Endgame

2008-11-03 - 12:31 p.m.

Did everyone change their clocks back in time? Did anyone get embarrassed on Sunday by being somewhere an hour late?

My phone kept jumping back and forth between PDT and PST. I finally had to turn it off and reset it before it behaved.

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Saturday I got lots of sleep, and actually woke up really early Sunday morning...early enough that I actually got to have breakfast at HomeTown and read the Sunday paper.

Then I went to the Park and walked until my legs were sore.

It was a good day and evening.

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Tomorrow is the election. As my regular readers know, I'm not going to vote for Barack Obama. The main reason is this: I don't agree with his tax policies. The whole "tax cut for 95% of Americans" isn't a tax cut - besides, over 40% of their numbers don't pay income taxes come April 15, so how can he give a "tax cut" to people who don't pay? And with the economy doing what it's doing, is raising taxes a good idea at all?

Then there's the energy policy. When did a presidential candidate actually want to BANKRUPT an industry if they tried to expand? Well, that would be...now.

And Obama acknowledges that his cap-and-trade plan will cause electricity prices to "skyrocket". How does this help the poor and the middle class? He wants to use "price signals" to "change behavior", letting costs go up so you change how you use energy. Again, how does this help the poor and middle-class?

Thomas Sowell writes here about Barack Obama and the "changes" he's planning.

Interesting item from Neal Boortz:

Peter Nicholas is a reporter for the Los Angeles Times. He has been traveling with Obama for almost the entire campaign. Nicholas writes "After all this time with him, I still can't say with certainty who he is." Nicholas doesn't know him, but so many voters are so sure they do.

If this reporter has been with Obama for so long and STILL doesn't "know him", how can the voters - who have heard only debates and sound bites - be so sure? I think what's more amazing is that this is a journalist who has actually said something negative about Obama. The media has done more to glorify Obama than any candidate I've seen.

Will I vote for John McCain? I don't know. But I can't in good conscience vote for Barack Obama. I don't think his policies are good for the country.

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Speaking of the economy, there are a huge amount of bond issues on the ballot here in California. I intend to vote "no" on every one of them. One of the biggest mistakes will be Proposition 1A, which is supposed to build a "bullet train". According to Sacramento Bee columnist Dan Walters, the details to the $9.5 billion bond issue won't be available till after the election.

That's right - the population of California will be voting blind on almost ten billion dollars of debt.

Note this item in Walters' article (emphasis mine):

Kopp and others say the public is protected because only 7.5 percent of the bond money could be spent without legislative approval, and the measure guarantees that federal and private financing will cover at least half the system's cost.

That 7.5 percent, however, is no small sum. It would be spent not on bullet trains but on local commuter systems in Los Angeles and the San Francisco Bay Area – which may be the key to the whole thing.

An 800-mile-long bullet train system sounds romantic, but could the main motivation behind the project be to get more money for urban commuters with the rest of the state paying for it?

Good question. The state is bleeding red ink - why do we need more debt? Especially for something we don't have any details for?

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Comics.com has made some changes in its site, and I hate them. The biggest thing is that the site has slowed down tremendously. It will take time, and maybe even get better. But it REALLY sucks right now, IMHO.

I've sent a complaint letter. I'll let you know if there's a response.

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Turning now to sports...

Angels players Mark Teixeira, Jon Garland, and Garrett Anderson have all filed for free agency. We'll see how the negotiations shape up.

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Okay. I've been called in to work early, so I need to get going if there is to be lunch in my future.

Be seeing you.

Bob - 2008-11-04 11:00:59 - http://shadowgm.diaryland.com
The interview in which Obama made the comment about coal plants has been available online since it was published - and the criticism only takes the first half of his statement, ignoring Obama's remarks about clean coal technologies. As for Calif. Prop 1A ... agreed. A lot of money, a lot of slick talk, no accountability.

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