Not Much News to Report

by karenulijohn

Thankfully, I don’t have much to report in the way of drug reactions or doctor visits.  Harvey continues to be actively involved in all of the clubs and associations to which he belongs.  I mentioned in an earlier post that he is organizing “Hamfest” for the Ham radio club.  This event happens tomorrow morning, and I have been impressed into service manning the coffee and donut booth at 6:00 AM.  By his own admission, he will be glad when this event is finished.  Like most of us, he worries whether it will be a success or not.  Only time will tell.  I suspect the donut sales might be enhanced if I wore something provocative.  On second thought, no.  It might go the other way.

Harvey reads the paper religiously, every morning.  Lately, he has become more and more agitated over the state of the State.  Sometimes, he is moved to put pen to paper (or fingers to keys), and writes a very direct, but humorous letter and sends it to the local newspaper or radio station.  In England, several of his letters were read over the BBC’s Terry Wogan morning talk show.  He wrote another letter to Lee Iacocca, president of Chrysler Corp., which resulted in a phone call from the engineering department in Detroit.  I have reproduced his latest letter below.

Harvey’s Homily:

Some years ago, when we decided to return to the USA and live in California, many friends suggested we choose the southern part of the state due to the entertainment facilities, most particularly Disneyland. We have since discovered that greater Sacramento offers just as much entertainment, and certain leaders even bear some remarkable similarities to favorite Anaheim-based characters.

While Anaheim boasts of the “Magic Kingdom,” some here refer to Sacramento as the “Tragic Kingdom” — anchored on the North by Sacramento City Hall, and to the south by the State Capital. City Hall is an elegant building, and is occupied by Goofy and his equally witless friends. The City Council, Mayor and an NBA basketball team seem to spend all of their time trying to figure out who really runs the place — and to an outsider it appears that the smart money should be on the basketball team. City leadership seems eerily similar to one of those intricate machines one sees in some airport lounges — wheels turn, gears mesh, levers clank, and while much noise and furor is generated, nothing useful ever comes out the other end.

A short stroll across Cesare Chavez Park and down the Capital Mall brings one to the gleaming dome of the State Capital. Here the leaders devote their energies to diverting as many taxpayer dollars as possible to their own benefit or to those of their special-interest masters. The Governor loudly trumpets the need for more tax dollars, but there is no shortage of money for jaw-dropping pensions and extended death benefits for the favored few. The state infrastructure is crumbling, major cities are filing for bankruptcy, schools are shedding teachers, and police and fire personnel are being discarded by the hundreds, yet Dopey and the rest of the mental dwarfs think this is a perfect time to build a high-speed bullet train between two isolated cities in the central valley.  Anaheim hosts “The Happiest Place on Earth” while our elected leadership seems determined to turn California into “The Crappiest Place on Earth.”

Viewing Sacramento as a source of entertainment is the only sane way to handle it. Expecting solid leadership, imagination and vision from the political body is simply too great a leap. However, an alternative position is that we should be proud of our elected leaders — they are, after all, the very best that money can buy.