I grew up on Long Island in Hewlett (Nassau) and my dad grew up in Syosset (Nassau). I have been urging media to cover the political landscape on Long Island for years -- it is an extremely complex area. I am a lawyer and have witnessed firsthand the joke that is the justice system in New York. While judges are "elected," voters are not presented with a choice. A judicial candidate cannot simply enter the race -- years of dedicated cronyism is literally a prerequisite (as it is in NYC). For federal and state legislative and executive elections, it is vital to consider that New York is a power-sharing state for all intents and purposes -- meaning, the two parties do not actually have many differences when it comes to policy. The corruption runs deep within both parties. The elected leaders on Long Island exist on a separate plane from the people who live here. Kathleen Rice, a Democrat, was my representative for several years. In 2020 or 2021, she voted "no" on a bill that would have lowered prescription drug costs. I still have her responses to my emails on the topic, both of which merely bash the GOP. Of course, it isn't coincidence that she received PAC money from pharmaceutical companies. I also still have the emails that the head of the NYS Democratic Party sent in 2020 following gains in the state legislature by Democratic Socialists -- you would think they were sent by the GOP. In short, like this country, Long Island has been a one-party region for as long as I can recall. It is a party of deeply ingrained corruption and crime. This is not limited to Long Island -- one only need look to India Walton's election in Buffalo, which she won, only to be overtaken by the state Democratic Party in the general election, wherein they apparently disapproved of voters' primary choice and reran their preferred corporate candidate as a write-in (who did win).
I am 34 years old and cannot speak to NYS and Long Island politics before a certain point. However, my dad is of the mindset -- he has lived here for his entire life. Moreover, my mother's uncle was the chairman of the NYS Commission of Investigation in the 1960s and 70s. I have read and saved all reports and reporting on their findings, which did include elected officials on Long Island. For context, the Commission investigated Fred Trump as part of a major investigation into NYC government corruption. Despite the Commission's extensive findings of criminal activity, it cannot be said that any action was taken to prevent the Trump family from continuing to benefit from their ties to the powers that be. If you look at the history of the Commission, up to and including the Moreland Commission, there is a glaring trend of the state defunding the Commission -- the only semblance of governmental check that I am aware of.
Long Island cannot be viewed as an electoral democracy to the extent that the party in power represents the actual political leanings of its citizenship -- we have never been presented with a choice. Even when a candidate running on change does manage to slip through the cracks, the NYS Democratic Party has and will continue to make sure that candidate does not succeed. There is no local independent media to speak of, which has opened to the door to decades of unchecked corporate propaganda from both parties. There is a New Yorker profile from 2020 about then-County Executive Laura Curran's "successful" response to Covid in Nassau County, a piece that one would expect to run on Fox News had she been a Republican. I find it difficult to imagine a future for Long Island where voters actually have a say in who is on their ballot and who is ultimately elected without major structural changes that the official Democratic Party is not willing to accept.
Are these issues particularly acute on Long Island, though? What social or geographic factors particular to Long Island would result in particularly undemocratic governance? I ask because these issues seem to be widespread - people often talk about national politics in exactly the same terms.
(Also, minorly, I'd aver that someone winning a write-in campaign is pretty strong evidence that voters genuinely prefer them...winning as a write-in is a tall order no matter how much state-party backing or funding one has.)
I can't speak to anywhere other than Long Island and NYC, as those are the only two places I have lived and worked. I certainly don't think this is unique issue -- I just personally have not read or otherwise heard about local/state government as deeply and openly corrupt as I have witnessed here. The issue about the write-in campaign was that India Walton ran as a Democrat in the Democratic primary, and despite fierce opposition from the incumbent and the establishment, she did win. I don't discredit the incumbent's ultimate victory -- I did find the Democratic Party's push to run a different candidate than the one who won the primary (something I have never seen before).
I’m a Long Islander too, born and bred and back after a lengthy stint in NYC. My perspective is that we’re largely happy with our representation, both of the republican and democrat flavors. Too much corruption, sure, but even Mangano was well liked.
Sometimes the lack of alternative candidates and media is the result of suppression by entrenched interests; sometimes it’s because the population isn’t particularly enamored with the alternative ideas in question. Long Island, I think, is the later. Turning Red, definitely. But Trumpism is pretty muted. So is the presence of “in this house we believe” types. Both are present and welcome though. Not a lot of political tension here.
What's so fascinating about Long Island is how different one end (Queens) is from the other (deep Suffolk County). I have not experienced much of Suffolk but often go there for work. From what I've seen, especially and expectedly in the more impoverished areas, there is a huge "Trumpian" population. On the other hand, the Republicans in office in Nassau County, as well as the people that vote for them, are Republican for economic reasons only. As Lisanne mentions below, these Republicans are old school moderates -- I grew up around a lot of people who cared solely about their own personal wealth and maintaining it at all costs. I totally agree with you about the general lack of interest or participation in local politics. There is little to no interest or media coverage of local elections (e.g., George Santos), and I think that's because our leadership operates pretty secretly and without much public controversy. Since it is a "power-sharing" state, we have existed in a quasi-auto pilot political landscape for decades -- nothing really changes. I do think that national politics has brought out the deep-seeded economic inequality that exists here started to radicalize the right once Trump was elected. As a leftist, I have witnessed surges in organizing and significant (relatively speaking) gains in the state legislature. It will be very interesting to see where the political landscape goes from here because I strongly believe the old guard is becoming irrelevant.
