Answer key for the Nov 2010 ballot

Here, for the benefit of my fellow left-leaning progressive egalitarian voters in the Montclair District of Oakland, is the answer key for Tuesday's election. For the rest of y'all, this is an opportunity to learn why you should be glad you don't have to vote here, where democracy is not a sport for amateurs.

If I've made any factual errors, please correct me in the comments. If you have any insights on the issues where I'm perplexed, please enlighten me. If you're a right-leaning regressive bigot, don't bother to comment, because we won't persuade each other. If you have a reasoned disagreement and are interested in respectful debate, then by all means, comment away!

We have three freaking ballots!

Holy crap! Between state offices, state measures, and local ranked-choice questions, we have not one, not two, but three tests to fill out!

Ballot the first: from Jerry Brown to "Who the heck is Katy Foulkes?"

Governor: Jerry Brown.

C'mon, folks, this one's easy.

Governor Moonbeam did a great job thirty-some years ago when California was the land of opportunity that drew Meg Whitman to come earn her ill-gotten fortune here. And he dated Linda Ronstadt. Who can argue with his taste? Linda Ronstadt is not, by the way, Rosanne Cash.

Mayor Moonbeam did wonders for Oakland, with most of the benefits of his sensible leadership only now becoming visible to people who didn't pay attention and thought he was an evil pro-business Republican in disguise. He's not; he's a sensible guy who understood that if you want scary areas to get scarier, you make them unattractive for business, and if you want scary areas to become nice, you attract businesses and make them places people would want to live.

Attorney General Moonbeam had the dignity not to defend Prop H8. In fact, he saw to it that his office gave Prop H8 the discredit it deserved.

We need Governor Moonbeam again.

And he's my neighbor! No kidding—he lives about a mile from here, along my jogging route. Every so often, I run into him and his wife while I'm walking Kjersti the chocolate lab in Redwood Park. We exchange nods and smiles, I pretend he's just some ordinary guy, and he pretends I'm just some ordinary woman with a ridiculously cute dog.

As for Meg Whitman, she's got hideous politics, she made a ton of money by doing a bad job as eBay's CEO, and she treats her domestic help as disposables, not as people. I don't even want to have a beer with her, and I love beer.

As for the others, I imagine the Green candidate is fine, but we need Jerry to win. Don't waste your ballot; this one's too close for comfort. Anything but a 99-point margin over Meg is too close for comfort.

Lieutenant Governor: Gavin Newsom

I wouldn't have voted for him for Mayor of San Francisco, either, but once he took office, he turned on his wealthy supporters and started doing the right thing all over the place. He legalized gay and lesbian marriage in San Francisco, and the pictures of crowds of happy people in love changed the conversation. For that alone, Gavin deserves some more time in politics.

Yes, he appears to be a slime-ball, but he's our slime-ball.

Et cetera: vote for the Democrats

Unless they have such a huge lead that you can safely vote for the Greens. I'm too lazy to figure out which ones those are.

Attorney General: Kamala Harris

She's the real thing, and she prosecutes crimes that matter instead of BS that's good for headlines, and there are some cretins spending serious money to smear her. Don't be fooled.

United States Senator: Barbara Boxer. Repeat, Barbara Boxer. Repeat, Barbara Boxer.

A lot of politicians who are on the right side nevertheless make a lot of weaselly votes, pander to idiots, and generally fall shockingly short of acting on even their own convictions. Not Babs. She's one of the few who actually speak the truth and bring up the issues that matter.

Carly Fiorina has a lot in common with Meg Whitman: she was a lousy CEO, her politics are hideous, and she doesn't treat her inferiors with respect. About all I can say in her favor is that she's a lot better looking than Meg Whitman. I'm happy for her about the cancer thing. I wish her well, but she needs to pay a lot more taxes, and the idea of her replacing Barbara Boxer as my Senator scares the bejesus out of me.

I once performed at a Barbara Boxer benefit event, and not only did she give a great talk, but when the event was over, she and the headliner, Hillary Rodham Clinton, came right over to thank us musicians and stand with us for several pictures. That's before either one of them shook a single wealthy hand, mind you. They said thank you. To the musicians. The hired help. The nobodies.

Class act, Barbara Boxer.

And she's WAY shorter than you can possibly imagine, even when she's standing in some high scary-ass heels, as she was. The mere fact that she can walk in those things should earn her your great respect.

US Representative: Barbara Lee. Barbara Lee speaks for me!

Barbara Lee was the only dissenting vote in the appalling, embarrassing, unworthy, unamerican rush to blow Iraq to hell and gone because a terrorist organization in Afghanistan attacked the United States again. She was the only person in all of Washington to say no to Dubya and Cheney's blood lust. One person in Washington voted with integrity. It was Barbara Lee.

Member of the State Assembly: Sandré Swanson

Even though he robo-called me more than once. Haven't we proven to ourselves enough times that not having a majority in the Assembly leads to absurd stalemates over basic things like passing budgets and writing reasonable laws?

Judicial Yes and No people: I have no clue

I have absolutely no idea how to vote on these justices. Never have. There are no reliable resources that I know of that are of any help whatsoever on figuring out who, why, or why not. The only voter guides that we pay attention to that say anything say yes for all of them. Okay, I guess.

Seriously, though, WTF? If intelligent people who are willing to put some work into this voting thing can't figure it out, then isn't something broken?

Update! NO on Ming Chin! NO on Ming Chin!

