Some Light Weekend Reading

While you form your questions for the SR-55 Study Session on Tuesday, after which you can stay to hear the presentation by the staff regarding the possibility of commissioning a Library Services Master Plan, here's a couple things to contemplate this weekend.

"JUMPIN'" WITH JOY (AND JIM)
First, our good friends over at Orange Coast College are celebrating their 60th birthday next week with a spectacular event. On Wednesday, September 10th - sometime around 12:30 p.m. Jim Wallace - three-time US National Skydiving Champion, dressed in full Pirate costume, will jump from 4,000 feet above our fair city and, hopefully, land on the college's logo in the outdoor student quad.

BIG CELEBRATION = BIG CAKE
The announcement of this event also tells us that this celebration will include a 1,200-pound birthday cake, which will be located just a short distance from the skydiver's landing spot. One local wag - and probably a lot more people, too - has postulated about what fun it would be if the skydiver actually lands on the cake. I find myself wondering if the cake is in the shape of a bulls-eye...

FREE AND FUN
This event is free, open to all and will include costumed performers and refreshments. Sounds like a fun event.


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A FEW POLITICAL OBSERVATIONS TO MUNCH ON
Of course, I'm not going to let this week slip away without some kind of political observation for you to chew on...

BIG DOG AT THE BAR
This morning, in an article by Alan Blank, we were treated to photos and quotations from the party held at former mayor and current city council candidate Gary Monahan's gin mill on Newport Blvd. According to the article, HERE, many prominent Republican Party members were present, including the Big Dog himself, Scott Baugh.

FRIENDS IN HIGH PLACES
If there was any doubt about Monahan getting big time OC GOP support in his run for a place back at the municipal trough, this should put those doubts to rest.

RIGGY - FEELING THE LOVE
And, to further cement the awareness that carpetbagging Planning Commissioner (and council candidate) Jim Righeimer was way, way up on the OC GOP food chain, reports from the Republican Convention in St. Paul quote Riggy - not as a delegate, but as a guy with enough GOP pull that he found himself in the middle of the celebration, sharing the love and feeling the power.

THAT SHADOW IS CASH HEADING OUR WAY
So, to the newbies in our lowly City Council race, be advised that that shadow you see looming on the horizon is caused by a mountain of cash being pushed toward the Costa Mesa City Council Race. The OC GOP sees the opportunity to completely take over our city by accomplishing a 5-0 majority on our council by getting Eric Bever re-elected, and Righeimer and Monahan elected. Does that make anyone else just a little uncomfortable? I'm a Republican and it makes me nervous!

ANSWER THE DOOR WHEN CANDIDATES COME CALLING
On that happy note, have a great weekend and be sure to open your door when the candidates come calling. They want your support and input on what's important to you. Most of them seem willing to listen - a refreshing change from years past.

SR-55 Study Session Slide Show

Further on the SR-55 presentation at the Costa Mesa City Council Study Session next Tuesday, September 9, 2008 at 4:30 in the Neighborhood Community Center at Lions Park...

STUDY SESSION POWERPOINT PRESENTATION AVAILABLE
The PowerPoint presentation that will be used by the consultants and OCTA staff to illustrate the results of their winnowing process is available for viewing on the City of Costa Mesa web site. To access this presentation simply slide your cursor over to the right of the page and click on my link to the City of Costa Mesa web site. Once there, scroll down the middle of the page to the SR-55 Access Study section and then on down to the link that is entitled "Initial Screening of Alternatives". Click on that link and you will be presented with the OCTA's 18 slide program.

REJECTED CHOICES
A little homework on this presentation ahead of time while help interested parties follow the discussion better on Tuesday. Certain elements jumped out at me as I reviewed the presentation. For example, near the end of the presentation slide #17 lists the options considered, but rejected. These are 1) Bored Tunnel Freeway; 2) Reversible Lanes; 3) One-Way Couplets and 4) Parallel Routes. The reasons for their rejection are shown on the slide.

BRING GOOD, BRIEF QUESTIONS
Take your time and review this presentation. As I mentioned in an earlier post, time for comments will be extremely limited Tuesday if they follow the Study Session format.

NEWPORT BEACH IS NEXT
The OCTA will make the same presentation to the Newport Beach City Council in their Council Chambers at 4:00 p.m. on September 23, 2008.

THE BALL'S IN THE OCTA BOARD'S COURT
According to the OCTA staff, once this presentation is made to the elected leaders of both Costa Mesa and Newport Beach it will also be made to the OCTA Board, probably at their meeting in October. At that point the OCTA Board will decide to fund further study of the options or not. If not, the issue will be pitched back into the laps of the cities involved to fund their own studies if they choose to do so.

