Pros:

• Location is much needed in area not so much to say as a pharmacy as there are a couple in the area,  but as a 24 hour convience location. Many a time I have needed something at Midnight or so, and I was forced to go to the ghetto chopper on Delaware.
• Although the location is placed very close to the road, which is a problem I believe, There is one element that is very good. The way the land was developed, the store is about 3 feet lower than the road, so it provides a bit of a natural wall to the store.
• There are worse locations, it is next to the McDonalds, but it borders the historic part of Holland with the Tudor houses (Does anybody know the story with those?)

Cons:

• The placement on the land is way too close to the road. Thats what makes the neighborhood great, is the mix of development, but all of these places are off the road, to keep the natural, look to the neighborhood. This walgreens does not fit within the rest of the buildings.
• Not a separate entrance? It appears as though the only way to enter is through the McDonalds Parking lot that Hackett runs into. There should also be an entrance off Holland as well.

Overall, I am amending my previous hesitations to the Walgreens, and I hope it will make a good addition to the neighborhood.

I thoroughly enjoy the Lark Tavern for many reasons.

1. Tess-An Albany Legend. Tess the owner of the Lark Tavern previously managed Justins, and Bombers. She has a great knack for this business. She remembers everyone, even how they kept their hair the last time they were in. She is always willing to accommodate, and does it always with a smile.
2. The Food-Arguably the best food, and most diverse of any of the bars on Lark Street. From hamburgers, to Garbage Plates, to pasta that changes daily and home made meatballs, Lark Tavern is much more than a gin mill.
3. The Clientele-Last night I was in there, and Barack Obama was giving his acceptance speech at the DNC. Not only was it on all the channels, the sound was on, and everyone was paying attention to the speech. This type of people that would stop what they are doing for politics are a rare group of people you will find out at bars at 11 pm on a thursday…certainly not at other Albany establishments.
4. Service-The service here is second to none, I have never had more receptive, quick, efficient, and all allround excellence in a bar.

Kudos to everyone at the Tavern for making it such a great place to hang out!

So I was inspired by this post by reading about Bob Morgenthau at, Manhattan DA for the last 35 years, and is going to be running for re-election next year at 90. This made me think, how did Morgenthau get the support of New Yorkers that love you win you win, and hate you when you lose.

Morgenthau in his tenure can be repeatedly attributed with reducing crime in New York City, and prosecuting white collar crime. He is a legend in the Justice system, so much that a TV show was created about his office, and a character with a lot of his personalities and styles as much a part of the show as well.

Now lets look at this locally.

In Albany County, we have P. David Soares as our DA. This is someone who is far from the professional that Morgenthau has been. Talk about a guy who doesn’t get it.

Soares on multiple occasions has cited his opposition to the Rockefeller Drug Laws, which are some of the toughest laws in the country for drug posession and use. What makes this a problem? David Soares does not make the laws. He prosecutes. If he has a problem with the laws, run for State Assembly or Senate. But, he has used his office time and again as a political pawn for his own selfish self-emblazing gains.

He also is one of the most political DAs I have seen in a while. Yes, DAs are elected, yes they are nominated by a party. But just like judges, once they go to work for the people they represent, they need to take off the party buttons and work for everyone in the municipality they represent. Remember, Justice is Blind. Time and again, DA Soares has refused to go after members of his own party. At the conclusion of his “troopergate ‘investigation,”‘ Soares office sent the press release to Eliot Spitzer’s office looking for the OK to send out that said they would not press charges. The email said:

“DA Soares asked me to run this by you prior to our releasing it,”

This was released in a report by the NY Public Integrity Commission. You combine this with the fact that the Comptroller recently came out and said Soares’ office had a “‘total disregard for fiscal management’ — including the placement of more than $351,000 into a petty cash fund that’s not supposed to exceed $5,000.” Seriously? Lets take a look at what petty cash funds are for.  According to the Best Practice Guide to Managing Petty Cash, it says “The majority of businesses generally restrict cash payments to small items of expenditure and minor employee reimbursement.” So this brings me to the question, What is this guy spending 7000% more than the amount he was supposed to exceed on? That is a lot of chinese food when working on a case late at night. Petty Cash is generally a discretionary fund, So maybe David is putting it to the same good use that his buddy Eliot put to his “Discretionary funds.”

On a broader level, Soares has forgotten who he represents. He went after drug sellers in Florida, and Steroids in Baseball. Neither of which have any real practical effect on Albany County. All of this has been at the loss to Albany County Residents. Many people I have talked to have said that his office fails to due anything unless he can get media and coverage from it. Sound Familiar? I think I have heard this story before of a prosecutor that was the Sheriff of Wall Street.

Rattled Americans Try Their Lottery Luck In Hard Times

The article discusses how people are playing the lottery in tough economic times so that they can “get ahead”

Seriously?