With a tip of the hat to Zoe for supplying this helpful link: http://www.calitics.com/diary/12705/november-2010-statewide-endorsements

Superior Court Judge, Office #9: Victoria S Kolakowski

Most of the leftie voter guides are split on this one. John Creighton appears to be decent enough. Here I go with the advice of Alice B Toklas
organization and the local Green Party Voter Guide, both of which prefer Victoria Kolakowski for a variety of reasons. She's progressive and transgendered, and I'm all for some diversity on the court. About darned time.

Good thing she's not a write-in candidate.

By the way, even if you're not a Green (I'm not, although I wish I could be), their voter guides are considerably more helpful than most. They actually explain their endorsements and supply facts that are helpful for weighing the fuzzier matters.

State Superintendent of Public Instruction: Yech

Even the Greens can't figure this one out. They're both pretty lame. Torlakson seems slightly less awful; at least he doesn't harp on and on about test scores.

AC Transit District Director, At-Large: Joel Young

Thanks, Greens.

EBMUD Director, Ward 3: Katy Foulkes

Thanks, Greens. She's decent on ecology and lousy on labor. She's also unopposed. I guess we might as well vote for her.

Ballot the second: from legalizing marijuana to funding for the Oakland Police Department

Fasten your seatbelts. The propositions are where democracy is at its most challenging in California. Holy crap, I hate our so-called voter initiative process. Let's face it, most of the propositions are so poorly worded that it's hard to figure out how to vote even after you've figured out how you feel about the issue. Most of them address things our Assembly is too wimpy to do, more badly than even the Assembly could manage to do them. Most of them are heavily funded by massive corporations who do not have the needs of California citizens in mind.

So, my first rule is always: when in doubt, not just no, but hell no.

Now let's struggle through each one of them.

Proposition 19 Legalize marijuana: yes

No, I've never smoked it myself, and the way the smell makes me want to hurl, that's unlikely to change any time soon. I know some people who've messed themselves up pretty badly with the stuff, too, and lots more who haven't, but here's why I'm voting yes: because it's time to stop wasting resources on treating its personal use, cultivation, and purchase as a crime.

Prohibition was a lousy idea, and it didn't work either.

Proposition 20 Redistricting: No

I know, it seems like a good idea when you read it, but look who's supporting it: big business. Who's opposed? Everyone from the ACLU on down. That's all I need to know.

Proposition 21 State park vehicle fees: Yes

It's a flat tax, which is generally regressive, but the Greens make a good argument for why to vote yes, anyway. Short answer: the parks need money, and it ain't coming from the Assembly.

Proposition 22 Confusing jibber jabber about moving money around: No

As theballot.org puts it, "Complicated & suspicious way to prevent state borrowing from local agencies." The good guys all say no, the bad guys all say yes. This is a great example of "When in doubt, no." Lots of propositions are just plain bad ideas, written as badly as possible so as to confuse people into supporting something they'd never in their right minds agree with.

Proposition 23 Postponing planetary health: No

Why on earth would anyone in their right minds postpone enforcing the environmental protection laws that aren't strong enough in the first place? Because big bidness told them it had something to do with why they don't have jobs, of course! Bullshit. Not just no, hell no.

Proposition 24 Repeal some tax loopholes: Yes

This one is basically about getting big bidness to pay more taxes by ditching some ridiculous loopholes. A rare example of a proposition we need. Not just yes, hell yes.

Proposition 25 Drop the supermajority budget thing: Yes

California can't pass anything to do with budgets without a two-thirds majority, which basically means it can't get anything done. When do the good guys ever have a 2/3 majority? That's right. It's a stupid, stupid, stupid law, and it's time for it to die. Not just yes, hell yes.

Unfortunately, this isn't a great proposition, but it's a start.

Proposition 26 Create a new supermajority budget thing: No

See above under Proposition 25. The supermajority budget thing we already have is a disaster. The last thing we need is yet another supermajority budget thing. Not just no, hell no.

Proposition 27 Undo bogus redistricting scheme: Yes

This one goes with Proposition 20 but gets it right. It's not perfect, but the Governator's bogus system is a pile of crap. As theballot.org puts it, "Eliminates that sketchy redistricting commission (see Prop 20)." Barbara Lee says yes, as do most but not all of the good guys.

Oh, boy! There's more! It's county, school, and city stuff!

Measure F Paying $10 more to improve Alameda transportation: Oh, OK, I guess so.

Measure L Paying $195 more to do something about the embarrassment that is the Oakland school system: Yes, unfortunately

Measure V Raising taxes on medical marijuana. Sure!

Raise almost a million bucks? Yeah, sounds good to me.

Measure W Paying $15 more a month to keep Oakland from breaking off and sliding into the Pacific Ocean. Well, okay.

This is another sucky flat tax that hurts poor people far more than wealthy people, but we do sort of need to keep the lights on somehow.

Measure X Paying $360 more to do something about crime or something. Uh-uh. No. Hell no.

Uh-uh. This is another bogus "scare the people into passing yet another regressive tax measure that hurts poor people and lets rich people off easy by reminding them that their city is full of black people and implying that somehow this will do something to pay for more police somehow without actually doing so" measure. No. Hell no. And, no.

Sandré Swanson says he's for this one. Seems like a good reason to look forward to Rebecca Kaplan filling his seat in a few years to me.

Measure BB Something about police something something. Yes.

I can't for the life of me figure out what this one means. I can't even figure out what the Greens say it means. I'm tired after doing the first, third, and all but this question on the second test. I can't take it anymore. The Greens say yes and I'm leaving it at that.

