With their compatriots from around the country, New York State's political leaders ended the summer at their national conventions. Democrats and Republicans alike cheered as each of their presidential nominees presented himself as the true agent to change how business gets done.

"When Washington doesn't work, all its promises seem empty," Barack Obama said.

"We're going to recover the people's trust by standing up again for the values Americans admire," John McCain said.
"You understand that, in this election, the greatest risk we can take is to try the same, old politics with the same, old players and expect a different result," Obama said. "You have shown what history teaches us, that at defining moments like this one, the change we need doesn't come from Washington. Change comes to Washington."

"Let me offer an advance warning to the old, big-spending, do-nothing, me-first, country-second Washington crowd: Change is coming," McCain said. "When we tell you we're going to change Washington, and stop leaving our country's problems for some unluckier generation to fix, you can count on it."

These, along with just about everything else the candidates said in their acceptance speeches, were applause lines, and if either New York delegation sat silently by, letting others cheer while they disagreed, no one seemed to notice.
There is a need for change in Washington, clearly (whether either Obama or McCain could really deliver that change as president remains an open question).

As great as the need for change is in the nation's capital, it pales in comparison to the need for structural reforms in our state capital.

Everyone knows the list: a more open committee process, the ability to bring bills that might fail to the floor, a more equitable distribution of power between the majority and minority. Any of these would be a good start to the process of moving Albany out of last place in the government functioning ratings.

As Obama and McCain both tried very hard to convey in their speeches, the talk of change is supposed to be about more than simple rhetoric, despite how appealing that rhetoric is to most voters on the most basic level. The status quo in Washington has caused problems in the lives of Americans in many ways.

There may not be a war to argue about on the state level. But just about every other problem Obama and McCain discussed could be affected by the right kind of action by state leaders. Health care, taxes, spending, energy policy and housing are all things that might be addressed by those walking the halls of the Capitol, should they choose to walk those halls a little more often and take care of a little more business while there. Instead, there have been decades of fiscal mismanagement, bows to special interests and targeted constituencies, out-of-control spending and legislative diddling that has made New Yorkers' lives worse-and not just because of the failure to make their lives better.

There was a lot of cheering in Denver and St. Paul. But whether any of the New Yorkers participating actually believed in the remarkably similar language of their presidential nominees will be seen by what happens when they return to Albany.