Who actually believes in John Kerry?

[derrick]

john kerry gets elected? everybody breathes a sigh of relief and stops paying attention again. george bush? at the very least we'll continue to be entertained and startled by the antics of a cokewild monkey wielding a scepter.

actually, i read a piece(naomi klein, i believe, in the guardian) that countered this quite well. in the latter clinton years, the american left finally got a loud systemic analysis going that targeted, for example, global trade agreements as the source of alienation, inequity, various social ills. this was really good; it's capitalism, dummies! were were finally saying it! then bush got elected, and everyone got stupid again. 'the problem is BUSH, he's so dumb! he looks like a monkey! hahaha! we've gotta get him out of there!' will dumping bush change everything? hell no; it'll change what it can, but that's not much.

elect kerry, and we can relax a little on the homefront, and get back to a real, effective, systemic analysis. bush is a convenient flashpoint; he's been a fantastic lightning rod for the last four years, and the system's gotten off scot free. elect kerry, and everyone stops paying attention to the personality at the middle of the web, and widens their focus a bit, to realize that the web is the problem.

[jebreject]

i agree with that quite a bit.

[Andrew_TSKS]

hell, even i agree with a good bit of that.

[davy]

my wife and i took a week-long roadtrip through eastern canada a couple years ago. in march. and despite the antagonistic weather, we had a splendid time. toronto was really great, but quebec city was our favorite by far. we had plans to continue on around the gaspe' peninsula, but we ended up spending the rest of our trip in quebec city. everyone was really nice (people on the street gladly took pictures for us, waiters would strike up conversations in english...i remember one guy getting really passionate about losing the nordics hockey team) and every establishment we visited was wonderful. toronto's youth hostel was a little better, but not by much. the language barrier was never a problem; we spoke as much french as we could, and when it wasn't enough, the people we met were glad to try out their english.

montreal, however, was awful. despite seeming like a really cool city where lots of cool things happen, we had a terrible time. our hostel was a joke, and every single person we met--and i'm sure this was just unlucky coincidence--was at least slightly rude. but really, we were only there for a day and a night, and it didn't ruin the trip by any means. we left feeling very positive about canada...even entertaining fantasies of moving to quebec city and whatnot.

and being from the south, accents and all, the two of us are pretty blatantly american. we didn't get beat up a single time.

[davy]

haha. now anyone who just clicks on the last page of this thread is gonna think i just up and posted about canada for no reason at all. "i thought this was the presidential thread!" they'll scream. ah well.

[giant_robot7]

derrick - that's one of the best pro-Kerry arguments I've read yet.

[derrick]

yeah- i really like it too. i wish i'd saved the link to the original piece, but hey. spread the idea, please; it does wonders on nader voters. (i wore a nader sticker on my backpack in 2000, while in my canadian high school, oh yeah)

after watching the second debate and seeing clips from the others, i'm a lot more curious about kerry's political qualities (aside from the obvious and all important non-george-bushness); he's not quite the cold fish i'd thought he might be. judging by polls, i'm not the only one to have this reaction; it's heartening to be on the upswing of public opinion for once.

a fellow i know here in vancouver has dual citizenship... with residency in FLORIDA. he showed me the absentee ballot the other day; it was pretty exciting. no worries, he's voting dem down the line(big senate race there too). kerry v. nader is the major debate here among lefty folk. in BC, polls show kerry with 60% and bush with 16% or something absurd. you should all move here; we have good sushi too. dunno about  socialist aspects, but we do have a lot more sympathy for second gen. human rights, which can be refreshing. 'cold before sunrise' isn't representative, i swear!

[mackro]

Derrick on the money about the sushi.   (I ALWAYS make it out to Kitsilano to Sushi Sushi to get their ridiculously cheap Veggie Combo #4.. Huge Tempura Yam Roll, Avocado Maki, and Inari... for $6CAN)

But about Kerry, yeah, Derrick made the most cogent point I've seen posted in any forum really.  Sadly, we thought that discourse regarding the bad influence the U.S. is having on the rest of the world would be exposed more with Bush than Gore... and it has.. the problem is: it has not been exposed to Americans, where it matters the most.  The Bush administration has been trying as hard as possible to make Americans forget about all the bungling.. and sadly, they've somewhat succeeded.  Hopefully not succeeded enough in time for Election Day.