I'd love for you guys to send some of those moderate Republicans to us here in New York City. You should see the freaks and jokers the Republicans put up in opposition to the establishment Democrats. They haven't been able to win with second-rate candidates, so they've given up, and now the freaks are all they've got to keep the ballot line warm. I'm a liberal Democrat and am dying for an alternative, just to try to enforce some semblance of accountability on the corrupt Brooklyn machine politicians that run Albany (badly) on behalf of everyone else in the state.
Simple. Bloomberg is a (highly competent) corporate Democrat who paid the sad-sack local Republican Party to use their ballot line, so he wouldn't have to face a Democratic primary.
Exactly! It certainly seems like NY politicians function more like a corporate one-party state than actual representatives of voters. The emails I have received from the NYS Democratic Party bashing the leftist wing of their own party contain more vitriol and stark political opposition than anything I've witnessed between the two parties. Ultimately, I think the AOC defeat of Crowley will prove to be a major turning point in NYS politics because it brought the forefront the fact that the Democratic Party does not walk the walk.
It is truly wild how impactful the Brooklyn Democratic machine has been over the entire state's political landscape and history. The leaders and participants of this machine were a large focus of the State's Investigatory Commission work during the 60s and 70s. People like Abe Beame and Bunny Lindenbaum played major roles in Trump's rise to power. Most of my cases have been in Brooklyn Supreme Court (the trial court) and there is a lawyer's lounge (a decrepit room with a table) where the Democratic machinery is in full force, at least when it comes to the judiciary. Needless to say, I have become quite disillusioned with the justice system.
It's noteworthy that this same political machine has control of the leadership of both Assembly and Senate in Albany, and that they are gerrymandered in so tight that the local red wave in the last election didn't make a dent in their supermajority. The Congressional map was drawn by a special master, and guess what? Some Republicans won! Accountability! Imagine that!
I think there's a class conflict in the crime issue as well. Not in an upper vs. lower class way, but a feeling that the merchant class (whether it's a huge chain store or a mom-and-pop operation) is being victimized while the culture class (e.g. writers, social media activists, politicians) either ignores these problems or even secretly enjoys them. The merchant class can be roughly defined as having lots of money but little cultural power, while the culture class is vice versa (unless you're some big superstar). The merchant class generally sees the culture class as self-absorbed snowflakes while the culture class sees the merchant class as soulless boring money-grubbers, so there's a natural antagonism built into their relationship.
You're missing the point on the importance of the crime issue to people who don't even live where it is happening. The issue is not crime itself, but the dismissive and contemptuous attitude of the (unaccountable) legislators who run the state towards public concern about crime. They like to speak of crime impersonally, as being caused (tautologically) by "root causes" instead of criminals. In this way they release themselves from responsibility for assuring public safety. This is offensive in itself, and is also a warning bell that if crime does start to develop momentum, this government has no intention of doing anything to stop it. A lot of people, and especially older people, aren't buying this. We remember exactly how it was in 1990, and the role of slack and dismissive governance in causing that problem, and we do not intend to go back there. No.
100%. The actual "root cause" of crime is the failure of local and state government act as advocates of their constituents (their actual job) by doing what they can to ensure access to basic social services. They also live behind closed doors without fear of actually facing accountability. I HIGHLY recommend this book, which is an incredible insider's accounting of his experience in NYS govt https://www.amazon.com/Three-Men-Room-Betrayal-Statehouse/dp/1595580328
My favorite book about Suffolk is Jimmy the King by Gus Acosta-Roberts, a former Newsday Reporter, about the other kind of crime: a dirty cop running the county.
One thing to also consider - most Long Island Republicans are basically the old school moderates, pretty much like old school moderate Democrats. Both Bruce Blakeman and Ed Romaine care about the environment and are responsible and not crazy at all. They are great retail politicians. They visit senior citizens at their homes and at the local Senior Center or VFW halls. They and their colleagues are woven into the community by many years of public service. Democrats, on the other hand, have no outreach, very little civic engagement and a completely broken local party system. I blame the local party leaders who have used the last few patronage jobs to benefit their friends and have basically gutted the Democratic Party - especially in Nassau County. A few two star generals and no army whatsoever. And they are ok with that because they still can make their friends judges and have titles like Chairman of the Board of Elections. I cannot even imagine how to rebuild from scratch an actual functioning Democratic Party - especially in Nassau. The current Republican Party in Nassau will likely be in power for the next fifty years unless something drastic changes.
It's a little too convenient to compare murders and shootings only to last year. While it is nice that things are trending in the right direction, we're still on track for murder to be up about 20% from 2017 and shootings up more than 50%. That is a big deal. To say nothing of all of the fact that felony assault is up again, and everyone can see the much greater levels of disorder resulting from the new refusal to take lower level crime and antisocial behavior seriously.
"Fears of crime—genuine, in a period where the murder rate would start to skyrocket—mingled with the openly racist view that a new people were bringing new problems with them." Very woke of you, it's easy to call people racist these days. But the racial breakdown of crime statistics inconveniently confirms that this "view" was accurate--then and now. Canarsie only became a (relatively) stable, middle class Afro-Caribbean community only after becoming a dramatically more dangerous and crime-ridden place than it had been previously.
Furthermore, everyone remembers how recently many prominent Democratic politicians in New York City were proudly endorsing abolish-police-and-prison lunacy. My reps all still feel that way even if they are quieter about it now.
If you read Rieder's book, you will find both a sympathetic portrayal of the people of Canarsie *and* absolutely, unfiltered racism. He captures it all.
I have read Rieder's book. I never said no one in Canarsie was racist and I have no doubt plenty were. What I reject is your contention that the observation of the racial demographics of crime is ipso facto racist..
