It'll Kill Jobs!

One more reason I never sign those petitions outside mega-shopping depots -- proposition 23, which would "suspend" AB32 until unemployment falls below a specified value for a specified time.

We are hearing the argument that AB32, a program to achieve quantifiable reductions in GHGs, would kill jobs, so we ought to suspend it until we "recover." This argument, espoused by those on the right, is made by the same group of cretins responsible for the hallucinated economy over the past decade who caused the unemployment situation we are in. I say this, because the wealthy were primarily responsible for deregulating the industries that led to housal unit bubbling...and the wealthy are predominantly right leaning.

Aside from this proposition, we hear from the right regarding SB375, a law passed in 2008 aimed at prompting communities to consider climate change impacts in the planning of new development. Their argument: this will kill jobs, too.

Unfortunately, we are riding a red wave through the November elections, as we have no long term view on anything and we pin the lack of economic progress on the incumbents. This was going to happen regardless, as a hallucinated economy is just that -- fake, pretend, make-believe -- and there's no way we had any hope of "recovering" in such a short time frame following thirty years of 1) eviscerating our manufacturing base, 2)converting to a services only economy, 3) ever increasing dependence on foreign energy, and 4) basing our entire prosperity on increasing levels of debt.

Personally, I don't really care about the climate -- but truthfully I'm glad others do, for it is a fantastic catalyst for creating communities worth a damn. We now have laws that mandate reductions in carbon emissions that can only lead to better designed places to live, places totally unlike Elk Grove. With these laws in effect, we have the potential to never again build such a fucked up place like the city I live in -- car dominant, brutalized by traffic, full of people who have no sense of community, of place, or who give a shit about their public realms.

But, the right intends on hijacking these laws, already passed by the legislature and the governor, for the sake of continuing sprawl, auto dependence, foreign carbon dependence, and building communities developments not worth a damn.

I believe this proposition will pass, because we will have been suckered into the "fear" of continued economic hardship, in a state reeling from 16% "real" unemployment.

The good news today is that CARB adopted nice, harsh targets for reduction via SB375, contrary to the opinions from the California Building Industry Association. This will, in the long run, hopefully prevent the extension of Elk Grove all the way to the Consumnes River, hopefully prevent our city from building Franklin Crossing, a totally worthless subdivision plan that epitomizes the multiple failures of community, energy conservation, environmental stewardship, and the notion of a worthwhile place to live. It is low density sprawl four miles farther away from existing sprawl, already fifteen miles from everything. It is nothing more that mandating extreme automobile dependence for every "resident." Or, should I say, consumer?

Yet -- you can be assured that the original developers of such sprawl, Reynen and Bardis Development, LLC, are staunchly in opposition to SB375 and totally in favor of proposition 23.

Too bad John Reynen filed personal bankruptcy in 2008. Awwwwww. He used to be a part of Reynen and Bardis Communities. Tell me, when was the last time low density suburban sprawl ever morphed into a viable "community?"

Never.