Getting Primary Priorities Right
By Frank Gruber
Vote Yes on R.
It occurred to me after I saw last week's column "in print"
on the website that when I wrote the column I buried the lead. I was
so interested in the cause of my bike accident that I went with that
first, leaving the far more important issue of Measure R, the parcel
tax for the schools, to the second part of the column.
Forgive my error in judgment. The most important matter facing Santa
Monicans on Tuesday's ballot (on a pound for pound, vote for vote basis,
considering that our votes will only have a tiny impact on the presidential
primaries) is Measure R. Getting two-thirds approval is never easy.
Every vote counts.
I'll say it again -- Yes on R.
* * *
I'm not going to insult the intelligence of my readers by asserting
opinions on the statewide measures -- community college funding, term
limits and Indian gaming. I mean, if I haven't made up my mind yet,
which I haven't, how can I pretend to have any opinion except that these
are all ridiculous issues to have to vote on?
Ballot box government has reached the level of absurdity.
* * *
I have previously written about the presidential races, and I can report
that nothing in the intervening weeks has changed my mind.
I still believe that Hillary Clinton is a more than capable politician
who would enter the White House with all the skills to make an excellent
president, but nonetheless I am even more enthusiastic about Barack
Obama now than I was a couple of months ago when I first wrote about
him. (see
column)
I've been watching Obama speak a lot, and in the interests of full
disclosure, while my journalistic ethics prevent me from making political
contributions in Santa Monica, or endorsing candidates in elections
here, I don't apply them to national politics, and Thursday night I
paid to attend an Obama fundraiser where I heard him give his stump
speech live.
Yes he can.
What Obama is trying to do with all his inspiring talk about coming
together to solve our problems is in fact something important. He wants
to revive the progressive coalition that ran America from the '30s into
the '70s, a coalition that did solve a lot of problems, but which fell
apart in the aftermath of Vietnam and riots and sex and drugs and rock
'n' roll.
He wants to bring the Reagan Democrats back into the party that better
represents their interests, and rescue the political culture from right-wingers
who believe that American can lead the world while forgetting the values
the rest of the world respects us for. It's a wholesale approach.
There's no argument with Hillary Clinton about doing this, but her
mind-set seems to be more retail. She's more focused on eking out what
she can from a political war of constant skirmishing within the no man's
land that lies between immobile entrenchments.
Her supporters consider this realism, but as her husband showed, all
the good programs in the world won't mean a thing if you lose Congress
because you can't out-inspire Newt Gingrich. Then the only legislative
achievements anyone remembers you for after eight years in the White
House are welfare reform and NAFTA.
* * *
As much as I hope Obama wins the nomination, and as much as I believe
he will deserve the victory, I won't be happy with how Hillary Clinton's
campaign contributed to his success. Go back to her victory in New Hampshire.
There she appeared alone on the stage, without Bill, without Madeleine
Albright, et al., and thanked the voters of New Hampshire for helping
her find her own voice. It was a great moment for her.
But what was the voice we heard for the next two and half weeks, until
the South Carolina primary? It was Bill Clinton's, who as a surrogate
not only drowned out the candidate, but nearly erased her image.
It's true that Hillary Clinton has her years as first lady to thank
for being a candidate. But it's still a shame that she ends up being
defined by her husband's ego.
* * *
As for the Republicans, I'm going to repeat myself from a few weeks
ago and say something that other Democrats might disagree with. Even
though John McCain is likely to be a more formidable opponent than any
of the other Republicans, particularly Mitt Romney, Democrats should
hope he wins the Republican nomination.
That's because it will show that even among Republicans, the American
people know that torture and immigrant-bashing are not right, and that
when you're sending troops to war, it's not time to give the rich a
tax cut.
* * *
One thing I've been doing since my bike accident is taking the bus
a lot. With my broken collarbone still on the mend it's still a couple
of weeks before I'll be able to cycle again, and until a few days ago
my left arm was in a sling, so I couldn't drive either.
Like most Santa Monicans, I live only a short walk from a bus stop.
