That clears it. Yes New York and California are on the way down.

OK, then. I'll mark it down. Wall Street, Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and every major media organization in the world are GOING DOWN. Cali and NYC are DOOMED. Prunepicker, the great economic oracle, hath spoken. LOL.

DeBlasio will probably make Bloomberg look like an anarchist....

OK, then. I'll mark it down. Wall Street, Silicon Valley, Hollywood, and every major media organization in the world are GOING DOWN. Cali and NYC are DOOMED. Prunepicker, the great economic oracle, hath spoken. LOL.

Personally, I find the whole big city far left progressive experiment fascinating. I am a huge states' rights person and being able to watch a new approach from a distance is intriguing. If the housing collapsed from rich guy flight, it could take down the NYC economy but on the other hand, it could open up housing for younger families that are being priced out, right now. Assuming they could find jobs, it would go a long way to bring in a thriving middle class back in instead of the very rich and the subsidized poor. The high housing costs in NYC, IMO, are the biggest driver of the inequality gap.

That being said, whatever happens in terms of tax base their bigger problem, seems to me, is the horrible public schools and the protecting of lousy union teachers who aren't doing right by their kids. I've been poor but in OKC, I could find a modest house close to decent public schools. In contrast, there are whole sections of NYC where poor kids are stuck in horrible schools with no way out because their parents can't afford to live in neighborhoods with decent schools. That is tragic. The progressives claim the charter schools aren't doing very well and certainly not enough to justify undermining union teachers. But then we get to the point that everyone with enough money puts their kids in private schools. NYC is covered with them. When I was there last month, we passed a little private school down the street from one of my kids. I thought it was a kindergarten and pointed it out to my girl. I asked her if my grandbaby would go there in a few years and she said it was a K - 8th grade school with a $28,000.00 annual tuition. I nearly fell over. How do young families afford that???????

Just seems to me that the poor kids are being written off and that sure won't help the next generation - nor will it contribute in any positive way to the social justice sought by de Blasio - at least to the kids. It might keep the union teachers in the middle class but at what cost?

Personally, I find the whole big city far left progressive experiment fascinating. I am a huge states' rights person and being able to watch a new approach from a distance is intriguing. If the housing collapsed from rich guy flight, it could take down the NYC economy but on the other hand, it could open up housing for younger families that are being priced out, right now. Assuming they could find jobs, it would go a long way to bring in a thriving middle class back in instead of the very rich and the subsidized poor. The high housing costs in NYC, IMO, are the biggest driver of the inequality gap.

That being said, whatever happens in terms of tax base their bigger problem, seems to me, is the horrible public schools and the protecting of lousy union teachers who aren't doing right by their kids. I've been poor but in OKC, I could find a modest house close to decent public schools. In contrast, there are whole sections of NYC where poor kids are stuck in horrible schools with no way out because their parents can't afford to live in neighborhoods with decent schools. That is tragic. The progressives claim the charter schools aren't doing very well and certainly not enough to justify undermining union teachers. But then we get to the point that everyone with enough money puts their kids in private schools. NYC is covered with them. When I was there last month, we passed a little private school down the street from one of my kids. I thought it was a kindergarten and pointed it out to my girl. I asked her if my grandbaby would go there in a few years and she said it was a K - 8th grade school with a $28,000.00 annual tuition. I nearly fell over. How do young families afford that???????

Just seems to me that the poor kids are being written off and that sure won't help the next generation - nor will it contribute in any positive way to the social justice sought by de Blasio - at least to the kids. It might keep the union teachers in the middle class but at what cost?

You make some good points, but not all of NYC schools are bad. In fact, some of the public schools in Manhattan are highly sought after.

Still, we have different problems here; namely, we do not pay our teachers a living wage. Is that better? At least in New York, teaching is a profession.

We also have strong union membership among our teachers in Oklahoma. But unions like AFT are moving away from protecting bad teachers -- it hurts their profession. I don't know enough about unions in New York to comment but I rarely ever hear a Republican like yourself ever say a nice thing about unions, so I take some of your comments with a grain of salt.

New York City has a huge challenge due to its scarcity of land, making the cost of living extremely high. Guiliani killed rent control, because according to him it was driving up rents. Well, rents still went up after rent control and they're still going up.

The point I was trying to make is not that NYC is an ideal place for a poor person to live (although they offer far better services for their poor than OKC does, including the best public transit arguably on the planet), my point was that a lot of conservatives are always rooting for NYC and California to fail, and predicting failure, and yet, here we are and both places are doing just fine.

So, we have Devon. Great. New York has Goldman Sachs, etc. California has Google.

One thing we could to do improve our situation vis a vis both places is to do a better job educating our citizens. We pretty much suck at that. And maybe we could pay our teachers a living wage. That would be nice. The really good employers we want to recruit to OKC aren't looking to locate where there are a lot of dumb people.

Meanwhile, Im sure New York students still score much better than students in Oklahoma.

Meanwhile, Im sure New York students still score much better than students in Oklahoma.

Have you checked the stats of the NYC public schools (the topic of discussion, not NY state)? Do so. Leave off the private schools to get a feel for it. The stats and the illiteracy rates are gawdawful.

http://nypost.com/2013/12/07/new-york-citys-misleading-graduation-rates/

NYC is proud of the 66% graduation rate because that is an improvement from the past. Over two thirds of graduates are not deemed ready for college.

http://www.abetterlifeokc.com/education/public-schools/

I didn't find the ready for college states but most OKC area graduation rates are well into the high 90%.

The notion that NY students likely score "much better" suggests to me a bias rather than any reliance on fact or research, candidly.

