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2010 September 28 — Why Now?
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More On The Amendments

There are six amendments on November’s ballot after the pruning by the Florida Supreme Court.

Project Vote Smart does its usual thorough job of providing all of the relevant facts at their page, Six Amendments on the 2010 General Election Ballot. They include the summaries that will appear on the ballot, the actual text of the amendments, and the standard statements from supporters and opponents.

I will give you my reaction to each, but make your own decisions. My reactions are for my circumstances, YMMV:

Amendment 1NO This is the Republican legislature’s attempt to undo a citizens’ initiative to provide public financing of elections. There is too much corporate money in our elections, and I’m not thrilled by millionaires deciding they want to dabble in government while waiting for their yachts to be fixed. Government is not a business. The goal of business is to maximize profits, and that is definitely not the goal of government.

Amendment 2NO This was legislature pandering to the military, and while it sounds good on the surface, it will be a nightmare if passed. It provides an extra homestead exemption on property taxes when a member of the military is deployed. First off, outfits like Special Operations and Special Forces don’t publish deployment information, and don’t want their troops talking about it, so how will anyone know about it? Second, if you are going to give this benefit, why not just give it to serving members of the military? This is a gimmick, not real relief.

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September 28, 2010   Comments Off on More On The Amendments

To Mustang Bobby

Since I don’t dare attempt your comments again –

JS-Kit went nuts when I published the comment this morning. I had to hit the red X to break out of some sort of loop. It seems to have decided to reprint that comment forever, and it clearly wasn’t that memorable.

So, now I will add Echo/JS-Kit to the growing list of commenting systems that hate me. Usually they simply don’t allow me to comment or ignore my comments, so this reaction is a bit different.

September 28, 2010   8 Comments

Tropical Depression Sixteen

Tropical Depression SixteenPosition: 21.9N 81.9W [10 PM CDT 0300 UTC].
Movement: Northeast [035°] near 8 mph [13 kph].
Maximum sustained winds: 35 mph [ 55 kph].
Wind Gusts: 45 mph [ 70 kph].
Minimum central pressure: 997 mb.

Currently about 95 miles [155 km] South-Southeast of Havana, Cuba.

I knew wouldn’t last, but another day or so wouldn’t have been bad.

The pressure continues down, but this is a very large system and it will take a long time to spin up the wind.

A Tropical Storm Warning is in effect for all of the Cayman Islands; the Cuban provinces from Mantanzas eastward to Ciego de Avila; the northwestern and central Bahamas including the Abacos, Andros Island, Berry Islands, Bimini, Eleuthera, Grand Bahama Island, New Providence, Cat Island, the Exumas, Long Island, Rum Cay, and San Salvador; and the Florida coast from Jupiter Inlet southward to East Cape Sable, and for all of the Florida Keys, including Florida Bay and the Dry Tortugas.

A Tropical Storm Watch is in effect for the West Coast of Florida from north of East Cape Sable to Chokoloskee and for the East Coast of Florida from north of Jupiter Inlet to Sebastian Inlet.

Here’s the link for NOAA’s latest satellite images.

[For the latest information click on the storm symbol, or go to the CATEGORIES drop-down box below the CALENDAR and select “Hurricanes” for all of the posts related to storms on this site.]

September 28, 2010   Comments Off on Tropical Depression Sixteen