From: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org (fegmaniax-digest) To: fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Subject: fegmaniax-digest V12 #371 Reply-To: fegmaniax@smoe.org Sender: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-fegmaniax-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk fegmaniax-digest Wednesday, October 8 2003 Volume 12 : Number 371 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: Entirely OT: Belief-O-Matic [grutness@surf4nix.com (James Dignan)] Governor's race [Eb ] Re: Entirely OT: Belief-O-Matic [Sebastian Hagedorn ] Re: All right... ["Stewart C. Russell" ] RE: All right... ["FS Thomas" ] RE: All right... [Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey ] Re: California Recall (RH content) ["Jonathan Fetter" ] Re: Entirely OT: Belief-O-Matic [Ken Weingold ] Re: California Recall (RH content) [steve ] Re: California Recall (RH content) [Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey ] Re: California Recall (RH content) ["Stewart C. Russell" ] RE: All right... ["Iosso, Ken" ] Re: California Recall (RH content) ["Stewart C. Russell" ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 19:46:46 +1300 From: grutness@surf4nix.com (James Dignan) Subject: Re: Entirely OT: Belief-O-Matic well, whaddayaknow, I'm more Sikh than I am Jehovah's Witness! Is it about time to form the Unitarian Universalism branch of Fegmaniax!? Seems a common top response... (what is it, anyway?) >1. Unitarian Universalism (100%) >2. Neo-Pagan (97%) >3. Mainline to Liberal Christian Protestants (92%) >4. Liberal Quakers (91%) >5. Secular Humanism (82%) >6. Mahayana Buddhism (76%) >7. New Age (72%) >8. Taoism (67%) >9. Theravada Buddhism (62%) >10. Baha'm Faith (59%) >11. Reform Judaism (59%) >12. Orthodox Quaker (56%) >13. Nontheist (55%) >14. Christian Science (Church of Christ, Scientist) (54%) >15. New Thought (54%) >16. Jainism (48%) >17. Scientology (47%) >18. Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (Mormons) (46%) >19. Hinduism (44%) >20. Mainline to Conservative Christian/Protestant (39%) >21. Sikhism (37%) >22. Jehovah's Witness (29%) >23. Seventh Day Adventist (27%) >24. Orthodox Judaism (21%) >25. Islam (18%) >26. Eastern Orthodox (13%) >27. Roman Catholic (13%) James James Dignan, Dunedin, New Zealand -.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.-=-.- =-.-=-.-=-.- You talk to me as if from a distance .-=-.-=-.-=-. -=-. And I reply with impressions chosen from another time .-=- .-=-.-=-.-=-.-=- (Brian Eno - "By this River") -.-=-.-=-.-=-.-= ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 01:51:52 -0700 From: Eb Subject: Governor's race http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2003/recall/pages/governor/index.html Amusing to see the complete vote totals (a lot more amusing than the main result). My big question is: Who the heck is George Schwartzman, and what did he do to land in (currently) ninth place, ahead of faces like Mary Carey, Bill Simon, Gallagher, Angelyne, etc.? What's the hook?? Looking at his site (http://www.governorgeorge.com), I still can't see it. Maybe his finish is the most impressive achievement of all? Eb ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Oct 2003 11:19:14 +0200 From: Sebastian Hagedorn Subject: Re: Entirely OT: Belief-O-Matic - --On Mittwoch, 8. Oktober 2003 19:46 Uhr +1300 James Dignan wrote: > well, whaddayaknow, I'm more Sikh than I am Jehovah's Witness! Is it about > time to form the Unitarian Universalism branch of Fegmaniax!? Seems a > common top response... (what is it, anyway?) Hmm, I'm 100% Secular Humanism and would've expected that to be the top result ... why is it not? Cheers, Sebastian - -- Sebastian Hagedorn PGP key ID: 0x4D105B45 Ehrenfeldg|rtel 156 50823 Kvln http://www.spinfo.uni-koeln.de/~hgd/ ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Oct 2003 10:28:55 +0100 From: "Matt Sewell" Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) Arnold Swarzenegger called up my mum He said "dear lady do you think that I'm dumb?" [answer: yes] "Sorry Arnold" she said, dropping her book "You are good looking [?] but I wish you were cooked Like a Lobsterman...." No offence, of course, to our own Lobsterman, but Jesus Tap-dancing Christ - Arnie as governor? I know California is a long way from here, but the UK seems to be desperate in its aping of the US... so how long will we have to wait until Ross Kemp (Eastender's Grant Mitchell) as Mayor of London? Anyone fancy moving to another planet? I'm collecting funds for a spaceship... Cheers Matt >From: Tom Clark >Reply-To: Tom Clark >To: The Myriad Ones >Subject: California Recall >Date: Tue, 07 Oct 2003 16:59:10 -0700 > >Just so you know, I voted for porn star Mary Carey, and forgot to cast my >vote against the recall. Probably shouldn't have had that mescaline for >breakfast... > >-tc - ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Get a free connection, half-price modem and one month FREE, when you sign up for BT Broadband today! ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 12:24:13 +0100 (BST) From: Michael R Godwin Subject: Re: Entirely OT: Belief-O-Matic Just looked at this and I don't think it is a good questionnaire. Every question is set out in the same order (first=strongly 'people of the book'-oriented, last=not very god-conscious at all), and it's pretty easy to manipulate your answers to get any desired result. What they should be doing is asking a lot of short questions, half in reverse order from the other half, which check your views on the doctrinal status of Mohammed's son-in-law, the number of persons in the godhead, the transmigration of souls, consubstantiation, the rope and crushing hells, etc etc. And I bet if they did that, they would find that practically no-one votes for the bizarre three-in-one formulation which many Christian churches subscribe to, following a deal at the Council of Nicaea. - - Mike "shining in the rays of the living Aten" Godwin PS Anyway, I would have thought that the main issue was when do we get our proper Celtic Easter date back? ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Oct 2003 07:46:53 -0400 From: "Stewart C. Russell" Subject: Re: All right... Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey wrote: > > How about Canada? (No, I'm not implying Canada's just another > state...) Can't recommend it highly enough. Mind you, I like -25 C winters. Our US expats tend to be getting a bit old, 'cos many of them came across to avoid that unpleasantness in Viet Nam. Sign up here: Stewart ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 08:00:25 -0400 From: "FS Thomas" Subject: RE: All right... > -----Original Message----- > > ...so Ahnold has won. Any suggestions about which state I should move > to? I'll consider any of them. Well, except Nebraska. Georgia's not entirely bad. Sure it might get smarmy hot in the summer and housing is a bit expensive, but we are getting three area Robyn gigs... I feel for the guy, honestly. Not Schwarzenegger specifically, either, but anyone who gets vaulted into the California Governor's office. The fiscal burdens of past initiatives alone are crushing. What is it? Something like 60-70% of the budget is required spending on past plans? Ridiculous. Proposition 13 doesn't lend any help either by limiting any increase or change in the structure of property taxes. With limitations like that, anyone in the office will have a hard time of it. (Not to mention a Republican facing party opposition from practically every office.) If he could somehow garner support to restructure the budget, throwing out required spending it would be a start. I haven't the resources to go over the budget, naturally, but I think one could assume that the bulk of the spending is on social programs. While I generally support social spending, the problem is that it is easy to lay into effect spending plans when the economy is in good shape. Real maturity is shown when, in light of a faltering economy, you realize it is no longer fiscally responsible to fund such programs, and remove them. California \ber Arnold. - -f. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 07:34:20 -0500 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: RE: All right... Quoting FS Thomas : > fiscal burdens of past initiatives alone are crushing. What is > it? > Something like 60-70% of the budget is required spending on past > plans? > Ridiculous. Proposition 13 doesn't lend any help either by > limiting any > increase or change in the structure of property taxes. > I haven't the resources to go over the budget, naturally, but I > think > one could assume that the bulk of the spending is on social > programs. I agree about Prop 13 and the other initiatives (my Californian friends curse the guy - Howard Phillips? - who led the push for 13), but I suspect that if California's typical (in many ways not, granted), a huge chunk of spending is on prisons. Don't know as you'd call that "social programs" - I suppose if you stretch the definition a bit. - --Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: PLEASE! You are sending cheese information to me. :: I don't want it. :: I have no goats or cows or any other milk producing animal! :: --"raus" ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 08:51:36 -0400 (EDT) From: "Jonathan Fetter" Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) > Anyone fancy moving to another planet? I'm collecting funds for a > spaceship... Why don't we just put all the actor/politicians on a smaller spaceship (and program it to crash land)? Jon, useless third ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Oct 2003 13:57:08 +0100 From: "Matt Sewell" Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) Absolutely - persuade them the Earth's going to explode or something... actually isn't this a premise in The Hitchhiker's GTTG? Persuading all the hairdressers to