Clinton had to deal with the WTO protests, and got a lot of shit during press conferences at various universities.. I'm not sure WTO or similar would have happened the same way had Bush been president at the time.
Keep in mind that much of the RIAA bullshit we have to deal with in the U.S. exist because of laws that Clinton helped pass, for example.

But anyway, I can tell you right now, if Bush does get re-elected, there are going to be a lot of vehicles with Bush stickers with smashed windows in Seattle.  (something I'm not entirely proud of, but I suspect it's going to happen, if such a scenario happens.. :/  and similar things will happen probably in NYC and other cities.. I doubt there won't be some immediate expression of anger uncontained.)

[mackro]

Not that there's that many Bush-stickered vehicles in Seattle city proper.. barely any.. but there are more in the Eastside communities, alongside a growing number of Kerry stickers too.  

Some dude in Mercer Island had 60(!) of his Bush signs stolen from his front yard until he installed a camera, caught a suspect, and called the cops.

On my bus ride home every other day during September mainly, I would see dualing anti-Bush pro-Bush protests in downtown Redmond.

[derrick]

Washington isn't considered a swing state, is it? I imagine you've got the old rural/urban republican/democrat divide, but that it's complicated by the crazy suburbs. bellevue, everett, tacoma, whatever. What's the pop. of Seattle, proper?

oh; i saw ads for your governor race, Rossi vs. Gregoire, on a hotel TV the other day. it is more vicious than races tend to be, or is that nasty advertising par for the course?

Vancouver has, according to the japanese consul-general in town, the best sushi in the world, including japan. There it's a delicacy, but we've got cheap and plentiful; there are easily 50 sushi spots downtown, ranging from lunch counters to classy expensive places. it's pretty awesome.

The senate races look to be more interesting than the presidency at this point. a democratic senate could change a lot on a practical basis, where kerry v. bush is more symbolic, i think. (that's not to say it's not important; symbols matter, but that a dem senate/bush mix might be better legislation wise than a repub senate/kerry mix..? hm.)

[mackro]

Derrick,

yeah, we do have that Leftists In The State's Biggest City vs. Rightists In The Rural Lands thing going on.. just like B.C.

..although there is a strong history of union in many rural parts of Washington, so they aren't all uniformally right wing... just the small cities you see along the highways... like in Chehalis (shiver).  

Then again, you have some rich right wing people in Tacoma, and those cities like Bellevue, Redmond, etc.  and also Spokane too.

Olympia is split, though more slightly leaning left, thanks to Evergreen.

The Tri-cities area is split too, though more right leaning, thanks to Richland.

In other words, I don't know if we're still a swing state or not...!  We were called one at some point. But last I saw, apparently Washington was becoming more of a solid blue state than a swing state... but I have a hard time believing changing polls anyway.. due to my cynicism of the concept of THE MASSES changing their minds so drastically, but anyway...

I don't watch TV so I never saw any Gregroire vs. Rossi commercials.  I'll be pissed if Rossi wins.

[derrick]

Actually, BC doesn't fit that rural/urban split, for a whole bunch of historical reasons, really... current polls have the BC Liberals(psycho right) with stronger support in the urban/suburban lower mainland than anywhere else; the left/centre NDP have a lead everywhere else, including the rural Kootenays, far north, Cariboo, Vancouver island. Vancouver's 10 ridings were split in the last parliament, 6/4, between the two.

at what point did 'liberal' become a cuss word in the US? It's really weird, because all of the stuff that people consider 'American'(declaration of independance, the constitution, "freedom" etc etc) come from traditional liberalism. From a political philosophy perspective, Bush is as liberal as a president can be, at least in terms of rhetoric.

