Syracuse New Times
As an artist with a studio in Syracuse I spend four days a week here and am naturally interested in this year's mayoral race. I am appalled at the cluelessness of the major-party candidates. Matt Dribble and Joanie Baloney remind me of The Simpsons' Itchy and Scratchy: cartoon characters fighting for leadership of the status quo, blind to the fact that our city, along with most others in America, will soon be facing serious challenges that make their canned politics an irrelevant spectacle.
Both are lame puppets of outmoded and interchangeable imperial parties that are unconcerned with real people. Those parties have written the tragic script of Syracuse from behind the scenes for too long, with obvious dire results. Just look around.
As stewards of our collective future, politicians should be able to articulate a plan for the long-term sustainability of our local economy and culture. The Republicrat and Demican candidates can barely speak for themselves, relying heavily on prepared statements, out-of-town handlers and packaged advertising. The good old boys they represent have no fresh ideas and no vision beyond different flavors of "business as usual."
However, the next few years promise to be beyond the usual. A looming global energy crisis will cripple every city in America. I'm sure neither candidate has a clue what to do when the 30 percent of people in Syracuse who live below poverty level must turn their thermostats down to 50 degrees this winter so they can still afford food. Also beyond the usual will be the task of running a co-dependent city when federal dollars dry up, going to Iraq or Halliburton instead. Beyond the usual is the necessity for our community to radically redesign its lifestyle and development patterns if it is to be competitive in the future.
Yet I hear nothing beyond the usual from Itchy or Scratchy. They're rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic!
The candidates who are an evolutionary step beyond the usual are the two who have been utterly marginalized, as if there was a conspiracy against an empowered future for Syracuse. Both understand the challenges we will face and are willing to confront them. Green Party candidate Howie Hawkins speaks with authenticity and political awareness, and has been dealing with issues of environment, energy and social equity all his life. He is an elder statesman of the Green movement and an intellect to be respected.
Jake Roberts has genuine vision, and it is shameful he is not better covered by the press. His Web site has solutions that need to be seriously explored. His passion, energy and ideas for Syracuse would ensure its collective future, making it a sustainable and competitive wealth generating regional center.
If Howie is Knowledge, Jake is Love. They are Syracuse's real choices. Matt and Joanie are like a choice between Play-Doh and Silly Putty. And let's face it, the Crunch monkey is an evolutionary step backward--don't fall for a sports team's publicity stunt. If you do, you deserve to live in a banana republic.
As an artist, I would write in Jacob Roberts, because politics seriously lacks love and passion these days, but Howie is a great choice, too. Far from seeing this election as a pathetic and boring affair, I conclude that it is the best opportunity for Syracuse to evolve out of Itchy and Scratchy politics, into a community that makes a choice between two aspects of humanity that really matter, Love and Knowledge. Ultimately I believe that Jake and Howie possess plenty of both, and both will be needed to keep Syracuse afloat as the future unfolds.
~ Rob Marache, Ithaca
EDITOR'S NOTE: Jacob Roberts has recently dropped out of the campaign for the city of Syracuse's mayoral contest.
Posted by syracusegreens at October 12, 2005 02:10 AM