Ballot the third: from Don Perata to "Who the heck is Gary Yee?"

Oakland Mayor: not Don Perata

That's the most important thing. Yes, he's got lots of name recognition, because he's under investigation for corruption and he's been a famously lousy politician for freaking ever. Even by Chicago standards, he's too corrupt to elect to anything else.

After that, this one's hard for me. Ranked-choice voting is a good thing here, because it means we actually get to vote the way we want, not the way we feel we have to. So for me it's the Green guy first, Don Macleay, because he's actually a smart guy with good ideas. What a concept!

Second, I go with Jean Quan. She's earnest and basically on the right side of most things, but I also think she's prone to some wimpiness for the sake of gathering votes, and she does lots of smarmy crap that makes it embarrassing to support her. Still, she's decent, she's on the right side of most of the most important issues, she's kept her staffers busy doing good stuff for Oakland and its citizens, and she's a credible candidate. Second choice.

My reluctant third is Rebecca Kaplan. I want to like her a lot more than I do. She's smart, Jewish, feminist, lesbian, left, progressive, and lots of other good stuff. But she's gotten a lot of criticism for temperamental behavior, which isn't generally a recipe for effective leadership, and she's got her sights on higher office; this run for mayor is widely seen as a grab for attention just to up her name recognition for the Assembly position when Sandré Swanson terms out. I think she'd probably push more issues that I care about than Jean Quan, but I think Jean Quan would get more stuff done. Let's go with Jean for the executive position that needs to get stuff done, and let's look forward to voting in a few years for a scrappy rabble-rouser to join the Assembly that desperately needs them. Yes, here it is, my 2013 endorsement of Rebecca Kaplan for State Assembly. She'll be awesome there. She'd probably be a pretty good mayor, too. I won't be upset if she wins.

Either one of them would be fine and a heck of a lot better than Don Perata. Did I mention that he's under investigation for corruption?

Update: You know, let's switch 2 and 3. I like Kaplan better. I just do. And see the comments below.

Member of City Council, District 4

My wife did the work on this one, and here are the answers according to her survey of the endorsements.

First, Libby Schaaf, because she worked for Jerry Brown, he supports her, and all the good guys endorse her. Second, Jill Broadhurst, because she's a mensch and has started lots of good stuff. Third, Clinton Killian, because he's the smart black dude who went to Stanford and UC-B Law School and he walked Montclair.

Just writing down what she says here, folks. My wife's smart; you best listen.

Uh-oh. We've got an update—she says maybe it should be Daniel Swafford instead of Clinton Killian. Swafford does look good.

City Auditor: Courtney Ruby

She's the incumbent and has been doing a great job. No second or third choice.

School Director, District 4: Benjamin Visnick

Thanks, Greens. No second or third choice.

Putting disasters in perspective, or Our crappy economy isn't so bad

[Note: I originally wrote this for my consultancy's blog, where references to localization make more sense. You can read it here if you prefer: http://blog.globalpragmatica.com/?p=62]

Many people are depressed these days, for many valid reasons. The economy is still a disaster. The localization industry is a mess in more ways than I can count. (I don't think I'll get much argument about that, but if anybody questions that, please leave a comment, and I'll elucidate in a future blog post.) Many of us are out of work and have been for a frighteningly long time. Many of us are clinging to scaled-back jobs. Many of us are worried about how long the work we're grateful to have will last.

When even the blue chip companies are slashing workforces and budgets and the banks themselves are declaring bankruptcy, we know our economy is a disaster.

Looking outside the devastated economy of the developed world, let's consider the vastly greater struggles in the two-thirds world.

Terminology break! (T9Y break!) When people say "third world," they mean "undeveloped or developing nations," and these represent over two-thirds of the world's population, so let's stop saying that and say what we really mean: "two-thirds world."

In the news today, hundreds of thousands of Haitians are believed dead after a major 7.0 earthquake hit, its epicenter right in the most populous part of an already fragile island. Most Haitians are black and live on less than US$1 a day. Putting this in perspective, fewer than 3000 people will killed in the horrifying 9/11 attacks. However, I fear that history will show the great failure of our humanity when the global public response to the crisis gets those metrics backwards.

Because I have spent several decades working in statistical software in various roles, I can't help wanting to look at the desperation quantitatively. Here are some graphs that will probably startle most people---and I hope horrify many of you into taking some kind of action, today. Mind you, I'm expecting to startle and horrify even the well-educated, privileged, mostly white people in the developed world who have the means to read my blog.

First, let's compare the death tolls from a handful of disasters that have filled our headlines in recent years. Before you look at the graph, which do you think was worse?

• 9/11 terrorist attacks
• Hurricane Katrina
• Indian Ocean tsunami
• Haiti earthquake
• 2008 Earthquakes in the People's Republic of China

And how do you think the economies of these places compare?

First, the scale of the disasters. For my North American readers: remember how devastated you felt watching the TV coverage of 9/11 and of Hurricane Katrina, please.


That's right. The devastation of 9/11 and Katrina combined are trivial compared to any of the others.

Now let's consider the economies of these places. Most of us know that USA's wealth dwarfs that of most countries by most measures. A relevant measure for this situation would be the gross domestic product per capita--that is, the total economic output of each state or nation, divided by its number of people.



