Seems Obama won.
I heard honking horns and some crazy chick yelling "OBAMA WOOOOOO" next door.
I'm pretty sure he won.
FUCK BARACK OBAMA.
OH MY GOD HE SUCKS.
I just wanted to get a head start. Poor Obama. The thing is, starting in about a week, he will stop being BARACK OBAMA, and start being our president. And people will hate his ass. Such short memories, we all have. People liked Clinton, people liked both Bushes, people like Reagan, etc.
Guess what?
Once they were actually presidents, people HATED their asses. Because they cease to become ideas, and become actual people, who make a bunch of decisions you don't agree with, sometimes rather big ones. When you actually become president, your life is open to unyielding criticism, and that's if things go the best they can possibly go, which they of course will not. It's a really shitty job, and frankly I hate to see Obama waste his talents on it. I know I'm supposed to have some reverence for the office, but...no. It's an awful, awful job. And frankly, there's no way he can be a good a president as he was a candidate. The way this race was run was...amazing.
John McCain just gave his concession speech. A damned good one. As I believe I mentioned once before, it's a shame his supporters have been so anti-Obama, and not pro-McCain. Dude has a legitimate claim to being a fucking war hero.
The bar has been set far too high for Obama to actually obtain; it's worse for him than for other presidents, because people have this very strange way of projecting their own ideals and ideas onto him. A quick example being gay marriage- being a left-leaning democrat people assume he would support gay marriage and gay rights...he doesn't. At least, certainly not to the extent that many of his supporters, and for that matter, detractors, assume that he does. There's this audio clip you might have heard if you pay too much attention to this campaign stuff, of some crazy lady from an Obama rally last week saying something like, "I don't have to worry about putting gas in my car, I don't have to worry about paying my mortgage...as like as I help him (Obama), then he'll help me."
That is an insane statement for several reasons, but Obama has been very much a politician, and not taken clear stances on any number of issues, and people have filled in the blanks themselves. The fact is that Obama is going to be far more centrist than either his crazy fans or his crazy detractors may like to say. Either because he has to compromise to get anything done, even with the democrats making runs at taking over the House and the Senate), or because he is far more flexible than people give him credit for, people claiming his election to the office of the presidency would be/will be the death of our country are completely fucking retarded.
YOU ARE RETARDED.
In general, both sides, very often, represent positions which he has not taken, either out of hope (or to inspire it) or out of fear (or to spread it).
Anyway, I voted today.
I was gonna cut this short, but what the hell:
Here is what I did and didn't vote for:
Follow along if you like;
http://citizenvoiceblog.wordpress.com/
-Prop 1A: High-speed rail bond
Voted Yes. Okay, this is terrible. This will cost billions of dollars. Even if all goes well, it won't be ready for about 20 years. There are several assumptions that I would need to make, then: will I still be in/near an area where I would use it? Like, would I even be in the state? Would I have cause to use it if I were? Will I still be alive? Etc etc. However...it's an investment in the future. Cuts traffic down (traffic in southern California, Los Angeles especially, is horrible- so the fact that it will ease up some of that, and that mass transportation is, at least in principle, good for the environment and air quality, made me vote for it. That sumbitch is expensive, though, I tell you whut...
-Prop 2: Animal confinement stuff
Did not vote on this one. ...this will be a recurring theme. I...should care more about animal cruelty. However, I do not. Maybe if I had pets, I don't know. But here is the thing- these animals are going to be slaughtered and killed. So...I mean...while I don't support animal cruelty, it's like...eh. Furthermore, how much animal cruelty is really going on is in debate. There are certain humane conditions that some animals (mostly talking about chickens here) are kept in, which may not meet the new standards.
There is a general rule that some people go by, to just vote "no" on anything which will raise taxes. That is a wise rule. Not one I abide by, but it is applicable here. I worry about this one hurting farmers, and as a consequence stuff will be getting shipped in from other states and Mexico, etc. BTW, I don't appreciate people trying to use that as a scare tactic....vote no, or else WE MIGHT GET EGGS FROM MEXICO. ....? OK guy.
-Prop 3: Children's hospital bond
Uhh. Money for kids hospitals and shit. This ran almost unopposed, it seems. Voted yes. I am a sucker.
-Prop 4: Parental notification before abortion
Left this one blank, also. Here's the deal: I don't think that if you're pregnant and feel like you can't tell your parents, that forcing you to tell them will make much difference. I mean, teenagers blow everything out of proportion anyway, to say nothing of something that's actually big, such as getting knocked up. So you're really just discouraging teens from trying to get abortions. There's this logic that you're forcing chicks to go get "back alley" abortions with coat hangers and bleach or something, but, and please pardon me if I seem naive here, that shit doesn't happen. Not nearly as much as people talk about it, anyway. Not nearly. So I don't buy that.