A more interesting question is what makes Westchester County(or SW Connecticut for that matter) different from Long Island? I have a couple of thoughts. A mixture of older industrial cities(Yonkers, Mount Vernon, White Plains, Port Chester) along with residential suburbs. The fact the the county is part of the Northeastern Megapolis length wise so density doesn't really decrease that much even as one approaches the state line between Port Chester and Greenwich, CT? Influence of New England political culture seeping in from Connecticut?
In Westchester (pop 1mil) there were 119 opioid overdose deaths in 2020; in Nassau co. (pop 1.4mil) 356 overdose deaths in Suffolk County (pop 1.5mil) 937. I don't think opioids are the problem I think they point to the problem, Nassau and Suffolk are insular, downwardly mobile and more despairing. They're not places of great hope.
I remember there was a segment in the last episode of New York: A Documentary Film by Ric Burns with Ray Suarez talking about Long Islanders reactions to the 1975 fiscal crisis. He said that, despite the fact that many of them were born in the city and grew up there, they were delighted to hear Ford tell them to drop dead. He never expanded on the psychology of someone who felt that way and I wish he had. This post scratches that itch a little and that book on Canarsie I guess, but that generation is still alive and I’d be curious to hear about why they have such little attachment to the place that is so central to their culture and identity. I mean, I have my answers to those questions about them but I’d be interested in their side of it. My parents are among them but they never developed that kind of hostility to the city. Thomas Campanella’s book, Brooklyn: The Once and Future City makes the claim that the 1898 consolidation had an enormous impact on the self-esteem of the outer-borough residents and that white-flight was primed in those places by a kind of self-loathing that came from being in the shadow of Manhattan.
To a significant degree, "white flight" is a euphemism. "Driven out" might be more accurate. New York City lost two million white former residents during the 1970's, over 25% of the white population. Many of them left because their homes became untenable due to crime, racial turmoil, fiscal collapse, and governmental incapacity and indifference to their basic needs. It was exhaustively reported at the time. This might somehow have a relationship to the bitter suburban mindset. Just might.
Ask and you shall receive! Thanks. You're rather glib button gave me the impression that you felt my take was naive and judgmental. I can see how it came off that way, sorry about that. I'm going to have to stand firm on 'white flight' though. There are points of view that have emerged since then that perhaps challenge the prevailing wisdom of the reports of that time. Structural things that may have encouraged whatever you mean by 'racial turmoil' but I see what you're saying. That certainly strikes me as the perspective of someone who lived through it. Maybe, more than the bitterness, I'm most curious about why the reaction didn't seem to be, I don't know, mournful. Sad about their old home coming under such strain. Did many of them always hate 'the city'? Was it always many of their ambition to 'get out'? Was there truly nothing left for them to love about it and remember with fondness? Since you seem to have a point of view about it I'd be curious to hear it.
I think there was great sadness, indeed, grief, in people who lost their homes and their neighborhoods this way. Jim Sleeper recounts going with a big burly guy to his old neighborhood in Brooklyn, and how he cried when he saw the deterioration, the trash and the social disorder occupying the place where his community and his youthful memories had been. To me this a missing strand in what we in New York City would call "the typical Long Island attitude." I see it as more defensive than aggressive.
I'd be interested in knowing what points of view that challenge the wisdom of time you have in mind, and in what way they challenge it. In recent years, I have learned to look at revisionism in this area with a high degree of skepticism. There are powerful institutional motivations to revise and politicize narratives that don't need revising: nobody gets tenure or a book contract by doing meticulous research that confirms and enriches existing knowledge. Most of what's produced in this area is not worth a nickel. It goes double for pieces that appear in the press.
There is now (finally) history being written that seeks to go beyond the black civil rights/militant struggle/white racist resistance narrative that is a monoculture in our time. I have known many contemporaries who grew up in northeastern cities and all of them have had experiences that simply aren't reflected in the discourse. These experiences have been erased in the younger generation and replaced with blameful abstract stereotypes. It's a pity, as the era is rich in contemporary literature so deeply researched as to be essentially original sources (Anthony Lukas, Jim Sleeper, Ken Auletta, to name three). These are not newspaper articles or opinion pieces.
Here is something structural to think about: as whites began to move out of New York in the Sixties, a million migrants from the South and from Puerto Rico were coming in. The City's low-skill economy was starting to fail, and there weren't jobs for many of them, but New York City had rather generous public welfare payments that exceeded what the migrants could make by working back home. The result was ballooning social service costs which the city's politicians rolled over (with all their other overspending) in short-term notes until the market collapsed and the City went bankrupt. Which made the City difficult to live in for everybody.
Lukas’ book “Common Ground” is monumentally good. The lazy stereotypes and calling people racist here by Barkan is unusually poor. Lukas was heroic in not taking the easy narrative and telling it like it was during that time period.
I was not familiar with those writers. Glad to know them. And look, I know we’re having a classic prickly internet discussion here, and personally, I don’t like those very much. I really don’t see the point in a couple of intransigents shadow boxing. But I will say this: the structural point that I see is a city that benefitted greatly from federal funding in the New Deal and the war. When that money dried up and the city ran deficits, it was around the time that new waves of migration, as you say from the south and Puerto Rico, arrived (which correlates with the filth and disorder that you lament and, man, you’ve just gotta know what that sounds like). The scholarship that you’re skeptical and dismissive of quite simply points out that the people you accuse of running the city into the ground (or the people for whom the city was run into the ground for, or something) had limited access to the GI Bill, to decent housing (or even mortgages), and many opportunities for career advancement. Deliberate generational material deprivation in living memory. And, unless you’re talking about foreclosures, most people, as I understand it, didn’t loose their homes, they sold them. And hey, I’m with Ross, I think the class angle on these narratives are neglected. They went where these migrants could not follow, for all kinds of reasons. That’s my piece. But I am curious about those writers and I’ll have to take a good look at them.
