ELECTION DAY IS OVER- finally.
There was enough going on to make people both happy AND unhappy with these election results. Obama, or I should really say, "President-elect Obama," will be sworn in as the new President of the United States on January 20th, 2009, according to my recolletion of tradition and the law.

I can remember back in January 1961 and seeing President Kennedy on tv at Albion St. when we watched him get sworn in as President and it had snowed in D.C and it was cold. There was some kind of electrical short with the podium wiring and Robert Frost, the famous poet, spoke after some singing by Marian Anderson, a famous black singer. We were in the auditorium, I believe, and watching the whole ceremony on a black and white tv, since color tv's were still not a common thing. It was all very impressive looking to us, even though we just knew it was Kennedy becoming president and that was the big thing for us.

There's the famous speech that President Kennedy made that day that gets played on tv a lot, even YouTube should have it. The funny thing about that time was that some people were for Nixon and others were for Kennedy, mostly Kennedy, but we used to see all these bumper stickers (back when cars had real bumpers) and count them to see the popularity of each one.

But we never heard of vandalizing and all this pretty serious tension that you had lately with this Obama v. McCain presidential race. Our times have changed. Lots of people were looking at this more like a sporting event - maybe from seeing too many Laker playoffs and having last year be a waste for them- but there was a lot more similarity to a competitive sports event than to an election campaign with the only real action was when they tallied up votes in each state so you could keep track of who was winning states.


The local props and measures had some surprises. It looks like people can't get enough of taxes and giving out more public money through bonds that have to be paid back by the taxpayers for so long that the interest costs alone can be as much as the bond amount. More like paying for a home mortgage for 30 years.

Really, did we NEED to start spending for a high speed train to San Francisco. Well, I guess by the time it ever gets built we might find a reason. There may be so many people in the state that it will be populated in places that are empty now. I went to college in San Diego after leaving Lincoln and I could tell how long it would take to get home or back to the campus as I drove on the freeway just by looking at the areas I was passing through- Commerce, Norwalk, La Mirada, Santa Ana, Disneyland (Anaheim), El Toro Marine Air Base (Tustin?), OCIR- "Orange County International Raceway, San Juan Capistrano, the Nuclear Plant (San Onofre), Camp Pendleton, Oceanside, Carlsbad, La Jolla (Torrey Pines Park) and San Diego, the Navy base and Point Loma. There were big spaces in between and I remember some places had horses and cows in the fields that you could see from the freeway. So much empty and open space, usually green, in between cities.

It's all changed now. You can't tell where you are because of all the buildings everywhere- it all looks the same, and there's no way to know how long it would take because of all the traffic at all hours at any location. One time I came home from San Diego on a Friday early afternoon and did not step on the brake, not even to slow down, until I got off the freeway in Lincoln Heights, the traffic was so light and steadily moving- it was like watching a no-hitter developing in baseball; you wonder how long this can go on until something interrupts it all. That was the only time that happened. The ususal travel time came out to be about 2 hours and 10 minutes with only a few segments that going past 70 mph was not going to get you a ticket. That would be too slow for most open stretches now, but like I said, things have changed. It's time to leave memory lane.


Well, if you voted good for you. My recommendations were based on lots of things and some people might agree, others not, but what happens too often is that you spend all your time evaluation some choices- maybe not all- and then somebody comes in and starts punching their ballot like they are choosing a lottery number, not really even familiar with what the ballot measure is about.

The city tax is not much but it's easy to buy the same things for me in Glendale, Pasadena, Alhambra and so on, where the sales tax would be lower than 8.75%. For some expensive items, maybe like new cars, you know people will do that, but not for everything.

WELL, What's done is done. We can consider that again later.


FOOTBALL- BUT AT EAGLE ROCK HIGH SCHOOL
2007 Season, Coach Chou has winning season; 2008 Principal bars Coach Chou from being head coach, no winning season, but maybe a "whining" season.
See the Daily News story of October 24 http://www.dailynews.com/preps/ci_10811846
gives some update on what has been happening with their football program since their principal got into a dispute with the coach last season, allowed him to continue coaching after he "resigned" in a dispute with the principal and then rescinded it afterwards. The principal said he only allowed the coach to finish the season as head coach, and that was all. The coach said it was understood to be a plain and simple return to his head coach job, and then things went downhill for Eagle Rock's football program from then on.

There is an LA TIMES Varsity Blog story on this from January that gets out more details, which make the principal look to be more interested in power than the overall good of the school. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/varsitytimesinsider/2008/01/dismissal-of-ch.html

The local monthly paper in Eagle Rock, The Boulevard Sentinel (taken in part from the old neighborhood paper, The Sentinel that was a sister publication to the Lincoln Height Bulletin News of old) has more and richer details in its report, http://www.boulevardsentinel.com/03-2008.htm "Breaking the Code of Silence."

The next month, "Community Demands ERHS Principal Be Removed" http://www.boulevardsentinel.com/04-2008.htm

In the end, the parents let the ball drop by not pushing further, but they were already becoming afraid of retaliation against their children by the principal and most became intimidated. LAUSD admin turned out to be there just to settle the people down with meetings that went nowhere as far as real remedies and truth, in my opinion.
In the end, the most forceful factor could have been parents, but they could not carry the fight any further. By the way, nearly all forms of retaliation are illegal and actionable in court, but most people don't know how they can use develop their case in terms of proof issues.

Well, let's leave all that for now. Lincoln's Homecoming is coming up Friday night and you might check the Daily News comments regarding the next opponent, Marshall, and the Marshall team player's ideas regarding the Eagle Rock High team's condition. http://www.topix.com/forum/high-school-football/TH0PQL7UMRVS3TFKO#

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