On the other hand, teenage girls are stupid. Like, really stupid. Especially hysterical ones, who LITERALLY feel like their parents will kill them. This is also something which is mentioned far more than actually happens. So saying that they have to have their parents notified 48 hours prior to an abortion (btw, something easily circumvented; just give them the phone number of someone who will cover for you, etc), is, on principle, not a bad idea. Indeed, like 30 other states have such a law in place. But I couldn't reconcile with myself a decision, and so I left it blank.
-Prop 5: Nonviolent drug offenders drug rehab thing
I think drug addiction, addiction in general, is one of those things you will only really quit when you are ready. And some people never quite live that long. So, given that there are already drug rehabilitation programs in place for criminal offenders in this state, I think making them bigger sorta misses the point. Also, this will of course be hideously expensive, like all big propositions proposed. And we're supposed to assume this program will be competently run, which is something we can't assume.
On the other hand, I feel like, even if it only helps one person...isn't it worth the money? If it saves one person's life? I mean, provided that person's life is worth, at minimum, several hundred million dollars.
Also worth taking into consideration is that this will let "non violent" offenders out of jail early, provided they keep up their end of the bargain and stay off the dope. A positive in that it clears out prisons to have more space for more dangerous criminals, but a negative in that some of those released, addicts or not, are destined to end up back in jail.
Left this one blank. I couldn't see myself turning down a program that would help people, but couldn't support it either for reasons stated above. Or did I? I think I left it blank.
-Prop 6: Public safety, and money for cops
I honestly don't remember if I voted for this one, if I did it was probably no. Seemed very ill-defined as to where the money would actually go, and there seemed to be fairly little oversight.
-Prop 7: Renewable energy thing
Requires publicly-owned (ie. government-owned) utility companies to match the standard mandatory for private businesses in terms of using renewable energy sources. As government things are often horribly inefficient due to lack of competition (see: DMV), I was for this in principle. The downside is that it will also put a pinch on smaller companies. I still voted for it.
-Prop 8: Banning of same sex marriage
This amends our state constitution to so it says, basically:
Any two adult persons can get married provided they are legally capable of doing so.**
**P.S. no homo
A few years ago there was a ballot initiative that would allow gay people get married in this state, I think it was Prop A or 1A or something. Or maybe 17. I don't know how I would confuse those. It could also have been 2. Anyway, It was shot down by a vote of like 65%. However, some judges decided that was against the state constitution- that two otherwise eligible people couldn't get married because they happened to be of the same gender. So it was overturned, and as of a few months ago, gay couples started getting married. This pissed people off, so we ended up with Prop 8, which seeks to ban gay marriage.
As you might have gathered, there is a difference between adding a law saying that gay people can get married, and stripping them of a right they already have, which I think worked out to the benefit of this prop, at least because this time around the latter half applies to (or, rather, against) it. I know that factored into my decision.
There is certainly a case to be made that the voters decided one way a few years back, and then their decision was overturned. The anti-gay-marriage (Yes on prop 8) people have been absolutely awful and making that case, to the extent they've tried to do so at all. It was all just fairytale scapegoating. People feel insecure about the world, and perhaps relationships in general, if not theirs especially. So you get play saying that it's an amendment to "protect traditional marriage," etc. That is, to put it politely, a euphemism. You know who fucks up "traditional" marriages? Straight people. Like, pretty much exclusively. People were literally saying that gay marriage rights were an "attack" on traditional marriage, an attack on FAMIMLIES. OMG, they GAYS are ATTACKING your CHILDREN. OMG OMG OMG.
... As you may imagine, I resent this line of reasoning, if you would be so kind as to call it reasoning. The fact that someone would have the balls to just point at gays and their hypothetical ability to marry as being the root of all of the problems in society, blows my motherfucking MIND.
To say nothing of the fact that some people claim a "moral" objection to homosexuality, which, and please stop me if you find this offensive, means you are fucking retarded. In that case, I have a moral objection to women. So, yeah, no more rights for you guys.
...now, my vitriol aside, you might be surprised to know, that I didn't vote for or against this. This is weird. It wasn't just that I couldn't decide, it's that I wanted this as a bellwether. I wanted to see what kind of state I live in, what the people think about this one. There's a bit of that in all I left blank, and even those I didn't. But this one especially.
