The Bus Bench

The Sales Tax and Ballot Language

The key to passing something with 66+% of the vote is to make whatever you want to pass seem totally uncontroversial. Many people will head into the ballot booth this November with no idea what's up for a vote except a few big-name measures or candidates, so the actual words written on the ballot are hugely important because they may literally be the only election information some people read all year.

Now Metro and the city have surely screwed up many parts of the Measure R roll out, but the ballot language they got approved is pretty much as good as you could write it without, you know, lying and just telling people it's free money and their cars will magically fly from here on out. 

Here's an overly detailed phrase-by-phrase look:

Will Detour be Detoured?

UPDATE: I spoke this afternoon with Goldenvoice event producer Phil Blaine—a downtown resident, I might add—and he stated that with the coöperation of the Secret Service, LAPD, LAFD and Clinton's people, the two events should pose no problems to the attendees. Clinton's fund-raiser will take place from 6 p.m. until 7:30 p.m. and will have reserved parking as well as offer egress in Harlem Place (the alley between the Edison and the cigar/art shoppe) whereas the main gate of Detour—half a block away—will not interfere with the Edison soiree. The security perimeter for Clinton will not intrude on Detour.

The Detour Fest will be this weekend, and Browne and I will once again be marching proudly and unpaid through the gates because, well, it's a street festival and we already paid when the taxman had his hand out.

Or so we hope. . .

The REAL Reason for Exorbitant Oil Prices

Don Pardo tells us why oil prices are so damned high. In 1976.

-BusTard

Black Monday prompts Blue Metro

As there is neither a recession nor a depression, then it follows that tits and ass, drugs and death, wrong and right, AIN'T. Or so Metro implies, as this single slice of the debauchery to follow clearly illustrates:

Hey LACMTA: What Mistakes Might We Anticipate THIS week?

Starting with the unprecedented death toll owing to Metrolink's wreck on Friday, 12 Sept., the public transit in southern CA has had no dearth of near-fatal mistakes in what appears to be an effort to permanently wreck public transit.

As such, one would do well to wonder: How is Metro/MTA/etc gonna roger us this week?

more after the transfer—provided you ain't dead. . .

Parker Center Blood Donor Drive Distraction

Last Wednesday, while on my way to Parker Center for my 10 a.m. appointment to be bled for Metrolink's miasma, I came across Bernie Parks and Gloria Molina holding a PR event. As Browne supports both folk speaking, I stopped for a moment to record the event.

What Will It Take To Get Folk To Take Mass Transit?

It was a long week of research, this. In the end, a couple of us weary BusBenchers elected to sit down, down some drinks and watch a video of a Los Angeles-based illustrator whose work I have long admired. (I was unaware of the video until I found it at the main branch of the public library.) Titled "In Smog and Thunder: The Great War of The Californias," it is a low-budget albeit sharply produced documentary—replete with brilliant narrative that mocks most every aspect of California life in L.A. and 'Frisco—exhibiting Sandow Birk's voluminous cache of paintings of the same name.

Browne's Been Busy

Before the day wears me out, and I find myself wandering the Art Walk, let me tell you about the Bus bench's busy editrix's latest writings in L.A. Progressive and L.A. CityBeat.

'Nuff said.

-BusTard

The boot of oppressor can fit any person who can kick.

As a radical feminist and politically black woman I’ve always had a problem.

How do you talk about oppression without:

1. Going into a long rambling of why it’s not all white people, but just some white people who are bad. Just like there are some of "everyone’s" who are bad.

2. Going into a long rambling of why it’s not all men, but just some men who are bad. Just like some women are bad.

3. Alienating people outside of the black/white paradigm of race. You know how it is you start talking about patriarchy, you start talking about oppression, you start talking about America, then slavery and then your white woman friend says “What about us, we couldn‘t vote?” and then your black woman friend says “Haven’t we talked about you enough?.”

And after you get through mopping up the blood there is no time left to talk about Native Americans, Asian-Americans, Latinos and a host of other people.

Freakin’ unproductive and very 90s.

The boots of oppression, in his and her sizes!!!

Oh wait, maybe today is "historic"

McCain chose a woman, Sarah Palin for his running mate.

Totally didn't expect that. And I'm good. I predicted McCain's Republican party nomination and my father thought I was crazy. This does make sense in retrospect (McCain picking Palin.) Old dude wants to win.

Dude has heart I have to give him that.

She is a pro-life, NRA member, pro-capital punishment woman, but it's a woman.

This election is the most exciting election I have ever had the privilege of witnessing, just when I was getting bored.

Browne Molyneux