Monday, October 23, 2017

'Forces of Division'

Peter Baker's story from the front page of the NYTimes October 20, 'By Leaving out Trump's Name Message is Sent'  illustrates the dilemma this country is in. Dilemma is putting it lightly.

    How do we as citizens find a way to wrap our minds around these days of maximum discord. It seems the whole nation is facing a dark descent into civil strife.

   Not only do former President's Obama and Bush 'take aim at divisions' but so does the national Press Corp, and certainly the NYTimes talented staff of reporters.
But how good is their aim, how good is your aim? Are our bastions of decency, former Presidents of the Democrats and Republicans standing on ground that allows them to fire their moral directives with a clarity of vision that understands the frustration of the ordinary citizens who held their noses and voted Mr. Trump in?

  The trouble with the viewpoints of Obama, Bush and the National Media is that they are not very 'Liberal', using the word as it implies a free exploration of ideas including ideas that might even seem contrary to one's own. From my perspective 'the Liberal' viewpoint of today so permeated by fear and the hyperbole of hate, it is anything but Liberal, in it's certainty that Evil is confined to the current President and his supporters it is creating a counter wave of ugliness that will not go away.

   What the NYTimes and President Obama and President Bush see is that 'the Powers of Division' all come from 'the other side'

   Let's look at a couple of premises of supporters of President Trump. That all immigrants should obey the laws of the United States including Immigration laws and that those laws should be enforced. That an immigration policy that calls for extended scrutiny of applicants from Islamic Nations to 90 to 120 days, or by reducing refugee totals from 100,000 to 50,000 is not a Ban. Is this a ban, or is it the due diligence of a man elected through as honest a process as we have so far of one man one vote? How can he not do what the people of America deeply need and asked for. Restrain the flow of illegal immigration. 11 Million is insanely way too much. How can the media go on about Lies and not own it's own distortion?

   As a car free, California Tree Hugger, who watches the destruction of this Planet on a daily basis  I have come to the conclusion that there will be no future for our children and their children until individuals live lives of personal responsibility.
The policies that we have inherited of centuries of expansion of an Economic engine that thrives on more and more people, now wrapped around notions of compassion is completely doomed. This blind compassion will lead to massive death and destruction down the road. We are in the full blossom stage of the human population bloom without regard to consequences. The knee-jerk, America First, nationalism is at least a modest form of waking up to a nightmarish future that the 'Liberal' state of civilization seems to offer. If those who call themselves Liberals could remember some basics, such as we are all one, then we might stop ripping the supposedly less educated people of America for standing up as best they can in the face of forces that seem out of control.

  Try to take an objective look at this world of information. I am speaking to all my friends, and everyone who reads this might be in that category, and I am speaking directly to the editors of the NY Times, who every day with their crack reporters attempt to wrestle that steering wheel of .. the control of truth … to work on behalf of restoring civilization into the hands of the likes of George Bush or Barack Obama. I out of my .. reckless, noble, foolish, ignorant call it what you will, attempt to understand the truth have joined sides with the deplorables and those of Brexit and every indigenous voice of aspiration and sovereignty that says let me be me. If you want a borderless planet then kiss Democracy good bye. Borders define communities, communities have a right to exist and have a right to and a duty to defend themselves from invasions. If someone wants to explain to me how a borderless planet will still respect communities through self government, please let's talk.

   The Planet is in the midst of an unprecedented transformation, I hold no faith in the 'Liberal'  democratic state nor much in the Trumpian rebellion but at least there is a rebellion and all I can hope with the Monkey Wrench he represents that President Trump represents an opportunity for America and the world to ask where are we going?
  
    Beyond that it is probably best to resume a sense of being in God's hands and good luck to us all.

   
 I can't provide a link to this story that is only 4 days old as the New York Times Search Engine despite typing the Front Page Headline as written or the first seven words of the article, does not find the story. Perhaps it is an issue of me not owning a digital subscription to the Times. I have been thinking of doing just that. Though this causes me to pause in paying out money and supporting the organization that for most of my adult life have used even more and more in the last few years I have to wade through the spin.