[swilkes]

sorry if I'm jumping into this late, but Michael Berube put it nicely  here.

An excerpt:

Maybe you,Aeore fond of speaking of the ,Aeucorporate duopoly,Aeu of American politics,Aei and I admit that the phrase does roll nicely off the tongue.  Or maybe you like to imagine that there,Aeos a groundswell of hundreds of millions of people around the globe who believe that Kerry and Bush are just two different brands of detergent, even though actual polls show wide margins of support for Kerry in other nations.  Or maybe you just think it,Aeos smart, cool, and alternative to dismiss both guys as ,Aeumillionaires,Aeu or ,AeuSkull and Bones men,,Aeu because you know better than to buy into ,Aeuthe system.,Aeu

But your political stance really means one of two things.  Either:

(a) you are unaware of the extent to which the Bush crowd consists of kleptomaniac Contra-funding retreads, neo-segregationists associated with Confederate outlets like Southern Partisan magazine and the Council of Conservative Citizens, and Christian fundamentalist jihadists who believe themselves to be the instruments of God; or

(b) you are sublimely indifferent to the fact that the Bush crowd consists of kleptomaniac Contra-funding retreads, neo-segregationists associated with Confederate outlets like Southern Partisan magazine and the Council of Conservative Citizens, and Christian fundamentalist jihadists who believe themselves to be the instruments of God.

A bit sanctimonious, that Berube, yes, but I happen to agree with the sentiment in this particular post of his.

[mackro]

at what point did 'liberal' become a cuss word in the US? It's really weird, because all of the stuff that people consider 'American'(declaration of independance, the constitution, "freedom" etc etc) come from traditional liberalism. From a political philosophy perspective, Bush is as liberal as a president can be, at least in terms of rhetoric.

haha, I don't think Bush has exactly advanced the causes of freedom for Americans, unless they are extremely rich or his friends, though.

But getting back to the crux of your point.. I'm guessing "liberal" became a bad word somewhere in the late 60s/early 70s in America during the Nixon era..  It wasn't a "cuss" word then, but it developed into one during the Reagan era, for sure.

then again "Liberal" (capitalized) is a dirty word in Canada too, today, which (much to the confusion of mostly Americans) is practically the opposite of "liberal" in the U.S. sense.

We in North America should have some sort of political terminology alliance which seeks to rename all of our parties something like The Leftish Bullshit Party, Left Of Center Bullshit Party, Right Of Center Bullshit Party, and Rightist Bullshit Party...

...

 

(i luv toothy)

[mackro]

Actually, BC doesn't fit that rural/urban split, for a whole bunch of historical reasons, really... current polls have the BC Liberals(psycho right) with stronger support in the urban/suburban lower mainland than anywhere else; the left/centre NDP have a lead everywhere else, including the rural Kootenays, far north, Cariboo, Vancouver island. Vancouver's 10 ridings were split in the last parliament, 6/4, between the two.

really?  wow, that's actually kind of scary.  I've always known that a lot of Vancouver is pro-Liberal, especially in Kits, North Van, and West Van... but I didn't realize it was enough to make Vancouver the Liberal voters base in the province.

I would have thought that was more the case in Victoria, but Victoria has really gotten to be this weird mecca of street kids in the past four years, from my own experience, and -- from what I hear from my cousins who live there -- more NDP friendly.  I never woulda thought.  (Derrick, or anybody in Vancouver Island, correct me and my cousins if we're wrong, which we probably are)

[boganlux]

then again "Liberal" (capitalized) is a dirty word in Canada too, today, which (much to the confusion of mostly Americans) is practically the opposite of "liberal" in the U.S. sense.

It took me a minute to realize a headline in the (British) Economist, "The Liberal, Ultra-Socialist E.U. Constitution," meant those two terms to be contradictorary (it was about how the E.U. Constitution was opposed, for roughly opposite reaons. by conservatives in England and socialists in France). And later I had to explain to my dad that even though the Economist refered to itself as a "liberal paper" it didn't mean that in anything approaching the American sense.

