Don's Tuesday Column

          THE WAY I SEE IT   by Don Polson  Red Bluff Daily News   10/18/2016

         Considering ballots, bonds, jokes

It could be a service to readers, trying to sort through a plethora of ballot measures, if this column provided some guidance. That said, I must first defer to readers’ judgment on the choice for the Governing Board Member of the RB Joint Union HS District. I’m unaware of what would qualify a candidate or set one above another. I will vote against both school bond measures—H for the Shasta-Tehama-Trinity Joint Community College District; J for the Red Bluff Joint Union High School District—for the reason that there is no way under current “prevailing wage” rules for local taxpayers to get $165 million worth of actual monetary value.

As long as our ability to get competitive bids is driven by Sacramento or San Francisco union wage scales, we are saddling future citizens, many of whom will have lower wages and salaries than those of our urban betters, with property tax hikes. Such property tax increases skew the burden of paying for school construction onto property owners at a time when not only are many students’ families residing in rental housing and not paying that tax, but also many property owners no longer have school or college age children that benefit from such a monstrous level of bond indebtedness.

Allow local wages, which drive our lower local income levels, to be a major determinant of the labor costs for such school bond construction; allow some sort of broader base for taxation to spread the burden more equitably among our citizens—I could then support such bonds.

My sample ballot arrived; upon opening it I was shocked at how much my reading vision had diminished. I’ve not in my memory had to immediately reach for a magnifying glass. Not to worry, as the actual absentee ballot was in normal font size; but I still found the “Full Text,” “Impartial Analysis,” “Tax Rate Statements” and “Arguments” challenging to read. Lord help older voters who’re unable to read sample ballots, and depend on reading Election Day ballots.

Ballot recommendations are worth passing along, given the confusion (intentional?) surrounding ads and flyers. I found Doug LaMalfa’s choices simpatico with my own analysis.

51—No, given the deep debts we already have from bonds and unfunded pensions.

52—Yes, “Stop Sacramento from redirecting funds away from hospitals.”

53—Yes, give voters more say in bond debt (see points made above on school bonds).

54—Yes, transparency lets bills get read by the public before a vote.

55—NO, NO, NO to extending taxes that were promised to be “temporary.” We all end up paying them in spite of targeting “the rich.”

56—No to just “another special interest tax.”

57—No! Stop the release of criminals; most are in fact threats to people and possessions.

58—No, “Keep English as the primary language for education.”

59—No, “Protect political speech,” period.

60—No, just no. Yuck.

61—No, “Increases drug costs to Veterans.”

62—No, “Keep the death penalty.”

63—No, “Stop the Gavin gun grab, protect the 2^nd Amendment.”

64—No, “Don’t legalize pot, no pot ads on prime time TV.”

65—No, “No enviro money to attack rural California.”

66—Yes, “Reform the death penalty to remove the endless delays.”

67—No, “Overturn the plastic bag ban and paper bag tax.”

If border enforcement, military spending, tax and regulation reform, abortion, school choice, Supreme Court appointments and gun rights matter to you more than decades-old unproven allegations of sexual improprieties, there is only one choice: Donald Trump.

Last Friday’s liberal political cartoon showed “evangelicals” selling souls to the devil to support Trump. Trump’s “oafishness” vs. Hillary’s rabid secularism. Her judges will remove tax exemptions from churches and force gay marriage services, destroying America’s Christianity.

Well, Robert Minch started the fight, “drew first (literary) blood” (as John Rambo would say), by making repeated unprovoked castigations of “the Tuesday columnist.” When I finally took on—took apart, really—his assertions on Trump’s taxes, it was not fair as I presented facts to Minch’s ill-informed opinions.

Just to catch readers up: Last Friday saw Minch’s attempt at levity descend to near “eliminationist” rhetoric; at the very least, he framed a thinly-veiled wish for harm to befall me—and perhaps by extension, anyone supporting Donald Trump—as a joke involving a rancher’s polluted stock pond. Minch thought it cute that the Trump campaigner was told to drink heartily from water that “cows have been pooping in.”

That would subject the Trump man to many forms of bacteria, including e-coli, which would likely hospitalize the Trump man, exposing him to potentially fatal effects. Cue the laugh track, knee-slapping and guffawing; also bring on the reliably dismissive defense and a rationalization that “it was just a joke.”

Perhaps Minch could explain his thinking, retract his “potty-themed” joke, or apologize for suggesting physical ill for Trump supporters or campaigners. I ask for Mr. Minch to confirm or deny his agreement with Hillary Clinton’s assessment of half of Trump supporters—about 30 percent of Tehama County voters—as “deplorable,” racist, sexist, homophobes. Will he offer any good faith reconciliation with such “irredeemables”? All are accountable; words have meanings.