More news [1]on the recently released polling showing support for publicly financed elections in New York is at around 74%. But New York Governor David Paterson is saying he's reluctant to move forward with a public financing bill now because of concerns about the state budget -- here's what Paul Silver [2] at The Moderate Voice has to say about that.

Think public financing costs too much, asks Silver, what about those favors to special interests?

It seems to me that one of the challenges of balancing the state budget will be the pressure from special interests to preserve their advantages. And, I am only guessing but, the total amount of special interest expectations are a lot more than the cost of publicly financed elections. The whole notion behind separating legislators from special interests is to allow more objective and open minded deliberation of the best use of public funds. Isn’t this the essence of the aphorism “penny wise and pound foolish.”

Yup, that sounds about right to me.