We all know that New York is wealthier than Louisiana, but did you realize that the New York-Louisiana comparison is almost meaningless in the big picture? Even the difference between those two tall bars dwarfs the size of the bars in the two-thirds world nations!

So now let's put those two ideas together: let's look at the wealth in each place lined up with the scale of the disaster in each place, as measured by GDP per capita

This composition of the most massive bloodbaths in big red bars lining up directly with the meager economic means of each place in tiny green bars is the most devastating graph of all. The biggest disasters have taken place where people are least prepared to cope with them.

There are many ways to help, and of course there are many craven imbeciles who take this opportunity to scam the people of goodwill with fraudulent donation methods. Here are some ways that have been vetted and determined to be reliable: http://www.google.com/relief/haitiearthquake

Here are some flaws in my analysis that could distract nitpickers from the clarion call to our humanity:

• My national and state GDP data are from different years and sources, and they're probably inflation-adjusted differently.
• I'm considering these events to have taken place in New York, Louisiana, Indonesia, China, and Haiti, where the most deaths occurred, although other states and nations were affected.
• The costs of 9/11 and Katrina were borne nationally, but the victims were (mostly) local, so I considered the state economies instead of the national economy.
• Estimates of the death tolls in the two-thirds world are always much fuzzier, because the poorer you are, the less likely you are to be accurately counted.
• Estimates of the death toll in Haiti are wildly premature. Some sources say "hundreds of thousands," and while they might mean "100,000 give or take a few 10,000," a careful speaker would mean the far more frightening "100,000 or 200,000 or 300,000" by that description.
• It's a little weird to measure ability to recover by comparing the GDP per person to the number of persons dead. The dead people are dead, and no amount of money will help them. But the people left behind are living in economies that are more or less capable of recovering.
• These data are confounded, if you consider that poorer nations have a lesser ability to build safety into their communities. Wealthier nations have higher survival rates in times of disaster because their buildings are sturdier, more of their citizens live in buildings in the first place, their bridges and roads and so on are more prevalent and higher quality, their emergency responders are more numerous and better-equipped and -funded, and on and on and on. The ways in which wealth mitigates disaster and the lack of wealth compounds disaster are numerous and heartbreaking.

My data sources:

• http://www.emdat.be
• http://data.un.org/CountryProfile.aspx
• http://www.weather.com/newscenter/topstories/060829katrinastats.html
• http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_GDP_per_capita_(nominal)
• http://www.statemaster.com/
• http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/2010/haiti.quake/

The analysis was my own, and I prepared all the graphs using JMP's Graph Builder.

A military perspective on Obama vs. McCain - the MAJORITY perspective

Here's an email I got from a friend of mine, whose husband is in the Air Force. I think it's worth reading.

Dear family and friends,

TO ME THIS ELECTION IS A LIFE OR DEATH ISSUE (no exaggeration).

Most of the public is completely disconnected from the wars on a personal level (which was my life before) so I want to try to personalize it for you:
My husband is in the Air Force and I have had the humble (& challenging) privilege of learning about the military world for almost 10 years now. I have seen first hand, the toll that this war has taken on countless families. When our daughter was a baby I took her to Walter Reed Army Medical Center in DC for checkups, where I saw soldiers with limbs and/or parts of their head missing from combat. When our close friends are in war zones, I pray for their safe return. My heart hurts when I see children suffering due to an absent parent (for 15 months!!) and spouses struggling to keep their families together. Due to frequent moves, we typically do not have the luxury of living near family and close friends, so we often bear the burdens on our own. Military members and spouses are some of the STRONGEST, most HONORABLE and IMPRESSIVE people I have ever met.

Regardless of your position on the war(s), if you appreciate the sacrifices that our MILITARY (over 4,000 dead, many with serious lifelong physical and mental issues, increased numbers of suicide) and their families are making to serve our country, I BEG you to THINK about THIS COMPELLING FACT (from the NON-partisan Center for Responsive Politics), and PLEASE pass the info along to as many people as possible:

DEPLOYED TROOPS ARE CONTRIBUTING TO OBAMA 6:1 OVER MCCAIN.

To me, this says everything. If so many of the troops don't want McCain as their Commander in Chief (and Veterans groups support OBAMA far more than McCain), THE PUBLIC REALLY NEEDS TO TAKE NOTICE (particularly because this is supposed to be McCain's strength).

I have joined a group called Blue Star Families for Obama (www.bsf4o.com). We are military families who are PRO-MILITARY and PRO OBAMA, and we are working hard to get the word out that many military families want Barack Obama to be our next President.

The deadline to register to vote is rapidly coming up (especially for people serving overseas) - please see voter registration info below. PLEASE participate in this historic election.

With love, ACTION and FAITH in our goodness,
Kimberley Taylor-Beer

-----

Kimberley -

Registration deadlines are coming up soon. Tell your friends, family, and neighbors to check out our new one-stop voter registration website.

Just forward this message.

VoteforChange.com makes it easier than ever to register. Instead of tracking down the right forms, all you need to do is answer a few basic questions and you'll be ready to vote. You can also:

Confirm your existing registration
Apply to vote absentee
Find your polling place
If you don't know your own registration status or you'd like to learn more, take a minute to visit the site right now.

This race is too close and too important to stay home on Election Day.

It's people just like you who will transform this nation.

Thanks,

Barack

On Sarah Palin

All this excitement about Sarah Palin is bizarre. Sure, she's funny and pretty, but her opinions about and track record on governance are scary! How is a funny, pretty scary politician any better than an ugly, boring scary politician?