[Andrew_TSKS]

so wait, why do canadians say "liberal" when they mean "conservative"? could someone explain that to me?

[mackro]

Well, Liberal is an actual party name in Canada.. whereas liberal is just a general colloquialism for "bleeding heart leftist" in the U.S...

Different countries distort different euphemistic terms of government practices for their own purposes. Sometimes, they don't translate well from country to country, such as this case.

Basically on a scale of 0 to 10.. 0 meaning communist, 10 meaning fascist:

Canada Reform: 8
Canada Liberal: 6
Canada NDP: 3

American Republican: 7 (or 8, with bush now)
American Democrat: 5
American Green: 3

Thing is.. Canadian NDP is a more viable, known controlling party than the American Greens right now.. so in general, Canadian politicians are generally more left leaning than not.  And there are different shades of Liberal.. there are more left leaning Liberals, and there are psycho right Liberals.  This whole scale is an oversimplification really.

but getting back to party name semantics:

Hell, "Democrat" and "Republican" are essentially two peas from the same pod originally, semantically speaking (the U.S. is a republic with democratic subprocesses).  Even back in the civil war days, they were just names for the parties.  The meanings have changed around every decade ever since, even though they seem to change more often in recent times.

[derrick]

mackro does a good job of explaining things; congrats!

honestly, though, Canada's even more messed up than that: we've got a federal Liberal party and a number of provincial Liberal parties, none of whom are officially organizationally connected. In BC, our liberals were a perpetual third party, never winning seats in 40 years of big elections between Social Credit(long story, think 'christian businessmen') and the NDP. SC got really bloated and decrepit by 1991, when the NDP won a majority, and by 1996, the younger rightwingers discarded the old hulk and took over the then-opposition Liberal party, bringing it sharply right. There are 3 or 4 former socred ministers in the current BC Lib cabinet. No, it doesn't make sense, but the BC Liberals are a little to the right of the federal Conservatives.

The federal Liberals are referred to as Canada's natural governing party, having been in power for something like 75 of the last 100 years, since good ol' John A bit the dust. They're a massive vote-vacuming machine, with big fuzzy platitudes and a whole lot of ego. They alternate their leaders between french and english, like kings. Bono from U2 was the keynote speaker at the last convention. The best way to read how political winds are shifting in Canada is to see if the Liberals are stealing their platform from the NDP/left or the Reform/right. In a strict comparison, I'd put most of the party to the centre-left of the US Democrats. They're into big social policy, bringing in same-sex marriage and talking about decriminalizing marijuana. they're into big government but only so far, helping the poor but only so far, etc etc. Slippery bastards, and becoming scandal ridden after 11 years in power.

The last non-Liberal gov't we had was Mulroney's Progressive Conservatives(how's that for an oxymoron) from '84-93, our version of Reagan/Thatcher. Mulroney knit together Quebec nationalists(separatists, gasp!) and Alberta rednecks with Toronto businessmen, which worked pretty well until he imploded: the result was the Bloc Quebecois of Montreal, the Reform party of Alberta, and the husk of the PCs, of, well, nowhere. The Reform party went through a number of convolutions, and has now absorbed the former PCs to get the more attractive Conservative brand name. They know they can only form government by playing footsie with the separatists again, but the west hates Quebec so much that they know they'd lose their power base... poor fuckers. The Bloc Quebecois is still going strong, je me souviens!

We've got a Green party too, but they're pretty non-ideological and fruity; they talk about being 'above ideology' and stuff, but I've got no time for them until they get a class analysis. Right now, the party is a mashup of burnt out hippies and yuppie engineers driving hydrogen cars. They're getting some libertarians too; don't ask me.

the NDP began life as the CCF, who were an unabashedly socialist party in the 1930's. The NDP was the child of a merger between the CCF and the Canadian Labour Congress(our AFL-CIO) in the 1960's. They're a solid labour party, opening up to environmentalists and the general lefty crowd in the last several decades, becoming a solid third party with designs on opposition one day. Their troubles are of the usual lefty navel gazing sort(are we a party? or are we a movement?), and they have a crisis whenever a popular election plank is stolen by the Liberals. Provincial NDP parties are directly connected to the federal party, and often form government. Most of them are social democrats or democratic socialists, but they're concerned with what's 'electable'.

more than you all wanted to know, I'm sure. Remember to bring this stuff up when we complain about your politics, because we've really got little right to be smug.