-Prop 9: Parole and victim's rights
This is something saying that people, by which I mean inmates, can go before a judge in parole hearings at a less frequent rate than which they are allowed now. And victims are entitled to notification when people who have harmed them get out of jail, etc. The problem is, it's expensive, and mostly redundant. It does include a beef up in civil actions, making it easier to get restitution from the convicted offender. Good intentions, bad execution IMO. I voted No.
-Prop 10: Alternative energy thing
Would help people buy vehicles...well, it would mostly be businesses, and help those guys convert to using cleaner-burning fuels. It's deceptively titled, there's no mention of hybrids or anything like that, it's mainly a thing for freight trucks, from what I got. Also some money for research in renewable tech. etc. I don't recall how I voted on this one. Maybe yes? If so I kinda regret it now, but I could go either way.
Prop 11: Redistricting.
Fuck yeah, redistricting. Basically, there's a...let's call it a loophole, where politicians can draw their own districts...like, let's say you're a hardcore right wing type, ultraconservative. Your city is sorta half and half, some conservative, some progressive types...so you only take the conservative half. And same with the next city and so on and so on. You draw your own districts. This creates a few problems...notably, you can only be replaced by someone with more extreme views than you, because you're appealing to a certain base, and you don't have to compromise. This, as you can imagine, leads to other problems.
I voted Yes, because "fuck yeah, buddy" wasn't an option.
Prop 12: Veterans home/farm money
Voted yes. Because I am a sucker.
Measure M: Money for Los Rios Community Colleges
City thing. American River College, Consumnes, Sac City etc. I admit I didn't really even look this one over too hard.
Measure O:
Another city thing. This is a tax reduction...takes the tax on phone use down from 7.5% down to 7%, or something like that. However, it is deceptively named. It actually flattens the rate out, and adds to the list of things to be taxed. So text messaging, internet service, VoIP etc are up to get taxed. Voted hell to the no, as I recall.
There were a bunch of spots for congressmen and representatives that I didn't vote for, because I hadn't researched the people running. And, as you may have intuited by this point, I think voting for something just to vote so as to not seem indecisive, is dumb.
As for mayor...there are two options. Kevin Johnson, businessman guy, supported by the local police and fire departments, and Heather Fargo, our current mayor, supported by the tree huggers and Planned Parenthood etc. Left that one blank. I really hadn't looked too deeply into either, and there wasn't enough info for me offhand. I wish they could merge and form one hermaphroditic supercandidate, but what can you do.
And as for the Presidency of the United States of America, I voted for...
I'm pretty sure he won.
FUCK BARACK OBAMA.
OH MY GOD HE SUCKS.
I just wanted to get a head start. Poor Obama. The thing is, starting in about a week, he will stop being BARACK OBAMA, and start being our president. And people will hate his ass. Such short memories, we all have. People liked Clinton, people liked both Bushes, people like Reagan, etc.
Guess what?
Once they were actually presidents, people HATED their asses. Because they cease to become ideas, and become actual people, who make a bunch of decisions you don't agree with, sometimes rather big ones. When you actually become president, your life is open to unyielding criticism, and that's if things go the best they can possibly go, which they of course will not. It's a really shitty job, and frankly I hate to see Obama waste his talents on it. I know I'm supposed to have some reverence for the office, but...no. It's an awful, awful job. And frankly, there's no way he can be a good a president as he was a candidate. The way this race was run was...amazing.
John McCain just gave his concession speech. A damned good one. As I believe I mentioned once before, it's a shame his supporters have been so anti-Obama, and not pro-McCain. Dude has a legitimate claim to being a fucking war hero.
The bar has been set far too high for Obama to actually obtain; it's worse for him than for other presidents, because people have this very strange way of projecting their own ideals and ideas onto him. A quick example being gay marriage- being a left-leaning democrat people assume he would support gay marriage and gay rights...he doesn't. At least, certainly not to the extent that many of his supporters, and for that matter, detractors, assume that he does. There's this audio clip you might have heard if you pay too much attention to this campaign stuff, of some crazy lady from an Obama rally last week saying something like, "I don't have to worry about putting gas in my car, I don't have to worry about paying my mortgage...as like as I help him (Obama), then he'll help me."
That is an insane statement for several reasons, but Obama has been very much a politician, and not taken clear stances on any number of issues, and people have filled in the blanks themselves. The fact is that Obama is going to be far more centrist than either his crazy fans or his crazy detractors may like to say. Either because he has to compromise to get anything done, even with the democrats making runs at taking over the House and the Senate), or because he is far more flexible than people give him credit for, people claiming his election to the office of the presidency would be/will be the death of our country are completely fucking retarded.
YOU ARE RETARDED.
In general, both sides, very often, represent positions which he has not taken, either out of hope (or to inspire it) or out of fear (or to spread it).
