Author: MichaelPellegrini

Statewide Prop One – Roads and Transit – Vote Yes
Prop One is one of the most important ballot measures we’ve seen in recent years. In addition to funding the expansion of mass transit, it provides funds for key infrastructure improvements.
After the disappointing and untimely demise of the Seattle Monorail, the region is getting a second chance at mass transit with light rail.
If the Seattle metropolitan area is to succeed in becoming a world-class city, we have to start building mass-transit systems.
Our current freeway system is maxed out. It can’t handle the traffic that currently exists, much less handle the anticipated growth we’re likely to experience in the coming years.
Mass transit is one of the answers.
I was in San Francisco while they were building BART in the early 70’s. The disruptions were terrible. Market Street, downtown was torn up for several years. It was a real mess. And the expense to taxpayers? Horrible. People bitched and moaned for years. It really was terrible.
But now 30 years later, on an average weekday BART has over 340,000 riders. That’s 340,00 people who did not have to take the freeway.
The Seattle area needs something like that – soon. If the Monorail wasn’t the answer, then apparently light rail is.
Mass transit is a must for this area.

Continue reading “November Election Endorsements”

Well I for one was completely surprised when George Bush came out publically in support of General Petraeus’s plan for Iraq.
Yeah, right.
Petraeus’s plan is nothing more than Bush administration propaganda designed to justify prolonging the war in Iraq. And Petraeus himself is nothing more than a figurehead, a puppet doing Bush’s bidding.
The 30,000 troop “drawdown” Petraeus proposes is a meaningless gesture designed to appease critics of the war. It’s not in any way a genuine move to end American involvement in Iraq.
The only words you will consistently hear from Bush and his cronies are, “more time.” The idea is that if the US has more time in Iraq to stabilize the situation, then everything will be roses. They’ll embrace the democratic form of government, and we’ll have a new stable ally in the mid-east.
This is a futile dream. It’s no more achievable than the goals we had in Viet Nam,
The French colonized Viet Nam in the late 1800’s. They were there 67 years, only giving it up as a lost cause finally in 1954. The US became involved at that time, and spent another 21 years and over 58,000 American lives in pursuit of the hopeless dream of turning South Viet Nam into a democratic nation.

Continue reading “Petraeus Plan is Good Fiction”

Al Qaeda are coming!!!
I was watching Meet The Press this morning – Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) was on, pushing the company line for the Bush administration. What a shit-for-brains idiot!

It’s all, al Qaeda, al Qaeda, al Qaeda! The surge is working! We must stand firm! Our national security is at stake. If we leave, al Qaeda will win. Blah, blah, blah. al Qaeda. He must have said “al Qaeda” 10 times in maybe a minute.

It’s like Bush and his cronies figure that if they say the magic words – “al Qaeda” – then everyone will stand at attention and go along with anything they say.

And then if Bush and his buddies really want to get our attention, they’ll invoke the ghosts of “9/11.”

Continue reading “Sunday Morning Musings…”

Now we’ve heard it all.
Today Vice President Dick Cheney told America that the threat of terrorists detonating a nuclear bomb in an American city: “It’s a very real threat … something that we have to worry about and defeat every single day.”

And then he went on to warn that if the United States withdraws from Iraq, then basically we’re just paving the way for terrorists to plant such a bomb in some US city.

So let’s get this straight. According to Reichsmarschall Von Cheney:
US stays in Iraq = US safe from nuclear terrorism
US leaves Iraq = American cities go boom!

What a bunch of unmitigated bullshit!

Cheney actually expects anyone to buy this kind of tripe? And this coming from the people who brought you Iraq’s wonderful “Weapons Of Mass Destruction” and Saddam Hussein’s much vaunted nuclear program.

Yeah, right!

This is obviously a last desperate card being played by the Bush administration. An empty attempt to salvage their position on the Iraq war-funding bill.

They figure if they can scare the holy living shit out of people, then the voters will play along with their program.

Now this approach did work rather well for the first few years of the war. All the orange, yellow, purple and mauve terror alerts. People were on edge, off balance. Suspicious and distrustful. Let’s buy some duct tape and tape up all our doors and windows in case of a chemical or biological attack. Right now!
And Bush and his buddies kept America that way – all to their advantage.

The bitch is, eventually people have come to see through the farce.

All the justifications for the Iraq war have been proved to be false – there were no WMD, no nukes, no ties between Saddam and al Qaeda – no nothing. No rational or practical basis for invading Iraq. None. Saddam as it turns out, wasn’t a menace to anyone outside the borders of his country.

Continue reading “Cheney Plays Nuclear Card”