[jebreject]

it's the difference between being politically liberal and economically liberal.  classically, to be economically liberal is to believe in the free market and that market forces will work everything out.  i think.  like adam smith rather than keynes.

[cold before sunrise]

alright alright, oh man, apparently those last few posts came across as snippier than intended. sorry guys. it's simply part of my nature to jump to the defense of whatever side of a discussion has least voice (apathy... murder... dubya... whatevs... >there's light in everything<) and banter for the sole sake of challenging commonly held opinions, asking people to explain to themselves why it is that they believe the things they do. infantile 'bush = nazi' arguements are nothing but the reactionary scapegoating of a poorly informed population. the people want to pin their problems on bush? keep him right where he is and channel the energy of the thereafter outraged public to fuel that systematic analysis, loudly spreading critism beyond the figurehead to the grid map, if it's change you're looking for. the real problem with kerry is that he's smart and well-spoken enough to trick the populace into settling back into complacency over the self-satisfaction of feeling like you've "made a difference" and "had your voice heard" by "exercising your right to vote," patting yourself on the back for the next four years as though ticking off a ballot box for once actually constitutes taking action. that's the only decision we're all told we have, to choose one alien slave lord or the other (remember that episode of the simpsons?) and in case you didn't notice they both have their speeches written for them. it's a total crock, suckas.

canadian politics are a fucking beautifully ramshackle mess of parties that constantly shift and change with public opinion, in many ways the way they ideally should although our own system is far from ideal. to be honest the bureaucracy is inept and more symbolic of tradition than anything substantial while the population generally polices itself. the country is so far left of the globalist scale that when a capital minded leader like gordon campbell gets into power with ideas on how to strengthen american ties it throws everything maddeningly off-kilter. we should seriously be working towards becoming ever more communistic and self-contained than we already are, ideally with the united states on board to become a single entity. derrick, our country is north america's number one source of oil, rich in lumber, grain fields (the only reason we sell to the usa is because they need the wheat and corn - taber corn rocks - so hard they'll pay 10% more than the next highest bidding nation), fisheries, amongst the finest beef in the world (second only to argentina. fuck off, it was one cow and originally american to begin with.), artisan cheeses, orchards, breweries, vineyards, chocolatiers, certified organic micro farms, wild game, blood-free diamonds, 90% of the world's clean drinking water (the only substance more valuable than oil), and the second largest land mass on earth. american universities encourage canadian applicants because we raise their overall gpa, following a more british line of education than american in general. and this is all without a modicum of any sense of superiority as a culture, as most canadians are about as homegrown as they come. true north strong and free. as far as humanitarianism goes alberta kinda fucked up with the whole sterilizing-those-tested-with-lower-iq-than-satisfactory business a few years ago but we're not too shabby in general. the unsound being tended to at public expense? that's our biggest weakness as a country: caring too much about our neighbours. we'd probably we better off siding with china but if the states wants to protect us from occupation we should only be happy enough to shut down the borders from immigration and have convinced the white house to dissolve corporate rule.

i miss vancouver, especially since the new safe injection sites make it less likely i'll run into a heroin junkie convulsing on the sidewalk in broad daylight on the lower eastside with a needle sticking out of his arm.

