Vallejo California is not where I was born but is where I have lived since 1995. It is here that I chose to buy a house and to raise my family. It is now my home town. Vallejo in a way encapsulates the USA. Here is a short history. From the mid 1800s Vallejo had a large naval presence and repaired and constructed ships and even nuclear submarines. Downtown Vallejo was prosperous and business thrived . In the late 1960s the city policemen and firemen staged a simultaneous strike whose effects are still being felt today.In the 1980's the city was offered a large shopping mall which was fought by the local businessmen. In a scene repeated around the country the mall was built in another city and downtown died a slow death.
In the early 90's Congress due to environmental concerns did not approve funds for dredging the bay in front of the shipyard. Soon silt filled the harbor and the shipyard no longer had the ability to service the large subs of the US Navy. The shipyard closed as part of the peace dividend of the end of the cold war. The shipyard employed thousands and provided millions in tax revenues. Latter on the city became home to a Six Flags amusement park and several hundred $10.00 an hour jobs. The town remains to an extent an old blue collar town and votes 85% Democrat. The old shipyard on Mare island sits with a group of mainly unoccupied decrepit buildings.
Crime increased and street prostitution flourished. The state for a short while provided 35 highway patrol officers to restore the peace. Any development in the city is stifled by an incompetent planning and permitting process.
The tax roles decreased but city spending did not. Vallejo became a bedroom community with no good local jobs . The public employee unions signed lucrative contracts with the city and expenditures ballooned as the city was burdened with over 100 employees making in excess of 100K per year. The local school district was so ineptly run that after the head of the district was arrested for embezzlement the state of CA took it over for a while. Crime and drugs are still a problem and the police forces have been reduced. The city was offered the development of a large liquefied natural gas processing facility and latter shopping center associated with a super Wall Mart at the site of an old Kmart. The local liberals howled and the natural gas facility was never built and the Wall Mart shopping center moved itself five miles up the road to the next community. The existing Wall Mart in Vallejo sits closed and the old Kmart property still sets on a vacant lot next to a stinky swamp.
Over time the local politicians did nothing and pushed off today's problems until tomorrow . Tomorrow finally came and several months ago despite legal challenges from the public employee unions the city of Vallejo was declared bankrupt.
Now this is where it gets interesting. About two years ago the city announced there would be no more money to trim trees on city streets and residents would be expected to pick up the tab. This became a hot issue in the local letters to the editor forum. A few weeks latter I saw barricades on my street about tree trimming. This tree trimming was paid for by a grant from the US Forestry Service. There are some nice trees on our city streets but certainly no forest. This in many ways was a mini stimulus package. The issue of tree trimming became mute as did the local citizens complaints. The city streets had deteriorated as the city can no longer afford to do proper maintaining. Recently due to Federal stimulus money a great deal of asphalt has been recently laid.
The trees are trimmed the streets are paved hey everything is great ... But wait nothing has really changed . We have no new long term good paying jobs or even prospects for them; tax revenues are still way down ;environmentalists fight any development and the city bureaucrats slow what few projects are approved;over 50% of our kids are dropping out of school ;and the residents continue to vote the same way they always have. There is a quotation that says those who do not learn by history's mistakes are doomed to repeat them. Have you learned anything today?
I hope this has scared frightened you , and sent shivers up your spine for after all it is Halloween.
A Voice Crying In the Wilderness
Thursday, October 29, 2009
Monday, October 26, 2009
The Peasants are Revolting
Something interesting is happening in upper New York a tiny revolution of sorts. It seems there is a special election in the 23rd congressional district . The local GOP committee and the national party is backing a candidate who maintains many views more in line with the Democrats then what you would perceive the GOP to stand for. The Conservative Party of New York is backing another candidate who has been given an endorsement by Sarah Palin and several other leaders of the conservative movement. Normally the GOP candidate in NY automatically gets the endorsement of the Conservative Party as the Democrats automatically get the endorsement of the state Liberal Party.
The RINO's ( Republicans in name only) have been giving us voters lip service and then doing exactly as they please for quite a while. They think and believe the GOP voters of this district are so stupid that they can fly in a tired old retread like Newt Gingrich to make an endorsement for the official GOP candidate and the rank and file GOP will run like lemmings to the polls. I started to write a post concerning this when I read the following article. It expresses in much more eloquent terms then I could ever do what many of us in the rank and file conservatives have been feeling for quite a while.
http://news-political.com/2009/10/26/sarah-palins-call-to-arms/
PSST Don't tell anybody but The Peasants are Revolting!