And just for giggles, one of the main things creating division in NYC is deBlasio's stated intention to tax the rich to pay for universal kindergarten. We are one of the few states already well down that road. http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/11/09/the-oklahoma-model-for-american-pre-k/?_r=0

You make some good points, but not all of NYC schools are bad. In fact, some of the public schools in Manhattan are highly sought after.

Still, we have different problems here; namely, we do not pay our teachers a living wage. Is that better? At least in New York, teaching is a profession.

We also have strong union membership among our teachers in Oklahoma. But unions like AFT are moving away from protecting bad teachers -- it hurts their profession. I don't know enough about unions in New York to comment but I rarely ever hear a Republican like yourself ever say a nice thing about unions, so I take some of your comments with a grain of salt.

New York City has a huge challenge due to its scarcity of land, making the cost of living extremely high. Guiliani killed rent control, because according to him it was driving up rents. Well, rents still went up after rent control and they're still going up.

The point I was trying to make is not that NYC is an ideal place for a poor person to live (although they offer far better services for their poor than OKC does, including the best public transit arguably on the planet), my point was that a lot of conservatives are always rooting for NYC and California to fail, and predicting failure, and yet, here we are and both places are doing just fine.



I don't think there's much conventional wisdom these days that doesn't acknowledge NYC's rent control did, in fact, drive up rents. Its abolition was long overdue. As per your own statement, the limit of land in the area will keep supply of housing low, thus pricing is going up by virtue of the market naturally, not via government fiat.

I can't find one conservative, myself among them, "rooting" for California or NYC to fail. What a bigoted statement to make, stuffing conservatives in a barrel and wrapping them up in one intolerant bag and shooting them with "they want NYC and CA to fail!" I have no desire to see any city or state fail. I detest what's happened to Detroit. I hate the economic situation in both NYC and California, but at the same time, I have not the slightest hesitation in pointing out all three examples are virtually all self-imposed. When you tax and regulate the revenue generation sources into oblivion, when you have bankers willingly participating in a virtual ponzi scheme of bad real estate loans through a system that dates back to the very earliest incarnations of what became Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac (back as far as the Carter administration), it isn't hard to see the economic problems each will and shall continue to have. And NYC has put in a new "progressive" guy who's all ready to jump on the populist bandwagon of screwing the rich to pay for more government expansion under the name of "universal kindergarten, which up there amounts to little more than glorified day care. Predict their failure? Don't have to. They're already models of what not do to. We need to run, not walk, away from the NYC model and its "progressivist" leadership that has already tried to criminalize your soda and now apparently has its eyes set upon imposing punitive/confiscatory tax rates to perpetuate its dogma.

I'm not world-traveled enough to make any assertions about the relative quality of mass transit in NYC compared to the rest of the world, but I've heard from folks who are that have, over the years, relayed plenty of examples of clean, efficient mass transit systems that look nothing like NYC, and in contrast hold NYC's as a monument to, well, just the opposite.

In contrast, I think OKC has demonstrated itself as a model of reason and compromise. We're trying to build and/or restore an urban option after literally decades of misguided leadership and outright neglect, but we've also tried to work to acknowledge the presence of a substantive element of the citizenry that choose not to exercise the urban option. We're trying to be smart, as best we can, about funding our long-term improvements. I'd like to think that, going forward, despite a few hiccups and bumps in the road, OKC could be seen as a model on how to bridge the gap between urban and suburban, conservative and progressive, that truly does a decent if imperfect job of serving a non-trivial percentage of its residence. These days, considering what's going on in Washington, that's no small achievement. To me, DeBlasio's horse issue (which started this thread, which I guess really should have been in politics - and for that oversight I apologize), to me is a demonstration of the kind of vacant "leadership" we should all work diligently to avoid.

Chuck Schumer Doesn't Endorse Bill De Blasio's Universal Pre-Kindergarten Tax (http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/01/06/Chuck-Schumer-Steps-Away-From-Endorsing-De-Blasio-s-Universal-Pre-K-Tax)

Based on what's happened here and what's happened here and everywhere else. Going to the extreme left or the extreme right is just a bad idea. The governments in this country work best when we use our heads and use common sense that comes from view points on both sides of the aisle. I think our state and federal leaders need to look to the Oklahoma City Council for guidance when it comes to getting things done and being successful. When your politicians apply commons sense and use judgement that is not tainted by extreme beliefs the people prosper. Oklahoma City is living proof of that. We would not be the city we are today without the leadership we have had past and present over the last 20 years.

Could This Be the Real Reason the New NYC Mayor Vowed to Ban Horse Carriages in NYC? | TheBlaze.com (http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/01/07/could-this-be-the-real-reason-the-new-nyc-mayor-vowed-to-ban-horse-carriages-in-nyc/)

I hope that's not the reason - if it was, the corruption would be sickening. I honestly prefer to think it is just being a dumbass.

I hope not too, but it's odd that he chose that as a high-profile issue so quickly.

(UPDATED) Could This Be the Real Reason the New NYC Mayor Vowed to Ban Horse Carriages in NYC? | TheBlaze.com (http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/01/07/could-this-be-the-real-reason-the-new-nyc-mayor-vowed-to-ban-horse-carriages-in-nyc/)

Updated

(UPDATED) Could This Be the Real Reason the New NYC Mayor Vowed to Ban Horse Carriages in NYC? | TheBlaze.com (http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2014/01/07/could-this-be-the-real-reason-the-new-nyc-mayor-vowed-to-ban-horse-carriages-in-nyc/)

Updated

Maybe you should take this to the politics thread.