President Bush famously claimed after his narrow 51-48% victory in the 2004 election “I have political capital– and I intend to spend it.” The media oohed and ahhed over his “mandate”– not the first time desire for a pre-determined narrative trumped the facts. (I’ve felt the same tug, so I have sympathy for them. I just try to dig a little first. Then again, I’ve got complete editorial freedom and no deadlines, so that helps.)

Well, now we have an example of a true mandate. Spitzer’s massive 69-29% stomping of John Faso provides Spitzer some serious political capital. If that weren’t good enough, the D&C reports that Spitzer will be going into office with a financial boost as well:

Fortune smiles on Spitzer

But bulging state coffers raise the question: How best to use it?

Jay Gallagher
Albany bureau chief

(November 26, 2006) — ALBANY — Gov.-elect Eliot Spitzer is catching a couple of breaks on the financial front, with a booming Wall Street likely to boost state revenues more than expected, and Medicaid costs increasing more slowly than predicted.

Nifty. We’ve got a little windfall to work with. Fortunately, Spitzer has at least one person with long-term vision advising him, according to the article:

“Businesses have been cutting back on benefits, and the government is ambivalent about doing it, so more and more the responsibility is falling on families,” said Karen Schimke, co-chair of a panel appointed by Spitzer to give him advice on human-services issues. “Government needs to step up to the plate, or there are going to be a lot of floundering citizens.”

Schimke, also president of the Albany-based Schuyler Center for Advocacy and Analysis, said the inauguration of a new governor is the time to push for more help for families — and to think about the cost later.

“We have a long history of money driving policy rather than policy driving money,” said Schimke, who had top policy-making jobs in the Democratic administration of former Gov. Mario Cuomo. “This is a moment in time we should focus on policy.”

What a relief. It’s so refreshing, the idea that “taking care of business” doesn’t just mean “taking care of Big Business”. I can just hear the sound of conservatives’ heads exploding at the idea of “government stepping up to the plate”, but let’s face it: our society is, at this point, like the cartoon character Wily E. Coyote. We’ve run off the cliff and now we’re hanging in mid-air, failing to fall yet due to inertia, and continuing to run due to our amazing ability to ignore reality.

Because, as the article points out:

Welfare benefits, now about $6,500 for a family of three, haven’t been raised in 13 years, pointed out Mark Dunlea of the Hunger Action Network.

The number of children and teens without health insurance in the state grew by 61,000 last year, an increase of 17 percent, according to the Children’s Defense Fund.

2.8 million New Yorkers have no health insurance.

The income of the state’s top fifth of households is more than eight times as high as the lowest fifth — the biggest disparity of any state.

Sure, everyone knows life isn’t fair. But that’s why we need someone with enough leverage, and government has that leverage, financially and otherwise, to help level the playing field a little. Say someone has a catastrophic illness in their family, or gets downsized because they were “on the wrong team at the wrong time”, and then can’t find work because they’re too old/expensive/overqualified (that’s happened to several folks I know). Or something like Hurricane Katrina hits, and folks can’t get anything out of their insurance companies, who argue that it’s “storm damage” or “flood damage” (depending on which one their policy doesn’t cover).

“There have been countless opportunities to spend money wisely that we’ve ducked,” Schimke said, pointing to the need for more early childhood education programs and universal health insurance as two areas where she thinks the state should spend more.

She said a frustration is that such spending in the long run would probably more than pay for itself — in healthier, more productive adults.

“We pay a lot of money when kids end up on welfare or in the juvenile-justice system, or they don’t graduate from high school,” she said.

The challenge as she sees it is to get politicians who usually have short-term horizons to focus on what is best in the long term. And she thinks this time before the Spitzer administration takes office may be the best time to make that case.

Sounds good. Let’s help them make that case. Contact your local state rep and senator (find them through this link), and let them know you support universal healthcare and early childhood education.