[mackro]

alright alright, oh man, apparently those last few posts came across as snippier than intended. sorry guys. it's simply part of my nature to jump to the defense of whatever side of a discussion has least voice (apathy... murder... dubya... whatevs... >there's light in everything<) and banter for the sole sake of challenging commonly held opinions, asking people to explain to themselves why it is that they believe the things they do. infantile 'bush = nazi' arguements are nothing but the reactionary scapegoating of a poorly informed population. the people want to pin their problems on bush? keep him right where he is and channel the energy of the thereafter outraged public to fuel that systematic analysis, loudly spreading critism beyond the figurehead to the grid map, if it's change you're looking for. the real problem with kerry is that he's smart and well-spoken enough to trick the populace into settling back into complacency over the self-satisfaction of feeling like you've "made a difference" and "had your voice heard" by "exercising your right to vote," patting yourself on the back for the next four years as though ticking off a ballot box for once actually constitutes taking action. that's the only decision we're all told we have, to choose one alien slave lord or the other (remember that episode of the simpsons?)  

..so I take it you read Derrick's analysis on the Kerry vs. Bush dilemma above and decided to completely ignore it because you didn't agree with it?  I'm giving you the benefit of the doubt here.

and in case you didn't notice they both have their speeches written for them. it's a total crock, suckas.

Because the U.S. is the only country in the world that has political candidates with pre-written speeches.  Right.

And how do you know what Kerry is exactly going to do if he gets elected anyway?  I don't even think Kerry himself knows!   I don't think Bush knew either when he got elected.  A vote for a candidate is a vote based on faith in the candidate.  No one has ESP yet. (Maybe you do, CBS)  

No doubt, on both sides of the spectrum, most promises are never fulfilled, and I attribute that mainly to the relative lack of voter turnout here in the U.S. to date, and hence the lack of caring on the electee's part to follow through because he or she usually doesn't feel he or she is under as much scrutiny since only this pod of people voted, as opposed to having to answer to the entire country, if that makes sense.

I hope 2004 will improve in that respect.  I really really hope.. even if "the wrong guy" gets elected.

canadian politics are a fucking beautifully ramshackle mess of parties that constantly shift and change with public opinion, in many ways the way they ideally should although our own system is far from ideal. to be honest the bureaucracy is inept and more symbolic of tradition than anything substantial while the population generally polices itself. the country is so far left of the globalist scale that when a capital minded leader like gordon campbell gets into power with ideas on how to strengthen american ties it throws everything maddeningly off-kilter.

...which... begs...the question.  If Campbell threw everything so off kilter, how come he got elected in the first place?  It's not uncommon to run across very right wing Canadians in Vancouver... they often say things like "Why are we such wusses, when we should be out there supporting the U.S. in the war on Iraq?  Canada sucks."... granted, this is usually at the hoochie clubs in downtown on a weekend.  Last time I was there, I saw a couple of leather motorcycle dudes with a BC plate with American flags in the back and Bush stickers!  Granted, that's far less common than it is in the U.S., obviously.. but pro-Republican Canadians exist!   So one person's "throwing everythig off kilter" is another person's "mending things back the way they should".  Just flip NDP with Liberal, and the same is true.

I am intrigued though with BC's tradition of going far left to far right and not having settled on a truly centrist premier in a while.  I don't know the history other than that most of my Vancouver friend can't stand Gordon Campbell, and that they also didn't like the whole high-tech-ferry-boats-that-didn't-work debacle when the NDP was last in power in BC.

we should seriously be working towards becoming ever more communistic and self-contained than we already are, ideally with the united states on board to become a single entity. derrick, our country is north america's number one source of oil, rich in lumber, grain fields (the only reason we sell to the usa is because they need the wheat and corn - taber corn rocks - so hard they'll pay 10% more than the next highest bidding nation), fisheries, amongst the finest beef in the world (second only to argentina. fuck off, it was one cow and originally american to begin with.), artisan cheeses, orchards, breweries, vineyards, chocolatiers, certified organic micro farms, wild game, blood-free diamonds, 90% of the world's clean drinking water (the only substance more valuable than oil), and the second largest land mass on earth.

You forgot printing of American independent label music packaging!  (Didn't Minneapolis's Arcwelder actually call one of their albums Jacket Made In Canada back in 1990 or so?)

american universities encourage canadian applicants because we raise their overall gpa, following a more british line of education than american in general.

