The Daily Take For Thursday, April 26Th, 2012

     For a brief moment, I thought we were talking about Democrats.  When voting in Albany, the norm is for democratic candidates to run unopposed.  That didn't happen Tuesday.  What happened was Mitt Romney won the Republican presidential primary by a statistical landslide.  Statistically meaning it is real easy to win with your only viable opponent already sitting on the sidelines.  Throwing money away seems to come easy for the system.  Some reports say that the primary state wide cost some $25 million.  Estimates in Albany County put the cost to taxpayers at $200,000.  NewsChannel 13 reported that in twenty districts, no one showed up to vote.  I originally thought that the $200K number seemed a little high.  With further thought I realized that with four inspectors per polling place, that would amount to a lot of pizza and Chinese takeout.  And just think; we can all do this again two more times........There was a great "Letter to the Editor" in today's TU.  The piece was concerning the legalization of marijuana for medical use.  The letter takes a well deserved shot at the governor for the absurd reasoning that "the risks outweigh the benefits".  The writer goes on to say that he doesn't know why our inept state legislators didn't have enough time to consider the legislation.  That's OK Wayne, nobody does.  He was right about another thing.  A person can walk into a doctors office with a headache, and walk out with a script for a hundred Hydrocodone pills, and someone with a debilitating type of cancer can't get the relief from pain they need.  My suggestion to the governor would be: The next time you're in the doctor's office, just ask him........Imagine that.  Mayor Jennings won't sign the antifracking bill that the common council approved last week.  That means for the citizens of Albany they can be assured that there will be no drilling for natural gas on Manning Blvd.  I wonder how much time the council wasted on such a ridiculous piece of law.  Not once.  But twice.  The gas drilling companies in order to drill in the state, they need to overturn the no drilling moratorium now in place.  To do that they need to win a lawsuit against a municipality.  If I were them I'd start in Albany.  Someone, somebody has to know the status of the new drilling regulations.  They've been written, submitted for comment, so what is next?

And that is "The Daily Take"