SYRIA | NY Voters Opposed to U.S. Action

Rep. Carolyn Maloney gives mic to Alice

Tepper Marlin as Rep. Tim Bishop looks on.

Sept. 8, 2013–A vote on military action was taken at a fundraiser that my wife Alice and I supported for Rep. Carolyn Maloney yesterday on the East End of Long Island, NY, hosted by Rep. Tim Bishop.

The Q&A was extraordinary. Sharp questions, good answers. The voters of NY1 and NY12 are well represented.

Neither Bishop nor Maloney is listed as of September 6 (Friday) in the Think Progress tabulation as leaning either for or against action in Syria. In the House of Representatives, 39 expect to vote yes to Syrian action, 223 probably no.

Polls show that most Americans oppose U.S. action in Syria.

This is reflected in the mail for Rep. Bishop. He says that 95 percent of his constituents' messages are against a strike in Syria.

Rep. Maloney asked for a show of hands for support of a strike at Syria for use of chemical weapons. Only three people put their hands up, and 40-50 hands went up by people opposed.

Marriages in America – How Many Have a Foreign-Born Spouse?

There is a new report on marriage by the American Community Survey, which does interesting studies of Census data. The report focuses on native nationality of spouses. Highlights:

• Of 115 million U.S.  households in 2011, 55.5 million (48 percent) are married couples.
• Couples with at least one foreign-born spouse - one out of five.
• Couples that have one foreign-born spouse - 7 percent.
• Likelihood that the foreign-born spouse is the wife - 55 percent.

My parents were in that 7 percent category. One was foreign-born - my mother, in Holland,

DE BLASIO | The Income Inequality Issue

Bill de Blasio with wife Chirlane and their son Dante.

September 4, 2013–It wasn't supposed to happen this way.

A year ago, the accepted wisdom was that Christine Quinn would at this point be leading the pack, followed by Bill Thompson. In the runoff, Thompson would attract most of the male and underpolled minority voters, and he would probably win.

It is hard to believe today that the Thompson-winning-the-runoff scenario will in fact pan out–now that Public Advocate Bill de Blasio has pierced the crucial 40 percent line in a Quinnipiac poll one week before the primary election. Thompson had a better chance in 2009, when he finished close behind Bloomberg, who arranged a  change in NYC law to allow himself to run for a third term.

If de Blasio does win more than 40 percent of the primary vote, he would walk to the November election without a runoff. Thompson is running second and Quinn third. The difference between second and third place in the poll is not significant. But the difference between first place (43 percent) and the average of #2 and #3 (19 percent) is highly significant. There is still the unknown of the underpolling of black voters, but a majority of those polled say they prefer de Blasio to Thompson.

Gail Robinson,

reporter for City 

Limits

What should we credit for de Blasio's surge in the polls?

• Seriously, one factor is Dante de Blasio's Afro and his warm words about his father in a television ad. He and his mother have pulled votes from Thompson. 
• But the New Republic thinks that de Blasio has picked out a perfect theme for NYC Democratic primary voters, i.e., the issue of inequality.

A brave reporter for City Limits, Gail Robinson, has attempted to dig into the issue and she contacted me for my thoughts. Certainly, incomes in NYC are unequal. I told Gail that my reading of economic history is that attempts to make incomes equal have worked best in a negative direction, by lowering the incomes of the top earners:

• The idealists who led the Decembrist revolt in Russia in 1825 wanted to raise the status and income of the serfs. They failed. 
• The Bolsheviks had a more manageable plan–force the rich farmers into collective farms. Stalin slaughtered the ones who protested. Worked perfectly. The farmers who survived became equally poor.

Ironically the case for income inequality in NYC that de Blasio is hammering at was best developed last year by the candidate who is at the bottom of the polls, John Liu. The staff of the NYC Comptroller's Office reported to him that:

• The top 1 percent of earners in NYC accounted for more than one-third of the income reported by NYC residents in 2009–twice the national share.
• These 34,500 households all earned at least $500,000. Together, they paid 43.2 percent of NYC's income taxes. Progressive taxation of income is alive and well in New York City.
• At the other extreme, 53 percent of households, those earning less than $30,000, owed no state or city income tax, although anyone working has to pay the Federal payroll tax. 

