gun was quickly back in his pocket and we can’t blame him for carrying some protection, since he welcomes anyone who knocks on his door into his home at all hours of the day and night.

And no matter how strange or off color he was, MacLeod was genuinely grateful that people were there to visit and appreciate his work. You will not likely ever visit a museum or attraction that documents and celebrates your attendance as much as Graceland Too. MacLeod is sincerely happy to have you there and makes you feel welcome, even if it is in his own odd way. He thanked The Beast several times for bringing people to Graceland Too, and was very happy to receive a Blackout Shoppers t-shirt and CD from us.

We wished MacLeod all the best, vowed to return and went on our way back to Memphis and the rest of our tour, knowing that not much would be able to leave as big an impression on us as Graceland Too.

Good Riddance to Bad Frogs and Bogus Claims

2011-08-24T00:28:00.003-04:00

After several months, New York’s District Attorney dropped rape charges against former International Monetary Fund leader Dominique Strauss-Kahn. It would be a bigger hullabaloo today if there had not been an over-hyped earthquake on the East Coast today.

In my experiences in working for the immigration service at JFK, diplomats are the most arrogant and entitled people you will ever have the displeasure to meet. They can, in many cases, literally get away with murder and don’t mind letting you know how important and above the law they are at every opportunity. They treat everyone in front of them as if they are there to do nothing but serve and dote on them. Carrying their own passport is beneath some of them, really.

So it would not surprise me at all if the accuser’s account of being sexually assaulted by Strauss-Kahn was truthful. He apparently had tried to rape a young writer in France years ago. And by his diplomatic logic, any maid who enters his hotel room while he’s there must be there to give him a blow job.

But the case fell apart completely and it became evident over a month ago when prosecutors leaked information about there being trouble with the case that it would eventually be dropped. The problem wasn’t physical evidence or even diplomatic immunity, it was the accuser’s big gang rape lie, and it’s the fault of our country’s asylum and immigration system.

The accuser told prosecutors that she had been gang raped in her native Guinea. She provided graphic details over several interviews. When her lawyer convinced her to come clean, she admitted it had been a total fabrication and said she had memorized the story to help gain political asylum and stay in the U.S. The problem with that is that she failed to mention being gang raped in her asylum application. The fact that she was willing to repeatedly lie about a vicious rape left prosecutors with no case; it even left them vulnerable to being called as defense witnesses.

It had nothing to do with the wealth and powerful position of the defendant. Any decent defense attorney would have shredded the case based solely on the litany of lies told by the victim. Her very presence in the country is buoyed by a raft of untruths.

A recent article in The New Yorker follows the case of a young asylum seeker and documents how she rehearsed a false story about rape to help her case for winning asylum. Immigrants from many parts of the world know they can do an end-run around our clogged legal immigration system if they fabricate details of abuse and torture. Who gets asylum is often determined by the luck in getting a sympathetic or gullible asylum officer. It is a system rife with abuse, where many people come from places they have settled and were not in danger and many asylum seekers return to visit their countries once they receive a green card.

The government has to reform the asylum process and let it be known that people getting asylum will be the real thing or will be gone and that asylum is just that, and not a path to being a legal immigrant in the U.S. Until that happens, the people who continue to flock here with fabrications will find few reasons to tell the truth.

The New Yankee Stadium: A Concrete Cathedral of Greed

2011-07-30T17:08:00.004-04:00

Last night marked my first visit to the new Yankee Stadium, and I’m sorry to say it is exactly the kind of soulless place I expected. It is a concrete cathedral of cupidity and a lousy place to see a baseball game unless you are a millionaire.

The new Yankee Stadium is not a ball park; it’s a large, expensive and poorly-designed imitation of a ball park where fans coming to see a baseball game are an inconvenient afterthought.

I went to the new Yankee Stadium with an open mind, since I was against its very existence. Friends who had been told me good things about it. The seats are bigger and it’s easier to get in and out of it. It’s new and isn’t falling apart.

