'Congestion' Tax Scam With THIS Sort of Book-Keeping Tradition?

Within days of the NYC City Council's approval of the 'congestion' tax
Mass Surveillance CamScam ...

Bloomberg Praises Quinn's 'Principled Leadership'

(excerpt)

Mayor Bloomberg appeared at a Red Room press conference with Council Speaker Christine Quinn soon after the City Council passed a home rule message for his congestion pricing plan and lauded her "principled leadership," which he said "shows this time, as it has in previous times, that she cares about the city and the interests of the city come first with her."

"It is not easy to corral a lot of people; it’s not easy to tackle some of the controversial issues," Bloomberg continued. "But Christine Quinn really did stand up and, with the power of persuasion and the arguments that we all know make a lot of sense here, she managed to get 30 votes when I think most people did not expect this to pass."

The mayor said it is now "completely clear that congestion pricing has the strong backing of the people of New York City," adding:

" And so this evening’s historic vote by the Council really is something that they all deserve congratulations, all of those who voted for it. I think everybody in this city either believes today or will come to believe that this is the right thing to do for New York City and I just wanted to personally applaud those who had the courage to stand up and do what was right, starting with the Speaker and all of her members. So thank you very much."

Quinn Says She Was Unaware Of Multimillion-Dollar Slush Fund

(excerpt)

"I hope what New Yorkers see here is that this was a long-standing practice, not one that we began in the council, and that as soon as we saw what was going on, we took action and turned the information over to the authorities,” Quinn said.

Quinn acknowledges office hid millions of dollars

(excerpt)

The New York City Council for nearly a decade tucked away millions and millions of taxpayers' dollars by securing the payload for imaginary public groups, Council Speaker Christine Quinn said Thursday after revealing the same bogus bookkeeping practice occurred in her first term.

Quinn also said the council had a practice of adopting and holding funds dating back to 1988. In keeping with her pledge for a "transparent" budget so New Yorkers can see exactly how their money is being spent, Quinn said she condemned the 20-year-old practice.

Phony Allocations by City Council Reported

(excerpt)

The New York City Council has appropriated millions in taxpayer dollars in recent years to organizations that did not exist, Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn disclosed on Thursday.

The maneuver, in which funds were set aside for fictitious groups like the Coalition of Informed Individuals and Senior Citizens for Equality, allowed Council members to spend the money later on community programs they supported without obtaining the mayor’s approval.

The practice dates to at least 2001 and encompasses the tenures of the previous two speakers, Peter F. Vallone Sr., and Gifford Miller, according to Ms. Quinn.

Since 2001, about $17.4 million has been budgeted for dozens of fake community groups, according to documents provided by Ms. Quinn’s office.

"I think everybody in this city either believes today or will come to believe that this is the right thing to do for New York City"- NYC Mayor Bloomberg

That many people approve being doubled and tripled taxed within the context of such a tradition of "book-keeping?" Is that Bloomberg the businessman? Or Bloomberg the puppet- tool of the super elite who suppose that the food appears in supermarkets via magic?

How much $$$ has been so siphoned since say September 1985 when officials surrender the Westway Highway project giving Manhattan but a single north-south highway route usable by trucks, to a political movement dedicated to subsidizing questionable mass transit bureaucratic book keeping via an array of domestic surveillance cameras, and to distracting from this ever growing inquisitional monster this represents?

How many activist man hours were fretted over the $$ to be spent on Westway, versus the multiples of that spent on Pentagon bloat and the sinfully wasteful socially counter productive pharmacratic inquisition?

Truck Strike Needed to Educate Elites About Importance of Highways

As exemplified by the movie "The Day After Tomorrow" Manhattan and D.C. elites have about zero understanding of road transport infrastructure, as if the food just appears in supermarkets like magic.

This strike regards fuel costs, but it really is needed to educate the elitists in places as N.Y.C.'s Manhattan and Washington, D.C. NW about their pathological-jesuitical "new urbanist" disregard of highway maintenance and expansion.

The strike is to be nation-wide, but since truckers like everyone must earn to live, the strike is only to last one week (April 1 - April 7).

A better approach would be a far, far longer strike that targets the areas of the wealthy elites: aka Manhattan below 116th Street and the entire NW area of Washington D.C. and its adjoining area inside the I-495 Beltway and northward to Potomac where significant elitists live.

Also, places as Bayville and especially Rye N.Y.

http://www.topix.com/forum/business/truck-drivers/TN8JSAN3IIVG779D9

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=60155#

'Congest' Pricing for More Bureacrats, Not Infrastructure

"Congestion" Pricing Advocates have a religion that's against any new roads, but which favors creating many new bureaucratic jobs to produce little or nothing in benefits.

