Our new assemblyman, Republican Kevin Jeffries, dropped by The Roadrunner office this morning, just to say, "Hi!" That is a remarkable event, in and of itself, since we aren't used to our previous assemblyman, the termed out Ray Haynes, giving our county or our community, the time of day. Good on you, Kevin! We appreciate a legislator getting out and about to interact with his constituents.
Arant told me: "It is a good to know that we have people like Kevin in Sacramento. What’s especially nice about having Kevin there is that he served of two water boards (Elsinore Valley MWD and Western MWD) prior to going to Sacramento. With that as a background, he fully understands what we are facing today and what California needs to do to solve its water supply issues. Now all we need to do is find him 40 more votes in the Assembly."
"I like to get out and drive around my district," Jeffries told me. He was visited the water district across the street where he met with Gen. Mgr. Gary Arant and director Merle Aleshire to talk about water issues.
"It looks like we are going to have some real problems with water supplies next year," Jeffries remarked.
Sacramento is a remarkable place, he said, where it seems as though much of the Assembly is interested in passing nanny type legislation (spanking, pet neutering, etc.) rather than doing things that would solve the state's ills, such as fix the broken water distribution system that threatens to cause a manmade drought in Southern California.
* * *
Jessica Simonsen, the Valley Center Rodeo Queen, left Wednesday to practice for the big Rodeo this weekend in Prescott, Arizona. Friday she shows in the Tough Enough To Wear Pink show, and then the Rodeo on Saturday and Sunday. She is very excited and happy to represent our Valley Center Community in this major event. She can't wait to meet all the other Rodeo Queens that were accepted as well. From on outside source we have heard that she has been one of the very few or the first Rodeo Queen from Valley Center to actually to attend this event. She wants to thank the Prescott, AZ Rodeo Committee for accepting her to go.
Friday, June 29, 2007
Saturday, June 23, 2007
COMPULSORY VOLUNTEERISM
There is a large segment of society, and especially politicians of an authoritarian bent that is dead set on pushing the idea of "Universal Service" on the youth of America.
For example, Democratic presidential candidate Chris Dodd in remarks he was to deliver this weekend was going to say that he wants, “to rekindle the flame lit in this place with an American Community Initiative that calls once again upon every American to be a part of something larger than themselves …. I want to use the power of the presidency to create the first generation of Americans in history in which everyone will have served their country—40 million Americans by 2020.”
Of course, this is not an initiative exclusively of the left or the Democrats. Among Republicans we find people like Colin Powell and John McCain who think it's just dandy to steal away two years of someone's life for their "compulsory volunteerism," or "paid slavery" or "forced community service," or whatever they want to call it. The implication here is that citizens owe not only their taxes, which might well consume half of their income over their lifetime, but actually some of their actual lives, to the state.
Requiring every American to "serve their country" unless it is in defense of the country in time of national peril is, simply put, UnAmerican. It's more in line with the types of universal service that was required in Soviet Russian, Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany It defies everything that this country was founded on.
Yes, it is true that during the time of the Revolution that every able-bodied man was a member of the militia. But the Minutemen were obliged at a moment's notice to defend their community from Indian attack, the British, and other forms of invasion.
They were not ready, at a moment's notice, to empty bedpans at an old folks home, or perform Peace Corps type duties, or clean up slums, or all of the endless tasks that those of an authoritarian mindset think would make them "better people." Tasks that, by the way, they don't want to pay ordinary people a living wage to perform. They prefer to draft young people to be, in effect, indentured servants.
Hillary Clinton says she wants to get away from Bush's "ownership" society and replace it she says, "I prefer a 'we're all in it together' society."
Sound pretty collectivist to me. We aren't "all in it together" when it comes to individuals paying their mortgages, raising their children, competing in the workplace, and making a life for themselves. We own our own lives. We don't need the government and society in general telling us what to do with them!
For example, Democratic presidential candidate Chris Dodd in remarks he was to deliver this weekend was going to say that he wants, “to rekindle the flame lit in this place with an American Community Initiative that calls once again upon every American to be a part of something larger than themselves …. I want to use the power of the presidency to create the first generation of Americans in history in which everyone will have served their country—40 million Americans by 2020.”
Of course, this is not an initiative exclusively of the left or the Democrats. Among Republicans we find people like Colin Powell and John McCain who think it's just dandy to steal away two years of someone's life for their "compulsory volunteerism," or "paid slavery" or "forced community service," or whatever they want to call it. The implication here is that citizens owe not only their taxes, which might well consume half of their income over their lifetime, but actually some of their actual lives, to the state.
