Sacramento, CA

So, I was reading the Sacramento Bee this morning, and I think I can honestly say I won’t be the only person thouroughly ticked off by what I read.

At the end of August, news broke through that the city was planning on cutting several major bus routes and significantly shortening others. These plans are still going to go through in January of 2008. All along, they have been telling the public that the cuts are being forced upon them because ridership is down. They have told us over and over that they just don’t have the money to keep up with these routes–which just so happen to run in poorer neighborhoods in Sacramento.

However, they now magically have enough money to add a new light rail track that is going to cost $46,000,000!!! The new track runs from Eigth and K Streets to the Downtown Amtrak and is the most expensive light rail track in Sacramento. Furthermore, costs were never expected to be that high in the first place! In this morning’s edition of the Bee, officials try to play it off as something that was beyond their control:

Transit officials say they were naive about the difficulties of digging up downtown streets for a rail line. They set an aggressive construction schedule they never came close to meeting. The project took 30 months, more than twice what was expected.

It was slowed by discoveries of unmapped underground utilities that had to be moved, numerous unearthings of American Indian artifacts, intense spring rains in 2006 and a late-hour demand by federal judges that the line be rerouted farther from their courthouse.

I can’t believe how irresponsible this is!!! To waste so much money and then to try to gloss it over as an act of God is completely uncalled for. The worst part is that they know that!!! This morning, an RT Board Member–David Sander–even admitted, “These are taxpayer dollars, and it is extremely important we invest them as wisely as we can…Cost over-runs are a sign we are not doing the best we can managing projects.” All I can say to that is no s**t Sherlock! I mean really, who do these people think they are fooling? Do they honestly think we are stupid enough to buy this crap?

The Chief of Transportation even had the audacity to say, “I’m getting an education in how complex it is”! Well, frankly, we don’t give a damn about your education Mr. Zlotkowski. We DO care that you have succeeded in wasting millions of dollars on a project when you claim to be unable to pay to keep existing lines open!! You can argue all you want about these lines being necessary, but no one believes it. We still don’t have routes to Natomas–or even the airport for that matter. I seriously doubt there are any other major cities in the country that have airports but no way to get to them. It’s a ridiculous example of how easily officials in this area manage to get away with wasting our tax dollars. They have no problem with spending money on outrageous things like stakeouts for golf ball thieves and rail lines they will never complete, but they can’t seem to be bothered with any of the numerous severe issues this city faces everyday. All I can say is disgusting, disgusting, disgusting!!!!

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Okay, so I’m pretty sure that a fair number of you are already sick and tired of hearing me rant and rave about breed discrimination, but I just couldn’t help myself this time because the proposition seems so innocuous. It even sounds really intriguing to those of us–like myself–who are nerdy enough to be totally turned on by things like the Human Genome Project. It’s funny, but it never really dawned on me that such areas of science could potentially be used for nefarious purposes.

Then, I discovered the following ad whilst browsing on craigslist this morning:

Its a DNA Swab-a-thon!!! An exciting new product that uses DNA to pinpoint the breed-mix of a mutt will be demonstrated during a weekend “DNA swab-a-thon” Nov 2-4, 2007.

Representatives from the Canine Heritage™ Breed Test will be on-hand at eight PETCO stores in the Sacramento area to answer questions about the test. Kits will be available for purchase($10 off the internet price!) and representatives will be there to swab your pooch and process the paperwork. The only thing left to do is to wait for the results in the mail!

Quick and painless, the Canine Heritage™ Breed Test is a step forward in DNA technology yet remains very simple to administer. It requires only a simple cheek swab that is mailed to the lab in Davis, CA, with results coming back to the pet-owner in about 4 weeks. The current test can identify 38 breeds which represent about 75% of the most common registered domestic breeds.

Now, I’ll be the first to admit that this seems like a harmless bit of fun. You know, you and your boyfriend have always argued over whether Fido is secretly part lab or part golden retriever. Now, you can finally settle the argument once and for all. However, right after that thought came a second one–this could help to further facilitate breed discrimination in America. Just imagine the possibilities. It will be much easier to determine if a dog is a member of a bully breed or not. This in turn will make it much easier for landlords to dictate which dogs can live on their properties and which ones can’t. It will set in motion a chain of events that–I predict anyway–will eventually lead to the eradication of bully breeds.

We already have issues where states and cities can ban dog owners from having pit bulls. Authorities in those areas can go into peoples’ homes and sieze their dogs for no reason except for their breed. (How they can do this and then wonder why people are willing to support people like Michael Vick is beyond me–but that’s a whole other issue that Susan Mead at My Friendly Pets and I have both already covered so I’ll say no more on it for now!) The dogs are not dangerous and have done nothing wrong. However, these dogs then go on to be euthanized merely for existing. Until now, owners have been able to hide under the cover of declaring their four-legged friends to be mutts. The government could not murder them unless the owners admitted that they were pure bred dogs–or if the animal really had attacked someone. I personally know of at least thirty dogs who have been spared because of this little convenient glitch. However, now the authorities will eventually have the power to demand owners to give them a sample of the dog’s blood so that it can be tested.