Any politician voting in favor of this jesuitical tax scheme ought to lose their job!

City jumps the gun on 'congest' jobs

By PATRICK GALLAHUE Transit Reporter

http://www.nypost.com/seven/03282008/photos/news004.jpg

March 28, 2008 -- The city is already seeking résumés for high-paying gigs with its congestion-pricing initiative - despite the fact it might never be approved.

And, according to the salaries being offered, drivers aren't the only ones who'll pay if the plan gets off the ground.

The Department of Transportation posted 10 positions - paying up to a combined $1.2 million - for engineers, planners and spokespersons who would work in a variety of capacities promoting and managing Mayor Bloomberg's contentious plan to charge drivers $8 to enter Manhattan's business districts.

"Starting the search now is necessary, so we can quickly hire the engineering and planning professionals we need to implement the many components of congestion pricing efficiently within one year of approval," said DOT spokesman Seth Solomonow.

The gigs, advertised on the DOT's Web site and on Craigslist, run the gamut from press officers to planners.

The position of "administrative city planner" can earn a maximum of $162,790 while an "administrative public-information specialist" can make up to $135,240.

Even low-end salaries in DOT's want ads are in the ranges of $50,000 to $60,000.

But several lawmakers - who must approve the plan to charge $8 to drive below 60th Street during business hours before it can go into effect - said they felt the city "put the cart before the horse."

"[It] still has several major hurdles to clear before becoming a reality and it is shameful that DOT has already taken the liberty of posting employment opportunities," Queens City Councilman Tony Avella said.

He and several other council members plan to rally against congestion pricing today at the 59th Street Bridge.

Even Councilman John Liu, who chairs the Transportation Committee and is a supporter of the plan, said, "I think it will happen, and I know the time frame is short, but this is jumping the gun."

The federal deadline for the plan to be approved by the City Council and the state Legislature is April 7, but the closing date Albany set for itself is Monday.

If the council and Legislature do not approve the plan, the city could miss out on $354 million in federal mass-transit funds.

The jobs are in DOT's Office of Sustainability and Planning, and the salaries would be paid from congestion-pricing revenue.

patrick.gallahue@nypost.com

Obama Endorses 'Congestion' Tax Scheme WITHOUT Anything for Roads

ObUma- PLONK!

Not because what he says is necessarily bad in the abstract.

But rather, it's bad in the context of the strict doctrine of no new highways and that of NYC's infamous book-keeping, along with its new cameras that would be most useful for dissident tracking.

Without elaboration upon 'infrastructure' that takes a stance against the religious doctrine of no new urban highway links, this translates to just some 'mass' transit with bloated bureaucracy.

Just another panderer to the elites who want to raise more taxes without providing more benefits!

Obama: Congestion Pricing ‘Thoughtful’ and ‘Innovative’

Mar 28, 2008 in Congestion Pricing, Politics, Transportation

In an exclusive interview with a New York television station, Senator Barack Obama described congestion pricing as a thoughtful and innovative approach to the problem of congestion. In the interview he described it as a way to reduce congestion, reduce pollution, and invest in infrastructure and mass transit. With an April 7th deadline approaching, New York City appears poised to approve a historic congestion pricing plan. (See Streetsblog for exhaustive congestion pricing coverage.)

More room on the existing roads for our limos, frat brother...

and no new urban roads to offend elites...

NY Times Calls for Conjestion Pricing to Ignore Highways

From today's NY Times editorial page:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/26/opinion/26wed4.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

(excerpt)

Riders have a right to be skeptical, especially after the M.T.A.’s recent flip-flop. Lawmakers must include tough language to ensure that all congestion pricing revenues are dedicated to promised improvements in transit. That is essential for public support and to coax commuters out of their cars and on to mass transportation.

Wrong. Pay back the Westway funds as a start before embarking on any new such tax schemes.

Open up the MTA books to the public, as canceling Westway was a subsidy for dishonest mass transit bureaucratic bookkeeping, and a distraction from all of the funds squandered by the Pentagon and such criminal entities as the U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (tobacco cigarette mercantilism protection scheme).

'Conjestion Pricing' Tax Scheme's Disregard Highway Planning

Proposed new tax schemes to fleece vehicularists -- $2.75 billion annually around and within Washington, D.C. -- with ZERO capacity additions.

Report for the Greater Washington, D.C. 'Council of Governments' limits new lanes to a single new I-395 Virgina HOV/HOT lane, and NONE anywhere within Washington, D.C.

