Mr. Toy's Mental Notes

Here is reason #652 why I'm no longer a Republican. Once upon a time, this country accomplished pretty much everything it set out to do. Defeat the Nazis. We did it. End racial segregation. We did it. Put a man on the moon (during war time, no less). We did it. Conserve energy during an oil embargo. We did it. We used to be a "can-do" nation. But as the extreme right-wing nuts have taken over the once respectable Republican party, they keep telling us we can't do the things we need to do. Let people marry whoever they choose, regardless of their sexual orientation? It goes against the Bible, so we can't do it. Make our transportation systems more efficient and comfortable by modernizing passenger trains and developing high speed rail corridors? It's too expensive and government shouldn't be subsidizing trains (even though we subsidize roads, airports, waterways and shipping ports), so we can't do it. Develop environmentally friendly energy sources to...

The Monterey Herald reported today that some folks in Seaside are asking the city to rename Broadway Avenue as Obama Way. I'm as much a fan of President Obama as anybody. I support his work on health care reform, I support his efforts in the middle east. I'm behind him on pretty much everything. But let's not let our excitement get in the way of good sense. So far, President Obama hasn't had time to accomplish much, and it remains to be seen how much he can do. He may indeed be the greatest thing since Abraham Lincoln, but he needs to accomplish something enduring before we start naming things after him. Remember when Arnold Schwarzenegger first became governator? Republicans were so ecstatic that they wanted to amend the United States Constitution so that he, a native of Austria, could run for President someday. That was before the state crashed head-on into fiscal reality. Arnold has turned out to be just another mediocre governor in a long string of mediocre gove...