Author: Paul

Kudos to Bruce Sawhill’s (October 16, 2016) reasoned and factually- supported proposal to get off the dime and start using the rail corridor’s tremendous potential for moving people around the county. Now, imagine a fleet of small shuttle buses running back and forth on all the streets that intersect the tracks; picking up passengers throughout the neighborhoods and taking them to the rail line; with other shuttles taking passengers off the rail to their final destination: school, work, shopping, dining, entertaining, you name it. That rail corridor can be the backbone of a public transit system second to none. Instead of very large buses running at infrequent intervals, on serpentine, difficult-to- follow routes, there would be a fleet of small buses running at frequent intervals back and forth on simple routes. Practically everyone living in this county could catch a shuttle bus a short walk from home and transfer to a line that could take them anywhere else in the county they want to go. What’s more, the whole system can be put into effect without requiring any taxpayer money. Sawhill is right. We should quit dancing around the subject, and give people of Santa Cruz County the transportation system they deserve. Heaven knows it has been debated enough.

Could there be a secret strategy by the GOP to let Trump be Trump, continuing to shock America’s sensibilities (and keep the resulting intraparty intrigue on the front page) in order to divert attention from Republican misdeeds in states they control? It might be their best way to influence down ballot votes. After all, Trump speaks Republican better than anyone has ever mastered that language.

How can we know, as a white person, what goes through the mind of a black man after a police killing of another unarmed black man? The answer is we can’t. There is no way we can appreciate the combination of sorrow (for it may have been a relative), anger (for it will probably go unpunished), fear (for it might be me next time) and frustration (for we know such things will continue to occur and no one is doing a damn thing about it!). Will we ever be able to say: “there, but for the grace of God and the color of my skin, go I”. And will our collective attitudes change, somewhat, toward people in the Black Lives Matter movement? And when someone responds with “All Lives Matter”, can we remind them that “all lives” are not being systematically snuffed out by cops with guns?

Trump gets credit for “telling it like it is.” Should not Clinton also be credited when she does likewise? She didn’t claim ALL Trump supporters were “deplorable”, only that half who are “racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamophobic, you name it.” How else could you describe those characteristics if not “deplorable”? And if Trump can tell it like it is, why can’t Clinton?

If you want to see the most egregious fallout from the so-called Republican revolution of the 1980s, look no further than the way we treat our public school teachers. When the public school system was originally established, teaching was considered “woman’s work” and their pay was set accordingly low. It was considered to be a second income in a family. And there it has stayed. With tax cut after tax cut, public schools have been repeatedly and progressively more underfunded. We have known for years how teachers have been purchasing supplies, etc., out of their own pockets, now we learn from a feature article in a recent issue of The Nation Magazine how teachers in high rent areas are forced to take second jobs, like driving for Uber and Lyft, not only to buy supplies, but to pay their rent and put food on the table. And many are still unable to live in the community where they teach. It is hard to imagine a situation more disgraceful. And do any of our presidential candidates have an answer?

To Paul Fleishman regarding your September 18, 2016, Your email 42 I don’t know 42 registered on so I don’t know has to be, and it otherwise wouldn’t have that manyletter on the “demonization of taxes”: Well said, Sir. That, along with the demonization of government, itself, formed the basis of the Reagan revolution of the eighties which split the country apart and directly led to the super majority of Americans who feel that we are on the wrong track.

Big Democrats are ganging up (as are lots of big Republicans) on the candidate for president Donald Trump. In fact, the Republicans are doing such a good job dissing Trump that anything the Democrats say is simply overkill. So let us agree, here and now, that the adversary most in need of being taken down is the GOP itself. No one with an “R” next to their name on the ballot in November should get your vote. If you have no other reason to go to the polls in November, make it your patriotic duty to keep as many “R”s out of the office as possible. Bernie showed us the way, and it is the only way we can hope to accomplish the improvements we so desperately need.

Clinton’s huge head start has given her the momentum to coast to victories in several key states and will probably put her over the top in delegates. However, the tactics used by the Democrat party to give Clinton such a head start gave her campaign a stain so ugly that only an open convention can erase it. There could well be a substantial number of those super delegates who would really prefer Sanders but declared for Clinton out of loyalty to the party. There must be a way to bring those progressives back to the polls in November. All the years of Obama administration sidelining, ignoring, and belittling progressive initiatives have created a lot of virtual pigeons that came home to roost and stayed home in the midterms of 2010 and 2014, when Democrats were “shellacked”. How many of these progressives have not yet fallen in line for Clinton? We don’t know, but an open convention would allow enough debate to neutralize the negatives of both candidates, and settle on a platform that would give the eventual-named candidate something to fight with. Clinton cannot win without the progressives. Period. An open convention is the only way she can hope to bring them over to her side. Clinton could signal her willingness for an open convention by releasing all her delegates now. It would be the honorable thing to do. If she is the right candidate, the convention will say so.

Another indication of how crazy this primary season has become: the one guy who makes total sense is Bernie Sanders, but he is being attacked from every quarter, including, believe it or not, the whole Democrat party and their surrogates. There is not one of his ideas that have been proven to be unworkable. Even so, you hear terms like “pie in the sky” and any other deprecation they can think of. Bernie would beat any Republican alive, but the total Democrat party effort is focused on a candidate whose negatives are so numerous, and serious, that she cannot possibly win a general election. Crazy!

It is nice to know that at least one letter-writer (in this case Peter Gelblum, April 14, 2016) knows enough about how the economy works to describe the overall effect of a higher minimum wage, to wit: more money in circulation, more consumer spending, a healthier economy, more people enjoying what the world has two offer. That can’t be all bad.