Category Archives: Politics

Rails in California

Don’t ask me silly questions
I won’t play silly games
I’m just a simple choo choo train
I’ll always be the same
I only want to race along
Beneath the bright blue sky
And be a happy choo choo train
Until the day I die
–Blaine the Train

On November 4th, the people of Marin and Sonoma will get another shot at getting the funding for the Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit (SMART) up and running. This failed very narrowly two years ago when gas was about a dollar a gallon less around here, so there is a good chance that the curmudgeons that squeezed out just enough votes to deny the needed 2/3 majority will be on the losing side of economic momentum this time around. This is Measure Q, and I’ve already marked it “yes” on my absentee ballot. Hope you did the same.

All of California will also get a chance to weigh in on Proposition 1a, a high-speed rail bond intended to provide bullet-train service along a largely pre-existing right-of-way corridor all the way from the Sacramento, through the Bay Area, and down to Los Angeles. It isn’t cheap, but it is a massive infrastructure improvement that should help ease the crowding at some of our busiest airports, and take some burden of long-haul corridors like I-5 and Hwy 99, which see a lot of pass-through traffic. Unlike most of the recent bond measures, which I habitually vote against, this is a proper use of bonded debt: to build infrastructure that will help reduce future costs to the people and state, encourage economic development, and produce something that will be in use long after the bond is repaid. Prop 1a gets a thumbs-up from me as well.

In the interest of full disclosure, I must admit that I have a (nearly) three-year-old son and would love to buy him two big choo-choo sets to play with. Also, I’d much rather kick back and read a book than drive for eight hours to visit my nephews and niece down in Long Beach.

Where does the power come from?

A lot of people are going to vote in ten days. Many already have, either at early-voting precincts or by absentee ballot. Some people aren’t going to. Many because they do not consider their choices appealing enough. Some because they do not feel their votes will account for much. Some unknown number will, however, show up to the polls and not actually vote. Vote suppression, caging, registration purges, broken polling equipment, and uncounted provisional ballots may yet steal the franchise of thousands of citizens this year, just like in 2004. This is essentially the last remaining path to victory for the John McCain campaign, which is trying desperately to put up a fight in Pennsylvania, Colorado, and Virginia.

If they do it again, if Ohio voters in predominantly minority and urban areas have to queue up for hours in the rain, if thousands of registered voters are turned away at the polls due to a typo in some database, if contested voters are forced to use provisional ballots in Colorado, Indiana, and Florida that will then be re-contested after the voter has left, and the election is stolen, what happens next? Some pretty broad-scale election fraud is already under way, so what do we do about it?

Keep an eye on the news November 4th. Election fraud is a hard story for the nightly news to cover, as it involved actually getting reporters out on the streets to interview poll workers, voters, and election officials. It takes more than two seconds to explain what “caging” means, so the producers on the 24-hour news networks are reluctant to tie up air time with it.

Get your buddies together and plan yourself a party. A celebration of freedom, democracy, and the rule of the people. Don’t have it at your house, have it at your town square. Have it on the lawn in front of your city hall. Bake some pies, bring some drinks. Invite everybody. Plan on having a grand old time, like 4th of July on the 5th of November. See if you can get the local campaign HQ of your presidential candidate of choice in on the act. Make up lemonade for their campaign volunteers and have a big shindig. If things go sour on election day, you may be able to have a few hundred people already set to hit the streets.

tl;dr – the power to govern comes from the consent of the people, even by way of apathy. Don’t give it and they don’t have it.

Pity Party

Multi-poll trendline as of October 3

The Republican Party here in the US has fallen on some hard times. The party of personal responsibility has prominent factotums refusing to honor congressional subpoenas. The party of high moral standards has been hit with a series of embarrassing corruption and inappropriate-sex scandals. The party of fiscal conservatism ran the federal government’s budget into the dirt and pushed for a $850 billion bailout for a financial market they are widely perceived as having failed to regulate for the past seven years. Their presidential candidate has hung his hat on a maverick persona that relies heavily on his reputation for opposing pork-barrel spending; but he pushed for, lobbied for, and voted for the $850 billion bailout laden with pork. Their vice presidential candidate… Well, I don’t think there’s a lot that needs to be said there.

I’m kinda feeling sorry for them at this point.