My friend Alicia has taken to calling her "Caribou Barbie."

I think Hillary Clinton got it right: 

I don't think [Palin is] what this election is about. Anybody who believes that the Republicans, whoever they are, can fix the mess they created probably believes that the iceberg could have saved the Titanic.

Wow

That a Republican mayor is the one saying it is encouraging. What he has to say is great. How hard it is for him to say it has me puzzled a bit. I can make some guesses but can't convince myself that one is better than another. http://cbs5.com/video/?id=26888@kpix.dayport.com

Iowa does good

A while back I posted on the subject of so-called "gay marriage." Shortly after posting that, I got involved in an email conversation with fellow St. Olaf College alumni in which I expanded on my thoughts. Today upon receiving a news alert from a friend that Iowa has joined the ranks of sensible states who are choosing to protect economic and legal fairness for all its citizens, I am prompted to post my email here:

14 November 2006

I agree with almost everything said so far, in particular the fact that it's heartening to be reading this conversation [on a St. Olaf College LISTSERV]. I found it especially heartening for it to have been started by Pastor Benson. The public perception of this issue seems to be far too slanted in the direction of "religious leaders object to gay marriage." It doesn't seem necessary rehearse the various reasons for that here; instead I'll add my thanks to him and all who have replied.

I'm not sure whether to be optimistic or not. Sometimes I'm optimistic; I think the fact that so many people are talking about it--and so many people, so reasonably--is a sign of tremendous progress since, for example, when I was at St Olaf in the 1980s. The fledgling GLBT community's hottest topic then was whether it was safe to be "out," at St Olaf or elsewhere. This feels like progress.

Sometimes I view it historically in a different way: the institution of marriage has hardly been static for more than a few generations, let alone throughout history, and I'm not sure that its present definition is one that's going to last much longer anyway. More than a few progressive thinkers have suggested that nontraditional couples are in fact privileged by lack of access to traditional marriage, because they are both free and obligated to explore for themselves what they mean by committing to each other. I'm not sure it's a fair trade, but it seems like a valid point.

Sometimes I'm pessimistic and think we're weaving our handbaskets with so much damage already done by the misguided fights going on at the constitutional level.

Most of the time, I take a pragmatic view, or maybe it's denial: I think it's an issue that's getting way too much airtime relative to more serious problems in our country and world, and I resent the fact that conservative extremists (read "bigots") are so happy to exploit this as a wedge issue, but I just don't see it as being nearly as pressing as the lack of universal health care, decent education, and a zillion other things that our politicians SHOULD be spending their time on first.

I wrote at greater length on the subject recently in a blog post, which you can find here:
http://erinvang.blogspot.com/2006/08/im-sick-of-so-called-gay-marriage.html

The gist of that post was to propose that we separate marriage and civil union into two separate institutions. What I didn't address is this: what are we all supposed to do in the meantime?

I have the great happiness of being "engaged" (or whatever) to a wonderful woman, and we plan to be "married" (or whatever) in January 2008, but I'll be darned if I know how we're going to do it.

We set a distant date in part so that we have time to talk to lawyers and financial planners and whoever else about how to go about creating a partnership with as many of the dimensions currently available to "married" couples as possible, given the patchwork of simple and domestic partnership options available to us. And then there's all the questions around which laws will end up taking precedence over the others. Any legal experts out there want to help us? [Followup: we didn't get any offers from lawyers, but I did receive an astonishing number of thoughtful, supportive replies from friends and strangers alike.]

We also have a pile of questions about what kind of ceremony to create with what kind of officiant(s), since the traditional options aren't available to us, but none of that seems as important as figuring out how to protect each other and make ourselves accountable to each other financially and legally in all the myriad ways that straight couples get for the price of a marriage license.

Another brush with fame (among well-read news junkies, at least)

David Brooks was on my shuttle from Dulles to Raleigh on Monday morning, a few rows ahead of me. I saw him stand up to escape down the aisle and that's about it. I attempted to catch up to him in the airport to say that, although I often disagree with much of his thinking, I respect it and appreciate his writing, and ever since he would seem to have turned on Bush, I have more respect for his thinking. Not that it would have meant much to him, of course.

He was wearing a pink oxford and his glasses (and other things), and it looked like he had shaven recently. Respectable, in other words.

I was wearing microfiber camping pants, a t-shirt, a denim shirt, sneakers, and my leather jacket, and I looked like I hadn't shaven, eaten, slept, or had water nor a coherent thought for at least ten hours (because, of course, I hadn't, having flown red-eye from SF). Like hell, in other words.

While trotting from baggage to the rental car bus, I pondered the cost of fame. If David Brooks had looked as beaten up and downtrodden as I did on that shuttle, at least a few people would have recognized and thought ill of him, and it probably would have made gossip columns or at least a few blogs. If I'd caught up to him and spoken to him and he'd received my comments with any kind of grace, despite my appearance and probable incoherence, it would have been to his great credit.

I looked like hell, and nobody cared.

My politics are better and I'm sure I make way less money, but his life might be harder, and I'm not sure I'd trade with him. Anonymity has its privileges.

David Brooks, if you should google yourself and land here: I enjoy your columns. I often disagree with you, but you don't make it easy. Further quibbling with your recent writing is less interesting than the preceding points.

And you look better in pink than I ever will. Not that there's anything wrong with that.

