Politics: J'accuse!

[Tyrone Slothrop]

Originally posted by sgtclub
1. Roll-back of the car tax

I'm always happy to get money back, but it made the state's structural budget problems worse.

2. Passage of the new bond measure and corresponding balance budget amendment.

Like getting a new credit card but promising it will be the last one. How are you going to pay off the balance?

3. Passage of the bill reforming workers compensation

I'm all for this, I assume, but don't understand what they've changed. The old system was a mess, though.

4. NO TAXE INCREASE

Presumably you've put this in all caps because of the recent rumors that Arnold is thinking about raising taxes to solve the structural budget problems I mentioned above. And that's even before he pays for this little bit of foolishness.

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
The SF Chronicle writes about polyandry, the new polygamy.

The article suggests that they're on the same course as the gays, but running about 30 years behind. Presumably polygamy is in the middle, but they don't say where.

"What possible reason could you find for discriminating against or denying equal access to threesomes, foursomes, etc.?'' they asked in a letter to Newsom.

Anyone have an answer for them?

More fun with polyamory/polygomy/polywhatever:

"There are people who want to be in committed relationships -- whether it's heterosexual marriage, same-sex marriage or polyamory -- and that should be acknowledged religiously and legally,'' he said.

According to Amsbury and other Unitarian polyamorists, most of the people in their movement are bisexual or heterosexual.

Amsbury is bisexual, her husband of two years is heterosexual, and her current "other significant others" are bisexual.

One of them, Peter, lives in West Hollywood with his boyfriend. The other one, Conly, lives in Santa Rosa and has been her lover for seven years.

"I wear a wedding ring for my husband," she explained, "and a bracelet for Conly.''

Though Amsbury and her husband, Terrance Roff, did not involve Peter and Conly in their Alameda marriage ceremony, other polyamorous Unitarians have proposed church ceremonies to bless threesomes, foursomes or moresomes.

One set of guidelines for church blessings of polyamorous partners suggests that the officiating minister try to put people at ease by saying, "We are from many different faith traditions, and we have many different experiences of love. What made us say 'yes' to being here was the love among these people.''

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Tyrone_Slothrop
Like getting a new credit card but promising it will be the last one. How are you going to pay off the balance?

With the increased tax revenues that will come from more economic prosperity due to a better climate for businesses to operate in CA.

[Sexual Harassment Panda]

Originally posted by sgtclub
Wondering what some of my friends on the left think of AS' performance to date. For those of you not keeping up, here are the highlights of his first few months:

1. Roll-back of the car tax
2. Passage of the new bond measure and corresponding balance budget amendment.
3. Passage of the bill reforming workers compensation
4. NO TAXE INCREASE
From my vantage point, the sky is not falling, contrary to what we were told prior to and immediately falling the election.

When I see a balanced budget, then I'll believe. Until then, he's just another borrow-and-spend Republican.

With all that going on, I guess driver's licenses for illegal immigrants is a small price to pay.

[The Larry Davis Experience]

Originally posted by sgtclub
Wondering what some of my friends on the left think of AS' performance to date. For those of you not keeping up, here are the highlights of his first few months:

1. Roll-back of the car tax
2. Passage of the new bond measure and corresponding balance budget amendment.
3. Passage of the bill reforming workers compensation
4. NO TAXE INCREASE

From my vantage point, the sky is not falling, contrary to what we were told prior to and immediately falling the election.

I have already spewed forth my bile about the bond measure, so I won't bore you with that again. It just bugs me that the car tax repeal made the hole that much bigger to dig out of, when the reduction in the car tax back in 98 was drafted specifically to allow for the very increase that Davis put into effect once the boom years ended.

The workers comp reform was a good thing in that the legislature did its job instead of continuing our ongoing experiment in government by ballot measure. From what I've read there was nothing done about forcing the insurers to pass the savings on to their ratepayers, which confused me since I thought a lot of the (public) rationale for the reform was that the CA bus environment was hurt because of the soaring premiums. Perhaps you know more about this.

