A proposal for amending the California Constitution

I propose that we amend the Constitution of the state of California to require that any law the voters pass must be voted twice. One of the problems of California's democracy is that it is easy for the voters to pass an initiative or a constitutional amendment, and therefore every term is an exercise in passing endless laws that are not necessarily beneficial long-term.

By requiring that a constitutional amendment or initiative passed by the voters be voted on twice, in successive term, it would allow laws to expire that were passed when people were enraged, but whose passion has cooled after two years. The first vote passing the law would have it take effect immediately, and in that intervening two years, the people will have a chance to decide whether to keep the law or not.

Cardamom

Enjoying the rain
Fall quickly and never hurt
The air drags it - slow

in writing

Father:

I am fine. I did not reply because I had very little to say. I believe you are telling me your truth. I was just a little boy when it happened, so all the things I've heard are circumstantial, based on vague and sometimes suppressed memories, stretched over years, and day by day wrought and hewn of emotion. And now, after 20 years, it is a moldy story. I think the court will not care about an old case, or about long-past happenstances and forgotten evidence, but I could be wrong. There have been rare times when people have gone to court for something that happened many decades or centuries ago, and they succeeded. I see the truth you told me that your honor and integrity compel you, you were a victim of a grave injustice, and the time that has so long passed has not yet assuage your pain and anger, and for that you fight for a compensation equal to the emotional anguish and the years lost, but I am saddened to admit it is a fight I have no interest in participating. I am sorry you had to spend four years in prison for what you earnestly know you didn't do wrong. And you are very like a person of great dignity. I am glad there are many people who support you and don't believe you are weak.

I hope you will succeed in making new products that will be popular even though your bookstand is not. If at first you don't succeed, try and try again. I hope to see many different and new things of your gift rather than just the bookstand. If you've only invented the bookstand, then it is only one thing. But what if you've actually invented all the things that are in your head, the ideas you have that you can make into reality? Then you have many things! You are a man of talent, and I hope you are putting it to good use, while you're waiting for someone to buy. Making new and new things will help you improve your skills, help you be more efficient in construction, be less wasteful, and make things that are beautiful. That's why you should keep practicing making new things, and you will improve, and you will get a better sense of engineering and business, and you will be able to design things to do what you want, and people will want to buy them.

I know that you would like my support in the form of money, but I have none to give you. In some ways, it is good to have scarcity, because necessity is the mother of invention, and maybe you will learn to be more creative in managing money, priority, and materials, if you know how to direct that energy to better and more fruitful use.

Good luck,

Music has been known among hearing people to be an expressive medium. The researchers have experimented with creating A Concert for the Deaf through an Emoti Chair. I would love to try it out, and see how it evokes memory and emotion.

divestiture

Hampshire College, who was one of the first to divest from South Africa, has taken another first, divesting from Israel. Israel was once a country I supported because of the shock of the Holocaust, but now it has engaged repeatedly in unwarranted mass murders and disproportionate warfare. It is time for Israel to be restrained from its destructive behaviors, both in its disgusting attempt at permanent settlements and its bombing of Lebanon and Palestine.

Phelps

I, like many others, find this whole hoopla over Phelps' smoking pot to be silly. It is a non-affair. I couldn't care less, and in fact, I would have preferred him to be defiant, to state an opinion against the federal government's waste of money being spent on the drug war. Marijuana, a more harmless drug than cocaine and others, is so easy for the police officers to use as a bludgeon to arrest and strike fear into the hearts of people. He should have said, "I do not believe marijuana should be an illegal drug. The fight against it is like Prohibition against alcohol."

But, he will not sacrifice his career or live in acrimony. Instead, he will be an embarrassment forever. When London Olympics come around, it seems, hosts will mention his drug-taking habits along with his rare accomplishment. And that's a sad thing to me.

Alien Workshop's "Mind Field" has been a highly anticipated video since Photosynthesis in 2000. However, the skateboarding world is an underground community and is often not seen by people in the mainstream. They are the skaterboys that often wear out the rails and the ceilings of building by grinding on them. They are experts at finding good locations, and are the product of our concrete age, when pavements, curbs and barricades are seen not as obstacles dividing people from people, but as potential and ephemeral art forms of inertia, gravity, and friction.

Some of those boys are hot.