WIPEOUT!!!!

I know I've said that I'm not much interested in writing about politics, but forgive me if I take a moment to hop from foot to foot and clap my widdle hands at the way the good people of my home state have bitch-slapped the governator.

All eight of the ballot initiatives he favored have gone down. Even Prop. 73 -- the creepy "parental consent" anti-abortion measure, which was really a back-door effort to change the state constitution to define abortion as murder, and which I was sure was going to pass (earlier polling said it would), was narrowly defeated.

Indeed, every proposition on the ballot was voted down, which proves what so many of us have been saying for months -- this special election was not needed, and was a waste of money.

The one mixed feeling I have is about Prop. 77 -- the gov's redistricting effort. My wife and I had a long talk about Prop 77, because both of us
were torn between wanting to see the gov get his head handed to him and
a sense that the actual proposition was maybe a good idea.

Finally, after reading the nonpartisan legislative analysis, we both
agreed that it was very fairly written, with a number of checks and
balances built in to keep any one side from grabbing all the power,
while at the same time reducing the chances that the two major parties
could get together and gerrymander the state into nothing but safe
seats. We ended up voting yes, even though we knew it was a likely loser.

I wonder how many other people actually read the proposition and voted
for or against on the merits. I'd like to see something similar become
the law here some day.

Still, it was good to see the left -- and working folk in general -- go out the polls in force. Plus I hear that Virginia has a new Democratic governor.

As Peggy Lee once sang -- "It's a good day for losing the blues!"