The general principle of voting against all ballot inituitives certainly holds this year. The three questions are:
1) abolish sales tax on alcohol, the argument being that it's double taxation, because they also pay an excise tax (11 cents per gallon of beer). I don't know where people get this idea that the same thing can't be taxed twice, it seems to be some sort of implicit, non-functional metaphor to the notion of double jeopardy.
2) Repeal the law that lets developers bypass local zoning boards if towns don't have enough low-income housing. I don't mind the law being improved. Ballot questions aren't the way to do it. And if they get rid of it, it has to be replaced by something, otherwise sprawl and economic self-segregation will accelerate. I don't think this sort of law can solve it, but it can at least mitigate it. The house I presently live in couldn't possibly be built in Lexington now: the lot is far too small for the zoning regulations.
3) Cut the sales tax to 3%, with a weasel-worded exception that if contractual obligations (read state employee pensions) require it to be higher, then it should be as low as legally possible. But then in the argument, their claim is that doing this would stop out of control state employee pensions. So, essentially, this is a self-destruct switch for the state: the only way cutting sales tax would get the state out of it's obligations is if doing so drove us bankrupt.
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(2)
08:53:40 PM,
Monday 20 September 2010
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04:50:36 PM, Saturday 18 September 2010
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04:50:11 PM, Saturday 18 September 2010
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My favorite political issue gains traction.
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(1)
12:28:28 PM,
Saturday 18 September 2010
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Has anyone ever tried reading Little Lord Fauntleroy?
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(5)
05:25:53 PM,
Friday 17 September 2010
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07:59:30 PM, Tuesday 14 September 2010
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The three villages in Defiance County, Ohio are Hicksville, Ney and Sherwood. I think I like Ney best, but they're all pretty good names, considering.
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(3)
01:17:31 PM,
Tuesday 14 September 2010
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Massachusetts is a 1 party state. The 90% of the General Court are Democrats.
There are almost no contested elections in the primary today. If I did go in, the only choices I would have would be for State Auditor and State Treasurer.
The system is broken, there is no accountability to the electorate.
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10:53:11 AM,
Tuesday 14 September 2010
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Civil War coffee substitutes.
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(4)
03:28:46 PM,
Sunday 12 September 2010
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Alligator in the Charles.
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03:50:33 PM,
Friday 10 September 2010
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07:46:27 PM, Thursday 9 September 2010
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There is a video of cuteness, but I don't seem to be able to find a free editor that works with my camera's encoding.
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07:17:54 PM,
Thursday 9 September 2010
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site & script courtesy of Moss