I don't feel prickly at all about you or this conversation at all, and I'm sorry that my tone has made you feel that it has been that way. I have emotion with me, because I feel that historical memory and understanding is being sidelined for crude political reasons. But there is nothing personal in that.
I feel that your framework is an aspirational one that doesn't fit the historical facts very well. For one thing,, New York City was receiving geysers of Federal money in this period. Local politicians exploited this by demanding more and more Federal aid to cover the deficits that they would not discipline themselves to stop running. It was a liberal time with good intentions, until the merry-go-round stopped.
The flow of middle-class people to the suburbs was real, but much smaller through the Sixties than the exodus in the Seventies, which included working class people who were upended from their rooted communities just a few years. Many lost almost all their housing equity as property values crashed. At this time, the City also decided to prioritize open spaces in the city's public housing for those "most in need" which in practice meant the most disorganized, incapable families. The projects, which had been stable working-class communities, rapidly became a byword for crime and social disorder, and the former inhabitants joined the exodus.
I don't think you can wave these very specific facts away with reference to the GI Bill, redlining or highway displacements, which happened a whole generation earlier. Those basically function as a grab-bag of grievances with no relation to any causal model of how this specific event happened. It's not political and it's not a matter of blame on one group or another. I'm just trying to put the whole story on the table.
“Getting out” of the city was always a dream for many, sure. I think you’re confusing the upper class playground of today with the poorer and more messy city of the 70s. My grandparents all lived in NYC until they got married and then moved to Queens (and eventually Nassau) once the kids were born. That was back in the 40s and 50s, though. The urge to leave got stronger in the next two decades.
Raising kids in the city was not a wonderful prospect in any of these decades unless you were wealthy, and the issues Rock_M raise exacerbated that fact enormously. Not much has changed in that respect - my wife and I decamped for Long Island when our first child was born.
You’re examining the attitude of NYC emigrants in a way more black and white way than I ever heard from those generations or mine. In my experience some people liked the city, some people were thrilled to get out, few if any regretted the move (including me and my wife). It’s better here.
I’ve never heard anyone here on Long Island be “delighted” by bad news or whatever from NYC. I don’t know where that’s coming from. Problems in the city tend to work their way out here, so bad news for them is often bad news for us. I haven’t seen it, but that portion of the documentary you cited seems dubious.
Our general attitude towards NYC politics has been adequately explained and explored in these comments. We’ve got our own thing going and intend to keep it that way. NYC, though, is a behemoth, and fighting it on any issue is tremendously difficult. To pick on example, the rest of the state - not just LI - is, on the whole, not onboard with massively increasing housing density. Getting that heard above the NYC activist class, though, is almost impossible. NYC is to Long Island and Upstate as the United States is to Puerto Rico. If it wants us to change something we don’t want we’ve got an uphill battle ahead of us.
Well that’s the thing, Suarez’s account was very offhand and brief, which is why I was curious to hear from people who experienced it. And voila! Here they are. I’m sure there’s a lot of nuance to the perspective of people who chose suburban life. I was just curious about attitudes towards it at it’s lowest point.
My mom grew up in Queens and my dad in Nassau -- they both worked in NYC for the duration of their careers and lived on Long Island since 1988. For context they were born in 1955 and 1956. The only time I recall hearing of some type of animosity towards Manhattan from those in the outer boroughs is when the media tries to create a narrative of Trump's psychology.
As an aside, I would be curious to know more about your parents' experiences (if you're comfortable). The demographics of Nassau County and NYC have changed so often throughout the past century that even tiny segments of Queens and Brooklyn change from year to year. Specifically when it comes to the economy -- I personally do not know anyone who can afford to lives in Manhattan, and it seems that Brooklyn is following quickly.
With a hometown newspaper like the NEW YORK Post....
I think that paper has done more to spread fear of crime than any other local media outlet. I know otherwise intelligent people who rely on the Post for their news either directly or through their are website or through social media clicks. The Post punches way above its circulation weight which is highly unfortunate.
If you rely on the Post, you'll think there's a mugger on every street and you're only too glad to spread your fear and gloom to anyone who will listen.
Just because it's in the Post (and also the Daily News) doesn't mean it's not happening. It's not like they are making this stuff up. Who would you prefer to get your news from? The Times has showcased a lot of worthy opinions about crime, but can't be bothered to do any actual reporting even of what's going on literally outside their doors on 8th Avenue. Their so-called reporters barely have to get up from their desks. They could try talking to some cops once in a while. Where else is the information going to come from? The Citizen app?
The lack of independent local journalism is a mystery to me. I have to imagine it has something to do with the cost of operating in competition with the Times, but the history of local journalism in NYC and Long Island is definitely something I want to know more about and how to go about changing that.