It is hard to make the case that the 1 percent in NYC are not paying their "fair share" of NYC income taxes.

Digression: The figures would look distinctly different from the Federal perspective, including payroll taxes. The 12.4 percent regressive FICA payroll tax on labor stops being collected at $113,700, though the smaller Medicare tax of 2.9 percent stays and a surtax of 0.9 percent kicks in at $200,000 or $250,000. The basic taxes are paid half by employer and half by employee. Payroll amounts to 85 percent of the income of the bottom 99 percent, vs. 40 percent of the top 1 percent, whose other incomes are on average less rigorously taxed than payroll is (the key point being that there is that $113,700 ceiling on incomes subject to the payroll tax).

When I was working at the NYC Comptroller's Office, a political aide to one of the Comptrollers asked me if I could write a report to be used for a speech in which the Comptroller would argue that rich people didn't pay their "fair share" of City taxes. I provided the data showing numbers like the ones above and the project was abandoned. It was picked up again by Liu.

The problem is not that a surtax on the rich would make them all leave New York. Only a few of the 34,500 households that make up the top 1 percent would leave. But they would not go gently into that good burb. Once officials in Connecticut, New Jersey or Florida (or Westchester) get wind of such moves, they would actively recruit movers. The departure of 500 households could seem like a mass exodus.

Restoring New York City's middle class remains an admirable goal. Taxes are too high on the working poor. But solutions must be sought in an intergovernmental context. When President Clinton imposed a surtax on people earning more than $200,000 a year, there was no moving or squawking about moving because no one could escape the tax except by leaving the United States.

If he wins the Democratic primary, Bill de Blasio will need to recalibrate his political antennae to the more conservative electorate of the General Election. Significantly higher taxes on the 1 percent will prompt some people to avoid the higher tax by moving out of NYC–i.e., by selling or giving up their home or office or both. If a lot of people decide to start doing this all at once, it will be bad for NYC real estate and business generally.

BAN THE BOX | Minor Arrests as Barriers to Jobs

Cornell William Brooks, Esq., President and CEO, NJISJ, 

Newark, N.J. [Now President of NAACP]

Last year I worked for six months in Newark, NJ as Chief Economist for the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice, which is headed by attorney Cornell William Brooks, who used to work in Washington for the Department of Justice.

One of the projects of the NJISJ that I spent some time on was preparing background data to examine the potential impact of a proposed New Jersey law nicknamed "Ban the Box".

This is a bill to prevent job applicants from being given no chance of competing on their qualifications because of the inclusion of a box on employment applications that asks about arrests or convictions.

In practice, checking this box can mean that applicants are disqualified immediately from further consideration.

The NJISJ knows that eliminating the box is not going to help someone who is applying for a job in sensitive areas where stealing or sexual offenses would automatically raise a red flag. The objective is to stop the automatic disqualification of applicants whose offenses may have been

• many years earlier, or were 
• minor incidents of disorderly conduct connected with a sports event or protest, or were 
• group arrests in a  "stop and frisk" situation, or were for 
• convictions for offenses like possession of small amounts of marijuana that would today likely be dismissed.

For the City of Newark, it is an economic issue, because the high unemployment rate in parts of the city means that many youths have a choice between no work and work that borders on, or crosses over, to illegality. The economic health of the city depends on finding work for people who have an arrest or conviction record that is a barrier to employment. "Ban the Box" is an attempt to break this vicious circle.

The NJISJ President and CEO, Cornell William Brooks, has written a fine article on the "Ban the Box" issue that appeared today in the NJSpotlight, a newsletter targeted at the nonprofit community in New Jersey.

With Cornell's permission, I have appended his article, in full, unedited except in three paragraphs that I have put in bold face because they lay out economic aspects of the problem.

One of today’s major economic challenges to the nation and New Jersey is best described not with new data but with two long-forgotten black-and-white photos. The first depicts a young man with a precocious maturity and the number 7-0-8-9 scratched over his undeniable dignity. The second shows a somewhat older woman whose face reveals both shyness and fierce determination. Yet the number 7-0-5-3 is scrawled like the grime of graffiti across her unrepentant personhood.