Until latter A Voice Crying in the Wilderness
The RINO's ( Republicans in name only) have been giving us voters lip service and then doing exactly as they please for quite a while. They think and believe the GOP voters of this district are so stupid that they can fly in a tired old retread like Newt Gingrich to make an endorsement for the official GOP candidate and the rank and file GOP will run like lemmings to the polls. I started to write a post concerning this when I read the following article. It expresses in much more eloquent terms then I could ever do what many of us in the rank and file conservatives have been feeling for quite a while.
http://news-political.com/2009/10/26/sarah-palins-call-to-arms/
PSST Don't tell anybody but The Peasants are Revolting!
Until latter A Voice Crying in the Wilderness
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
How did we get here?
How did we get here?
1. We rebuilt industry in Europe and Japan after WWII as a vanguard to stop communism and as a place to sell our goods and services
2. For 40 years we ran our steel industry into the ground ( no preventive maintenance)The mills closed and the rust belt was born.
3. In the 1970s we decided that some industries steel , chemicals, oil production were too dirty so we outsourced the production of those products overseas. We were going to be a service economy and an information economy.
4. In the early 1970s there were two oil embargoes. The American automobile industry was unprepared to produce fuel efficient cars. The American consumer found higher quality and value in Japanese autos and then proceeded to buy their electronics and appliances for the same reasons.
5. There was a plan to turn our vast reserves of coal into gasoline. Our good friends in the middle east talked us out of it.
6. In the late 80's we stopped enforcement of antitrust laws and as a result company's were bought and sold with junk bonds. This produced less competition among fewer companies and many American firms were sold to multinational corporations. Divisions of corporations were sold for the sole intent of a short term profit to the shareholders.
7.In the 90s the Internet and the personal computer industry blossomed as well as the American economy. The bubble was short lived as investment capital was invested in projects with no thought to profit.
8. In the late 90's we began to outsource our customer service jobs to countries like India. We also shifted jobs like computer programming and engineering overseas because it was cheaper. Hundreds of thousands of US manufacturing jobs moved overseas where they don't have to worry about the EPA, OSHA or other burdensome state or federal regulations.
9. In 2000 we elected an inarticulate idiot for President who poured over one trillion dollars into the sands of Iraq and in conjunction with the Republicans and Democrats allowed a financial house of cards to be built on the mortgage industry.
10. In 2008 we elected a new President this one being eloquent; charming; a socialist; and also an idiot. We have spent over 3 trillion in nine months. Now OPEC in conjunction with Japan and China does not even want to use our currency as the standard for procurement of oil.
How do we get out of this? Pray for our leaders and pray for our county. Everything else will follow.
1. We rebuilt industry in Europe and Japan after WWII as a vanguard to stop communism and as a place to sell our goods and services
2. For 40 years we ran our steel industry into the ground ( no preventive maintenance)The mills closed and the rust belt was born.
3. In the 1970s we decided that some industries steel , chemicals, oil production were too dirty so we outsourced the production of those products overseas. We were going to be a service economy and an information economy.
4. In the early 1970s there were two oil embargoes. The American automobile industry was unprepared to produce fuel efficient cars. The American consumer found higher quality and value in Japanese autos and then proceeded to buy their electronics and appliances for the same reasons.
5. There was a plan to turn our vast reserves of coal into gasoline. Our good friends in the middle east talked us out of it.
6. In the late 80's we stopped enforcement of antitrust laws and as a result company's were bought and sold with junk bonds. This produced less competition among fewer companies and many American firms were sold to multinational corporations. Divisions of corporations were sold for the sole intent of a short term profit to the shareholders.
7.In the 90s the Internet and the personal computer industry blossomed as well as the American economy. The bubble was short lived as investment capital was invested in projects with no thought to profit.
8. In the late 90's we began to outsource our customer service jobs to countries like India. We also shifted jobs like computer programming and engineering overseas because it was cheaper. Hundreds of thousands of US manufacturing jobs moved overseas where they don't have to worry about the EPA, OSHA or other burdensome state or federal regulations.
9. In 2000 we elected an inarticulate idiot for President who poured over one trillion dollars into the sands of Iraq and in conjunction with the Republicans and Democrats allowed a financial house of cards to be built on the mortgage industry.
10. In 2008 we elected a new President this one being eloquent; charming; a socialist; and also an idiot. We have spent over 3 trillion in nine months. Now OPEC in conjunction with Japan and China does not even want to use our currency as the standard for procurement of oil.
How do we get out of this? Pray for our leaders and pray for our county. Everything else will follow.
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