I wanted to see the new stadium for myself and go to a game again, especially since my favorite Yankee, Jorge Posada, may not be back next year. I’m still glad I went to last night’s game. We lost, but Jorge Posada played well. And the spirit and camaraderie of Yankee fans is not broken. Also Nick Swisher impressed me as someone with good Yankee spirit, as his introduction video, which are staged and lame for most of the team, begins with him greeting the right field bleacher creatures. He played his heart out as well.

Leaving home early, I planned to explore the new place as much as I could and maybe visit Monument Park before the game. Two short subway rides got me to the new stadium in good time.

The new Yankee Stadium makes no pretenses about who it expects to attend games: people coming from out of the city or from other boroughs other than the Bronx. If you’re coming to the new stadium from one of the bars on River Avenue of from a part of the Bronx where people actually live, there is no entrance for you unless you are a police officer or food vendor. All the big gates where fans come in face the parking lots and public train stations. It is good that those entrances are there, but why not have other entrances? If you decide to visit Mullaly Park before going to the game, your view of the stadium is a fenced-in parking garage filled mostly with police vehicles.

Where the real Yankee Stadium used to be is a construction site surrounded by ugly fencing. The famous field that saw so many legendary moments is now at least three baseball diamonds. It’s called Heritage Field now.

Entering the stadium, it is large and roomy and the customer service there on the part of the staff is for the most part excellent. Buying concessions was easy and there were not mobbed bathrooms.

But the stadium is designed with the priority of keeping people from moving from one area to another, which is a part of the game understood by generations of fans (move down until the person with the ticket for that section arrives, then move along). Sections that were once different segments of the same level are now two different levels, and the area closes to home plate is surrounded by the infamous “moat,” a clearly visible barrier that shows the Yankee management’s contempt for the majority of fans.

Last night’s game was delayed by rain for about two hours, and fans got to see firsthand that the stadium has serious drainage issues. In the grandstand’s passage, there were big puddles of water that fans had to tiptoe around. I saw a plastic drain pipe emptying water out right on to the floor. The passageway is somewhat open-air, so if you stood at the concession counter, you were rained on and risked getting your expensive concessions drenched. Smooth concrete stair landings had inches of standing water on them. This is inexcusable in a multi-billion-dollar stadium.

And when you attend a baseball game, you should be able to see the entire field of play from every single seat. From the right field upper deck, one cannot see the right field wall where all of last night’s home runs went. The big screen is partially obstructed also by stairs and railings. Isn’t the entire purpose of going to a baseball game to watch the baseball game? Again, inexcusable in a stadium that is supposed to be state-of-the-art.

The big screen was filled with exciting “news” about the latest overpriced foods available at the stadium, and there was even a commercial for a Yankees-themed children’s cartoon called “Henry & Me,” which features voices of Yankee players as well as owner Hank Steinbrenner, and which I can only imagine is as unwatchable as its commercial. It marks a new low for Yankee management avarice.

It is good that you don’t miss an entire inning of baseball waiting to buy a hot dog, and that the person behind the counter isn’t also using the hot dog fork to pry open the cash register (yes I really saw that at the old Yankee Stadium). But as a place to watch a baseball game, the new Yankee Stadium is a big expensive failure.

The owners of the Yankees are not doing justice to the great heritage of the team. They are quick to hawk nostalgia and make reference to the litany of legendary players that have worn the pinstripes. But the new stadium is an insult to the Yankees’ storied past.

One can dream that if there’s an afterlife, the ghost of Yankee owner George Steinbrenner is being bludgeoned by Lou Gehrig and Babe Ruth, with Billy Martin standing ready to kick dirt and spit tobacco juice on him.

Baseball is America’s past time because baseball serves as a mirror to the condition of America as a whole, and our condition is not good.

Another NYC Institution Bites the Dust

2011-07-20T00:23:00.002-04:00

One fine spring Sunday evening some friends from work and I were drinking our way across the East Village when we decided to have shot at Mars Bar. We were definitely not made to feel welcome there as we didn’t look the part of the Mars Bar regulars, who always colluded with the staff to give a frigid reception to curious tourists, yuppies and others (my friends and I fell squarely in the indeterminate “other” category).