The slender young man came to be known not by the arrest number 7-0-8-9 but rather by his formal name: the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. Similarly, the reserved older woman is not known to the world’s schoolchildren as number 7-0-5-3, but rather as the mother of the modern civil rights movement: Mrs. Rosa Louis Parks.

The 1956 mug shots and criminal records of civil disobedience for Dr. King and Mrs. Parks were found in a file cabinet in 2004 -- forgotten for nearly a half century. Were those records created today, they could neither be lost nor forgotten. The 65 million Americans (one in four adults) with a criminal record are reminded whenever they fill out a job application that states: “Please check the box, if you have ever been arrested or convicted of a crime.” This tiny box is a massive economic challenge to both job applicants and business.

The misuse of criminal records by some employers is not only an economic challenge but also a moral challenge. Business leaders, advocates, and legislators are addressing both with the proposed New Jersey Opportunity to Compete Act, sponsored by Sen. Sandra Bolden Cunningham and Assemblywoman Bonnie Watson Coleman.

The economic challenge starts with today's ubiquitous digital technology. Anyone’s criminal record is accessible to anyone anywhere in the world with the click of a mouse or the swipe of a finger across a screen. These Internet records, no matter how old or inaccurate, have digital eternal life. For employers protecting business reputations, workplace safety, and staff quality, criminal record access is critical.

Once a person with a record checks the box, the employment process often ends immediately -- regardless of what the record actually says. A box-checked application is often trashed unread.

Employers who blindly screen out applicants by the box hurt both business and applicants. The majority of people with criminal records have neither spent time in prison nor committed a felony or violent crime. Many are not guilty of any crime at all. Most have been arrested, but not convicted. Moreover, of those convicted, most have only been convicted of nonviolent and often minor crimes.

According to Princeton sociologist Devah Pager, having a criminal record decreases the likelihood of a white male job applicant getting called back for an interview by at least 50 percent. For black men, the rate is even 40 percent worse than for white men.

A man with a record of incarceration will lose $100,000 of income in his prime earning years. Not surprisingly, people formerly incarcerated lower the national employment rate as much as 0.9 of a percentage point; male employment, as much as 1.7 percentage points; and those of less-educated men as much as 6.9 percentage points. This joblessness costs at least $57 billion nationally and annually.

With 65 million Americans with a record, 2.4 million incarcerated nationally and 41,000 statewide, everyone knows someone with a record -- from the studious Rutgers undergrad with a high school shoplifting conviction, to the respected middle manager guilty of a nearly forgotten sorority prank, to countless scores of ambitious young men arrested but never convicted under “stop and frisk” policing run amok in our cities.

The box is also a moral challenge. Harvard sociologist William Julius Wilson has long written empirically, eloquently, and sadly about what happens to poor communities when their citizens aren’t able to work. Joblessness frustrates not only the ability and ambition to hold a job but also the ability and perhaps the aspiration to raise a family responsibly.

Imagine the possible moral consequences of employer policies that impede the ability of literally millions of people to compete fairly for work. Many employers, employees, and parents believe that work is not merely economic activity but a moral exercise. Work and even the ability to compete for work can imbue the young with discipline, ambition, an aversion to crime, and the aspiration to start a family responsibly.

Using the box to unfairly screen out qualified applicants, with minor convictions or mere arrests, not only affects them getting jobs, but also building character, forming families, and contributing to the community. For example, a child who sees a parent working -- or even competing for work–gets a moral lesson in responsibility.

After meeting with the business community for nearly a year, Sen. Cunningham introduced the New Jersey Opportunity to Compete Act. The legislation would move the box off the application and postpone (but not eliminate) a criminal background inquiry. This is precisely the same practical policy of America’s largest private employer, Wal-Mart, and the nation’s largest public employer, the federal government. This policy would allow job applicants first to be considered and compete on their qualifications -- then be asked about and assessed on any criminal record.

Should this legislation pass, New Jersey would join over 50 jurisdictions and 10 states with similar laws. With the bill’s introduction and a dozen pro-business compromises, this bill is now poised to become America’s most business-sensitive and community-responsive law of its kind.

