Spin Cycle

How about this for the county bird -- the vultures circling Team Suozzi!

C'mon, this is an actual issue?

How about the Absenteeus Suozzus Bird ... a soon to be extinct species who's current whereabouts are unknown....it flew the coop as it were...

How about the NC Legislative Pigeon? And NC taxpayers are the statue.

That would be the Columba Jacobus Ripoffus in latin.

Fix the county budget problems instead of giving us the bird.

the ostrich--since all that suozzi does is put his head in the sand and hopes to abn (anywhere but nassau) when it comes time to pull his head back up

spitzers heads in the sand greeney boy. hes a no show in buffalo. hes a no show in buffalo. hey that rthymes!!!!!!!!!

Hardly a burning issue. In the same vein, no harm in doing so either, and naming a County Bird support the recent focus on open space and environment. Is there never to be any fun in NC?

Mr. Greene you are so blindly anti Suozzi your posts all sound the same. He may not be the best guy for the job but for the love of god man get some perspective. He has generally done a good job in Nassau, wait until he screws up the budget to pounce on him atleast. I ask you politely please stop posting your useless comments because you are wasting mine and everyone elses time with your drivel. Suozzi fan your not any better. Suozzi is a good guy I'll give you that one but so is Elliot Spitzer. This isn't a battle of good versus evil more like good vs better.

the sad fact is that suozzi is a failed politican and once you really get an opportunity to examine his record--you realize he has not fixed nassau but papered over the problems for another day-either way-on sept 12th the citizens of the state of new york will not have to worry about tom screwing up the empire state--just one county

words of wisdom from greeny boy once again!!!!!!!!!! LOL

Newsday refuses to print this letter submitted by the Nassau PBA... why not?

Team Newsday and the Big Game

In response to the Newsday editorial of August 4, 2006 (Preseason Report), it is obvious that the 2007 Nassau County budget deliberations is clearly the Super Bowl of local politics. Normally in a sporting event of this magnitude, in addition to the two competing teams (Team Suozzi and Team Legislature) we would have the every present hometown media.
The local writers and commentators would be extolling the virtues of their team. Swirling around this event is the never-ending number of talking heads who feel compelled to offer their expert analysis of the strength and weaknesses of the two teams.
Naturally the game never turns out the way the local media predict, and the so-called independent experts usually miss the target. But that is the way of a sporting event.

The 2007 Nassau County Budget Bowl is somewhat unusual since it doesn’t follow the customary pre-game buildup. Firstly, the Coach, and some would say the only player on Team Suozzi, is auditioning for another job. Clearly Coach Suozzi wants to be anywhere but in Nassau County, this can’t be a comforting fact to his team. But it is a fact nonetheless.
The game can’t begin until the whistle is blown and that won’t happen until Team Suozzi presents the 2007 budget to Team Legislature.

What about the local media supporters of the competing teams? Sad to say but there is only one major media player, Newsday. Out the window goes the scenario of local media rallying around their team. Rather than being like the Super Bowl, this fact makes this game more like the big game between the two hometown high school football teams. Team Suozzi and Team Legislature. The local paper, not willing to be seen as taking sides, would run a series of articles supportive of each team, encouraging the teams to fight hard, but fair, and reminding the teams that is important that good sportsmanship should be the rule of the day. One would have hoped that Newsday would have followed this model and been a voice for reason in the upcoming budget debate.

Newsday seems incapable of being the voice of reason; instead it has chosen sides before the big game and has thrown its support behind Team Suozzi. Since Tom is out of town someone must be the mouthpiece for Team Suozzi.
Into the breach steps Newsday. It is clear from the recent editorial that Newsday has concluded that Team Suozzi does not have the superior arguments in the upcoming budget debate. Therefore if you can’t kill the message, you kill the messenger. In that editorial we clearly see the outline for the Team Suozzi/Newsday strategy in handling the 2007 budget deliberations. Team Legislature as well as the County Comptroller has come under fire from Newsday for daring to raise concerns about the County’s fiscal condition. Newsday seems to find it shocking that the Nassau Legislature and the Nassau Comptroller are stepping up to the line of scrimmage and are prepared to do their job of representing the interests of the citizens of Nassau County. If Team Suozzi/Newsday can’t push the line back, then someone must be blamed and targeted as the fall guy for the failures of Team Suozzi/ Newsday. To that end Newsday has, once again, gone back to the well-worn playbook, and is starting to put forth an argument that the Nassau PBA is the root cause of all the County’s budgetary ills.
Earlier in the year the Nassau PBA had to call Newsday on this type of behavior. We have attempted, once again, to have our voices heard in the op-ed pages of Newsday. Only now we are being told of Newsday policy to limit input from the PBA to four times a year. How convenient for Newsday, and for Team Suozzi. If Newsday really thought that the Nassau PBA was such a negative in the budget deliberations, it would stand to reason that they would encourage public discussion and debate in order to galvanize public support for the budgetary positions set forth by Team Suozzi/Newsday. Clearly, Newsday’s own policy is designed to make this a one sided debate. The Nassau PBA believes that an open and honest discussion of the issues is a critical component of all budget deliberations. We are confident that Team Legislature would welcome this public input. It is clear that Team Suozzi/Newsday can ill afford honest dialogue on this matter, never have and never will. The Nassau PBA will not sit idly by and permit forces that oppose reasoned discussion to control the debate. Once again we are being forced to use other media outlets to get all the facts on the table. We had hoped that after last spring’s confrontation with Newsday that they would have come up with a new playbook. It appears they can’t or won’t.

It's not such a "Loon"y or bird brained idea to designate an official Nassau County Bird! With over a million people, Nassau isn't just pigeons or Canada Geese, and its a nice thing to take time to appreciate that there was an environment here that we still have to share with wildlife.

OK, stop laughing about an official Nassau County Bird and actually vote! Its a great educational tool and we support the Nassau tree swallow over the LI duck any day except Sunday for dinner

enough with the nonence

Whether or not you thought the idea of a County Bird was a "loon"atic idea, there have already been over 10,000 "hits" on the official Nassau County web-ballot! A few feathers weren't ruffled with the idea.