Anyway, I voted today.
I was gonna cut this short, but what the hell:
Here is what I did and didn't vote for:
Follow along if you like;
http://citizenvoiceblog.wordpress.com/
-Prop 1A: High-speed rail bond
Voted Yes. Okay, this is terrible. This will cost billions of dollars. Even if all goes well, it won't be ready for about 20 years. There are several assumptions that I would need to make, then: will I still be in/near an area where I would use it? Like, would I even be in the state? Would I have cause to use it if I were? Will I still be alive? Etc etc. However...it's an investment in the future. Cuts traffic down (traffic in southern California, Los Angeles especially, is horrible- so the fact that it will ease up some of that, and that mass transportation is, at least in principle, good for the environment and air quality, made me vote for it. That sumbitch is expensive, though, I tell you whut...
-Prop 2: Animal confinement stuff
Did not vote on this one. ...this will be a recurring theme. I...should care more about animal cruelty. However, I do not. Maybe if I had pets, I don't know. But here is the thing- these animals are going to be slaughtered and killed. So...I mean...while I don't support animal cruelty, it's like...eh. Furthermore, how much animal cruelty is really going on is in debate. There are certain humane conditions that some animals (mostly talking about chickens here) are kept in, which may not meet the new standards.
There is a general rule that some people go by, to just vote "no" on anything which will raise taxes. That is a wise rule. Not one I abide by, but it is applicable here. I worry about this one hurting farmers, and as a consequence stuff will be getting shipped in from other states and Mexico, etc. BTW, I don't appreciate people trying to use that as a scare tactic....vote no, or else WE MIGHT GET EGGS FROM MEXICO. ....? OK guy.
-Prop 3: Children's hospital bond
Uhh. Money for kids hospitals and shit. This ran almost unopposed, it seems. Voted yes. I am a sucker.
-Prop 4: Parental notification before abortion
Left this one blank, also. Here's the deal: I don't think that if you're pregnant and feel like you can't tell your parents, that forcing you to tell them will make much difference. I mean, teenagers blow everything out of proportion anyway, to say nothing of something that's actually big, such as getting knocked up. So you're really just discouraging teens from trying to get abortions. There's this logic that you're forcing chicks to go get "back alley" abortions with coat hangers and bleach or something, but, and please pardon me if I seem naive here, that shit doesn't happen. Not nearly as much as people talk about it, anyway. Not nearly. So I don't buy that.
On the other hand, teenage girls are stupid. Like, really stupid. Especially hysterical ones, who LITERALLY feel like their parents will kill them. This is also something which is mentioned far more than actually happens. So saying that they have to have their parents notified 48 hours prior to an abortion (btw, something easily circumvented; just give them the phone number of someone who will cover for you, etc), is, on principle, not a bad idea. Indeed, like 30 other states have such a law in place. But I couldn't reconcile with myself a decision, and so I left it blank.
-Prop 5: Nonviolent drug offenders drug rehab thing
I think drug addiction, addiction in general, is one of those things you will only really quit when you are ready. And some people never quite live that long. So, given that there are already drug rehabilitation programs in place for criminal offenders in this state, I think making them bigger sorta misses the point. Also, this will of course be hideously expensive, like all big propositions proposed. And we're supposed to assume this program will be competently run, which is something we can't assume.
On the other hand, I feel like, even if it only helps one person...isn't it worth the money? If it saves one person's life? I mean, provided that person's life is worth, at minimum, several hundred million dollars.
Also worth taking into consideration is that this will let "non violent" offenders out of jail early, provided they keep up their end of the bargain and stay off the dope. A positive in that it clears out prisons to have more space for more dangerous criminals, but a negative in that some of those released, addicts or not, are destined to end up back in jail.
Left this one blank. I couldn't see myself turning down a program that would help people, but couldn't support it either for reasons stated above. Or did I? I think I left it blank.
-Prop 6: Public safety, and money for cops
I honestly don't remember if I voted for this one, if I did it was probably no. Seemed very ill-defined as to where the money would actually go, and there seemed to be fairly little oversight.
-Prop 7: Renewable energy thing
Requires publicly-owned (ie. government-owned) utility companies to match the standard mandatory for private businesses in terms of using renewable energy sources. As government things are often horribly inefficient due to lack of competition (see: DMV), I was for this in principle. The downside is that it will also put a pinch on smaller companies. I still voted for it.