I timed it, in fact, and I live about a three or four minute walk from
bus stops on both Fourth Street and Ocean Park Boulevard.
What better way is there to start a morning than with a few minutes'
walk?
Even better, if I arrive at one of those stops and don't see a bus
coming, in two minutes more I can walk to the corner of Fourth and Ocean
Park, where I can catch either the 2 or the 8 bus to downtown Santa
Monica (and my office on Fourth Street).
The advantage of that is that if I miss one bus, I don't have to wait
fifteen minutes until the next bus on that line, but I can take the
other bus. Fifteen minutes is otherwise too long of a wait between buses
for an urban commuter bus line.
Recently Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa made the suggestion
that people who complain about traffic should try taking transit once
in awhile, and there's an effort among employees of the City of L.A.
to take transit at least once a week to work.
We should give the same suggestion to complainers about traffic in
Santa Monica, simply because the local system is so darn pleasant to
use. If they try it, they just may like it, and if more people took
the bus, the City could schedule more frequent service, thereby attracting
more riders. Talk about a virtuous circle. Of course, there can be screw-ups
taking the bus, but then how often does your journey in your private
vehicle turn out to be a nightmare?
People don't like waiting for the bus, and it's true that Santa Monica
is behind other cities (including L.A. and West Hollywood) in providing
decent bus shelters, but what's so great about driving around looking
for parking, or finding your car in a gloomy parking structure or in
a vast ugly lot?
If more people tried the bus, they might just realize that taking it
is not a burden. In fact, aside from riding a bike, it's the best way
to get around Santa Monica.
* * *
With the closing of Santa Monica Place [see story http://www.surfsantamonica.com/ssm_site/the_lookout/news/News-2008/January-2008/01_31_08_Santa_Monica_Place_Marks_End.htm]
a chapter ends in the history of downtown Santa Monica. Call it the
suburbanization chapter.
>From its creation in 1875 as the future center of a great shipping
center, where a railroad was to connect with a port, into the 1950s,
downtown Santa Monica proudly grew as a city. Robust commercial buildings
shared the streets with august public buildings. Workers from the city's
thriving industries and their families thronged the sidewalks, which
were lined with shops.
In the 1950s, cities became old fashioned. The dominant paradigms were
horizontal suburbanism and a vertical modernism. Both shared the anti-urban
ideologies of separating uses and separating pedestrians from streets,
which were to be for motorists only. In fact, both suburbanizers and
modernists viewed walking as an old-fashioned technology that in the
automotive age should only occur in the context of a shopping mall.
The powers that be in Santa Monica were, if nothing else, forward thinking,
and downtown suffered from both paradigms, as it became the location
for towers without lively connections to the street, and once bustling
Third Street was turned into a sterile "mall."
[Insert the post card of the mall -- credit the Santa Monica Public
Library Image Archives, and the photo of 520 Broadway (credit me)]
Downtown suffered, temporarily it turned out, when it lost market-share
to the new malls that went up in places like Culver City, and the result
was the ultimate betrayal of downtown's urbanism -- the City used its
redevelopment powers to assemble ten acres for Santa Monica Place, the
quintessential inward directed, enclosed shopping mall.
Now Santa Monica Place is going to be destroyed to save it. It will
reopen as an extension of the Third Street Promenade.
Sic transit gloria suburbiae.*
* Latin ending courtesy the Santa Monica High School Latin Club. (Yes
on R.)
* * *
And also passes the glory of an able civil servant, with Craig Perkins'
decision to leave his job as the City's Director of Environmental and
Public Works. (See story. http://www.surfsantamonica.com/ssm_site/the_lookout/news/News-2008/January-2008/01_28_2008_Citys_Public_Works_Head_Resigns.htm)
I didn't know Mr. Perkins well, and observed most of his work from afar,
but he always impressed me as someone who succeeded because he followed
one rule over all others.
Apply your rational mind to a problem, and see what happens.
Good luck, Mr. Perkins, at the Energy Coalition. They are lucky to
have you.
* * *
Oh yes, vote tomorrow. Yes on R. |
