Lessons Not Learned

Seems somehow appropriate that Senators John Sampson and Malcolm Smith finally agreed to submit to the Inspector General's investigation of the selection of AEG to operate the Aqueduct racino on the same day that former Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno was sentenced to two years in prison for depriving the public of his honest services. As you may recall, the trial served as a backdrop for the impasse over the Big A selection, and there was talk here on this site that, given the potentially dire consequences looming for Bruno, it was just unimaginable that the Senate Democratic leadership would do anything with even a hint of appearance of a conflict of interest.

However, incredibly, not only was there a hint on conflict, they might as well have trumpeted it on the front page of the NY Post. From the very first days of AEG's emergence as a bidder right around this time last year, its connections to Malcolm Smith were clear and well-publicized. To me, the reports that the Senate leadership were steadfastly insisting upon this group, which was clearly not the most qualified and experienced for the job, despite the obvious influence, was nothing less than surreal. Even Bruno had some sense of when the line could not be crossed; I don't recall him ever advocating for Empire Racing despite its involvement with Abbruzzese.

So it's little wonder that the probe was reported by the Daily News to be focusing heavily on the state Senate, which is where the attention should have been all along had the governor not blundered his way into the headlines.

And of course, the beat goes on in the state capitol, where Senator Smith faces additional legal problems, and where the legal and ethical cloud surrounding present Senate Majority Leader Pedro Espada is of the magnitude of Eyjafjallajokull.

As for Bruno, I find myself deriving little joy from the thought of him going to jail. Sure, no question that he was a crook who used his position to enrich himself; and, in fact, I think he beat more raps in the case than he probably should have. But I also believe that he was merely a product of the culture in Albany, and that he truly believed what he was saying in his 40 minute speech in the court before his sentencing, when he proclaimed: "In my heart, and in my mind, I did nothing wrong.” Besides, the prior White House administration raised the bar for me when it comes to defining pure evil in politicians; at least Bruno didn't manufacture reasons to start a war. (And do you think we'd be in this situation with NYRA and OTB if he was still one of the three men in a room?)

Whether he actually enters the federal prison system, where out of a total population of 210,159, only 47 are Mr. Bruno’s age or older [NYT] will be determined when the Supreme Court issues its rulings this summer on the constitutionality of the honest services law under which he was prosecuted. The accounts I've read of the arguments in the three cases involved seem to indicate skepticism on the part of the justices. Considering that this court recently opened the floodgates to corporate influence in politics, I guess it would be little surprise if it now takes away a key weapon that prosecutors use to fight and punish the kind of corruption that is bound to proliferate. So it remains to be seen whether or not we see Bruno working the crowds at Saratoga in summers to come.

- Moving further off topic: I've mentioned the website Lala.com a couple of times here, recommending it as the best place to check out new music (you could stream any song in its entirety once) and to purchase albums in MP3 form significantly cheaper than on ITunes (usually $7.49 vs $9.99). I also noted warily that Apple had purchased the site. And now the other shoe has dropped with a thud; Apple is shuttering the site on May 31. Though there's some speculation that Apple will utilize Lala's streaming technology in a so-called "cloud-based" ITunes.com where one could store a music library to access via any computer device as you could do on Lala, some reports say that's far off. So, this sucks. And Apple isn't doing much these days to endear itself to anyone.

Fortunately, there are still cheaper alternatives to purchasing music on ITunes, such as the EMusic subscription service, where you can buy songs for as little as 40 cents (though the subscription model definitely has its own drawbacks). And websites such as NPR.org are streaming new albums in their entirety, at least prior to their release.

Anyway, the beat goes on in the world of indie rock with new releases this past week from the Canadian collectives Broken Social Scene and New Pornographers, and from Brooklyn's The National next week. And we have the 28th album from the venerable The Fall, whose craggy leader Mark E. Smith looks to be aging like fine wine and Calvin Borel.

via Pitchfork.tv