leave... anyone who's seen even a minute's worth of The Salon (a UK TV prog where one watches everything that happens in a salon. I kid ye not.) will know this is a good idea - perhaps if the hairdressers leave the celebs and the politicians will go with 'em? Cheers Matt, wishing Arnie was cooked >From: "Jonathan Fetter" >Reply-To: "Jonathan Fetter" >To: fegmaniax@smoe.org >Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) >Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 08:51:36 -0400 (EDT) > > > Anyone fancy moving to another planet? I'm collecting funds for a > > spaceship... > >Why don't we just put all the actor/politicians on a smaller spaceship >(and program it to crash land)? > >Jon, useless third - ------------------------------------------------------------------------ Get your hands on designer bargains for less - click here. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 08:58:27 -0400 From: "FS Thomas" Subject: RE: All right... > -----Original Message----- > From: owner-fegmaniax@smoe.org [mailto:owner-fegmaniax@smoe.org] On Behalf > > I agree about Prop 13 and the other initiatives (my Californian > friends curse the guy - Howard Phillips? - who led the push for 13), > but I suspect that if California's typical (in many ways not, > granted), a huge chunk of spending is on prisons. Don't know as > you'd > call that "social programs" - I suppose if you stretch the > definition > a bit. When Prop 13 was brought in back in the late 70s the property taxes were relatively out of control. Once in place it reduced property taxes by something like an average of 57% (http://www.hjta.org/prop13.htm). Thinking on that, you then look at people like Warren Buffet, who's quoted in the Wall Street Journal saying "it makes little sense for him to pay $14,000 in annual property taxes on a half-million-dollar Nebraska home while paying just $2,264 on his $4 million house in Laguna Beach." (http://tinyurl.com/q5pm) If you can't see anything ridiculous about the property tax disparity there, then I doubt I would have anything more to contribute on the topic. As far as Prisons as Social Spending goes, while I know they're a bit long, it's easier for me to post the following two articles than distill them down. In short: I think for most crimes, short sentences with strict controls and next to zero amenities would be more effective and humane means of punishment. The war on drugs is an abject failure and should be abandoned outright on both ethical and practical grounds. (I've got to get to work!) ==================================== Jewish World Review August 29, 2003 / 1 Elul, 5763 Jeff Jacoby More prisoners, less crime Major crime in the United States is at a 30-year-low, and the Christian Science Monitor can't understand it. In a story this week headlined "A drop in violent crime that's hard to explain," the Monitor's Alexandra Marks reported on the latest data from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, an agency of the US Justice Department. According to the BJS, there were 23 million instances of violent and property crime last year -- 48 percent fewer than the 44 million recorded in 1973. (The numbers don't include murder, which is measured separately by the FBI.) In just the past 10 years, the violent crime rate has plummeted by a stunning 54 percent, from 50 crimes per 1,000 US residents in 1993 to 23 per 1,000 in 2002. The plunge in serious crime is pervasive; it crosses racial, ethnic, and gender lines and shows up in every income group and region. But welcome as they are, the new data are only the latest extension of a downward trend that first appeared in the 1980s, not long after the nationwide crackdown on crime got underway. The dramatic drop in criminal activity followed an equally dramatic boom in prison construction and a sharp surge in incarceration rates. The conclusion is obvious: Stricter punishment has led to lower crime. But it isn't obvious to the Christian Science Monitor. Marks's story--which begins, "Unexpectedly, the national crime rate has taken another dip"--makes no mention of prisons or prisoners. It claims that criminologists are actually "quick to list the reasons" why crime should be going UP, such as the soft economy, cuts in local government spending, and the diversion of police from walking neighborhood beats to guarding public facilities against terror. The only explanation Marks can offer for the continuing reduction in crime comes from Alfred Blumstein of Carnegie Mellon University, who speculates that post-9/11, Americans may be treating each other more considerately. "The only thing I can think of," Blumstein says, "is some sense of cohesion that's emerging as a result of the terrorist threat. . . . Other than that, I don't see much that should be contributing to this decline." To be fair, Marks and the Monitor aren't the only ones with a blind spot for the nexus between crime and punishment. In the Associated Press story on the