“Retail Chains Abandon Manhattan: ‘It’s Unsustainable’” (NYT):
Of Ark Restaurants’ five Manhattan restaurants, only two have reopened, while its properties in Florida — where the virus is far worse — have expanded outdoor seating with tents and tables into their parking lots, serving almost as many guests as they had indoors.
“There’s no reason to do business in New York,” Mr. Weinstein said. “I can do the same volume in Florida in the same square feet as I would have in New York, with my expenses being much less. The idea was that branding and locations were important, but the expense of being in this city has overtaken the marketing group that says you have to be there.”
But New York today looks nothing like it did just a few months ago.
In Manhattan’s major retail corridors, from SoHo to Fifth Avenue to Madison Avenue, once packed sidewalks are now nearly empty. A fraction of the usual army of office workers goes into work every day, and many wealthy residents have left the city for second homes.
For four months, the Victoria’s Secret flagship store at Herald Square in Manhattan has been closed and not paying its $937,000 monthly rent. “It will be years before retail has even a chance of returning to New York City in its pre-Covid form,” the retailer’s parent company recently told its landlord in a legal document.
Faith in human action:
New York’s stringent lockdown and methodical reopening may have brought the virus to heel, Mr. McCann said, but it is also wreaking havoc on businesses with so few people going to work, virtually no visitors and many residents “a little loath to go out” and worried for their health.
It can’t be that the virus ran out of suitable hosts in NYC! Bold action by the governor and mayor defeated the virus.
Democrats in New York assert that Donald Trump is corrupt and acts out of personal financial interest. Donald Trump is known to own a lot of real estate in NYC that would get a big lift from a federal bailout of NYC. Putting these things together, wouldn’t it therefore make sense for New Yorkers to rally behind Donald Trump for the 2020 election? What other politician is certain to divert rivers of federal cash in New York’s direction?
From January 2019, NYC subway:
Now they know that the real minimum wage is actually $0 and/or $600/week…
If the Dems win they will bring back the unlimited state and local tax deduction so the rest of the US can help pay the big state and local tax bills of the wealthy, which may encourage the wealthy to return. This would make our corrupt municipal contracts will be more affordable. This has already passed the Democratic house twice and then went nowhere in the Republican Senate. You also don’t give credit where credit is due — so unacknowledged above is how our Governor Andy Cuomo forced the nursing homes to take in the sick, which led to many thousands of unnecessary nursing home deaths, which effectively thinned the herd and helped keep the virus at bay. The exact accomplishment of our State government is at present unknown since the Governor has refused to appoint an independent commission to investigate and report on what he accomplished. And who says New Yorkers are arrogant and immodest?
But the Trumpenführer’s bailout is conditional on Putin’s instructions, since, as we know, the Russians wield so much power over other countries’ elections.
For example, here’s a Russian-language forum openly discussing ways of overturning an election in a western country.
Oh wait, sorry, the target is Belarus and the discussion is on a US-hosted site. So nothing to see there!
Earlier this summer, Alan Chartock of WAMC radio was discussing Andrew Cuomo’s plans for 2021, in particular any possible role he might play in the upcoming Biden administration. Chartock has followed Cuomo for years, he’s Professor Emeritus at the University of Albany and he’s the next best thing to being able to read Cuomo’s mind.
He said that Cuomo doesn’t didn’t want the VP role (true) and he also probably didn’t want Secretary of State because he likes being the Governor of New York, where he can “be his own boss.” As for money, the looming state funding crisis was on the table for discussion (it’s a constant theme on public radio these days) and Chartock said that during the Biden administration, Cuomo and New York State would be “flush with cash.”
So they have nothing to worry about.
Chartock on Cuomo from July: He’s Amazing for Many Reasons!
https://www.troyrecord.com/news/local-news/alan-chartock-s-the-capitol-connection-andrew-cuomo-has-been-amazing-for-many-reasons/article_165f299a-c763-11ea-8a63-4f46d9df5f84.html|
The two of them are tight like brothers.
https://www.governor.ny.gov/news/audio-rush-transcript-governor-cuomo-guest-wamc-northeast-public-radio-alan-chartock-7
> Donald Trump is known to own a lot of real estate in NYC that would get a big lift from a federal bailout of NYC.
And they are working hard to see that the next piece of real estate he occupies in New York State is going to be a prison cell on Riker’s Island as Inmate #9-23943928.