Official Website of Ellis Henican | DEBT TALKS PARALYZED BY POLITICS

“Just dithering on the debt ceiling”, Ellis Henican Column, Newsday, July 30, 2011

If it’s this hard to raise the debt ceiling, how can Washington even think of solving real problems?

That’s the next question we’ll get to face, once this debt-limit fiasco is finally behind us — and not a minute too soon. What used to be considered little more than a clerical tweak has paralyzed the nation’s politics and rattled the world’s most powerful economy. Now the same brittle people in charge of this are supposed to work together cheerily and solve health care, immigration, Iraq, Afghanistan and unemployment?

Some of those issues are actually tough.

With excruciating effort, Republican House Speaker John Boehner managed to placate his tea party freshmen long enough to pass a debt plan that had absolutely no chance of Senate approval. At the same time, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid conductied parallel maneuvers with similarly pointless prospects.

This is what passes for governing today.

And that might not be so bad if the U.S. economic health weren’t hanging in the balance and if these same elected officials didn’t have such a daunting load of issues waiting for them.

Which one should they tackle first?

COMPROMISE, 2011

Let’s meet way over on my side.
Share and share unalike.
I’ll cut, I’ll choose.
I’m right, you’re wrong – shut up.
Uneven Steven.

THE NEWS IN SONG:

Sometimes, there is no middle ground.

“We Just Disagree” by Dave Mason, http://tinyurl.com/wejust

“So let’s leave it alone, ’cause we can’t see eye to eye.
There ain’t no good guys, there ain’t no bad guys.
There’s only you and me and we just disagree.”

ASKED AND UNANSWERED:

How many LI exterminators are kicking themselves now? You see that Jimmy Tallman and Michael Morales (Suburban Exterminating in Smithtown) just got their own Animal Planet reality show, “Rat Busters NYC”?…Should East Farmingdale residents get to veto Republic Airport’s expansion dreams? Does “busier airport” inevitably mean “grumpier neighbors”?….How old are the Web writers at WPIX/11? “Police on Long Island are searching for an elderly bank robber…believed to be in his 50s or 60s.” Okay, maybe that’s old for a bank robber….Are those turtle-nailing, swan-piercing, seagull-mauling animal abusers on the East End ready for a fair fight? Simeon Melman could help arrange that. The 17-year-old volunteer at West Islip’s Good Samaritan Hospital had first-hand experience with a bear mauling in the Alaska wilderness…Are eight bus companies, including Long Island Limousine Service of Hauppauge, really asking the state Transportation Department to GO SLOWER on bus safety? Slower?…Are the osteopaths being dissed again? With all the recent congrats for Hofstra North Shore-LIJ opening “the second med school on Long Island” (after Stony Brook), docs at the New York College of Osteopathic Medicine in Old Westbury are waving frantically now: “Did you forget about us?”…100 same-sex couples and 1,300 guests gathered Tuesday for a lavish wedding-and-reception night at Carlyle on the Green. Did CEO Steve Carl really comp them all? Why not? Gay marriage is LI’s number-one growth industry now…Will Andrew Cuomo’s best-plan-wins approach be an economic-development plus – or minus – for LI?… What really drew that big crowd to the “Vote Yes” rally outside Nassau Coliseum? Baseball dreams? Islanders love? Union membership ? Blue Oyster Cult nostalgia? Or the sizzling oratory of Charles Wang?

LONG ISLANDER OF THE WEEK:

BRIAN ROLSTON

Jittery Islanders fans are even more jittery than usual this weekend. Owner Charles Wang says there is no “Plan B” if Nassau voters on Monday reject County Executive Ed Mangano’s Coliseum-financing plan. But a small flash of hope just skated in from New Jersey. Make that a 6-foot-2, 214-pound wall of hope. Brian Rolston probably isn’t a one-man franchise-saver. But he’ll be a steady veteran presence for a young Isles team, and he arrives at a heavily discounted $2.5-million price, keeping the team comfortably under the $48.3-million pay cap. Credit the 38-year-old Rolston, a four-time 30-goal scorer, with 14 goals and 34 points in 65 games last season. Go, Isles! Stay, Isles!