Justice Department data, there is no mention of incarceration until the 11th paragraph. "Some criminologists," the AP grudgingly notes, "say tougher prison sentences and more prisons are key factors." None of those criminologists is quoted; instead, the point is dismissed as "political rhetoric" by the Justice Policy Institute, an anti-imprisonment advocacy group. No one disputes that more criminals are being locked up in this country or that they are spending more time behind bars. The Justice Department reported in July that the nation's prison population had reached an all-time high of 2.1 million in 2002, with violent criminals accounting for most of the increase. At year's end, 1 of every 143 US residents was in a state or federal prison or jail. That is a much higher level of imprisonment than is found in other modern democracies, a fact liberal critics point to it as evidence of American vengefulness. "The price of imprisoning so many Americans is too high . . . 5 to 10 times as high as in many other industrialized nations," admonished The New York Times in a recent editorial. "Locking the door and throwing away the key may make for good campaign sound bites, but it is a costly and inhumane crime policy." Actually, keeping known criminals locked up is a sensible and effective crime policy. The Times laments that it costs $22,000 per year to keep each inmate in custody, but that is not an exorbitant price for preventing millions of annual murders, rapes, armed robberies, and assaults. The cost to society of a single armed robbery has been estimated at more than $50,000; multiply that by the 12 or 13 attacks the average released prisoner commits per year, and $22,000 an inmate looks like quite a bargain. While crime has been tumbling in the United States, it has been soaring elsewhere. "Crime has recently hit record highs in Paris, Madrid, Stockholm, Amsterdam, Toronto, and a host of other major cities," Eli Lehrer wrote in the Weekly Standard last year. "In a 2001 study, the British Home Office found violent and property crime increased in the late 1990s in every wealthy country except the United States. American property crime rates have been lower than those in Britain, Canada, and France since the early 1990s, and violent crime rates in the European Union, Australia, and Canada have recently begun to equal and even surpass those in the United States. Even Sweden, once the epitome of cosmopolitan socialist prosperity, now has a crime victimization rate 20 percent higher than the United States." Not every inmate belongs in prison. Petty drug offenders, for example, may be better suited to intense probation and drug treatment than to jail. But on the whole, America's policy of locking up large numbers of criminals for long terms is doing just what it was meant to do: making us safer. Maybe Europe and Canada should follow suit. ==================================== Jewish World Review August 28, 2003 / 30 Menachem-Av, 5763 Thomas Sowell "Fairness" in sentencing For more than two centuries, the political left has crusaded against the punishment of criminals. Anyone familiar with history can find 18th century writers saying the same things that today's critics, politicians, judges and the ACLU are saying about how terrible it is to lock people up or to execute them. The latest ploy is to say how "unfair" mandatory sentences are. Can we all get together -- people of every race, color, creed, national origin, political ideology and sexual preference -- and agree, once and for all, that life is unfair? Then we can move on to a serious, adult discussion of what alternatives are available, at what price, and who is to pay those prices. The purpose of a criminal justice system is not to be fair. Its purpose is to protect law-abiding people from criminals. There is no need to be unfair but, as Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes said: "It is desirable that the burden of all should be equal, but it is still more desirable to put an end to robbery and murder." The left has never really recovered from the fact that, after their theories about "root causes" of crime from the 1960s were finally abandoned in the 1980s, and we belatedly started locking up more people for longer periods of time, crime rates began falling for the first time in decades. Liberals have certainly never asked how many crime victims could have been spared violence and murder if their ideas had never been listened to in the first place. A typical argument against mandatory sentencing in a recent issue of the New York Times began in typical fashion by mentioning a man who "stole a $16 bicycle" and will now spend the rest of his life in prison. Then comes the admission that he "had a five-year history of burglaries," and the caveat "none of them involving violence." So we are not really talking about stealing a bicycle, after all. We are talking about a career criminal being taken off the street. Like so many