We celebrated Veteran's Day last weekend with a parade. Still it seems like a lot of local folks confuse their compulsive Bush hating and reflexive aversion to military actions of any kind with those who volunteer to serve our country. Recently, an acquaintance regaled me with a story of how [...]
They say that all politics is local and that's no more true than on the national level. Whatever the differences are between Republicans and Democrats when they're in the minority, those differences seem to disappear once either party assumes power.
While the looming specter of big box stores in Petaluma has many locals hiding in the root cellar, the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea is doing some really scary stuff like supplying Iran and Syria with nuclear technology while at the same time playing hide the cyclotron with the idiots [...]
The self-anointed progressive party is in distress. With the White House seemingly within their grasp they are confronted a painful choice. Nominate a party stalwart who promises to furiously redistribute the nation's income, lavish remuneration upon the multitudes of victims and reform our crumbling health care system all while punishing [...]
Opposition to the proposed Target store has reached the level of hysteria normally associated with Global Warming and Britney Spears. Signs and banners have sprouted all over town promoting some agitprop titled "The Invasion of the Big Box Stores." I guess the title, "An Inconvenient Merchant," was already taken.�1/2
As a kid in Little League, I personally experienced a coach's tantrum some - ahem - 50 years ago. I wasn't much baseball player. I was nearsighted and slow of foot so they put me in right field. And with the lowest batting average in the league, when I came [...]
The Highway Transportation brain trust floated an old idea in new paint as part of the EIR for the Novato narrows. They call it the reversible commuter lane - essentially a single lane that would serve traffic alternately flowing in opposite directions to be supervised by CalTrans. When I was [...]
Recent events have revealed the General Plan to be the universal (and in some circles, highly useful) excuse to avoid making decisions, voicing support for - or even opposing - pretty much anything to do with our fair city. Adding to this implicit effort to maintain the status quo are [...]
America was founded and has thrived on the preservation of individual rights. The challenge, of course, is balancing peoples' rights against the "the public good"...whatever that is perceived to be at particular time and in any specific place. It's interesting to me that in this matter both Democrats and Republicans [...]
Nostalgia is a harmless enough vice except when it becomes a utopian philosophy. If the historical preservationists in Petaluma were to adopt a town motto, I'm guessing the winner would be..."The Older We Get, The Better We Were." Some of these backward-gazing folk won't be happy until Petaluma sinks into [...]