I grew up on Long Island in Hewlett (Nassau) and my dad grew up in Syosset (Nassau). I have been urging media to cover the political landscape on Long Island for years -- it is an extremely complex area. I am a lawyer and have witnessed firsthand the joke that is the justice system in New York. While judges are "elected," voters are not presented with a choice. A judicial candidate cannot simply enter the race -- years of dedicated cronyism is literally a prerequisite (as it is in NYC). For federal and state legislative and executive elections, it is vital to consider that New York is a power-sharing state for all intents and purposes -- meaning, the two parties do not actually have many differences when it comes to policy. The corruption runs deep within both parties. The elected leaders on Long Island exist on a separate plane from the people who live here. Kathleen Rice, a Democrat, was my representative for several years. In 2020 or 2021, she voted "no" on a bill that would have lowered prescription drug costs. I still have her responses to my emails on the topic, both of which merely bash the GOP. Of course, it isn't coincidence that she received PAC money from pharmaceutical companies. I also still have the emails that the head of the NYS Democratic Party sent in 2020 following gains in the state legislature by Democratic Socialists -- you would think they were sent by the GOP. In short, like this country, Long Island has been a one-party region for as long as I can recall. It is a party of deeply ingrained corruption and crime. This is not limited to Long Island -- one only need look to India Walton's election in Buffalo, which she won, only to be overtaken by the state Democratic Party in the general election, wherein they apparently disapproved of voters' primary choice and reran their preferred corporate candidate as a write-in (who did win).
I am 34 years old and cannot speak to NYS and Long Island politics before a certain point. However, my dad is of the mindset -- he has lived here for his entire life. Moreover, my mother's uncle was the chairman of the NYS Commission of Investigation in the 1960s and 70s. I have read and saved all reports and reporting on their findings, which did include elected officials on Long Island. For context, the Commission investigated Fred Trump as part of a major investigation into NYC government corruption. Despite the Commission's extensive findings of criminal activity, it cannot be said that any action was taken to prevent the Trump family from continuing to benefit from their ties to the powers that be. If you look at the history of the Commission, up to and including the Moreland Commission, there is a glaring trend of the state defunding the Commission -- the only semblance of governmental check that I am aware of.
Long Island cannot be viewed as an electoral democracy to the extent that the party in power represents the actual political leanings of its citizenship -- we have never been presented with a choice. Even when a candidate running on change does manage to slip through the cracks, the NYS Democratic Party has and will continue to make sure that candidate does not succeed. There is no local independent media to speak of, which has opened to the door to decades of unchecked corporate propaganda from both parties. There is a New Yorker profile from 2020 about then-County Executive Laura Curran's "successful" response to Covid in Nassau County, a piece that one would expect to run on Fox News had she been a Republican. I find it difficult to imagine a future for Long Island where voters actually have a say in who is on their ballot and who is ultimately elected without major structural changes that the official Democratic Party is not willing to accept.
Are these issues particularly acute on Long Island, though? What social or geographic factors particular to Long Island would result in particularly undemocratic governance? I ask because these issues seem to be widespread - people often talk about national politics in exactly the same terms.
(Also, minorly, I'd aver that someone winning a write-in campaign is pretty strong evidence that voters genuinely prefer them...winning as a write-in is a tall order no matter how much state-party backing or funding one has.)
Just for further clarification, this piece basically expresses more clearly why it is my impression that these issues are particularly acute on LI -- https://medium.com/the-long-island-advocate/a-tale-of-two-communities-housing-segregation-on-long-island-1bc2f710483c
I can't speak to anywhere other than Long Island and NYC, as those are the only two places I have lived and worked. I certainly don't think this is unique issue -- I just personally have not read or otherwise heard about local/state government as deeply and openly corrupt as I have witnessed here. The issue about the write-in campaign was that India Walton ran as a Democrat in the Democratic primary, and despite fierce opposition from the incumbent and the establishment, she did win. I don't discredit the incumbent's ultimate victory -- I did find the Democratic Party's push to run a different candidate than the one who won the primary (something I have never seen before).
I’m a Long Islander too, born and bred and back after a lengthy stint in NYC. My perspective is that we’re largely happy with our representation, both of the republican and democrat flavors. Too much corruption, sure, but even Mangano was well liked.
Sometimes the lack of alternative candidates and media is the result of suppression by entrenched interests; sometimes it’s because the population isn’t particularly enamored with the alternative ideas in question. Long Island, I think, is the later. Turning Red, definitely. But Trumpism is pretty muted. So is the presence of “in this house we believe” types. Both are present and welcome though. Not a lot of political tension here.
What's so fascinating about Long Island is how different one end (Queens) is from the other (deep Suffolk County). I have not experienced much of Suffolk but often go there for work. From what I've seen, especially and expectedly in the more impoverished areas, there is a huge "Trumpian" population. On the other hand, the Republicans in office in Nassau County, as well as the people that vote for them, are Republican for economic reasons only. As Lisanne mentions below, these Republicans are old school moderates -- I grew up around a lot of people who cared solely about their own personal wealth and maintaining it at all costs. I totally agree with you about the general lack of interest or participation in local politics. There is little to no interest or media coverage of local elections (e.g., George Santos), and I think that's because our leadership operates pretty secretly and without much public controversy. Since it is a "power-sharing" state, we have existed in a quasi-auto pilot political landscape for decades -- nothing really changes. I do think that national politics has brought out the deep-seeded economic inequality that exists here started to radicalize the right once Trump was elected. As a leftist, I have witnessed surges in organizing and significant (relatively speaking) gains in the state legislature. It will be very interesting to see where the political landscape goes from here because I strongly believe the old guard is becoming irrelevant.
I'd love for you guys to send some of those moderate Republicans to us here in New York City. You should see the freaks and jokers the Republicans put up in opposition to the establishment Democrats. They haven't been able to win with second-rate candidates, so they've given up, and now the freaks are all they've got to keep the ballot line warm. I'm a liberal Democrat and am dying for an alternative, just to try to enforce some semblance of accountability on the corrupt Brooklyn machine politicians that run Albany (badly) on behalf of everyone else in the state.
