San Mateo County district attorney investigating San Mateo vote trading allegations

To be clear, I don't know Amourance Lee and though I had heard her name I knew nothing about her before the disruption of the San Mateo city council meeting. This led me to ask what was behind 2 city council members disregarding the oath of office they had just taken and 100 years of precedent to refuse to appoint a mayor. The answers I found were very interesting.

Whoa, Westy...

Are you suggesting your interest in Amourence Lee's involvement in issues connected with November's election just blossomed magically, and mystically last week when you attended a city council meeting? As I recall, you have been very vocal in supporting Lee's ambush tactics against Candidate Linhares.

Dear Ray, Yep. And it furthermore has been and remains a mystery to me that you keep blaming Lee for Linares' loss because it is perfectly appropriate for his stance against human rights to have been brought to light before the vote. I'll take your word for it if Lee helped raise it, and if she did, I thank her for it. We cannot elevate people to office who consider some of us as not having rights to our own bodies.

Double whoa, Westy

You wrote that I "keep blaming Lee for Linares' loss" because of his position on abortion?

I have been pretty clear that the tactics used by Amourence Lee were out of bounds for an election to a nonpartisan city council election. While I disagree with the appropriateness of such tactics... when did I attribute Rod's loss to those tactics?

We really don't know Rod's position on abortion with respect to Proposition 1. Most Catholics support some form of legalized abortion. So, a member of the Catholic faith may support abortion but not support Proposition 1. For anyone to suggest that Rod's choice to not answer Amourence's question about Proposition 1 means that he is committed to subverting human rights... as you did... is wholly inappropriate.

What's particularly odd about this exchange is what's missing... two former San Mateo mayors have declared in these pages that it was wrong for Amourence to introduce abortion into the San Mateo city council election. When asked twice for your response to the opinion of those two former mayors... what do we hear? Crickets.

Do your own work TY. There are college courses devoted exclusively to water in the west. I have taken several of them. I suggest you do the same. Though if you can't figure out why growing alfalfa in the Mojave desert is not the best use of our water resources, then there may not be much point.

Hello, Terence

I hate to impose on you but I was unable to locate the discussion about state water policies referenced in your post this afternoon. Can you do my homework? Did that discussion follow an LTE or op-ed piece? Thanks...

Terence

In the words of Emily Litella... "Never mind." I found it. It was the discussion following Dan Walters column, "Can ocean water slake the state's thirst?" In that discussion, I offered the counterpoint to Westy's "desertification" comment. She did not respond.

BTW... guess which San Mateo DJ reader said last week that local government is in "great shape"?

Jorg

Westy – no need for college courses, a small bit of common sense provides a simple solution - one you're unable to dismiss. As for your taking college courses devoted to water in the west, might I suggest you request a refund? If you can’t provide a plan to tackle our water shortage problem other than “growing alfalfa bad” then it’s obvious you missed a few classes or the class wasn’t worth the time. If you can’t figure out why allowing 50% of our water to flow out to sea isn’t the best use of our water resources, perhaps a college class on first aid – to review self-inflicted wounds.

Also, you didn’t provide a preference for our city soap opera name. I’ll assume either is acceptable. Speaking of soap operas, will we soon see another episode of “The Dung and the Pest Mess” regarding the geese poop problem in Foster City? Did the geese leave “presents” before flying south for the winter (or is FC considered the “south”)? It’s too late for Thanksgiving and Christmas, so maybe we can shoot (pun intended) for a solution sometime next year and make use of those predation permits (although I can’t recall whether predation permits have been obtained).

Ray, it’s no problem to do homework for you, but I’m glad you found the discussion. It is too bad Westy never responded to your comment – we may have been able to learn something. As for Jorg, his local government may be limited to his household and he’s been working out or he thinks local government folks have been working out… BTW, isn’t it about time for another Jorg LTE with another twist on “orange man bad”? I'm not sure he's ready to join us in the present, even though presents may be presented to him on Christmas.

Good morning, Terence

In fairness to Jorg, he has apparently been busy revising his new book.

While I enjoy "thrusting and parrying" with other DJ readers in these pages, I've noticed some progressive-leaning contributors will abandon a thread when they are unable to refute an opinion that differs from their own. Further, a response steeped in sloganeering or a retort that reshapes another reader's words are not very persuasive positions on any topic.

Ray - great observations. I figure the contributors you refer to want only to be heard, but not understood. In some ways that’s a shame, because furthering conversations and ideas should be the aim. By now I can pretty much predict when I’ll be ghosted, usually after their opinions and positions are roasted. I know, a bit harsh to hear, but perhaps things will change for the better this coming year. PS Edward Ring of the California Globe wrote a 15 part series earlier this year on the water issue. The series is quite informative if one would like to round out one's knowledge base on the subject. PPS I’ve been watching more episodes of Nazi Megastructures – recommended if one would like to get background on the engineering and structures the German and Japanese built during WWII.