Let’s go through the numbers from a Quinnipiac poll, out this morning, of registered voters across the state:
• 58 percent rank the state legislature as “the worst” or “among the worst” in the United States, up from 42 percent in January.
• 49 percent to 40 percent think their local senator deserves to be thrown out of office as punishment for the humiliating coup earlier this summer.
• Another 50 percent said the 31-day Senate stalemate caused them to be “embarrassed to be a New Yorker.”
• 65 percent believe the state’s budget problems are “very serious.”
• 64 percent generally support a “constitutional convention” to overhaul state government.
Sorry, but nothing that is not Knicks- or Mets-related should ever cause anyone to feel “embarrassed to be a New Yorker.” As the Post points out, local popularity (seriously, people in the Bronx love Pedro Espada) is enough to keep state legislators in office, even if the larger population hates the body as a whole. But maybe with numbers like these, 2010 might be a year to actually get excited about elections.
POLL: NEW YORKERS SICK OF ‘WORST IN THE NATION’ LAWMAKERS [NYP]