Also worth mentioning is how meaningless party affiliation is when it comes to NYC mayor -- for instance, wtf is Bloomberg?
Simple. Bloomberg is a (highly competent) corporate Democrat who paid the sad-sack local Republican Party to use their ballot line, so he wouldn't have to face a Democratic primary.
Exactly! It certainly seems like NY politicians function more like a corporate one-party state than actual representatives of voters. The emails I have received from the NYS Democratic Party bashing the leftist wing of their own party contain more vitriol and stark political opposition than anything I've witnessed between the two parties. Ultimately, I think the AOC defeat of Crowley will prove to be a major turning point in NYS politics because it brought the forefront the fact that the Democratic Party does not walk the walk.
It is truly wild how impactful the Brooklyn Democratic machine has been over the entire state's political landscape and history. The leaders and participants of this machine were a large focus of the State's Investigatory Commission work during the 60s and 70s. People like Abe Beame and Bunny Lindenbaum played major roles in Trump's rise to power. Most of my cases have been in Brooklyn Supreme Court (the trial court) and there is a lawyer's lounge (a decrepit room with a table) where the Democratic machinery is in full force, at least when it comes to the judiciary. Needless to say, I have become quite disillusioned with the justice system.
It's noteworthy that this same political machine has control of the leadership of both Assembly and Senate in Albany, and that they are gerrymandered in so tight that the local red wave in the last election didn't make a dent in their supermajority. The Congressional map was drawn by a special master, and guess what? Some Republicans won! Accountability! Imagine that!
Yup! I cannot find where I posted this but just in case it wasn't in response to one of your comments I want to highly rec this book https://www.amazon.com/Three-Men-Room-Betrayal-Statehouse/dp/1595580328
I think there's a class conflict in the crime issue as well. Not in an upper vs. lower class way, but a feeling that the merchant class (whether it's a huge chain store or a mom-and-pop operation) is being victimized while the culture class (e.g. writers, social media activists, politicians) either ignores these problems or even secretly enjoys them. The merchant class can be roughly defined as having lots of money but little cultural power, while the culture class is vice versa (unless you're some big superstar). The merchant class generally sees the culture class as self-absorbed snowflakes while the culture class sees the merchant class as soulless boring money-grubbers, so there's a natural antagonism built into their relationship.
This former Bellmore guy really enjoys your hyperlocal coverage.
You're missing the point on the importance of the crime issue to people who don't even live where it is happening. The issue is not crime itself, but the dismissive and contemptuous attitude of the (unaccountable) legislators who run the state towards public concern about crime. They like to speak of crime impersonally, as being caused (tautologically) by "root causes" instead of criminals. In this way they release themselves from responsibility for assuring public safety. This is offensive in itself, and is also a warning bell that if crime does start to develop momentum, this government has no intention of doing anything to stop it. A lot of people, and especially older people, aren't buying this. We remember exactly how it was in 1990, and the role of slack and dismissive governance in causing that problem, and we do not intend to go back there. No.
100%. The actual "root cause" of crime is the failure of local and state government act as advocates of their constituents (their actual job) by doing what they can to ensure access to basic social services. They also live behind closed doors without fear of actually facing accountability. I HIGHLY recommend this book, which is an incredible insider's accounting of his experience in NYS govt https://www.amazon.com/Three-Men-Room-Betrayal-Statehouse/dp/1595580328
My favorite book about Suffolk is Jimmy the King by Gus Acosta-Roberts, a former Newsday Reporter, about the other kind of crime: a dirty cop running the county.
Did that have anything to do with the Long Island serial killer? There is a Discovery podcast about the investigation and the involvement of Suffolk County officials, inc the County Exec. It's a fascinating and disturbing story but well worth the listen -- https://www.investigationdiscovery.com/crimefeed/podcasts/unraveled--long-island-serial-killer
Yes it does. The serial killer stuff is part of the book, but only a part.
You'd think it'd be bigger news given the size of the Suffolk County police dept!
One thing to also consider - most Long Island Republicans are basically the old school moderates, pretty much like old school moderate Democrats. Both Bruce Blakeman and Ed Romaine care about the environment and are responsible and not crazy at all. They are great retail politicians. They visit senior citizens at their homes and at the local Senior Center or VFW halls. They and their colleagues are woven into the community by many years of public service. Democrats, on the other hand, have no outreach, very little civic engagement and a completely broken local party system. I blame the local party leaders who have used the last few patronage jobs to benefit their friends and have basically gutted the Democratic Party - especially in Nassau County. A few two star generals and no army whatsoever. And they are ok with that because they still can make their friends judges and have titles like Chairman of the Board of Elections. I cannot even imagine how to rebuild from scratch an actual functioning Democratic Party - especially in Nassau. The current Republican Party in Nassau will likely be in power for the next fifty years unless something drastic changes.
YES -- well put!
It's a little too convenient to compare murders and shootings only to last year. While it is nice that things are trending in the right direction, we're still on track for murder to be up about 20% from 2017 and shootings up more than 50%. That is a big deal. To say nothing of all of the fact that felony assault is up again, and everyone can see the much greater levels of disorder resulting from the new refusal to take lower level crime and antisocial behavior seriously.
"Fears of crime—genuine, in a period where the murder rate would start to skyrocket—mingled with the openly racist view that a new people were bringing new problems with them." Very woke of you, it's easy to call people racist these days. But the racial breakdown of crime statistics inconveniently confirms that this "view" was accurate--then and now. Canarsie only became a (relatively) stable, middle class Afro-Caribbean community only after becoming a dramatically more dangerous and crime-ridden place than it had been previously.
