Maggie's Farm

De Blasio will be Dinkins redux. New York will wallow in reduced services, higher prices, and massive subsidies for those who can't afford what De Blasio wants to hand out.

But it will be a haven for the 'down and out' as they take what they can get while the wealthy leave under the weight of increased taxation.

Just a guess, mind you, if De Blasio actually lives up to his rhetoric. Something tells me he is pandering, and he will simply let things be and ride around saying "Aren't I a great mayor? I'm letting you drink Big Gulps!"

No it won't. Because that has happened before.

They keep borrowing, then curry favor with a few businesses, hand out a few breaks to 'special' business friends, and keep enough tax money flowing and enough debt service working to stay afloat until re-election time. At that point, they double down, give away the farm and put themselves on the brink of an Abe Beame-style default.

Then some nitwit liberal financier shows up, plays with the books, sells off some of the liabilities, maybe even some of the city's holdings, and rebalances the books for another 10 years to keep the gravy train flowing.

At some point it will all come crashing down, admittedly. But there are plenty of ways for it to not happen for a long, long time.

Meanwhile there are enough of the .5% who 'are OK' with paying 'my fair share' to stick around - even as the tax burden and impact on their life increases. Then they get gonif accountants to start hiding the money so they can maintain their veneer of 'care' and tell others "if I can do it, so can you" to lure some morons back to the city.

I've seen this play so many times. Only Detroit was stupid enough to get to the Detroit level, so far. More will follow, of course. But they don't want to believe what happened to Detroit can happen in New York. Hell, even Zachariel spent time arguing with me about how "New York is different" than Detroit.

Yeah, right.