Can I see the studies on this?  links?

and this is all without a modicum of any sense of superiority as a culture, as most canadians are about as homegrown as they come. true north strong and free. as far as humanitarianism goes alberta kinda fucked up with the whole sterilizing-those-tested-with-lower-iq-than-satisfactory business a few years ago but we're not too shabby in general. the unsound being tended to at public expense? that's our biggest weakness as a country: caring too much about our neighbours. we'd probably we better off siding with china but if the states wants to protect us from occupation we should only be happy enough to shut down the borders from immigration and have convinced the white house to dissolve corporate rule.

I don't know where to start here, regarding the claim of "without a modicum of any sense of superiority" and then what followed.  

i miss vancouver, especially since the new safe injection sites make it less likely i'll run into a heroin junkie convulsing on the sidewalk in broad daylight on the lower eastside with a needle sticking out of his arm.

Well, I've seen that happen in the past year twice, so it hasn't completely gotten better, although I support the idea of the program no doubt, and it has helped, surely.

I'm more worried about the pending 2010 Olympics and hoping the city government doesn't do anything Gulianistic and just merely sweep those people away somewhere.  (I'm also optimistic that the 2010 games might help in developing things positively in some areas of Vancouver, too.)

[sedita]

fucking
break
it
down
mackro
word

[derrick]

again, congrats all around for mackro. nicely done.

The 2010 games are so wiggy. It feels like an anvil, or the sword of damocles or something... no, the better analogy is a steamroller that's ten miles away. It's coming, it will fuck things up, and there's nothing we can do but make the best of a bad situation. We'll be in debt for many many years, and services will be cut to make up the difference. We're going to see the next 6 years of public infrastructure decisions pivot on the demands of a two week tourist party, rather than the long term interests of the people that actually live here. I'm bracing for a raw deal.

Carole James of the NDP is setting herself up as the centrist premier we've never had right now, casting the Libs as way out there, reaching out to business, talking about the 'middle class' etc etc. Being a dem,ocratic socialist myself, I'm a little concerned, but there are enough mad lefties close to her that I trust it's only rhetoric. It's too soon to tell whether it's working or not.

about seattle, though, what's happening with the Alaskan Way viaduct? last i heard, there was talk of demolishing it and building a tunnel..?

[mackro]

haha, don't get me started on Seattle public transportation plans...

remember that big earthquake we had in early 2001?  Well, the Viaduct suffered a few cracks, and later was deemed unsafe in the event of a future quake as big or bigger.  So that's why "it must be torn down".  Never mind that the SR-520 bridge (the Microsoft-Seattle bridge, basically) is just as unsafe apparently, but there are only vague plans to replace it.

At the same time, we have people being wishy-washy about the monorail.. in fact, there's a proposition to RECALL the monorail that barely passed a year ago already.

I realize Seattle's geography makes it harder to build a 21st century public transit system with all the hills and water and all that, as opposed to Portland or Vancouver's geography, which is a little more flat and tame and therefore friendly for public transit development purposes.  But COME ON.  People are overreacting on both sides to the whole monorail issue, IMHO.  It's been a comedy or errors and fools on both sides.  I'm voting against the recall, because if the recall passes, people will STILL have to pay car registration taxes for the "monorail research" which will become something else yet to be determined.  Great.

also for some reason, buses are still a dirty word to many people in American apparently, and many here in Seattle don't use the Seattle bus systems (King County Metro and Sound Transit) which, while not perfect, have done me just fine in lieu of not driving...  They're far better than any bus system in California.  Hell, dare I say New York buses?  Seattle buses are actually quite faster than NYC buses, from my experience.  (Granted, the existence of a subway in NYC makes up for that and then some, duh, but anyway...) It's definitely worth its value.  Portland and Vancouver have better systems but are also (now, with the PDX fare hikes) more expensive.. Sky Train rocks tho.. it must be said.

(Sorry for the off-topicness)