All lottery programs are are a regressive tax on the poor and stupid. My favorite line from the article is “But if I spend $10 on the lottery, at least I have a chance of making $5,000, and then I could take a real trip. … Times are tough and my only choice is to take a chance.”

Lets do some simple economics.

This guy spends $1000 a year on the lottery. According to the CT Lottery Website, the odds of winning are 1-5. lets say he does a little bit better, and cashes a few more tickets and wins $250 dollars instead of $200. That would leave him with $750 a year, to spend as he wishes, he  could take a real trip with that, and what he would spend on a “fake trip” maybe its not to cabo, but is a “vacation” none the less.

What aggrevates me here is the same with many of these other economic issues. These are the same people that are begging the government for subsidies and handouts to help with their mortgage they got into, the credit cards they maxed up, and the cars they didn’t need that they bought.

In full disclosure, I gamble. In fact I spent a couple days this week at the track. I play with money I can afford to lose. I don’t play with the mortgage, or the kids tuition.

For further reading:

http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/1126.html

The intersection of State and Pearl in downtown Albany.

Check it out: Google Maps now offers transit info on its maps for the Capital Region. (Zoom in to the third closest level to see it.)

Bus stops are marked with an icon. Click on them and info about all the routes that connect at that stop pops up. Click on one of the numbers and a schedule will pop up. Pretty cool.

Public Transportation in Albany is abysmal at best. And it has become a endless loop of mismanagement, idiocracy, and just plain stupidity. The lack of planning that has progressed over the many years has only created a endless domino effect of encouraging people not to use public transportation.

Who is to blame? The Capital District Transportation Authority (CDTA) is the obvious answer, but this is not solely and absolutely the problem. If we take Albany for instance, the PUblic Transportation is VERY INCONVENIENT to take in most instances. As long as you don’t need to transfer buses, and as long as you live near a route, and as long as you want to take CDTA between the hours or 8-5:30, its not horrible. But any other time or place, god help you.

By no means am I asking for the CDTA to be like the MTA, or DC Metro, as that would be obviously unobtainable. But, simple things that CDTA could do to increase rider ship would be to have some bus lines that run through the inner core of the city to run past 10:00 which many of them stop at.

This makes me every day to figure out what I have to do throughout the day, and if there is any possibility that I would stay downtown later then just for work, as in many instances this would cause me to resort to using my car. I’m not asking for 24 hour service, and all routes, but having them run so I don’t have to worry about this would be great.

For instance, this morning I was going to New York for work. As the good environmentally conscious person I am, I chose to take Amtrak instead of driving down to New York. But, as I researched the possibility of taking the CDTA from my apartment to the Train Station in Rennselear, I found that not only could I not take the bus going, I also could not get it coming back. Honestly? The best part of they story is that CDTA owns the train station, so you would think they would want to encourage people to ride CDTA to the train station then the 3 routes that go there now. On the way over I can partially understand as I am taking an early train, but I am coming back at 10:30-11ish…Not that late. Why can’t CDTA run a shuttle across the Dunn Memorial Bridge from the Empire State Plaza to the train station starting an hour before the 1st train out, and an hour after the last train arriving? If they could make it more affordable than the gouging prices of Metroland Taxi, everyone would win. In fact, I have a great idea, build a automatic shuttle that goes across the partially built “Bridge to nowhere” portion of the Dunn Memorial Bridge, that goes back and forth between the Train Station, and the Capitol, Empire State Plaza, and Downtown. Now I am no city planner, so I can’t tell you the cost of this exactly, but according to my engineering friends, this would be about the cost, or less than a convention center. I think my plan is better than the Tan Man. What do you think?

This is only the first rant on Public Transportation. Don’t fret, there are more to come.

Today, United Airlines announced that they would charge $15 for the first checked piece of luggage on all flights. This has been after they announced charging for the first one, along with every other airline but Southwest Airlines. The thing that aggravates me is the fact that even though this is all the case, air travel is still extremely expensive (for the base price ticket). I am OK with this, along with the charging for the frills on an airline, SWA has been doing it for years. But, my question is how Ryan Air in Europe can charge so little for flights, and have similar expenses. I just looked at flights from London to Rome, and one flight was 0.89 GBP, or $1.80! Thats right, for less than a Big Mac, you could be flying from London to Rome. I have part of an explanation on this, but that will be for a later rant on Trains, and Public Transportation.

Which brings me to truly question why this is the case? I understand a big part of the price is fuel, but not that much. I wonder if there was less administration, payouts, and pensions could this work? Or is it a problem of competition? Stay tuned to my future rant on Transportation to find out.

“People need to see what property tax has done to people in the state,” Paterson said. “And if they can’t see it, I would suggest laser surgery.”

This is a great quote, whether you are in favor of the cap or not, The gov is not only legally blind, he just underwent laser eye surgery!

He was dying to try the Egg Cream. He got a raspberry one. Said it was good, but no Miss Albany…Then again, what is?