Montana update from Dad

Dad replies with a note on voter initiatives in Montana:

We had several initiatives on our ballot, also. There were several more but the Montana Supreme Court threw out the ones that had been foisted on us by some whacko neo-cons, because of widespread fraud in the signature-gathering process. One of the initiatives that happily passed was an increase in the Montana minimum wage--a buck higher than the current Federal minimum. That won by about 80-20. A sticking point in that one was that it calls for annual adjustments in the minimum wage based on the Consumer Price Index. The Republicans who managed to kill a minimum wage increase in the last legislative session will have lots of time to contemplate the sins of killing good legislation, because they could have gotten it pushed through without the CPI thing and bragged about how they helped working class Montanans. Now all they have is egg on their face and if the restaurant industry, who really fought the wage increase, thinks about it, they should remember who they got to this point.

Glad to hear you're going to stay in the U.S.

My post-election day screed

Victoria and I had taken yesterday off to volunteer for the local Dems to get out the vote. Sadly, the local Dems were too poorly organized to take us up on our offer, so our big effort consisted of getting out our own votes. Candy walked us (about a mile downhill) to the polling place to turn in our absentee ballots yesterday afternoon. You'd think we could have filled them out and mailed them weeks ago, but as I've written many times before, it's hard work being a good citizen in California.

First, we've got these bizarre relics of misguided populism called voter initiatives, aka propositions, meant to give the power back to the people but actually used either to catch hot potatoes thrown wimpy politicians or to ram crackpot lunacy down our throats, because who wants to buy politicians when you can buy your very own laws? My original policy was to vote No on all propositions, because it's the wrong way to make law, but because there are the two kinds--actual decent laws that politicians won't pass, usually because they involve taxes, and awful laws that are cleverly written to confuse the dickens out of even the smartest and best-educated voters--I've shifted to a new policy of researching which ones are which.

This year we had about a dozen of them, and it took me about four hours to figure it all out. I'm not sure if I got the right answer on two of them, but I did manage to be on the losing side of the most egregious one, basically exiling sex offenders from urban areas, so that those rural law enforcement agencies will have something to do with all their abundant resources. Never mind that sex offenders are such a trivially small part of the population that it would be cheaper and probably more effective to build them a nice resort in Oahu. We also resisted the urges to make cigarettes and gas more expensive, because although we love regressive taxes, we apparently don't buy what economists have been saying for years, that if cigarettes and gas were more expensive, a few more people would decide that emphysema and SUVs aren't worth it. (I don't get it. An ugly rumor must have gotten out that economists are French or something.)

On the other hand, we did win six of our seven possible new taxes, told the parental notification zealots to start weaving their handbaskets, and told a New York real estate magnate where to shove his eminent domain ploy.

Second, there's the judicial elections. I still don't have a method for these. Our ballots list dozens of sitting judges on whose retention we get to vote yes or no. An hour of googling plus conversations with three progressive-minded lawyers left me no better informed on the matter. Many of us therefore adopt a "First do no harm" strategy of skipping most of them. There has got to be a better way to staff the courts.

Anyway, back to our walk to the polling place, we were pleased to run into three neighbors, all of whom made subtle indications that it was time to have Dubya taken out and fed to the hogs. We tried to get a ballot for Candy (an Oakland citizen, with tags to prove it) but were turned down. Her spirits picked up on the long schlepp back uphill, though, when she found not one but two tennis balls. About an hour later we were home, drenched in sweat and well spattered with dog slobber. Democracy is aerobic when you live in Montclair.

At the end of Oakland East Bay Symphony rehearsal last night, the conductor's parting words were, "Well, let's go home and see if we need to move out of the country tomorrow." With the House regained and the Senate close, I'm happy to report that I no longer feel the need to spend today researching Canadian immigration law.

I don't even mind that we reelected our Governator. Sadly, it was probably the right outcome--the alternative was an uninspired crook, and the actor was never as bad as we'd feared. Lately he's actually been good. Let's hope it wasn't a cynical ploy to get reelected so he'd get four more years to scurry back to the right. For the first time in my life I cast a protest vote for the Green guy, joining a proud 2.3% minority, since I knew there wasn't the least chance of my vote actually making a difference in the outcome.

In goofier moments for Left Coast pride, both Berkeley and San Francisco resoundingly passed measures to impeach Bush and Cheney, and our own Jerry Brown has added another title to his resume, making him Governor Mayor Attorney General Moonbeam.

I'm starting to believe in our republic again. I think I'll go buy a flagpole, so I can hoist the stars and stripes for the first time in many years.

Let's learn law with the DTWOF!

Alison Bechdel brilliantly defines habeas corpus in terms a grade-schooler could understand. If only Dubya were as smart as grade-schoolers. 

DTWOF #458: Below the Law

And speaking of Alison Bechdel, her new graphic memoir is one of the most brilliant pieces of new literature I have ever read. Run, don't walk, to your nearest bookstore and buy Fun Home. Listen to NPR's story about it (and her) here.

I'm sick of the so-called "gay marriage" topic

First and most important, let us consider who has made it a topic: the people opposed to it. The people putting it on ballots, platforms, and advertising are people hoping to use it as a wedge issue to divide progressives. The rest of us have generally preferred to focus on things of much greater importance, like this disastrous mess of a war in Iraq. Naturally these types of topics aren't as much fun for those people, since the politicians they've bought are for the most part the ones who got us into this mess in the first place.