Furthermore, everyone remembers how recently many prominent Democratic politicians in New York City were proudly endorsing abolish-police-and-prison lunacy. My reps all still feel that way even if they are quieter about it now.
If you read Rieder's book, you will find both a sympathetic portrayal of the people of Canarsie *and* absolutely, unfiltered racism. He captures it all.
I have read Rieder's book. I never said no one in Canarsie was racist and I have no doubt plenty were. What I reject is your contention that the observation of the racial demographics of crime is ipso facto racist..
A more interesting question is what makes Westchester County(or SW Connecticut for that matter) different from Long Island? I have a couple of thoughts. A mixture of older industrial cities(Yonkers, Mount Vernon, White Plains, Port Chester) along with residential suburbs. The fact the the county is part of the Northeastern Megapolis length wise so density doesn't really decrease that much even as one approaches the state line between Port Chester and Greenwich, CT? Influence of New England political culture seeping in from Connecticut?
In Westchester (pop 1mil) there were 119 opioid overdose deaths in 2020; in Nassau co. (pop 1.4mil) 356 overdose deaths in Suffolk County (pop 1.5mil) 937. I don't think opioids are the problem I think they point to the problem, Nassau and Suffolk are insular, downwardly mobile and more despairing. They're not places of great hope.
I remember there was a segment in the last episode of New York: A Documentary Film by Ric Burns with Ray Suarez talking about Long Islanders reactions to the 1975 fiscal crisis. He said that, despite the fact that many of them were born in the city and grew up there, they were delighted to hear Ford tell them to drop dead. He never expanded on the psychology of someone who felt that way and I wish he had. This post scratches that itch a little and that book on Canarsie I guess, but that generation is still alive and I’d be curious to hear about why they have such little attachment to the place that is so central to their culture and identity. I mean, I have my answers to those questions about them but I’d be interested in their side of it. My parents are among them but they never developed that kind of hostility to the city. Thomas Campanella’s book, Brooklyn: The Once and Future City makes the claim that the 1898 consolidation had an enormous impact on the self-esteem of the outer-borough residents and that white-flight was primed in those places by a kind of self-loathing that came from being in the shadow of Manhattan.
To a significant degree, "white flight" is a euphemism. "Driven out" might be more accurate. New York City lost two million white former residents during the 1970's, over 25% of the white population. Many of them left because their homes became untenable due to crime, racial turmoil, fiscal collapse, and governmental incapacity and indifference to their basic needs. It was exhaustively reported at the time. This might somehow have a relationship to the bitter suburban mindset. Just might.
Ask and you shall receive! Thanks. You're rather glib button gave me the impression that you felt my take was naive and judgmental. I can see how it came off that way, sorry about that. I'm going to have to stand firm on 'white flight' though. There are points of view that have emerged since then that perhaps challenge the prevailing wisdom of the reports of that time. Structural things that may have encouraged whatever you mean by 'racial turmoil' but I see what you're saying. That certainly strikes me as the perspective of someone who lived through it. Maybe, more than the bitterness, I'm most curious about why the reaction didn't seem to be, I don't know, mournful. Sad about their old home coming under such strain. Did many of them always hate 'the city'? Was it always many of their ambition to 'get out'? Was there truly nothing left for them to love about it and remember with fondness? Since you seem to have a point of view about it I'd be curious to hear it.
I think there was great sadness, indeed, grief, in people who lost their homes and their neighborhoods this way. Jim Sleeper recounts going with a big burly guy to his old neighborhood in Brooklyn, and how he cried when he saw the deterioration, the trash and the social disorder occupying the place where his community and his youthful memories had been. To me this a missing strand in what we in New York City would call "the typical Long Island attitude." I see it as more defensive than aggressive.
I'd be interested in knowing what points of view that challenge the wisdom of time you have in mind, and in what way they challenge it. In recent years, I have learned to look at revisionism in this area with a high degree of skepticism. There are powerful institutional motivations to revise and politicize narratives that don't need revising: nobody gets tenure or a book contract by doing meticulous research that confirms and enriches existing knowledge. Most of what's produced in this area is not worth a nickel. It goes double for pieces that appear in the press.
There is now (finally) history being written that seeks to go beyond the black civil rights/militant struggle/white racist resistance narrative that is a monoculture in our time. I have known many contemporaries who grew up in northeastern cities and all of them have had experiences that simply aren't reflected in the discourse. These experiences have been erased in the younger generation and replaced with blameful abstract stereotypes. It's a pity, as the era is rich in contemporary literature so deeply researched as to be essentially original sources (Anthony Lukas, Jim Sleeper, Ken Auletta, to name three). These are not newspaper articles or opinion pieces.
Here is something structural to think about: as whites began to move out of New York in the Sixties, a million migrants from the South and from Puerto Rico were coming in. The City's low-skill economy was starting to fail, and there weren't jobs for many of them, but New York City had rather generous public welfare payments that exceeded what the migrants could make by working back home. The result was ballooning social service costs which the city's politicians rolled over (with all their other overspending) in short-term notes until the market collapsed and the City went bankrupt. Which made the City difficult to live in for everybody.
Lukas’ book “Common Ground” is monumentally good. The lazy stereotypes and calling people racist here by Barkan is unusually poor. Lukas was heroic in not taking the easy narrative and telling it like it was during that time period.
