Full Focus with Gloria Penner

KPBS Television

January 30, 2007

Regarding “Rethinking San Diego's waterfront” (Opinion, Jan. 26):

Editorial San Diego Union-Tribune March 2, 2007

Introductory Video: CAIVP's Vision for San Diego's Waterfront, January 30, 2007 A new vision for San Diego's waterfront calls on planners to design a cohesive network of public spaces and transportation options, complemented by commercial development, including architectural icons that maximize the enormous potential of our bayfront. January 30, 2007

Existing San Diego Waterfront Plans (North to South)

This well-intentioned bill does not go far enough to serve America's veterans who have risked so much for the cause of liberty at home and abroad. Although Prop 12 has raised the number of loans, it still is not enough. This should encompass a wider range of benefits that stretch beyond low-interest loans.

Providing low-interest state loans to veterans to purchase a home or farm is a tradition that stretches back almost 90 years in California. Since 1922, Californians have voted 26 times to pass bond measures to aid veterans, and this year it has expanded to benefit even more former service men and women.

Let’s say for instance that you work the night shift at a low-paying job, you still drive the ’84 coupe you bought used and you’re renting a small one-bedroom apartment. You work hard, you save, but at this moment in time you’re barely making it. Oh, and don’t forget your credit card debt that has piled up over the years.

Your dream is to someday break out of your job, move to a nice house and most importantly, own a new Ferrari. You have the ambition, and one day you’ll have it, but for now, you have more important things to focus on.

In the summary for this proposition, the author uses the verb “gerrymander,” a verb that came into usage because of the gross abuse of a politician’s power in deciding what constitutes a state office boundary. This problem continues today, and will continue to do so. Once elected, it becomes difficult to vote out legislators when they have the ability to choose their constituents by drawing odd-shaped districts favorable to them and their party.

For an exercise in futility, log onto the Amtrak Web site and reserve a seat on the Coast Starlight train, which will take you from Emeryville, California straight into Los Angeles’ Union Station. To the tune of about fifty bucks one-way, you can chug your way down the coast to sunny southern California in only 12 hours and 40 minutes.