Requiring every American to "serve their country" unless it is in defense of the country in time of national peril is, simply put, UnAmerican. It's more in line with the types of universal service that was required in Soviet Russian, Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany It defies everything that this country was founded on.
Yes, it is true that during the time of the Revolution that every able-bodied man was a member of the militia. But the Minutemen were obliged at a moment's notice to defend their community from Indian attack, the British, and other forms of invasion.
They were not ready, at a moment's notice, to empty bedpans at an old folks home, or perform Peace Corps type duties, or clean up slums, or all of the endless tasks that those of an authoritarian mindset think would make them "better people." Tasks that, by the way, they don't want to pay ordinary people a living wage to perform. They prefer to draft young people to be, in effect, indentured servants.
Hillary Clinton says she wants to get away from Bush's "ownership" society and replace it she says, "I prefer a 'we're all in it together' society."
Sound pretty collectivist to me. We aren't "all in it together" when it comes to individuals paying their mortgages, raising their children, competing in the workplace, and making a life for themselves. We own our own lives. We don't need the government and society in general telling us what to do with them!
Thursday, June 21, 2007
LOOSEN THE DEATH GRIP
I read a lot about Indian casino issues around the country and one thing that seems to be common in all of the states is the fact that the state governments get a "death grip" on the funds collected. They are all very reluctant to disburse funds back to the communities that are actually impacted by Indian gaming.
California is a prime example of this. In the compacts that were negotiated by Gray Davis, but even more in the compacts negotiated by Governor Arnold, the state gets large amounts of money paid to it by the tribes. San Diego County, which has more Indian tribes than any other county in the union, also has more Indian gaming than any other county. Valley Center has more Indian gaming nearby than any community in the county. There is a compelling argument that Valley Center is more impacted by Indian gaming than any town in the United States. Yet California's government continues its death grip on funds that ought to go to help pay for strains to our infrastructure.
Our friends in the tribes that operate casinos in this area are very aware of this issue and they are very much on our side in trying to get this money released. But we need to do what we can to constantly pressure the state government to release these funds.
California is a prime example of this. In the compacts that were negotiated by Gray Davis, but even more in the compacts negotiated by Governor Arnold, the state gets large amounts of money paid to it by the tribes. San Diego County, which has more Indian tribes than any other county in the union, also has more Indian gaming than any other county. Valley Center has more Indian gaming nearby than any community in the county. There is a compelling argument that Valley Center is more impacted by Indian gaming than any town in the United States. Yet California's government continues its death grip on funds that ought to go to help pay for strains to our infrastructure.
Our friends in the tribes that operate casinos in this area are very aware of this issue and they are very much on our side in trying to get this money released. But we need to do what we can to constantly pressure the state government to release these funds.
IDENTIFY SOME EXTRAORDINARY PEOPLE
I'd like to develop a list of 100 people in the community that the Roadrunner should profile in the next few years. I'm not looking to write profiles about people who are in the paper all the time already, but unsung, yet interesting folks that our readers would be interested in reading about.
Would you help? If you know of someone who you think should be profiled, send me some information, including contact information, and the name of the person and spend some time telling us why you think people would be interested in reading about that person. Please note, I'm not looking for people to tell me why they think their spouse or children should be in the paper. People are already pretty good about telling us about their relatives. I'm looking for people to identify someone that THEY KNOW, who is noteworthy.
Would you help? If you know of someone who you think should be profiled, send me some information, including contact information, and the name of the person and spend some time telling us why you think people would be interested in reading about that person. Please note, I'm not looking for people to tell me why they think their spouse or children should be in the paper. People are already pretty good about telling us about their relatives. I'm looking for people to identify someone that THEY KNOW, who is noteworthy.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
A LEADER'S BREAKFAST
Ran into Rob Gilster at Jilberto's in Pauma Valley today, the last day of school at the high school. He was picking up breakfast for the members of his Leadership Class. "I promised them that I would buy them breakfast on the last day of school," he told me.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
ALTERED PHOTOS
ALTERED PHOTOS— Newspapers are notoriously and rightly worried in this age of digital photos about altered photos. Last year some important news organizations were made fools of when a stringer covering the Israeli-Lebanon war altered photos by adding smoke to make it look as though the Israelis had indiscriminately bombed Beurut. This is fairly easy to do using Adobe Photoshop using something called “The Cloning Tool.”
This week someone tried to pull a fast one on The Roadrunner. We were sent a photo of some school children (I won’t say what children or what school). A figure in the original photo was airbrushed out for unknown reasons. The photo was emailed to us and we prepared to put it into the paper when we were contacted by the person who took the photo. He wanted to replace the photo because he discovered that his work had been altered!
