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State Senator credits #OWS for creating bipartisan dialogue on millionaire’s tax

State Senator Gustavo Rivera

State Senator Gustavo Rivera, a freshman legislator from the Bronx, credits the #OccupyWallStreet protests as having a positive effect on politics and hints that Governor Andrew Cuomo’s consideration of tax-code changes may be a result of the Occupy Wall Street movement.

“I believe Occupy Wall Street changed the national dialogue,” said Sen. Gustavo Rivera. “The conversations we were having 6 months ago got no traction. But things have changed because of what the folks at Zuccotti Park started.”

There’s certainly is traction now, because not only is Cuomo moving toward real tax reform and fairness, New York Republicans are starting to line up in behind him.  GOP State Senators Mark Grisanti, Greg Ball, and John Bonacic are getting the message from their respective constituencies and are willing to talk about reestablishing an equitable and progressive tax code in New York.

This is good news for progressive legislators in New York, who have battled for years with their Republican colleagues, especially in the State Senate. New York’s legislature was once famously known as one of the most dysfunctional in the United States. Now it appears that they’ve passed the baton over to the US Congress and Senate.

Budget talks between the governor and key members of New York’s legislature will begin in January. And it’s good news for New Yorkers, not only that their legislators are finally acting like adults, but that Republicans might actually be agreeable to a fair state tax system.

“Ive always believed we need a more progressive tax system,” said Rivera. “I’m glad to hear the Cuomo administration seems to be open to it. We have the greatest economic disparity in New York. The economic gap is as bad as it was was in the depression.”

Although being a freshman Senator, Rivera has long served in New York State politics. He was a campaign manager for deceased New York City Councilman Philip Reed, and State Senators Jose M. Serrano and Andrea Stewart-Cousins. After serving as Director of Outreach under United States Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, he ran for the 33rd State Senate seat in 2010, defeating scandal-tarred incumbent Pedro Espada, Jr..

NATO Strike on Pakistan a Case of Mistaken Identity

Initial reports from NATO investigating the attack on a Pakistani outpost at the weekend cite mistaken identity as the probable cause. It may even have been set up deliberately by the Taliban to further inflame already delicate relations between the US and Pakistan.

So far, the news from Afghanistan is that a joint US special forces and Afghani mission were fired on from over the Pakistan border. As our troops called in air strikes, the pilots offering top cover attacked two camps they thought were being used by the insurgents. They were in fact, two border posts being used by the Pakistani army.

In the latest in a number of military blunders by the US, this case of friendly fire caused the deaths of 24 Pakistani soldiers.

The surely brings into question the entire American doctrine of throwing as much armament at a problem as we can to solve it. Since we have been active in Iraq and Afghanistan, our forces have killed Iraqis, Afghans, British, French, Swedish, Pakistani troops and who knows how many others from friendly countries in our efforts to overcome our enemies.

This has resulted in US forces having a reputation for being reckless and unprofessional, while we know the exact opposite is true.

US military sources say they are thinking that the Taliban engineered the whole engagement to have this effect. They believe Taliban forces purposely chose the area so that there would be confusion between insurgent forces and the Pakistan army.

There is currently a full investigation underway by both NATO and the US military. In a release yesterday, Gen. James Mattis, head of U.S. Central Command, announced that he has appointed Brig. Gen. Stephen Clark to lead the probe of the incident. He said he must include input from the NATO-led forces in Afghanistan, as well as representatives from the Afghan and Pakistani governments.

According to the military account of the incident, US forces and Afghan soldiers came under attack early Saturday. They came under small arms and mortar fire from across the Pakistan border. The report also says the forces contacted the Pakistani army to check that they had no forces in the area. The account said the Pakistanis replied that they had no forces in the region.

The troops on the ground searched for the attackers and spotted an encampment with heavy machine guns set up in a defensive perimeter. The commander on the ground called for an air strike. It was this air strike that killed 24 Pakistani border troops.

The air strike was comprised of Apache gunships and an AC-130 gun platform.

The current belief is that the Taliban engineered the incident to inflame already troubled US-Pakistan relations. Both to interfere with the supply route from Pakistan to Afghanistan and in advance of a key international conference.

Both NATO and the US military are continuing their investigations.