arguments against taking career criminals off the streets permanently, this one quotes some "expert" as saying that the "cost of prison is quite high." What about the cost of leaving career criminals out on the streets? Estimates of that are pretty high too, just in economic terms, not counting such incidental considerations as living in fear or dying in pain. But the anti-punishment people do not want to count that cost, much less weigh it against the cost of keeping criminals behind bars. When any costs are compared by the anti-punishment crowd, it is usually a comparison between the costs of imprisonment versus the costs of various programs that promise to prevent crime or to rehabilitate criminals. No doubt promises and theories are cheaper than walls and bars. The only question is whether they are equally effective. But evidence on this is seldom asked or given. Supposedly those who are against long prison sentences are more compassionate, though there seems to be little of that compassion showered on victims of crime. But, even as regards prisoners, there is a remarkable lack of compassion. The most hideous aspect of imprisonment is not simply being behind bars. It is being in the power of the strongest and most brutal bullies day and night -- especially night, when dehumanizing sexual assaults are unleashed. The victims may never outlive these traumas, even after their sentences have been served and they are released with their souls permanently scarred. The most obvious way to reduce such victimization would be to build enough prison capacity to allow each prisoner to have his own cell, where he could spend the night in peace and later walk out of prison with some trace of human dignity left. But no one opposes building more prisons more vehemently than those who are against mandatory sentences. "We should be building schools instead of prisons!" they cry. Most people prefer schools to prisons, but then most people prefer airports to cancer wards. Yet no one says: "Why should we be building more cancer wards instead of more airports?" Such rhetoric would be recognized for the cheap and childish thing that it is. It is cheap and childish when it comes to prisons as well. The anti-imprisonment crusade is moral exhibitionism to score points against "society," not compassion for fellow human beings -- in or out of prison. ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 09:19:53 -0400 From: Ken Weingold Subject: Re: Entirely OT: Belief-O-Matic Huh, I got Unitarian Universalism at 100% and Secular Humanism at 92%. Neo-Pagan was only at 70%. And I'm proud to admit that my lowest was Roman Catholic at 15%, but upset that Scientology was at 61%. - -Ken ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 08:51:13 -0500 From: steve Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) On Wednesday, October 8, 2003, at 04:28 AM, Matt Sewell wrote: > No offence, of course, to our own Lobsterman, but Jesus Tap-dancing > Christ - Arnie as governor? California Republicans now have a governor that could not have won their last primary. Interesting that Prop 54 got spanked pretty bad. __________ God told me to strike at al Qaida and I struck them, and then he instructed me to strike at Saddam, which I did, and now I am determined to solve the problem in the Middle East. If you help me I will act, and if not, the elections will come and I will have to focus on them. - George Bush, as related to Harretz by Mahmoud Abbas ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 08:56:09 -0500 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) Quoting Jonathan Fetter : > > Anyone fancy moving to another planet? I'm collecting funds for > a > > spaceship... > > Why don't we just put all the actor/politicians on a smaller > spaceship > (and program it to crash land)? > > Jon, useless third Didn't we vote to eliminate all the telephone sanitizers from this list? ..Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: When the only tool you have is an interociter, :: you tend to treat everything as if it were :: a fourth-order nanodimensional sub-quantum :: temporo-spatial anomaly. :: --Crow T. Maslow ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 09:07:43 -0500 From: Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) Quoting steve : > California Republicans now have a governor that could not have won > > their last primary. Interesting that Prop 54 got spanked pretty > bad. Schwarzenegger...a proposition turned down...hmm, you think there might be a joke in there somewhere? ..Jeff J e f f r e y N o r m a n The Architectural Dance Society http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ :: sex, drugs, revolt, Eskimos, atheism np: Firewater - The Man on the Burning Tightrope ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 07:28:02 -0700 From: Eleanore Adams Subject: Re: All right... You got that right - prisons are one of the biggest pits for spending here. We are at the bottom of