In later times, dressed in a punk or metal t-shirt and putting up fliers for an upcoming punk rock show, the reception there was better, but never 100% friendly. I was never a regular or the kind of disheveled mess that could pass for a Mars Bar regular.

Mars Bar, a definitive New York dive bar, is now closed. It had long been slated for demolition to make way for one of the latest high-priced apartment buildings that are growing in the East Village like a cancer.

Mars Bar took pride in its reputation as a scummy hellhole. Once I arrived there and was greeted by a friend who happened to be drinking there. We made some small talk and I saw a section of the bar that had empty bar stools where we could sit.

“Let’s go sit down there,” I said, motioning to the cluster of empty seats.

“Oh, no, don’t go down there,” my friend warned me. “Some homeless guy took a piss down there.” Sure enough, a second glance confirmed the bar stools were spotted with the territorial markings of the now-departed homeless visitor.

Mars Bars’ bathrooms were among the smelliest and dirtiest I have even been in, and I’ve been in some really disgusting bathrooms. They were even dirtier than the bathrooms at nearby CBGB, which were infamous for their filth.

The jukebox was well-stocked with punk and metal and there was almost always an interesting conversation to be had. You may not always have the best time or the cheapest drinks at Mars Bar, but it would always be damn interesting.

Since I never went there much even when I drank a lot, the end of Mars Bar will not affect me personally. But I mourn for the New York City that we are losing more and more each day. With every dive bar that closes, a city loses a piece of its soul. Mars Bar was a cheap dive, but it was richer in character than most bars in the city, and we need our dive bars far more than we need our office towers and condominiums.

Getting Gay for Marriage

2011-07-18T00:19:00.003-04:00

Here in New York, on the Friday before the city’s Gay Pride Parade, the last members of the New York State Senate who had been holding out switched teams and said they’d vote in favor of gay marriage. Joy permeated the air as people in the Big Apple celebrated: rainbows sprung from the sewers as unicorns danced in the streets and hot lesbian couples made out on every street corner. OK, it wasn’t really that great, but people marked it as a moment of great joy nonetheless. Many New Yorkers wear their progressive politics as a badge of immense pride and it really burned some of them up to have been beaten to the marriage equality glory hole by the likes of Iowa and New Hampshire.

And as it is part of the government’s responsibility to make sure all of its citizens are treated equally under the law, gay marriage is just. Consenting adults should be have the same rights and abilities to have relationships and form legal bonds with one another, no matter how objectionable others may find it. If you want someone of the same gender to be considered your lawful spouse for all legal purposes and business with the state, it would be wrong and un-American to deny you that.

But a larger issue is overlooked among the debating and celebrating, and that is this: Should the government have any right to regulate, approve or conduct marriages at all? I understand your needing a license to drive a truck, perform surgery or even sell real estate. But should you have to apply for the government’s permission to form a partnership with someone you love? (I’m still going to call gay couples partners, not because I like gays any less, but because I love the English language more. “I now pronounce you husband and husband” may be a great leap for equality, but it sounds like fingernails across a blackboard to me).

The question of defining marriage is none of the government’s business. The definition of marriage is often dictated by religious and deeply-held personal beliefs. Why throw the machinery of the state into a moral argument that can’t be won. And whether someone is married or not should not be anyone else’s business. The government should have no say over the romantic relations between its citizens. Why should married couples get tax penalties or benefits for being married? Whether you are married or not is strictly a personal matter.

Most people who get married don’t have a city clerk marry them; they go to a church or chapel most of the time. Let everyone get married on their own time and with their own money and file their marriage/gay marriage/partnership agreement with their city clerk. Their documented vows constitute a legal agreement that can be enforced in a civil court without any commentary on the morality of homosexuality or the validity of anyone’s marriage. Gays can call their unions marriages and religious fundamentalists will disagree, but so what? Why should they fight it out with our tax dollars in courts or state legislatures?