No tax increase...we should probably wait until there's a budget before these chickens are counted.

All in all, I'm pleased that AS is doing some actual work of governing instead of just using his high profile to do PR as he takes the big questions to the voters. In that way I guess I have been pleasantly surprised. But I'm still against him on a lot of issues, which is unsurprising considering I'm a dem and he's at least nominally a republican.

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Sexual Harassment Panda
When I see a balanced budget, then I'll believe. Until then, he's just another borrow-and-spend Republican.

With all that going on, I guess driver's licenses for illegal immigrants is a small price to pay.

Bush's Guest Worker plan moots this issue if passed.

[Not Me]

Olson, the government's top courtroom lawyer, replied the federal habeas corpus law that allows prisoners to challenge their detention does not apply to the Guantanamo detainees.

He argued that Cuba, under a lease with the United States concerning the base, has ultimate sovereignty and that places the detainees beyond the control of U.S. courts.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...6&section=news

[Sexual Harassment Panda]

Originally posted by Not Me
Bush's Guest Worker plan moots this issue if passed.

It won't be, since a) both parties are against it; and b) it won't come up for a vote before 2005. The guest worker plan is universally viewed as an undisguised election year bone thrown at the Latino population.

[Atticus Grinch]

I'm pleasantly surprised at the working relationship he's developed with the Legislature. However, most of that is due to the fact that every thinking legislator (a slim majority) realizes that if Arnold blames the Legislature for a policy failure, the electorate will believe it. So the Legislature is, um, a little accomodating of the expected result any initiative campaign. This counts as governing?

I'm a single issue voter in state politics. Every governor who fails to inform the electorate that (1) legislative and initiative mandates that move discretionary spending into untouchable parts of the budget combined with (2) near-exclusive budgetary reliance on revenue from personal income and capital gains rather than more stable property taxes equals (3) a recipe for disaster is a FUCKING LIAR. That includes our beloved Governator. He's not a hero until he tells Californians that their beloved Prop 13 is going to cause this problem to get worse and worse and we'll be seeing feast-feast-feast-feast-FAMINE!!!!! budget cycles until California falls into the sea.

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by Not Me

• Olson, the government's top courtroom lawyer, replied the federal habeas corpus law that allows prisoners to challenge their detention does not apply to the Guantanamo detainees.
  
  He argued that Cuba, under a lease with the United States concerning the base, has ultimate sovereignty and that places the detainees beyond the control of U.S. courts.

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.j...6&section=news

Oh, great. Now even our prison jobs will get offshored. Do they have a Great Writ of China?

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
until California falls into the sea.

Which may not be too far off:

http://www.cisn.org/news/cepec.04.03.02.html

[Not Me]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...2004Apr20.html

The suggestion that the Saudi government and the Bush administration struck a deal to lower U.S. gasoline prices before the 2004 election seemed like one of the more explosive allegations made by Bob Woodward in his new book and media blitz.

But Woodward explained yesterday that he never said there was any secret deal. And he never said the Saudis' plans were explicitly linked to an effort to reelect Bush.

[Atticus Grinch]

Originally posted by Not Me
Which may not be too far off:

http://www.cisn.org/news/cepec.04.03.02.html

Bitch, please. 6.4 in the Mojave Desert will not make California fall into the sea. It will barely make the gila monsters fall off of their Joshua trees.

Gotta love this part: "The prediction is for a magnitude 6.4 or greater earthquake to occur on or before September 5, 2004 . . . ." "On or before"?

[Gattigap]

Originally posted by Not Me
Which may not be too far off:

http://www.cisn.org/news/cepec.04.03.02.html

And yet, oddly, they also state:

CEPEC concluded that the results do not warrant any special public policy actions at this time in California.

Good to know our government servants are on the ball. Time to call the insurance company and up my coverage.

[Not Me]

Originally posted by Atticus Grinch
Bitch, please. 6.4 in the Mojave Desert will not make California fall into the sea. It will barely make the gila monsters fall off of their Joshua trees.

I am buying soon-to-be-oceanfront property in Nevada just in case.