I was not familiar with those writers. Glad to know them. And look, I know we’re having a classic prickly internet discussion here, and personally, I don’t like those very much. I really don’t see the point in a couple of intransigents shadow boxing. But I will say this: the structural point that I see is a city that benefitted greatly from federal funding in the New Deal and the war. When that money dried up and the city ran deficits, it was around the time that new waves of migration, as you say from the south and Puerto Rico, arrived (which correlates with the filth and disorder that you lament and, man, you’ve just gotta know what that sounds like). The scholarship that you’re skeptical and dismissive of quite simply points out that the people you accuse of running the city into the ground (or the people for whom the city was run into the ground for, or something) had limited access to the GI Bill, to decent housing (or even mortgages), and many opportunities for career advancement. Deliberate generational material deprivation in living memory. And, unless you’re talking about foreclosures, most people, as I understand it, didn’t loose their homes, they sold them. And hey, I’m with Ross, I think the class angle on these narratives are neglected. They went where these migrants could not follow, for all kinds of reasons. That’s my piece. But I am curious about those writers and I’ll have to take a good look at them.
I don't feel prickly at all about you or this conversation at all, and I'm sorry that my tone has made you feel that it has been that way. I have emotion with me, because I feel that historical memory and understanding is being sidelined for crude political reasons. But there is nothing personal in that.
I feel that your framework is an aspirational one that doesn't fit the historical facts very well. For one thing,, New York City was receiving geysers of Federal money in this period. Local politicians exploited this by demanding more and more Federal aid to cover the deficits that they would not discipline themselves to stop running. It was a liberal time with good intentions, until the merry-go-round stopped.
The flow of middle-class people to the suburbs was real, but much smaller through the Sixties than the exodus in the Seventies, which included working class people who were upended from their rooted communities just a few years. Many lost almost all their housing equity as property values crashed. At this time, the City also decided to prioritize open spaces in the city's public housing for those "most in need" which in practice meant the most disorganized, incapable families. The projects, which had been stable working-class communities, rapidly became a byword for crime and social disorder, and the former inhabitants joined the exodus.
I don't think you can wave these very specific facts away with reference to the GI Bill, redlining or highway displacements, which happened a whole generation earlier. Those basically function as a grab-bag of grievances with no relation to any causal model of how this specific event happened. It's not political and it's not a matter of blame on one group or another. I'm just trying to put the whole story on the table.
“Getting out” of the city was always a dream for many, sure. I think you’re confusing the upper class playground of today with the poorer and more messy city of the 70s. My grandparents all lived in NYC until they got married and then moved to Queens (and eventually Nassau) once the kids were born. That was back in the 40s and 50s, though. The urge to leave got stronger in the next two decades.
Raising kids in the city was not a wonderful prospect in any of these decades unless you were wealthy, and the issues Rock_M raise exacerbated that fact enormously. Not much has changed in that respect - my wife and I decamped for Long Island when our first child was born.
You’re examining the attitude of NYC emigrants in a way more black and white way than I ever heard from those generations or mine. In my experience some people liked the city, some people were thrilled to get out, few if any regretted the move (including me and my wife). It’s better here.
I’ve never heard anyone here on Long Island be “delighted” by bad news or whatever from NYC. I don’t know where that’s coming from. Problems in the city tend to work their way out here, so bad news for them is often bad news for us. I haven’t seen it, but that portion of the documentary you cited seems dubious.
Our general attitude towards NYC politics has been adequately explained and explored in these comments. We’ve got our own thing going and intend to keep it that way. NYC, though, is a behemoth, and fighting it on any issue is tremendously difficult. To pick on example, the rest of the state - not just LI - is, on the whole, not onboard with massively increasing housing density. Getting that heard above the NYC activist class, though, is almost impossible. NYC is to Long Island and Upstate as the United States is to Puerto Rico. If it wants us to change something we don’t want we’ve got an uphill battle ahead of us.
Well that’s the thing, Suarez’s account was very offhand and brief, which is why I was curious to hear from people who experienced it. And voila! Here they are. I’m sure there’s a lot of nuance to the perspective of people who chose suburban life. I was just curious about attitudes towards it at it’s lowest point.
My mom grew up in Queens and my dad in Nassau -- they both worked in NYC for the duration of their careers and lived on Long Island since 1988. For context they were born in 1955 and 1956. The only time I recall hearing of some type of animosity towards Manhattan from those in the outer boroughs is when the media tries to create a narrative of Trump's psychology.
As an aside, I would be curious to know more about your parents' experiences (if you're comfortable). The demographics of Nassau County and NYC have changed so often throughout the past century that even tiny segments of Queens and Brooklyn change from year to year. Specifically when it comes to the economy -- I personally do not know anyone who can afford to lives in Manhattan, and it seems that Brooklyn is following quickly.
With a hometown newspaper like the NEW YORK Post....
I think that paper has done more to spread fear of crime than any other local media outlet. I know otherwise intelligent people who rely on the Post for their news either directly or through their are website or through social media clicks. The Post punches way above its circulation weight which is highly unfortunate.
If you rely on the Post, you'll think there's a mugger on every street and you're only too glad to spread your fear and gloom to anyone who will listen.
But, they do have the best sports section.
Just because it's in the Post (and also the Daily News) doesn't mean it's not happening. It's not like they are making this stuff up. Who would you prefer to get your news from? The Times has showcased a lot of worthy opinions about crime, but can't be bothered to do any actual reporting even of what's going on literally outside their doors on 8th Avenue. Their so-called reporters barely have to get up from their desks. They could try talking to some cops once in a while. Where else is the information going to come from? The Citizen app?
The lack of independent local journalism is a mystery to me. I have to imagine it has something to do with the cost of operating in competition with the Times, but the history of local journalism in NYC and Long Island is definitely something I want to know more about and how to go about changing that.