And the religious right has itself partly to thank for the gay marriage cause. I don’t think gays by and large wanted to get married until people started telling them they couldn’t. Gays and lesbians viewed traditional institutions like marriage and child-rearing as trappings of a stifling religious society that rejected them. They didn’t want to spend thousands of dollars on weddings or be hassled by their parents about grandchildren. But times change, and marriage is now embraced by the gay community as a measure of their equal standing with the straight world.

And so state-by-state the U.S.A. will wage a gay marriage debate, I only wish we weren’t burning up our scarce tax dollars to do it.

Farewell to a Brilliant Jackass

2011-06-21T00:37:00.002-04:00

Important and beloved people that have recently passed away include Yelena Bonner, widow of Andrei Sakharov and a Soviet dissident in her own right, and Clarence Clemons, saxophone player for the E Street Band.

Though he will likely not be afforded the same praise and headline space as these or other recently-passed celebrities, Ryan Dunn of “Jackass” brought laughter to a generation that had grown cynical and helped change television for the better.

When I first heard about “Jackass,” I was very skeptical. MTV had been shoving “reality television” garbage our way for years and pioneered the shallow, self-absorbed and vapid genre and brought it new depths quickly (“The Real World” and “Road Rules” etc.). But Jackass spit in the face of MTV’s other programming, and brought slapstick comedy back into America’s living room in a big way. Without “Jackass” much of what is funny on television today wouldn’t be on. There would be no “Tosh.0” without Jackass, and I’d even argue that “Jackass” helped push the envelope of what could be said and done on regular television. How can a standard cable channel censor the word “shit” when they’re willing to produce video of people literally eating shit for money (cow pies in “Jackass 2”)?

A tragic death is always more tragic when the deceased is younger than you, and Ryan Dunn is the first member of the “Jackass” cast to pass away. He was 34 years old and died in a car crash near his home in Pennsylvania.

He was one of the cast members that we could relate to most easily. He never exhibited the celebrity ego of Bam Margera or the Hollywood ambitions of Johnny Knoxville. He went into every new experience with wide-eyed innocence that brought the audience in with him and put us on his side. While we laughed at the antics that often left him in pain, we were always aware somehow that Dunn was on our side.

Dunn took some of the worst punishment in the “Jackass” films, taking it up the ass, literally, by placing a toy car in his ass for the first film. He did it for our amusement and we were laughing with him as much as at him.

“Jackass” is beloved by millions because it is funny and because it gives many of us a chance to live our juvenile fantasies through the cast. During the week we sit in cubicles or in small offices and think about crazy fun things we would do if we weren’t burdened with the responsibilities of making a buck. If I dropped through the ceiling of my office in a ski mask pretending to be a burglar or sprayed a coworker with a fire extinguisher, I’d be shown the door and be out of a job. Dunn and the other Jackasses made a very good living doing the goofy shit that would be pathetic for grown men to do if they weren’t being paid millions of dollars for it.

It’s possible that Dunn died while driving drunk, as news reports have been quick to point out that he posted photos of himself drinking before the crash (the show is called “Jackass,” not “Genius”). If that’s true then it’s an even sadder end to a well-lived life.

All Politics (and Food and Education and More) is Local

2011-05-24T23:50:00.001-04:00

At a time when advances in technology have brought the world closer together, people with an eye for the future are becoming less global and more local in their outlook. New York is no exception.

One of the most noticeable is with the food we eat. Technological advances in agriculture allow farmers to grow food that won’t spoil as fast and can survive in more extreme climates, and suit the tastes of Americans. We can get fresh fruit all year round that can be shipped to us from tropical climates.