MORE OUTREACH - MAYBE
If the OCTA Board chooses to move forward there will be another community outreach program to present the choices and costs.

SR-55 Study and More Threats By The Mouth

SR-55 - A BIG ISSUE
One of the big issues expected to garner much attention during this campaign season is what the future holds for the possible extension of SR-55, (Newport Blvd.) from it's current terminus at 19th Street in Costa Mesa to the Newport Beach city limits. This issue has been studied by the city, CalTrans and the Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA) for months, with public workshops being held in both Costa Mesa and Newport Beach to gather input from members of the community and officials.

THE NEXT STEP PRESENTED
The next step in this process is a presentation before both city councils in study sessions by OCTA and CalTrans. The first of these presentations will be in Costa Mesa at the regularly-scheduled study session to be held on Tuesday, September 9, 2008. Because of the extraordinarily large turnout anticipated, this study session will be held at the Neighborhood Community Center at Lions Park. The meeting will commence at 4:30, with the SR-55 presentation anticipated to commence around 5:00.

LIMITED COMMENTS
This will not be the kind of meeting folks have experienced in the past, with unlimited opportunities for comment, questions and criticism. This presentation is, according to City Manager Allan Roeder at the City Council meeting last night, simply a presentation to the city leaders of the distillation of the process so far, showing the choices currently under consideration. Don't show up next Tuesday expecting unlimited access to the parties involved - it won't happen.

MORE WORKSHOPS ANTICIPATED
Roeder anticipates that the involved parties - the consultant, CalTrans, OCTA and the city, will host subsequent workshops so residents will have the opportunity for extended dialogue on this very important issue.

NEWPORT BEACH LATER IN THE MONTH
The second of these study sessions will be held at the Newport Beach City Hall on Tuesday, 9/23/08 at 4:00 p.m.


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MORE THREATS FROM "THE MOUTH"
Sadly, we feel obliged to mention that The Mouth from Mesa North is at it again. He's embarked on another campaign of threats and intimidation against those of us who speak out against him. Yesterday, in his blog entry #474, he amended his original post to make it clear that he will soon stop "pulling punches". Now, that could mean many things, but his history is that of a thug and bully, so it's hard to know what to expect.

ANONYMOUS POSTS MAKE HIM ANGRY
It becomes more clear every day that the anonymous posts on the CM Truth blog are really getting to him. Perhaps that's because they are true. The Mouth would be amusing if he wasn't so darn pathetic. In the aforementioned #474 he refers to a missed opportunity to be a living "Rambo". Ha! Yet another fantasy of a man with many unfulfilled goals in his sad life. He frequently lists many "careers" he's had in his miserable life, yet never talks about success in any of them. The fact that those of us he clearly considers "inferior" manage to strike a chord with readers must be really bugging him...

SUPERIOR IN HIS MIND ONLY
In typical Mensa Marty fashion, he looks down his nose at those of us who dare to disagree with him and criticizes our every move. It must be very frustrating for him to think he's the smartest guy in the room, yet he fails to win the debate of important issues over such sub-humans as those of us who challenge him.

CHRIS STEEL REMEMBERED
It brings to mind the perpetually inept Chris Steel, whom he managed to get elected to the City Council nearly a decade ago. Old Chris - he's my age so I can call him that - was not the brightest bulb, but he was smart enough to recognize that The Mouth was trying to manipulate him. Chris rejected him and it made The Mouth furious - an emotion he displayed time after time at the podium as he and Steel would spit venom at each other in a low water mark for our municipal governance that stands today. He eventually managed to get Steel un-elected - something he's proudly crowed about when he attempts to knock his chosen candidates back into line.

OH, I'M SCARED...
So, we sit here, shivering in our collective boots, waiting for him to quit pulling his punches - whatever that means - and will continue to comment on his lame attempts to swing voters his way. We'll comment when he attempts to sandbag new candidates that pose a threat to the stranglehold his chosen "improvers" have on the city today. As smart as he purports to be, his tactics and motives are laughably transparent.

OUR PICKS COMING IN A MONTH OR SO
Somewhere along the line - maybe in a month or so - we'll give our views of the candidates running for City Council this year. He's already picked his crew. We're willing to let this cycle run a little longer, to give the newbies a chance to get up to speed and demonstrate they are worthy of serious consideration. The men he's supporting are known quantities. Their strengths and weaknesses have been demonstrated for several years. We have their past actions and motivations to examine.

