On Building Big

You know, this article really hit me. I have a 1300 square foot home that often seems huge to me (and difficult to clean) and I sometimes wish we had a smaller home. I mean, all of us generally use the one master bath. We only use 2 of the three bedrooms. And yet, I know my home is considered "modest." A friend refused to consider any home less than 1500 square feet for her family. 1500 square feet? That's 200 more square feet to clean and to worry about. I personally like small houses with big yards but that ideal seems to be going as builders realize they charge "per square foot" and that's for the home, not the lot. You can read this poignant article here.

I was driving to Boston and saw this house set above the others, all pomp and puffery, just a blink away from a city where the working poor live in flats, and it struck me -- as it hasn't in a long, long time, because I am inured, because I see what I want to see -- that we are going in the wrong direction in this country; that the gap between the rich and the poor is a great divide and it is not pretty, no matter what your political beliefs.

More Nukes

While I am not one to march outside of Davis-Monthan or anything, I have been a member of the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF) for several years now. Most of the time I think some of the members have had a tad too much sugar, or perhaps smoked a leetle too much weed in the 60s. I mean, they would love to have civil disobedience every third day of the week, and nothing pisses them off more than a living, breathing Republican. I attended the meetings for a little while and then discovered that 1. Mentioning that Marti used to be in the Marine Corps brought silence to a room, and 2. I was the youngest person there by 40 years. At least. Also? I tend to be very moderate, at least in comparison, although by some of my family members standards I am a screaming liberal. And I don't like marching around nuclear testing sites, it's very bad for my complexion (and my ovaries)

Nevertheless, I was rather shocked when I stumbled across this article in the New York Times:

WASHINGTON, Jan. 6 — The Bush administration is expected to announce next week a major step forward in the building of the country’s first new nuclear warhead in nearly two decades. It will propose combining elements of competing designs from two weapons laboratories in an approach that some experts argue is untested and risky.

The new weapon would not add to but replace the nation’s existing arsenal of aging warheads, with a new generation meant to be sturdier, more reliable, safer from accidental detonation and more secure from theft by terrorists.

The article goes on to say that the government wants two competing labs to make a hybrid which MAY OR MAY NOT be safe, because if not one weapons lab will go out of business. I'm sorry? I thought we all agreed only to pour money into one failing business *cough - Amtrak - cough* ? What is up with this? I like to call it Republican charity, because those poor weapons laboratories, they are starving, and we wouldn't want them on the streets.

*sigh*

I suppose there is something to be said about not pissing off the guys who build the bombs. Nevertheless, am I the only one who thinks its a tiny bit hypocritical to be "renewing" our nuclear warheads at a time when we are fighting two wars and sanctioning or threatening sanctions to several other countries for... developing nuclear warheads? I know some redneck would say, "But we need to be number one, superior, keep our world power status, blah blah blah" but honestly -- developing more nuclear weapons? Will keep us safer? Come on. We already have Paris Hilton. Do we really need another weapon more deadly than that?

Some kudos to Republicans

While I generally think of conservatives as evil, power-hungry businessmen who love to use God to convince people to take money from the poor, I did appreciate this speech from new Minority House Speaker John Boehner:

And as Mr. Boehner rose to speak and to hand the gavel over to Mrs. Pelosi, he mentioned the historic nature of her rise to the speakership:

“But today marks an occasion I think the Founding Fathers would view approvingly. My fellow Americans: whether you’re a Republican, a Democrat, or an independent, this is a cause for celebration.”

And in a rather humble tone, he said:

“There were some great achievements during the 12 years that followed, but there were also some profound disappointments. If there is one lesson that stands out from our party’s time in the majority, it is this: a congressional majority is simply a means to an end. The value of a majority lies not in the chance to wield great power, but in the chance to use limited power to do great things.

“We refer to the gavel I’m holding as the Speaker’s gavel. But like everything else in this chamber, it really belongs to the people. It’s on loan from the real owners. This is the people’s House. This is the people’s Congress. And most of the people don’t care which party controls it; what they want is a government that is limited, honest, accountable, and responsive to their needs. The moment a majority forgets this lesson, it begins writing itself a ticket to minority status.”

Pelosi makes history

I had hoped it would be Cheryl, but oh well...perhaps the Senate?

Nancy Pelosi, possibly one of my father's most hated politicians, made U.S. History today with her election as House Speaker. In her speech, she quoted one of my favorite saints, St. Francis of Assisi.

Quoting St. Francis of Assisi, San Francisco's patron saint, Pelosi said, "Lord, make me a channel of thy peace; where there is darkness may we bring light, where there is hatred, may we bring love, and where there is despair, may we bring hope."

Pelosi, 66, married for 43 years with five grown children and six grandchildren, thanked her family for giving her "the confidence they gave me to go from the kitchen to the Congress."

Pelosi, wearing her trademark pearls and a purple suit, was elected by a 233-to-202 vote on party lines that became a foregone conclusion after Democrats rolled to victory in last November's midterm congressional election that swept aside 12 years of Republican control in the House.

I pulled this excerpt from a news article I now cannot find but the link goes to her speech as reported by the San Francisco Chronicle. Although the title of this blog is "Yellow-Dog Democrat," in reality I am skeptical of politics. People's motives can change, as the old adage says - "Absolute power corrupts absolutely." If we carry the logic further, "Partial power corrupts partially," and it is for this reason I doubt politics. After all, what did the Democrat say when s/he walked into the graveyard?

"Thank you for your votes."

Nevertheless, I hope that a few things change. I hope that we can change our course in Vietnam Iraq, that we can get government spending under control, that we can start limiting presidential powers granted during the terrorist attacks, and that we can stop being so damned partisan about everything. I want some cooperation, people, and less war-mongering. I want decent schools and a stronger police force and a better America. And if I don't stop writing I'm going to sound like a politician myself.

Dave Barry Does is Again

I was delighted to see that Dave Barry decided to emerge from retirement to do another 2006 Year in Review. Here's an except from the full article:

It was a momentous year, a year of events that will echo in the annals of history the way a dropped plate of calamari echoes in an Italian restaurant with a tile floor. Decades from now, our grandchildren will come to us and say, "Tell us, Grandpa (or Grandma as the case may be), what it was like to be alive in the year that Angelina Jolie, Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Britney Spears and Katie whatshername all had babies, although not necessarily in those combinations." And we will smile wisely and emit a streamer of drool, because we will be very old and unable to hear them.

And that will be a good thing, because there are many things about 2006 that we will not want to remember. This was the year in which the members of the United States Congress, who do not bother to read the actual bills they pass, spent weeks poring over instant messages sent by a pervert. This was the year in which the vice president of the United States shot a lawyer, which turned out to be totally legal in Texas.

Also there were many pesky problems left over from 2005 that refused to go away in 2006, including Iraq, immigration, high gas prices, terrorism, global warming, avian flu, Iran, North Korea and Paris Hilton. Future generations are going to look back at this era and ask us how we could have allowed Paris Hilton to happen, and we are not going to have a good answer.

Did anything good happen in 2006? Let me think. No. But before we move on to 2007, let's take a moment to reflect back on the historic events, real and imaginary, of this historic year"...

Long Live Dave Barry! Dave Barry for President, 2008!