the states with education. And when I say prisons, I mean prisons, not the judicial system as a whole. They have been cutting the judicial system. Laying off DA's, closing clerks offices at noon etc. It's all about privatized business eating at the trough with their lobbyists. (you can see I voted "no" and green) I am mad, very mad..... ea On Wednesday, October 8, 2003, at 05:34 AM, Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey wrote: > Quoting FS Thomas : > >> fiscal burdens of past initiatives alone are crushing. What is >> it? >> Something like 60-70% of the budget is required spending on past >> plans? >> Ridiculous. Proposition 13 doesn't lend any help either by >> limiting any >> increase or change in the structure of property taxes. >> I haven't the resources to go over the budget, naturally, but I >> think >> one could assume that the bulk of the spending is on social >> programs. > > I agree about Prop 13 and the other initiatives (my Californian > friends curse the guy - Howard Phillips? - who led the push for 13), > but I suspect that if California's typical (in many ways not, > granted), a huge chunk of spending is on prisons. Don't know as > you'd > call that "social programs" - I suppose if you stretch the > definition > a bit. > > --Jeff > > J e f f r e y N o r m a n > The Architectural Dance Society > http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ > :: PLEASE! You are sending cheese information to me. > :: I don't want it. > :: I have no goats or cows or any other milk producing animal! > :: --"raus" ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 11:23:05 -0400 From: "Stewart C. Russell" Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) Argh, the subject line has got me humming OTC's "California Demise" ... ;-) Stewart ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Oct 2003 11:35:56 -0400 From: FSThomas Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) I'm still waiting for a Dead Kennedy-esque "California! Uber Arnold!" At 11:23 AM 10/8/2003 -0400, Stewart C. Russell wrote: >Argh, the subject line has got me humming OTC's "California Demise" ... ;-) > > Stewart ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 11:14:32 -0500 From: "Iosso, Ken" Subject: RE: All right... RECALL AHNOLD Time it with next year's Presidential election. He will have had more than a year to prove he is not up to the job and Democratic turnout will be huge. Ken Iosso - -----Original Message----- From: Eleanore Adams [mailto:eleanore@tdl.com] Sent: Wednesday, October 08, 2003 9:28 AM To: arboreal autograph collectors Subject: Re: All right... You got that right - prisons are one of the biggest pits for spending here. We are at the bottom of the states with education. And when I say prisons, I mean prisons, not the judicial system as a whole. They have been cutting the judicial system. Laying off DA's, closing clerks offices at noon etc. It's all about privatized business eating at the trough with their lobbyists. (you can see I voted "no" and green) I am mad, very mad..... ea On Wednesday, October 8, 2003, at 05:34 AM, Jeffrey with 2 Fs Jeffrey wrote: > Quoting FS Thomas : > >> fiscal burdens of past initiatives alone are crushing. What is >> it? >> Something like 60-70% of the budget is required spending on past >> plans? >> Ridiculous. Proposition 13 doesn't lend any help either by >> limiting any >> increase or change in the structure of property taxes. >> I haven't the resources to go over the budget, naturally, but I >> think >> one could assume that the bulk of the spending is on social >> programs. > > I agree about Prop 13 and the other initiatives (my Californian > friends curse the guy - Howard Phillips? - who led the push for 13), > but I suspect that if California's typical (in many ways not, > granted), a huge chunk of spending is on prisons. Don't know as > you'd > call that "social programs" - I suppose if you stretch the > definition > a bit. > > --Jeff > > J e f f r e y N o r m a n > The Architectural Dance Society > http://spanghew.blogspot.com/ > :: PLEASE! You are sending cheese information to me. > :: I don't want it. > :: I have no goats or cows or any other milk producing animal! > :: --"raus" ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 8 Oct 2003 11:23:05 -0400 From: "Stewart C. Russell" Subject: Re: California Recall (RH content) Argh, the subject line has got me humming OTC's "California Demise" ... ;-) Stewart ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 08 Oct 2003 13:12:35 -0400 From: FSThomas Subject: RE: All right... At 11:14 AM 10/8/2003 -0500, Iosso, Ken wrote: >RECALL AHNOLD How many years did Davis serve? He was elected governor in 1998. The whole "we'll give Arnie 100 days to fix everything or it's RECALL time" is just asinine. Give him half as many years as Davis to fix the damage and then consider a recall. ------------------------------ End of fegmaniax-digest V12 #371 ********************************