Monday, October 2, 2017

California 'The Golden State'

Calif. Just Got 90 New Laws In 4 Days: Here They Are
It certainly has been a busy week for California's governor, who has signed nearly 100 bills into law in the last four days alone. On Friday, he capped off his most recent efforts with the high-profile signing of 15 new laws that are part of a legislative package aimed at increasing the state's housing supply and affordability.
"These new laws will help cut red tape and encourage more and affordable housing, including shelter for the growing number of homeless in California," Gov. Jerry Brown said while signing the package at Hunters View, an affordable housing project located in the Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood of San Francisco.
"This package has everything from A to Z – affordability to zoning," said Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon. "It’s not a magic wand, but it is going to put a lot of drafting tools, backhoes, hammers, and door keys to work. I’m proud of how the Assembly helped shape this package and of the real results it will deliver for Californians."
Among the bills that were signed Friday, along with a brief synopsis from the governor's office, are:
  • SB 2 (Atkins), the Building Homes and Jobs Act, establishes a permanent funding source for affordable housing through a $75 fee on real estate transaction documents. The fee is capped at $225 per transaction and exempts real estate sales. The fees would generate roughly $250 million a year, which would be split among state and local housing programs.
  • SB 3 (Beall) authorizes $4 billion in general obligation bonds for affordable housing programs and a veteran’s home ownership program. SB 3 must be approved by voters next November.
  • SB 35 (Wiener) streamlines the approval process for infill developments in local communities that have failed to meet their regional housing needs.
  • SB 166 (Skinner) ensures that cities maintain an ongoing supply of housing construction sites for residents of various income levels.
  • SB 167 (Skinner) increases the standard of proof required for a local government to justify a denial of low- and moderate-income housing development projects. (SB 167 is identical to AB 678.)
  • SB 540 (Roth) streamlines the environmental review process for certain local affordable housing projects.
  • AB 72 (Santiago/Chiu) strengthens the state's ability to enforce laws that require local governments to achieve housing goals.
  • AB 73 (Chiu) gives local governments incentives to create housing on infill sites near public transportation.
  • AB 571 (E. Garcia) makes it easier to develop farmworker housing by easing qualifications for the Farmworker Housing Tax Credit.
  • AB 678 (Bocanegra) increases the standard of proof required for a local government to justify its denial of low- to moderate-income housing development projects. (AB 678 is identical to SB 167.)
  • AB 879 (Grayson) authorizes a study of local fees charged to new residential developments that will also include a proposal to substantially reduce such fees.
  • AB 1397 (Low) makes changes to the definition of land suitable for residential development to increase the number of sites where new multifamily housing can be built.
  • AB 1505 (Bloom/Bradford/Chiu/Gloria) authorizes cities and counties to adopt an inclusionary ordinance for residential rental units in order to create affordable housing.
  • AB 1515 (Daly) allows housing projects to be afforded the protections of the Housing Accountability Act if the project is consistent with local planning rules despite local opposition.
  • AB 1521 (Bloom/Chiu) gives experienced housing organizations a first right of refusal to purchase affordable housing developments in order to keep the units affordable.
Since the legislative deadline of Sept. 15, Brown has been sifting through hundreds of proposed laws from lawmakers across the state. All of them need to be reviewed by Oct. 15, or they become law by default. Over the weekend, these 14 laws were signed — one of which included the naming of an official state dinosaur.

   A series of laws that rams through State power over local municipalities and the wishes of their citizens.

  I attempted to write a  clear cogent letter to the editor of the Sf Chronicle today. I haven't done this ever still... I got hamstrung by the 200 word cap on a letter.. here's what I had left after my too harsh editting left me unsatisfied and now I wait for tomorrow to have another go at it.
Despite the back-slapping and glad handing in Sacramento with signing the recent housing bills, the people of California are not served by this blind reaction to ‘the crisis’.
 California
 is becoming more and more unlivable not just because of the dramatic differential in those on board the new Corporate wave and those who would choose a career far from that – for instance one that serves communities. We are becoming unlivable through the shear numbers of newcomers that clog our highways and have transformed daily life in to a wretched slog. 
  
That there is ‘a deficit of 2 million housing units and growing by 80,000 per year’ as stated in your editorial should point to an alarming truth. The damage is not just loss in quality of life, that damage is real, but the impending damage of a very living geologic California event striking on a regular basis requires all persons who claim leadership via Democratic elections to brace and prepare for that fact and represent the families and children whom live here now not the flood of potential newcomers. 
  Unlimited growth is the biological definition of cancer. While business leaders and housing advocates celebrate, democracy takes another hit, ‘we are past the point where we can treat individual cities as kingdoms unto themselves, whether they can decide whether or not they want to produce housing’. Megalopolis grows with no thought of for how long or whether it ever should decide to stop ‘growing’. Steamrolling California in the name of Humanity.  We need some new thinking on the world’s great Environmental Challenge …Us.

Once Again Here We Are..

 Let me introduce myself, I have been living in Marin County mostly San Anselmo since 1975 when I came out here at the young age of 23 from points NorthEast in the USA. Part of that longhaired music loving crowd that migrated to the Bay Area in those years.  .... OK enough about me.