EXPECT THE WORST
In the meantime, expect only the worst from The Mouth From Mesa North. Expect him to yowl and puff, yelp and pontificate on every issue and - above all - expect him to attempt to demean those of us who disagree with him. The fact that his right-wing essays have won favor with David Duke, the former honcho of the KKK, should be a good starting place to evaluate this guy's true core beliefs. Even more telling is that he uses that Duke praise as a marketing tool to try to sell his inconsequential books. Pardon me while I fight back my gag reflex!

INVEST SIX MINUTES...

TIME OUT!
As we involve ourselves in the turmoil of political campaigns these days, and rocks are tossed around at various candidates for their political leanings, sometimes it's necessary for us to step back and consider important things around us.

A friend sent me this LINK, which will take you to a 6 minute video that is certainly worth your time in these hectic days. I think it's particularly relevant now, considering the positions taken by certain local politicians and many of their supporters vis a vie the less fortunate among us.

Watch the video and tell me what you think...

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OOPS!
As much as it pains me to admit fallibility (satisfied, Marty?), in the commentary I wrote to the Daily Pilot that appeared today I published incorrect information. I said that the show of hands by the nine council hopefuls at the first Candidate Forum on August 21st on the question of whether they supported a bridge over the Santa Ana River at 19th Street was unanimously against it. I was incorrect. The vote was 8-1. Eric Bever did not raise his hand and the moderator, Jay Humphrey, didn't comment on it. When I glanced up from making a note I didn't see Bever's hands still on the table in front of him. My bad! I apologize for that - my only mistake ever! :-) Several friends wrote to me to point out my error. However, Mayor Bever has not written. I guess he, among all the candidates, doesn't really care if increased traffic on 19th Street will create major problems for residents. I guess I'll have to check his campaign contributor list to see which developers support his return to office.

LABOR DAY LIES

FABRICATIN' FOOL
Labor Day finds us greeted with a pack of lies from hypocrite central over at the CM Press. In a multi-part post, the Mouth from Mesa North uses the end of his entry to rip those who post anonymously, and those who link to such blogs (me, for example).

HYPOCRITE!
In his blog entry #473, The Mouth states the following:

"We believe that if you're going to write something about others, that you should have your name associated with what you write. If you don't want your name associated with what you write, then you probably shouldn't be writing it."

Well, Mr. Mouth, we find it hysterical that you would make such a hypocritical statement!

POUTING PONTIFICATOR
You see, dear readers, The Mouth has been in a major pout since the Daily Pilot began requiring registration before permitting comments to be posted on their articles online. The editors wanted to know who was posting. I can't blame them. That really crimped The Mouth's style, since he was posting multiple comments using multiple names on the same comment thread in an apparent attempt to illustrate a broad appeal of his opinions. Those of us who regularly read those comment threads saw the difference immediately - it was a welcome absence.

OH, YEAH?
In his latest rant The Mouth goes to great lengths to tell us his name and that he stands behind the things he writes. How does this square with his use of a nom de plume for his hundreds of far right-wing essays he publishes on radical web sites? Is he afraid the Costa Mesa folks who might read his stuff on the New Nation News site, for example, HERE, might figure out just what kind of a bigot he really is? Seems likely. His anti-anything-but-white-folks bias is obvious. The cloud of intellectual dishonesty that surrounds this guy is like stink on a skunk.

THREATS, AGAIN
The not-very-veiled threats made in his recent blog entry are clearly an attempt to shut down the person who publishes the CM Truth blog - one of those he criticizes.

ANONYMOUS SPOTLIGHTS
He also criticizes those of us who link to anonymous bloggers - me, for example. Well, those sites may be anonymous to him, but they are not anonymous to me. I know the identity of CM Truth and have a really good idea of the identities of those who post as CM Watchtower. I know the CM Truth is hitting close to home on many of the entries posted on that site and it obviously makes The Mouth uneasy. Get used to it, Mr. Mouth. Nothing like a little light on cockroaches to make them scurry back under their rocks - just as the registration requirement in the Daily Pilot did.

DIRTY TRICKS WON'T WORK
He and his spawn can continue to attempt dirty tricks on council candidates they want to discredit... they've been forewarned to expect it now.

WHY DO I CARE?
Why do I write about this guy when I swore off it a couple times? Why do I proceed when he's made overt threats against my family and me? Well, the future and well-being of this city is important to me and he's an influential guy. The Mouth has made it clear he's supporting Bever, Monahan and Righeimer this time around. Considering his obvious motives and underlying bias, it makes one wonder just how tight he is with those guys, and how much influence he exercises over them. That's a question every voter should contemplate as they consider the very important choices they will make on November 4th.