Now that the election is over, the town boards of East Hampton and Southampton should move quickly to enact strict laws banning political signs on public property.

    It is a chicken-or-egg puzzle to ask which came first, the signs or the foolishness, but this much we know: Such placards consistently bring out a little too much bad behavior among misguided partisans. Like responsible adults who are forced to remove the toys with which the children are bashing each other in the head, the town boards, having allowed the privilege, now should take it away.

    In the East Hampton incidents we know of this year, there have been theft and defacement. One candidate is even reported to have cut up another’s signs to use as material for his own. Other signs were illegible, larger, or left up longer than the town code permits, posted illegally in the villages that ban them, and, by proliferating, became an all-around affront to the eye.

    Bigger apparently was better, though even the largest signs here were but trifles compared to those in the neighboring towns. In Southampton, room-size billboards went up for candidates for town trustee — yes, trustee, the clam people. Get ready to see more of the same  on the roadsides in East Hampton the next time around unless action is taken quickly to head off an arms race.

    By contrast, East Hampton Village is considering further limits in its already-restrictive sign law. Under existing law, none can be placed on public property at all; even yard-sale signs on tree trunks are prohibited. Mayor Paul F. Rickenbach Jr. wants to go further. He has suggested a stricter size limit on signs on private property to cut down on the clutter of real estate placards, though the law now allows only one that is no larger than seven square feet.

    In some parts of East Hampton Town the illegal come-ons are everywhere you look, but officials seem blind to them. Driving around Springs these days, for example, you can see prohibited off-premises signs actually nailed to utility poles. Enforcers look the other way, as they do with certain new lighted signs that are banned. Perhaps no one in town government cares about roadside aesthetics anymore, but, in that case, the law should be amended.

    Back to political signs: Other than attesting to the industriousness of certain candidates and their supporters, and helping voters identify which properties belong to party loyalists, these signs serve little purpose. The fall landscape would be better off without them, especially when they help bring out the failings of human nature.

    According to the State Department of State, a municipality can place rules on signs so long as they are “content neutral,” that is, they don’t favor one kind of message over another. In this regard, East Hampton Town’s law appears to be unconstitutional in that it allows real estate and construction signs to remain on public property for up to a year, while limiting all others to seven days. Government can regulate signs, but it cannot judge among the messages; all must be equal in the eyes of the law. While East Hampton is correcting this inconsistency, it should double down by ordering all such messages off public property. Both towns should put a stop to the silliness now.

    With Suffolk Executive Steve Levy’s exit from county government under circumstances that have not been entirely explained, two candidates relatively new to South Fork voters are poised to take his job. They are Steve Bellone, Bablyon Town supervisor, and Angie Carpenter, county treasurer.

    Neither has spent much time campaigning here, but Mr. Bellone seems more attuned to local issues. He supports an  East End alternative to the Metropolitan Transportation Authority and is a full-fledged fan of open space preservation. He touts a record of tax cuts, although Ms. Carpenter disputes the claim. Mr. Bellone is thinking big at a time when the region needs new ideas. The Star endorses Steve Bellone.

    As for the County Legislature, there is a refreshing quality to Cornelius Kelly’s run to unseat the incumbent, Jay Schneiderman. Mr. Kelly is tough and well informed and has gotten Mr. Schneiderman on the defensive about several issues key to the South Fork, notably Sunday bus service and land preservation.

    Since becoming East Hampton Town supervisor in 2000, Mr. Schneiderman, who hails from Montauk, appears on his way to becoming a career politician. This may disturb some voters, but in and of itself is not a reason to turn him out of office. He has amassed a string of achievements despite a bitter relationship with the county executive, while Mr. Kelly has no record at all. We endorse Mr. Schneiderman.

    East Hampton Town has two town justices who serve four-year terms and alternate on the ballot. Each appears on the bench for two weeks then uses two weeks for desk work. Each position pays $75,000 despite the job appearing to be less than full time.

    Justice Court is in session only three days a week, and the building itself was summarily closed to the public on Tuesdays earlier this year — and good luck getting a court staffer on the phone the rest of the time. This is high on the list of what Stephen Grossman, who is hoping to unseat Justice Lisa R. Rana, thinks ought to be changed.

    Mr. Grossman has been in private practice here for years and has run unsuccessfully in the past for a number of judicial positions, including this one. He has criticized the court as far too slow in disposing of zoning and quality-of-life cases, allowing violations to continue unchecked, sometimes for years. When businesses are charged, he says, defendants’ lawyers tend to run the show without objection from the bench while the interests of affected neighbors take a back seat.

    Ms. Rana, who comes from Amagansett, is a two-term justice, who is sometimes reported as tardy by those who appear in her court. After eight years, she may be settling in for what appears to her to be a long, comfortable career as town justice. While term limits might not be in the best interest of the electorate, getting a new justice in the court every now and then might make the system run more efficiently and help the town enforce its laws more promptly and effectively. We endorse Mr. Grossman.