Next we have a terminology problem. First, "gay" leaves out a lot of the people affected--lesbians, bis, trans, whatevers, and all the other kinds of non-traditional families. Second, "marriage" is missing the point: it's not about a lacy veil and a march down the aisle of a flower-bedecked church, it's about basic fairness in all manner of tax, inheritance, insurance, medical decision-making and hospital visitation rights, child custody laws, and so on.

Herewith my proposal.

Recognize that there are two separate issues: marriage and civil union.

Marriage is a religious institution with moral standing. Allow religious organizations the freedom to define for themselves what marriage is and who is eligible to participate. Allow people the freedom to choose for themselves whether to participate in religious organizations, to choose to join them or not, and to choose which other organizations' marriages they will respect and honor. Marriage confers only those privileges and responsibilities defined by the organization. The means to dissolve or annul marriages or to disallow dissolution or annulment is also assigned to the marriage-granting institution to define and regulate. Marriage has no legal standing.

Civil union is a legal institution with legal standing. Allow the states and nation to define what civil union is and let a reading of the Constitution make clear that all are equally eligible to participate. Civil union confers legal and financial privileges and responsibilities and binds its members as legally and financially responsible for each other. The means to dissolve or annul civil unions or to disallow dissolution or annulment is also assigned to the state to define and regulate. Civil union has no moral standing.

Legal dependency is just that: legal dependency. My legal dependents are my natural-born or legally adopted children and anyone else for whom I take legal responsibility.

Keep church and state separate. Keep marriage and civil union separate.

If you want both marriage and civil union, get both. If you want one but not the other, get one.

I am free to persuade my church to marry me to my female partner, and if I succeed, we shall be married in the eyes of my church and our fellow congregants. If you don't go to my church or respect my church, you are free to consider me unmarried. You don't have to send me a wedding present or say congratulations, and you don't have to send me a sympathy card if someday I am bereaved. If we have sexual relations, you are free to consider them adulterous, scandalous, promiscuous, fornicatory, and all other manner of immoral; I shall not.

However, if my partner and I have joined in civil union, whether or not we have been married, and I get in a car wreck, and you work at the hospital treating me, you must respect my partner's input as you would any legal spouse's. If you employ me, you must offer my partner and our dependents--be they our naturally-born or legally-adopted children, or our senile parents[-in-law], or our disabled siblings, or even the refugees on whom we have taken pity and for whom we have taken legal responsibility--same insurance benefits you offer to any legal partners and dependents. If you have rental property, you must consider our lease application on its merits. If you are a tax collector, you must offer us the same dizzying array of loopholes, gotchas, deductions, and messy choices as all the straight couples get--you must ding us or discount us the same as any other civilly-united couple filing jointly or separately.

I'm sick of this topic and wouldn't mind never having to debate or write on it again. For those who want more, here's some interesting reading from reasonable people: http://www.beyondmarriage.org/.

So often he does it better

My blog posts on the heat are topped by a Jon Carroll column. I don't mind when he does it better; I'm just glad I get to read him. He's right on, once again.

Another "he" who done good: my boss wrote a song that's worth checking out. You may recall from earlier posts that I work for some big ol' software company, so this is a fellow software geek we're talking about, but his song has something to say and says it well.

If you're from my generation, you might be as clueless as I was, so here's a tip on the background: the original Superman was George Reeves, father of Christopher Reeves, the guy who was famous as a movie hunk and then more famous as a spinal cord injury activist. George Reeves died under mysterious circumstances (murder? suicide? see the movie!). If anyone knows the truth and can prove it, they're not talking, but for at least one little boy in Iowa who needed his hero, the alleged suicide came as a real blow.

It's so amazing when people step way outside their usual comfort zones to do something that matters to them.

In other news, Ayse thinks my blog needs a new title. Obviously she's right, but what would it be? Use that comment link, people!

I've just learned that if you read this blog with Windows Internet Explorer, you've never seen all the stuff in the right column.

Let's take stock. Do you see nothing besides the title and recent posts? If so, you're using a crappy, lousy, horrible, inferior browser, and you should move on. Over there--->> on the right, you should see a little picture of me, a list of photo collections found within, a link to archives of old posts, a wee sudoku, and some links to other blogs I read. If you don't see that, your browser sucks.

Internet Explorer is about the lamest and most pathetic web browser I've ever attempted to use. I'll restrain myself from the urge to level a blast at all of Windows and focus my wrath on IE: it's lousy, and if it's the only web browser you've ever used, you're in for a huge surprise. Almost all the alternatives out there are better. I myself like OmniWeb, and Safari and Firefox are my backup browsers. None of them are perfect, but all of them are better. The first two are the exclusive privilege of Mac users, but those of you who haven't yet seen the light on the whole Mac vs. Whatever question could at least do yourselves the favor of trying Firefox. ("Firewho?" I hear you ask. Use Google, it's not hard to find it.) Download it and use it for two days. You might move on to something else, but you'll never go back to IE.

For those of you who do have Macs, give OmniWeb a try. It has its little problems, but I have yet to find a browser that doesn't. What OmniWeb does well, it does so well that you'll want to use it all the time, and you won't mind having to keep Safari and Firefox around for the bits and pieces it doesn't handle as well.

Guest post from my dad: 20,000 casualties later

Here's my dad's latest column for a Butte, MT rag, the Roun'Town Review, to be published in April. Reprinted without consultation or permission. You tell 'em, Pop! (Pop pictured here with Candy, back when she lived with Mom and Dad.)

20,000 Casualties later

Paul F. Vang

This last month we observed the third anniversary of our country’s invasion of Iraq. It wasn’t a celebration.