-Prop 8: Banning of same sex marriage
This amends our state constitution to so it says, basically:
Any two adult persons can get married provided they are legally capable of doing so.**
**P.S. no homo
A few years ago there was a ballot initiative that would allow gay people get married in this state, I think it was Prop A or 1A or something. Or maybe 17. I don't know how I would confuse those. It could also have been 2. Anyway, It was shot down by a vote of like 65%. However, some judges decided that was against the state constitution- that two otherwise eligible people couldn't get married because they happened to be of the same gender. So it was overturned, and as of a few months ago, gay couples started getting married. This pissed people off, so we ended up with Prop 8, which seeks to ban gay marriage.
As you might have gathered, there is a difference between adding a law saying that gay people can get married, and stripping them of a right they already have, which I think worked out to the benefit of this prop, at least because this time around the latter half applies to (or, rather, against) it. I know that factored into my decision.
There is certainly a case to be made that the voters decided one way a few years back, and then their decision was overturned. The anti-gay-marriage (Yes on prop 8) people have been absolutely awful and making that case, to the extent they've tried to do so at all. It was all just fairytale scapegoating. People feel insecure about the world, and perhaps relationships in general, if not theirs especially. So you get play saying that it's an amendment to "protect traditional marriage," etc. That is, to put it politely, a euphemism. You know who fucks up "traditional" marriages? Straight people. Like, pretty much exclusively. People were literally saying that gay marriage rights were an "attack" on traditional marriage, an attack on FAMIMLIES. OMG, they GAYS are ATTACKING your CHILDREN. OMG OMG OMG.
... As you may imagine, I resent this line of reasoning, if you would be so kind as to call it reasoning. The fact that someone would have the balls to just point at gays and their hypothetical ability to marry as being the root of all of the problems in society, blows my motherfucking MIND.
To say nothing of the fact that some people claim a "moral" objection to homosexuality, which, and please stop me if you find this offensive, means you are fucking retarded. In that case, I have a moral objection to women. So, yeah, no more rights for you guys.
...now, my vitriol aside, you might be surprised to know, that I didn't vote for or against this. This is weird. It wasn't just that I couldn't decide, it's that I wanted this as a bellwether. I wanted to see what kind of state I live in, what the people think about this one. There's a bit of that in all I left blank, and even those I didn't. But this one especially.
-Prop 9: Parole and victim's rights
This is something saying that people, by which I mean inmates, can go before a judge in parole hearings at a less frequent rate than which they are allowed now. And victims are entitled to notification when people who have harmed them get out of jail, etc. The problem is, it's expensive, and mostly redundant. It does include a beef up in civil actions, making it easier to get restitution from the convicted offender. Good intentions, bad execution IMO. I voted No.
-Prop 10: Alternative energy thing
Would help people buy vehicles...well, it would mostly be businesses, and help those guys convert to using cleaner-burning fuels. It's deceptively titled, there's no mention of hybrids or anything like that, it's mainly a thing for freight trucks, from what I got. Also some money for research in renewable tech. etc. I don't recall how I voted on this one. Maybe yes? If so I kinda regret it now, but I could go either way.
Prop 11: Redistricting.
Fuck yeah, redistricting. Basically, there's a...let's call it a loophole, where politicians can draw their own districts...like, let's say you're a hardcore right wing type, ultraconservative. Your city is sorta half and half, some conservative, some progressive types...so you only take the conservative half. And same with the next city and so on and so on. You draw your own districts. This creates a few problems...notably, you can only be replaced by someone with more extreme views than you, because you're appealing to a certain base, and you don't have to compromise. This, as you can imagine, leads to other problems.
I voted Yes, because "fuck yeah, buddy" wasn't an option.
Prop 12: Veterans home/farm money
Voted yes. Because I am a sucker.
Measure M: Money for Los Rios Community Colleges
City thing. American River College, Consumnes, Sac City etc. I admit I didn't really even look this one over too hard.
Measure O:
Another city thing. This is a tax reduction...takes the tax on phone use down from 7.5% down to 7%, or something like that. However, it is deceptively named. It actually flattens the rate out, and adds to the list of things to be taxed. So text messaging, internet service, VoIP etc are up to get taxed. Voted hell to the no, as I recall.
There were a bunch of spots for congressmen and representatives that I didn't vote for, because I hadn't researched the people running. And, as you may have intuited by this point, I think voting for something just to vote so as to not seem indecisive, is dumb.
As for mayor...there are two options. Kevin Johnson, businessman guy, supported by the local police and fire departments, and Heather Fargo, our current mayor, supported by the tree huggers and Planned Parenthood etc. Left that one blank. I really hadn't looked too deeply into either, and there wasn't enough info for me offhand. I wish they could merge and form one hermaphroditic supercandidate, but what can you do.
And as for the Presidency of the United States of America, I voted for...