While advances in technology were great, the abuses of that technology in the interest of profit margin have corrupted the purpose of agriculture: to bring healthy food to people. Warnings about pesticides, genetically modified food and serious questions about general food safety have caused people to turn to local food sources. Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farms that provide food to its local member customers are increasing in popularity. And a new identity has been embraced: “Locavores,” are dedicated to eating all of their food from within their local area (local area generally being defined as within100 miles; I know of no one brave enough to eat a tomato grown in Greenpoint’s natural soil).

While “locavores” have possibly discovered a way to be more obnoxious in restaurants that even surpasses the most grating vegan or vegetarian, they are on the right track. The future will be more localized.

The institutions that were supposed to create a more globally efficient and harmonious world failed miserably at both. People have lost confidence in large multi-national institutions and are looking for ways to do things on their own. We see it starting to happen with food, education and politics right now.

Over the next several years home schooling will not just be for religious fundamentalists anymore. We will begin to see home schooling start to take shape among secular and even liberal-minded people who otherwise would have sent their children to public schools. Public schools in many cities will become more dysfunctional. New York City is somewhat of an exception here because there is a multi-tiered school system where a handful of very competitive high schools continue to draw great students and do a great job teaching them. This doesn’t mean

New York is also ahead of the curve in that charter schools are going to take over more and more from public schools. Public schools have become too bloated a bureaucracy to survive in these continuing austere times. New York can afford the schools better than many places and we can’t really afford it right now.

One big sign for me of the increasing failure of centralized institutions was the Hurricane Katrina disaster. Here we had a government engaged in two overseas wars and fretting over Iraq’s border security while one of our major American cities drowned. The federal government (with the exception of the Coast Guard) was useless during Hurricane Katrina, but thousands of volunteers loaded up U-Hauls and pick up trucks with water and medical supplies and headed for the stricken Gulf Coast, and hundreds of local police and fire departments from around the country sent help.

More and more, the U.S. government appears to be a crumbling empire unable to secure its own borders or serve its own citizens. Just as the Roman Empire devolved into a series of feuding Italian city-states, it’s possible to see a United States fragmented along ethnic, religious and political lines. People are more likely to live in areas that are politically hegemonic; recent studies have showed electoral districts being won by larger and larger margins. Several states have nascent secessionist movements that come from both sides of the political spectrum. Increased cultural diversity creates more insular behavior, even between people within the same cultural or ethnic groups.

Here in New York City, while our stronger local government has insulated us from some of the worst of the federal government’s dysfunction, the can-do spirit of New Yorkers is already hard at work looking for local solutions to our problems.

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Bullets

2011-05-06T00:46:00.001-04:00

Earlier this week, President Obama said he would not release photos showing Osama bin Laden’s dead body. The President should know: The First Amendment does not negotiate with terrorists.

Obama deserves all the credit coming to him for Bin Laden’s killing (anyone trying to give credit to George W. Bush should stop now and save themselves the embarrassment), but he is not the nation’s censor or moral scold.

The things our government does with our tax dollars are, except in cases of national security, public information. Obama doesn’t have a choice in the matter; no president does. The Freedom of Information Act ensures that we can all admire the bloody sight of bin Laden’s bullet-marked face. Democracies can’t survive when leaders get to decide what the public gets to see about what they do.

Furthermore, the rationale behind not releasing the bin Laden photos is somewhat absurd. The President claims that doing so would harm our interests in the Arab world and among Muslims because it would inflame Arab and Muslim sensibilities. The larger and more substantial policies that have angered Arabs and Muslims for decades—interfering in Muslim countries, giving carte blanch to Israel—will continue unabated, but we’re supposed to pat ourselves on the back because of how sensitive we are to their sensibilities because we’re not publishing a grisly photo of bin Laden.

If the President’s portrayal of the larger Muslim world is to be believed, then bin Laden was rightfully so reviled that showing photos of his corpse should not offend anyone. Fanatics who would be offended by publishing these photos are going to hate us anyway, so why should be bother trying to appease them?

There is no shame in relishing the death of an enemy like bin Laden. He slaughtered thousands of innocent people under the delusion that he was doing holy work. Our obligation to his memory ended when he left the realm of decency and humanity.