In the March 2003 issue of the Roun’Town Review I wrote about the then impending invasion. On the topic of “War in Iraq—Tragedy in the Making,” I wrote, “While war is imminent, I can’t help but think of President Bush’s fixation on war against Iraq as nothing short of insanity.”

Nothing I have heard, seen, or read in these last three years has changed my outlook on the situation. We went to war, supposedly, because of Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction,Iraq’s ties to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, and purchases of uranium from Niger. We never found weapons of mass destruction—and we certainly looked. The only thing we found was that U.N. weapons inspectors, who had to flee Iraq before the war began, were right when they said they couldn’t find anything, either. The supposed ties to Al Qaeda and 9/11 proved false, and there was no Iraqi purchase of uranium in Niger. The exposé of that fiction led to the illegal uncovering of CIA officer Valerie Plame.

When the causus belli couldn’t be proved, the President reinvented the basis for war. We were bringing democracy to the Middle East. We wanted to get rid of their dictator. We got rid of their dictator and a show trial is one of the current side shows now playing in Baghdad. Have we brought democracy to Iraq? That’s a thornier question. There have been elections, which is good. Every day, however, the reports from Iraq tell us that the country is sinking further and further into all-out civil war.

In the meantime our soldiers and marines keep dying. The Administration would just as soon we wouldn’t dwell on such trivia and, in fact, raised a firestorm of anger against publications that published secretly-taken photos of a planeload of flag-draped coffins a couple years ago.

As of mid-March, over 2,300 American military personnel have given the ultimate sacrifice for their country. In addition, 17,269 men and women have suffered wounds. To be specific, according to CNN tabulations, as of March 21, 2,316 Americans, 103 Britons, 13 Bulgarians, two Danes, two Dutch, 11 Spaniards, two Thai, and 18 Ukrainians have died in Iraq. This is a total of 2,521 Coalition deaths. The butcher bill continues to mount, even as the Administration cuts funding for Veteran’s hospitals.

As to the total death toll, only God knows. A couple months ago, the President estimated, when asked at a press conference, that there had been 30,000 Iraqi deaths. Bob Herbert of the New York Timesrecently cited a Foreign Affairs article estimating that the number of Iraqi deaths has reached six figures—meaning over 100,000, not including deaths caused by previous sanctions prior to our invasion.

From the perfect vision of hindsight, and the continuing revelations of events leading to war, we can look to an ever-growing list of mistakes made in the preparation and execution of the war plans. We went in with too small of a force to truly occupy the country and to make Iraq’s borders secure. When we occupied Baghdad we let mobs take over the city—except, naturally, the Oil Ministry building. We turned Saddam Hussein’s notorious prison at Abu Ghraib into our notorious prison. In rebuildingIraq’s infrastructure, the Administration gave sweetheart contracts to politically well-connected contractors rather than give Iraqis a chance to participate. There was, and is, no exit strategy.

In spite of the ever-growing list of problems, President Bush continues to live in his self-delusional world where he thinks we’re winning in Iraq. In his March 21 news conference he said, “I’m confident, I believe, I’m optimistic we’ll succeed—if not, I’d pull our troops out.”

At the same time, we’re building major U.S. military bases that signal Bush’s intention and commitment to continue our occupation of Iraq indefinitely. Kellogg, Brown and Root, the construction company subsidiary of Halliburton, Vice President Cheney’s old company is, naturally, a major contractor for building these bases. George Bush will leave the White House in January 2009—less than three years from now. Who knows how long it will be before American sons and daughters stop dying in support of Bush’s misguided war and we finally bring our troops home?

From my perspective here in peaceful western Montana, I see no reason to be optimistic aboutIraq. An army of occupation will never be loved. We may be grudgingly tolerated in the best of situations, but according to recent opinion polls in Iraq, the vast majority of Iraqis consider our invasion and occupation of their country as their biggest problem, and that outlook is not likely to get better. They’re glad we took out Saddam Hussein but that’s as far as it goes. After all, if there have been 100,000 deaths among Iraq citizens, the chances are that just about every family in that country has lost someone in the process. Whether that death occurred because of U.S. military action or sectarian violence, the chances are that the family will say, “It’s all America’s fault.”

It’s no longer a war on terrorism. We’re just trying to survive the war of insurrection. Our troops hunker down in their secure enclaves between excursions into civilian territory where they become targets of opportunity from varying factions of Iraqis. If there’s any logical conclusion to this conflict it’ll likely be when Shiite Muslims achieve control of the country, proclaim an Islamist Republic, and become allied with that other member of Bush’s so-called “Axis of Evil,” Iran.

In Afghanistan, the battlefield from which Bush diverted troops to start his invasion of Iraq, violence continues to increase. General Michael Maples, director of the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, testified to Congress that the Taliban, the gang that sheltered Osama Bin Laden in 2001, is making a comeback, and presents “a greater threat to the Afghan central government’s authority than at any point since late 2001.”

While Bush, Cheney and their minions continue to defend their war and question their critics’ patriotism, it’s a losing proposition. Militarily, there’s all too much resemblance to Vietnam, our disastrous war of the 20th Century. From a political standpoint, Bush’s approval rating in opinion polls continues to sink. Even conservative commentators are distancing themselves from Bush, as we learn more about the basic lies about the basis for war, and the strategic mistakes that were made in planning and executing the war.

In the meantime, we continue to soak Iraq’s deserts with American blood.