This disgusts me because of the complacency with which it is likely to be carried out. No one really seems to notice the nefarious hidden implications that it could have for humanity as well. How much longer will it be before UC Davis sets up medical tests to determine a person’s lineage? Those curious about their heritage will flock to labs around the world like lambs to the slughter. Never mind that somewhere out there, the next fascist tyrant will be biding his time and waiting to exterminate various ethnic groups on a whim. I predict it will be much worse than what Hitler managed to accomplish too. After all, he only had Star of David patches and the word of other people. The next despot will have DNA evidence to back up his personal vendetta–evidence made all the worse because it will have been given willingly! i can’t believe how foolish science can be sometimes–never stopping to even consider the future consequences of their actions! Or perhaps I should instead be chiding the everyday average Joes–after all, WE are the ones who are going along with it without a second thought…

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San Francisco Assemblyman Mark Leno recently helped draft Assembly Bill 43–The Religious Freedom and Civil Marriage Protection Act. The bill basically argues that allowing the voters to decide the fate of a minority group–in this case the gay and lesbian community–goes against the State Consitution, and that, as such, the passage of Proposition 22 in 2000 should not be a legal determining factor in deciding the fate of gay marriage in California. They alos cite groundbreaking earlier actions of the California Supreme Court which paved the way for the elimination of such discrimination for other minority groups. For instance, in 1948 California became the first state to abolish laws prohibting interracial marriage, stating that,

“marriage is … something more than a civil contract subject to regulation by the state; it is a fundamental right of free men … Legislation infringing such rights must be based upon more than prejudice and must be free from oppressive discrimination to comply with the constitutional requirements of due process and equal protection of the laws“ (Perez v. Sharp).

Assembly Bill 43 seeks to eliminate discrimination by ammending various California Codes–such as Section 300 and 301 of the Family Code–to redefine marriage as a contract between two persons instead of between a man and a woman. However, the Bill will not effect Section 308.5 of the Family Code, which incidentally happens to be the Code directly related to Proposition 22’s refusal to acknowledge gay and lesbian marriages from OTHER states. Unfortunately, by purposely not addressing passages directly related to Proposition 22, drafters of the Bill have cast a suspicious light on it as a whole. Instead of noticing all of the positive things that it could accomplish for the gay and lesbian community and its likely ability to pave the way for such futue legislation in the Federal Government as well, all that the public sees is a crafty way of getting around legislation that was decided on by the majority of voters in 2000. It doesn’t matter to anyone that such legislation should never have been brought before voters. It doesn’t matter that “You don’t put a minority group’s rights up to a vote for the people,” or that “It’s up to the Legislature and courts to ensure that minorities’ rights are protected in this country” (Geoff Kors, Director of Equality California).

It certainly isn’t fair, but the fact of the matter is that the State of California ALREADY DID let Californians decide!! They can’t now repeal that decision without causing Californian voters to lose faith in their votes EVER meaning anything. This would be a dire mistake to make in a state where so many young people already feel that their vote is meaningless. The passage of Proposition 22 is the perfect example of this actually. When it was on the ballot, I was a senior in high school and everyone there believed that it was destined for failure. We all felt that in a state as liberal as California, there was no way that something like that would pass. On the day the results were given back, I remember sitting in my French class and everyone was left agape in shock when our teacher told us that it had passed. It was completely unfathomable until he also explained that the election had one of the lowest voter turnouts in the state’s history–especially amongst young adults who typically vote more liberally anyway. No one really thought that their votes meant anything so no one really voted. To repeal it now would be akin to saying, “Even if your vote does accomplish something the government can always overturn it with an Assembly Bill.”

I’m not at all saying that we should just let things be. After all, I completely support gay and lesbian marriage. Everyone has a Constitutional right to be happy. However, I don’t think that this is the right way to go about it. Supporters of gay and lesbian rights need to make the public aware that their actions are only designed to help the homosexual community–not to hinder or harm the heterosexual one. To do so, they need to bring the issues back into the public light and have everything out in the open for examination. It is the only way to keep people from being suspicious of some secret nefarious agenda. This sadly cannot be accomplished by waving a magic wand and passing an Assembly Bill behind people’s backs. It has to happen by bringing the matter back up for the public to decide on. Officials have to admit that it was a mistake to draft the legislation in the first place and the public has to admit that it was a mistake to pass it. Since the problem was created by giving the issue over to public scrutiny, it can only justly be ammended by allowing the public the chance to rectify it.

Furthermore, I think that this is the reason behind the Governor’s reluctance to pass Assembly Bill 43. He is likely to veto it because he knows that it cannot be solved by slipping it in so nonchalantly. In addition, I think it is disgusting that people are trying to bully him into signing it when he has already done so much for the gay and lesbian community here in California. Over the past few years, he has expanded civil rights protection in the employment and housing industries. He has also extended various domestic partnership rights to the community, including the ability to check the “married” box on state tax forms. It made me sad to see pictures of signs calling him a coward for trying to help the community as much as he is legally able to. In my opinion, he is doing everything that he is capable of doing. This is not a case of rallying Republican support or playing the political field, it is merely an instance of doing what is legal and just. That doesn’t mean that anyone has to like it–it NEEDS to be opposed. People just need to be aware of the right arena to oppose it in. Instead of protesting the Governor’s decision to DO HIS JOB by supporting state voters, they should instead be focusing on educating those voters so that the problem can be solved where it was created. For now, all I can say is that Governor Schwarzenegger is completely justified in saying, “It would be wrong for the people to vote for something, and for me to then overturn it…I don’t do that, I will not do it. And so they can send that bill down as many times as they want, I won’t do it.” And frankly, we shouldn’t want or expect him to do otherwise…

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