Tag: Politics

Jul 29

2024

Trump vs. Harris: The heavyweight battle begins

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I like to lead my Monday Morning Read with something local, but how can you ignore the presidential election? Maybe it’s just me, but it seems every time Donald Trump or J.D. Vance open their mouths, they alienate non-MAGA voters and turbo-charge supporters of Kamala Harris.  Take, for example, Trump’s pronouncement the other day that there will be no need for elections in four years should he win the White House in November. Here’s a story and, better yet, the video. Then there’s the proposal floated by Vance in 2021 to give voters with children more clout at the polls[...]

Posted 4 months ago

Jul 22

2024

Joe Biden: American Patriot

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Politicians tend to be egotistical, me-first creatures. That’s what makes President Biden’s decision to withdraw as a candidate that much more remarkable. He faced facts and put his country ahead of his ego.  Good for him, and good for us. Lindsey Graham, before he went to the dark side, described Biden as “as good a man as God ever created.” I wouldn’t go that far, but he’s been a good president who struck me as a decent human being – Gaza notwithstanding. While his legacy is yet to be written, it will no doubt include him saving us from another[...]

Posted 4 months ago

Jul 17

2024

Brown’s raising money as if he’s running for office

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Buffalo Mayor Byron Brown has a fundraiser today at the Diamond Hawk golf course in Cheektowaga, with tickets starting at $100 and sponsorship packages ranging up to $5,000.  Brown also held a fundraiser earlier this month at a Bisons game and another in April at The Atrium @ Rich’s. His Brown for Buffalo campaign committee has raised $58,500 since January, according to campaign finance disclosures filed on Monday.  That’s $22,000 more than Brown raised in the first six months of 2020, as he prepared to run for a fifth term. The mayor’s committee had $192,545 in the bank as of[...]

Posted 4 months ago

Jul 8

2024

Our entitled elected officials

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Erie County Legislator John Bargnesi recently proposed term limits for Erie County elected officials. Most legislators were cool to the idea and County Executive Mark Poloncarz said last week he’d veto term limits if they landed on his desk. Poloncarz used the tired excuse that elections serve the same purpose. But they don’t. Paul Wolf of the New York Coalition for Open Government did a tally of county election results from 2001 to 2023. Incumbents won 145 of 154 elections. “We don’t have competitive elections for Erie County offices and we should,” Wolf wrote county legislators last week. “ What[...]

Posted 4 months ago

Jul 5

2024

Political gains for foes of Kensington Expressway project

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Nine newcomers won Democratic Party committee seats in Buffalo in the June 25 primary elections.  A few of them beat big names in local politics, including former Common Council President Darius Pridgen, Assemblyman Jon Rivera and former state Sen. Marc Panepinto. All of them beat party insiders. That’s not all they have in common.  Six of the winners in those races are united by their opposition to the state Department of Transportation’s $1 billion plan to tunnelize a stretch of the Kensington Expressway. Matt Dearing, Jeff Carballada, Michael Gainer, Taj Richardson, Chris Hawley and Greg Olma — all winners of[...]

Posted 4 months ago

Jun 28

2024

STAMP is but the latest offense

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Scott Logan, a member of the Tonawanda Seneca Nation, stands at the edge of the Big Woods. Photo by Garrett Looker. This is the second of a tw0-part series. The first story is here. Standing at the edge of the Big Woods, an old-growth forest that researchers say contains one of the most unique ecosystems in New York, Scott Logan feels he can see history repeating itself. What he’s looking at are Plug Power’s hydrogen-producing electrolyzers, two massive spheres towering over land that once belonged to Logan’s Tonawanda Seneca Nation. The Nation has new neighbors: The Science, Technology and Advanced[...]

Posted 5 months ago

Jun 26

2024

Erie County Democrats attack challengers

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A Democratic Party mailer supporting favored candidates in party committee races. The Erie County Democratic Party sent a message last weekend to city voters in the handful of election districts where candidates challenged insiders and incumbents for seats on the party committee: Vote for the party’s “endorsed county committee candidates” to ward off “convicted felon Donald Trump and his MAGA Republican Party,” advised a mailer paid for by party headquarters.  Because “democracy hangs in the balance.” You’d think the party’s “endorsed county committee candidates” were fighting a pitched battle against a rabid red wave of Republicans seeking seats of critical[...]

Posted 5 months ago

May 22

2024

Who’s running for Buffalo school board

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Three at-large seats on Buffalo’s school board will be on the ballot this November. Two incumbents, Larry Scott and Terrance Heard, are running for reelection. The other, Ann Rivera, won’t seek another five-year term. So far there are at least four other candidates, three of whom are working together to make the ballot: Ed Speidel, president of the District Parent Coordinating Council and a former co-chair of the district’s Special Education Parents Advisory Committee. He’s the parent of two current Buffalo Public Schools students. He recently held a meat raffle fundraiser at the South Buffalo Moose Lodge. Raziya Hill, founder[...]

Posted 6 months ago
Investigative Post