There’s nothing like having to read a 116-page collection of economic mumbo-jumbo at 11 pm to put me in a fine fettle:

Amid today’s hoopla over the Bloomberg administration’s decision to give back its free luxury boxes at the Mets’ and Yanks’ new stadiums – about which it’s probably best said that the city decided that partying it up in a suite while the great unwashed paid through the nose for tickets didn’t look so hot, so instead chose to take the value on a gift certificate – there was another development in New York’s ongoing baseball stadium melodrama. This afternoon, the city Industrial Development Agency also released its cost-benefit documents for the $342 million in new tax-exempt bonds the teams are requesting from the city, in advance of a public hearing on January 15 to decide the bonds’ fate.

Covering 116 pages, the paperwork — released at 5:49 pm, the traditional time to dump documents on an unsuspecting press corps, knowing that few will have time to read them let alone track anyone down for comment — goes into mind-numbing detail on just what gewgaws the teams would be using the money for… [read more]