    Now that the election is over, the East Hampton Town Board is picking up a matter it dropped hastily last month concerning East Hampton Airport.

    Fearing what would happen if a public forum about Federal Aviation Administration money was held just before voters went to the polls, Town Hall went into panic mode in October, scratching a hearing on the deal. Having avoided what could have been a political bombshell, the board now plans to go ahead with a request for a relatively modest amount of money from Washington for  deer and security fences at the airport.

    A large number of residents, upset about aircraft noise, have decried taking any more money from the F.A.A. because they say (accurately, from what we can tell) that doing so binds the town’s hands in terms of meaningful control of the airport. Further, they say that the airport has a dedicated fund with a substantial surplus in it that could pay for the work, avoiding further entanglement with the F.A.A.

    Exactly why the town board majority, headed by Supervisor Bill Wilkinson, wants the Washington handout is not clear, but there are a couple of possibilities. One is a fear that airport-noise opponents could someday gain the upper hand and curtail hours of operation or limit certain classes of aircraft. By accepting the F.A.A. money, the current board would make it more difficult for the town to gain the upper hand at the airport, something some of the current majority’s backers worry about.

    Another reason could be that the town needs money. The East Hampton budget relies in part on the use of surpluses to keep tax rates down. But when they are gone, taxes will have to rise or more services be cut. In the 2012 spending plan, for example, the airport’s cash reserve is tapped for $400,000, roughly 10 percent of its budget to cover costs associated with a seasonal control “tower,” actually a trailer.

    Mr. Wilkinson and his budget officer, Len Bernard, are in a difficult place, having cut taxes twice and reduced the town work force about as much as possible. This is why they remain interested in selling such town assets as Fort Pond House in Montauk and scratching together additional non-tax sources wherever they can. The revenue has to come from somewhere. This is insufficient justification, however, for a policy decision that many believe will harm East Hampton in the long run.

    With the consensus being that accepting F.A.A. money comes at the cost of local control, the East Hampton Town Board should find other ways to pay for the fencing.

    Whatever happens next in Manhattan for Occupy Wall Street, after a 1 a.m. eviction by police Tuesday, it is remarkable that the encampment was allowed to remain in Zuccotti Park for so long. This would have been unimaginable in the past. Although the mayor’s responses have been erratic, few were confident at the movement’s outset that he would exercise any restraint.

    The city had successfully limited dissent with Orwellian “free speech zones” during economic summits and political conventions for years. The police were out in force and with video cameras during the National Republican convention a few years ago. Back in September, when all this started, few thought the city would allow the protesters to stay in the park one night, let alone until November.

    Detractors say they don’t understand what the Occupy Wall Street protesters want, but in one important aspect, the movement has been a success. If you ask just about anyone these days if they know what is meant by the 1 percent, they will have at least an inkling. The New York encampment and the others around the country have put the vast prosperity gap in the United States into the public consciousness.

    Whether it will lead to reforms that the poor and working class can take to the bank remains to be seen, but Americans are talking about it, and that’s a start.

    Tomorrow is Veterans Day and, like last year and the year before that, it is a day on which the United States is engaged in military conflicts on several fronts, including Afghanistan, which is said to be the nation’s longest war.

    According to the census, there are 22 million United States military veterans. About 1.7 million American men and women have served in Afghanistan or Iraq, some in both countries, and some on multiple tours of duty. Each has a personal understanding of what Veterans Day means. In a recent poll, only a third of these veterans said they believed those wars were worth fighting. And the number who reported having emotional difficulty returning to civilian life is now almost twice what it was among those who went to war before Sept. 11, 2011.

    Small gestures can help. One event, for example, will take place on Saturday at the Stephen Talkhouse, the Amagansett music venue. A group of musicians calling themselves Music for Morale will entertain to raise money to buy much-wanted supplies for a Marine unit deployed in Afghanistan, as well as to provide musical instruments for wounded veterans and those suffering from other war-related problems.

    This year, it is important not to overlook this country’s most recent servicemen and women, to thank them for the jobs they did or continue to do, to welcome home those who have returned, and to think with sadness of those who did not.

    Tomorrow on East Hampton Main Street — as in cities, towns, and villages across this country — veterans will march. It will be an opportunity for all of us, those who served and those who did not, to remember.

    New York State may come up short of cash as 2011 comes to an end, and the outlook for the 2012 budget has dimmed, according to latest projections. The anticipated shortfalls are renewing attention on Albany’s version of a “millionaire’s tax,” which is set to expire next month.

    The state appears to be facing a deficit of $350 million this year between what flows in and what must be spent to keep government running. Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s Budget Division said this week that a drop in tax revenue linked to volatility in financial markets was largely to blame. An expected weak bonus season on Wall Street adds to the grim picture. The budget gap for the next fiscal year, which begins April 1, is estimated to be as much as $3.5 billion.

    The so-called millionaire’s tax is actually a surcharge on New Yorkers making $200,000 a year or more. Although the extra tax has brought in about $4 billion a year, many Albany lawmakers and Governor Cuomo oppose its extension. Mr. Cuomo has said the issue is one of fairness and that continuing to tax high-income residents would result in more of them leaving the state. He says there is more room for more spending cuts.