Yet it's estimated $2.75 billion revenue intake could pay for a $25 billion capacious primarily existing corridor footprint new design underground Washington, D.C. "Big Dig" with a linear park covered "North Central Freeway" multi-model Grand Arc Mall Tunnel that includes an undergrounded and capacity added Red Line (Metropolitan Branch B&O Corridor) connection to an underground 'Inner Loop' described here....

Nonetheless the 'COG' report bears false witness about the physical feasibilities any such highways -- a Washington, D.C. "Big Dig" enjoys far more favorable soil conditions than Boston's.

Meanwhile, New York City Mayor Bloomberg is pushing hard for such a program with likewise ZERO highway additions- despite the clear needs and feasibilities.

The problem is not physical, but rather political.

A Beholden Doctrine

From Urban Transport.org

Unfortunately, about 1975, politicians and planners began to embrace the idea that we were in an "era of limits" - the notion that there were "smarter solutions," that "we can't just keep on building more roads," that "transportation demand management" could help wean Californians off their irrational "love affair with the automobile" and into "modern, efficient, high-capacity mass transit."

Then-governor Jerry Brown's aides openly proclaimed, "Our job is to pry John Q. Public out of his car (and) to make life miserable for the single motorist."

http://www.urbantransport.org/sole.pdf

Jerry Brown, pictured above on the front cover of an April 23, 1979 issue of Newsweek magazine with the singer Linda Ronstadt, about mid way through his 1975-1983 service as Governor of the State of California; he has a long political career including service as Mayor of Oakland from 1998 to 2006, and in 2007 is California Attorney General. In 1976, 1980 and 1992 he unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nominations, and in 1982 was the unsuccessful Democratic nominee for the U.S. Senate.

Jerry Brown- Wikipedia

(excerpt)

Brown was born in San Francisco, the only son of former San Francisco lawyer, District attorney and later Democratic governor Edmund G. "Pat" Brown Sr. He graduated from St. Ignatius High School and studied at Santa Clara University. In 1958, he entered Sacred Heart Novitiate, a Jesuit seminary, intending to become a Catholic priest.

A Sampling of Attitudes Towards D.C. I-95

Any Excuse to Track the Public

Why spend billions on transponders and readers?

Why not just raise the fuel tax?

I think you are going to see fairly hefty increases in subsidies for Amtrak and transit. Remember transit usage is up because of the increase in gas prices.

I am certain government will become more controlling over travel. Of course to travel we all need proper paperwork and submit to government demands. Since we already need clearance from homeland security to leave and re-enter the USA (of course those people being allowed in to flood the labor market and over burden the US taxpayer don't have to do jack, they just walk through a hole in the fence) we may see that for domestic travel as well.

What I think you are going to see eventually is a mileage based tax usage fee. Just like you have to register a vehicle, you will have a transponder that keeps track of mileage and road use, combined with readers on the road, that is the way vehicles will pay for road usage.

That's what the self proclaimed owners want and with it tracking the travel of each and everyone of us. Central planning in command.

Congestion Pricing (as proposed) Stabs Poor

On 7/24/07, Michael T Packard <michaelpackard1@ peoplepc. com> wrote:

The Minetta Transportation Institute published a report in 2002 titled, "Lessons from the Most successful Transit Systems in the 1990's". At the end of that study, in a section on review of literature-( p.117 ), they quoted a European Commission Transport Research study to the effect that,

"Road pricing is potentially the most effective way to shift riders to transit."

We all know it won't be middleclass or upper class car users being forced out of their cars by these targeted road tax hikes. Low income drivers will have to make multi-transfer ride trips on transit and sacrifice much time. Or they can travel or on crowded side streets and still sacrifice their time.

The central city snots who "love all mankind" just can't stand people living in suburbs, especially the poor. The snots will make them pay one way or the other.

Mike

Nor can such people stand any sort of road project, irregardless of the environmental consequences - e.g. its utility and its use of existing corridors.

It's as if such people don't think of the environmental footprint importance of infrastructure for accommodating greater human population and activity.

To them it does not matter whether the project respects existing properties and landmarks. They may have cut their teeth opposing a cross town Lower Manhattan or Mid Town Manhattan elevated highway that would have cleared a swath of buildings. But ultimately as of this writing, they oppose any new vehicular road that lacks traffic lights.

Apparantly our political elites don't include any truck drivers.

Just think of that movie "The Day After Tomorrow" with Manhattan flooded and frozen, obviously with no food coming in, yet the people are shown dancing in the streets after being holed up for weeks in the New York Public Library, with a blissful ignorance of infrastructure matter. For instance, a pay phone in a subway that works during a flood, with not a mention of any inoperable toilets, nor regarding drinking water.

Such is our intellectually bankrupt criminal apostate shadow government.