Don's Tuesday Column

THE WAY I SEE IT by Don Polson       Red Bluff Daily News 11/04/2025

        News “better late than never” covered

There has been quite an accumulation of articles and news events over several months, few of which have shown up in our local paper. Time to “clear the deck.”

Ever wondered why America can’t build anything quickly anymore? Start with the Environmental Impact Statements (EIS) required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) for major federal projects. In a 2018 study of EIS, the average statement took 4.5 years to complete and ran 575 pages.

The Golden Gate Bridge, pre-NEPA and EIS, took less than 4 ½ years to complete. The original 28-station New York City subway, in 1904, took about the same amount of time. The Empire State Building: 1 year and 45 days. The Hoover Dam took 4 years, 1 month. Closer to Red Bluff, Disneyland took 1 year.

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Why does California have the highest gas prices but a lot of marginal roads? The average regular grade gas price is around $4.65 per gallon. The Sacramento-imposed state excise tax rose to 61.2 cents per gallon in July; it’s indexed by inflation to rise every July unless lawmakers intervene (hint: they won’t ever). Arizona’s tax is just 18 cents per gallon; last time I drove on Arizona highways, they were quite adequate—for less-than-a-third of our gas tax.

Are we getting our money’s worth? The Reason Foundation ranked states on 13 measurable categories and found North Carolina—charging only 40.3 cents per gallon—to be first in the nation in overall highway performance. Tennessee, charging only 27.4 cents, is ranked fifth. At 61.2 cents, CA ranks 49^th, nearly last.

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Political violence and violent rhetoric is “trending.” Our own Gov. Gavin Newsom has some “‘splainin’ to do.” His statement seemingly suggested a threat: “Kristi Noem is going to have a bad day today. You’re welcome, America” preceded the Homeland Security Secretary’s visit to our state.

Newsom: “We are going to fight back and we’re going to punch this bully (the President of the United States) in the mouth.” Also: “We are going to punch these sons of b____es (Republican opponents) in the mouth.” I don’t see how it’s not encouraging violence to endlessly besmirch the President, Republicans in Congress, and our own Republican Congressman as Nazis, Fascists, and Hitler-like—which would apply to about two-thirds of Tehama County’s voters. I’m sure no such foul statements were found among our local “No Kings Day” signage, right?

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News items: Actual (non-political) violence, death and destruction, has been visited upon Californians and others by way of Commercial Drivers License-holders (CDL) from California. You’ve probably seen the camera footage from the horrific crash involving an illegal immigrant from India, licensed in our state, who couldn’t even speak English. A minivan that had no time to slow and avoid the illegal u-turning truck driver resulted in three deaths in Florida.

The Florida AG’s investigation has uncovered that the Indian illegal, Harjinder Singh, crossed the Mexican border into California in 2018, ultimately applying for his CDL in Washington state—which test he failed ten times in 2023. His ignorance of truck operations suggests systemic failure to prevent an inherently unqualified driver from getting that CDL—in California. Does the “buck stop” at Gov. Newsom’s desk?

“As the Trump administration works to make our roads safer and prevent illegal immigrants from obtaining commercial driver's' licenses (CDLs), two national public employee unions are filing suit to block the new rules” (Townhall.com 10/24). Unless those public employee unions find some addle-brained judge who somehow, against all logic and morality, rules against implementing emergency safety regulations—rules simply mandating English proficiency and competence for drivers of 80,000 pound big rigs—they will lose in court.

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Is it futile to hope voters reject the shamefully partisan redistricting measure on the ballot? Locals will have no problem voting it down but the state’s 60+ percent of brain-numbed Democrat robots will likely “follow their leaders” and approve it. We hope otherwise.

Meanwhile, a “Petition to Put Voter ID on California’s 2026 Ballot is Smashing Signature Records” (Redstate.com, 10/22). Given the proliferation of automatic voter registration accompanying driver’s licenses, and polling showing that a portion of illegal aliens getting said licenses do actually vote—it is only common sense to clamp down on illegal voting by this initiative.

For those with self-imposed blinders to such things, “Sacramento deputies discover nearly 100 voter ballots in homeless encampment” (kron4.com, 10/16). Anyone pretending vote fraud is either a) nonexistent or b) inconsequential or c) doesn’t change elections—take the blinders off because many elections are decided by relatively small numbers of ballots.

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For next week: “First arrests hint at how billions in California homeless $$$ vanished without a trace on Gavin’s watch” (pjmedia.com, 10/16). Hint: The idea behind spending $24 billion on the homeless crisis isn’t to solve it—it’s to maintain the grift.