Amazing! That in a small town like this someone would think it’s appropriate to remove someone from a photo and try to palm it off on us. I can’t think of any explanation that would justify this. Can you?
This week someone tried to pull a fast one on The Roadrunner. We were sent a photo of some school children (I won’t say what children or what school). A figure in the original photo was airbrushed out for unknown reasons. The photo was emailed to us and we prepared to put it into the paper when we were contacted by the person who took the photo. He wanted to replace the photo because he discovered that his work had been altered!
Amazing! That in a small town like this someone would think it’s appropriate to remove someone from a photo and try to palm it off on us. I can’t think of any explanation that would justify this. Can you?
Thursday, June 7, 2007
IMMIGRATION BILL DEAD FOR NOW
Well, the illegal alien amnesty bill is dead in the United States Senate, at least for awhile. The credit should go to the grassroots, who flooded their elected representatives with emails, regular mails, phone calls and various forms of harassment to let them know how unpopular the law is with the general public.
I think one of the main things that bothers me about legalizing the estimated 12 million people who are here from South of the Border is that there is no incentive for them to assimilate into our society. I don't want to become part of Mexico, I want their people to melt into our society.
I was reading an article earlier this month about how one reason that Muslim immigrants to this country frequently do not become part of our society is that they now have Arab language TV stations that they can listen to that pump them full of the same anti-West diatribes that they were exposed to in their native countries.
The same can be said of Hispanic immigrants. Today there are many Spanish-langauge TV and radio stations that simply didn't exist 30 or 40 years ago. Because they are in Spanish, they help defuse the incentive for younger immigrants to learn English. As long as you are getting much of your culture and entertainment in Spanish, you are not as inclined to do what it takes the learn the dominant tongue.
I think one of the main things that bothers me about legalizing the estimated 12 million people who are here from South of the Border is that there is no incentive for them to assimilate into our society. I don't want to become part of Mexico, I want their people to melt into our society.
I was reading an article earlier this month about how one reason that Muslim immigrants to this country frequently do not become part of our society is that they now have Arab language TV stations that they can listen to that pump them full of the same anti-West diatribes that they were exposed to in their native countries.
The same can be said of Hispanic immigrants. Today there are many Spanish-langauge TV and radio stations that simply didn't exist 30 or 40 years ago. Because they are in Spanish, they help defuse the incentive for younger immigrants to learn English. As long as you are getting much of your culture and entertainment in Spanish, you are not as inclined to do what it takes the learn the dominant tongue.
Wednesday, June 6, 2007
Immigration Debate
OUTSOURCING THE NEWS— I read recently that a news organization will be outsourcing some of its news writing. Apparently its hiring some guy in India to watch city council meetings on TV and write up stories about the event. Pretty cleaver! Sounds rather like how some of the daily papers choose to cover local news—at a distance. Which is why we find that the daily papers and TV news that occasionally visit Valley Center usually focus on the negative news.
IMMIGRATION DEBATE— For years many critics of the Republican party have said it is too beholden to the big business interests and not beholden enough to the common people. Nowhere is this divide in the GOP more obvious than in the very bitter and divisive immigration “reform” issue. The National Review’s editorial board, which has taken a position against the proposed law, while the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal has come out in favor of it. The National Review, of course, is the heart and soul of America’s conservative movement, while the WSJ is the rock ribbed supporter of big business. The NR editorial board has challenged the WSJ board to a debate on the subject, but the WSJ has declined. The dirty BIG secret about big business, and a lot of little business, is that they need cheap labor that they can pay at below minimum wage. When President Bush says that the immigrants “Do the jobs that Americans won’t do,” the truer statement would be “They do the jobs that Americans won’t do for slave wages. Raise the wages and Americans will do those jobs.”
IMMIGRATION DEBATE— For years many critics of the Republican party have said it is too beholden to the big business interests and not beholden enough to the common people. Nowhere is this divide in the GOP more obvious than in the very bitter and divisive immigration “reform” issue. The National Review’s editorial board, which has taken a position against the proposed law, while the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal has come out in favor of it. The National Review, of course, is the heart and soul of America’s conservative movement, while the WSJ is the rock ribbed supporter of big business. The NR editorial board has challenged the WSJ board to a debate on the subject, but the WSJ has declined. The dirty BIG secret about big business, and a lot of little business, is that they need cheap labor that they can pay at below minimum wage. When President Bush says that the immigrants “Do the jobs that Americans won’t do,” the truer statement would be “They do the jobs that Americans won’t do for slave wages. Raise the wages and Americans will do those jobs.”
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