Last Friday, on the day Mr. Faso was again in the news for challenging Mr. Spitzer's air travel, this time for using a luxury jet owned by a gambling lobbyist, Sen. Bruno was getting most of the attention as he scolded Mr. Faso for suggesting that upstate cities are "withering on the vine" and in a "death spiral." Upstate has its problems, Mr. Bruno said during an interview on a local radio station, but "I want to hear positives; I don't want to hear negatives."It's hard to disagree with assessment. It's hard to find an Upstate city that has done even modestly well over the past half century. Utica has lost more than 40% of its population since 1940 (see the population chart on WikiPedia, or confirm the figures for yourself on this site from the Census Bureau). Similar stories can be told of the other formerly large cities of the region: Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, and even humble Albany (which once had a population well in excess of 100,000). Even more indicative of decline, the suburbs of those cities are hardly booming, even if some modest growth has at times occurred.
Talk about being in denial. Things are bad upstate, even if Mr. Bruno doesn't want to hear about it. How bad? Bad enough for Eliot Spitzer to have compared upstate to Appalachia earlier in the campaign, only to stand corrected -- Appalachia is doing better than upstate. And bad enough that any candidate who cares about his or her credibility will acknowledge these grim facts.
Mr. Faso has his own problems, to be sure. More recently, he was attacked for using a contributor's aircraft, even as he deplored Mr. Spitzer's air travel. But that aside, Mr. Faso clearly wants to take the gloves off and go after his opponent. If only Sen. Bruno would take off his rose-colored glasses -- and leave them off.
This was once the region with arguably the most successful, advanced economy the world had even known. The Times-Union is right: something is seriously wrong, and Bruno probably doesn't even understand what.
The Links:
- Joseph Bruno
- Elliot Spitzer
- John Faso
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