New Jerseyians extol the values of competition and fair play on the sports field. We need to do as much in the job market–particularly for those who only want a shot at a job.

DE BLASIO | #1, Passes 43%, Quinn #3

Sept. 3, 2013–At 43 percent and rising, de Blasio may win the Democratic nomination outright, with no runoff.

Thompson and Quinn are competing for the runoff spot–if there is a runoff. Thompson is flat at 20 percent; he did not pick up any votes from the falling stars. The memory is still fresh of his close finish behind Bloomberg in Bloomberg's third election to the mayoralty. That is the closest Thompson has come to being Mayor.

Quinn fell below Thompson for the first time since the polling started in July.

Wiener and Liu are competing for the bottom spot, with 7 and 4 percent. Wiener's role in the election may have been to start off tall he surprises by coming in first at the beginning.

Bill de Blasio and his son (under

the Afro) Dante.

The Quinnipiac Poll cites a campaign ad featuring de Blasio's charming son Dante with a big Afro as helping pump up de Blasio's popularity. De Blasio not only leads Speaker Christine Quinn among women, he also leads former Comptroller Bill Thompson among black voters.

In a runoff, the projected vote as of the date of the poll would be
De Blasio over Quinn, 66-25 percent;
De Blasio over Thompson, 56-36 percent;
Thompson over Quinn, 59-33 percent.

With seven days left, only 24 percent of likely Democratic primary voters now say there is a good chance they will change their mind. The Thompson voters (61 percent, i.e., 12 percent of all those polled) and de Blasio voters (59 percent) are more loyal than Quinn supporters (56 percent).

De Blasio oriented his campaign for the Democratic nomination around the theme of income inequality–a good issue for the likely Democratic voters in New York, who tend to favor strongly progressive positions.

SYRIA | Statements from House and President

HASC Chairman McKeon.

Rep. Howard P. "Buck" McKeon (R-CA), Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, gave his views on the President's request for authorization to use military force in Syria on CNN's New Day, yesterday, September 2, to Anchor Chris Cuomo:

Over the last couple of years the President has surged the troops in Afghanistan while he cut the military budget. He flew missions over Libya while he cut the military’s budget. He changed the strategy to focus on the Pacific, while he cut the military budget. Our military has had over a trillion dollars cut over the last couple of years and going forward. The Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the Chiefs that serve with him have not had any kind of certainty in how they plan and what they look forward to from year to year over the last couple of years.

This Sequestration - the President needs to fix. This would be a great time to fix that. To show the military that while we are asking them to continue on with mission after mission after mission. Instead of cutting back, like [President Obama] told them the day before he announced this decision that they weren’t going to receive the pay next year that they have been planning on.

Instead of doing that kind of thing to our military, we ought to look out for them just as we are looking out for those people in Syria. ... We cannot keep asking the military to perform mission after mission with sequestration and military cuts hanging over their heads. We have to take care of our own people first. ... The world has not gotten safer and yet we are cutting a trillion dollars out of our military- asking them to do more with less.

House Speaker Boehner.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) announced today (September 3) that he would support President Barack Obama's call for action in Syria, and urged his colleagues to do so as well.

I'm going to support the president's call for action. I believe my colleagues should support this call for action. We have enemies around the world that need to understand that we're not going to tolerate this type of behavior.

His spokesman, Michael Steel, added that the President should be making the case:

The Speaker offered his support for the president’s call to action, and encourages all Members of Congress to do the same. Now, it is the president’s responsibility to make his case to the American people and their elected representatives. 

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Ohio) said today (September 3) that he would support a resolution backing military action.

While the authorizing language will likely change, the underlying reality will not. America has a compelling national security interest to prevent and respond to the use of weapons of mass destruction, especially by a terrorist state such as Syria, and to prevent further instability in a region of vital interest to the United States.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi also voiced support for military action in Syria.

President Obama did not draw the red line. Humanity drew it decades ago.

President Barack Obama said that he was confident that Congress would pass a resolution.

So long as we are accomplishing what needs to be accomplished, which is to send a clear message to Assad, to degrade his capabilities to use chemical weapons, not just now but also in the future, as long as the authorization allows us to do that, I'm confident that we're going to be able to come up with something that hits that mark.