    State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., who represents the South Fork, has a different idea. He has sponsored a bill that would extend the higher rate on millionaires and use the money to fund rebates to offset property taxes on households earning $250,000 or less. State income tax credits worth about $2.3 billion would be given to taxpayers based on a percentage of their income. The rest of the money raised by the surcharge would go for aid to schools. The idea is attractive in a Robin Hood kind of way, but, given the looming state budget crisis, it would seem to have little chance of passing. Mr. Thiele has said none of the millionaires who live in his district have complained to him about the current surcharge, though.

    With deficits likely this year and in 2012-13, Albany should look again at extending the extra tax on the state’s richest residents. Fair or not, it seems necessary. 

     The suggestion that the East End towns break away from the Metropolitan Transportation Authority is not new, but it resurfaced this week in a campaign appearance in Southampton with Steve Bellone, who is running for Suffolk County executive. Mr. Bellone was joined by State Assemblyman Fred W. Thiele Jr., who also supports a new Peconic Regional Transportation Authority, which might provide more frequent service among the villages and hamlets of the North and South Forks — and help businesses escape the M.T.A.’s usurious payroll tax.

    What Mr. Thiele envisions, and Mr. Bellone supports, is a network of rail spurs and connecting buses, although it might take up to four years to build and cost more than $100 million. According to a release from the Bellone campaign, a 2009 survey estimated that the East End paid at least $40 million more in taxes than it received in services from the M.T.A., which has had perennial financial problems. Mr. Bellone’s opponent in the race to replace County Executive Steve Levy, Angie Carpenter, derided the idea as more big government and too costly.

    Whether such a transit alternative would find enough riders here remains uncertain. From an environmental perspective, getting drivers out of cars and onto trains and buses would pay dividends in the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. However, the last-mile problem of getting people from bus stops or train stations to dispersed workplaces or shopping centers would remain an obstacle to any quick action on a new system.

    Nevertheless, a locally controlled authority that could provide a savings for taxpayers and offer more daily rail trips and an efficient interface with the Long Island Rail Road is an idea worth pursuing. Good politics aside, Mr. Thiele and Mr. Bellone should run with it.

    In news of the violence that has broken out in Cairo in recent days, a report has circulated that may indicate that the Egyptian authorities are paying attention to how some police in the United States have responded to the Occupy Wall Street protests.

According to the accounts, an Egyptian state television anchor cited the “firm stance” taken by United States law enforcement to “secure the state” as a justification for the Egyptian crackdown. This report came from Twitter, posted by Sultan Al Qassemi, a journalist and important voice in the Arab Spring uprisings. Whether or not this can be independently confirmed, it points to a troubling double standard between the United States’s internal actions and foreign policy.

    Occupy Wall Street first gained widespread attention in September, when a supervising officer in the New York Police Department used pepper spray on an unarmed and nonthreatening group of four women who had been standing together. Before that, the protests had been a curiosity; after it came out that N.Y.P.D.’s “white shirts” from higher ranks were leading an aggressive response to keep “sidewalks clear and crowds moving along,” the protest rapidly grew into a movement. Protesters greeted the news that the officer who had used pepper spray was “punished” by having 10 vacation days docked with anger.

    On Friday, campus police at the University of California Davis used pepper spray on nine seated protesters who had defied orders to move. Photographs of this unprovoked attack have become a new rallying cry of the movement. In one particularly resonant image, some wit digitally placed the campus officer into John Trumbull’s famous painting of the signing of Declaration of Independence, blasting America’s founding document with an orange-colored haze.

    It must be conceded that a few angry cops and misguided public officials do not add up to an overturning of democracy. Nor should  the police’s removal of the library Occupy Wall Street put together at Zuccotti Park be  considered on a par with book-burning in Hitler’s Germany. However, violent responses to the peaceful encampments reinforce the movement’s messages about inequality and the use of official force to resist meaningful change.

    If the report out of Egypt is accurate, the world is indeed watching.

    If East Hampton Town Supervisor Bill Wilkinson ever thought he had a mandate to do more than complete the work of correcting the financial chaos of the Bill McGintee-era, he can no longer make that assumption following his apparent narrow election victory over Zach Cohen on Tuesday.

    As the poll results came in, it was clear that Mr. Wilkinson’s support had shrunk from the election of 2009. That a relative unknown like Mr. Cohen could come so close to defeating him attests to the dissatisfaction of many voters with the supervisor’s record over the last two years.

    If any message for Mr. Wilkinson can be discerned from the outcome, it is that East Hampton residents want town government to change direction. The specifics may be subject to conjecture, but the consistent theme that has emerged during his term is that the supervisor and his Republican majority must do a better job of listening to constituents rather than dictating to them.

    At its best, elected office is an honor conferred by the voters on those whom they consider best represent their interests. This cannot be ignored by whoever is confirmed as the victor once the absentee ballots are counted.