“A perfect day, the sun
is sinkin’ low
As evening falls, the gentle breezes blow
The time we shared went by so fast
Just like a dream, we knew it couldn’t last
But I’d do it all again
If I could, somehow
But I must be leavin’ soon
It’s your world now
Use well the time
Be part of something good
Leave something good behind
The curtain falls
I take my bow
That’s how it’s meant to be
It’s your world now.”
This week I’m a year
older; my family visited for the long weekend from northern Nevada,
and as they left I thought of this Eagles song.
Not that gentle breezes
were blowing. Though they live in the high desert, at the foot of
the Sierra, they hadn’t encountered 9 degrees below zero. My
daughter-in-law and granddaughter didn’t want to leave the house; my
son and grandson kept walking down to Salem Harbor to watch it
freeze. Their Lake Tahoe is too deep to freeze.
I taught the twins to make
my birthday chocolate refrigerator cake; then introduced them to
Mrs. T’s classic pierogies, which they lined up at the stove to
collect from the big pot. This is not a grandmother who serves a
family dinner at a formal dining room table; don’t have a dining
room, they ate with their plates on their laps in the living room.
I am a grandmother who set
them in front of Chip’s larger television for the Republican debate.
My son and his wife have the Nevada Democrat Caucus to attend, and a
decision to make there; I asked the twins to help me decide on a
Republican candidate for March 1. They both listened carefully, as
nearly as one can tell when phones and thumbs are also in the room,
and said during a commercial break that they liked the look and
sound of Marco Rubio. Their mother then insisted they stay there to
hear discussion on social issues. Like me, she is appalled by
Rubio’s position on abortion and gay marriage. Finally, my family
and I agree on two candidates: we won’t choose Rubio, and were
turned off by Donald Trump’s behavior during the debate.
As a deficit hawk, I’m no
fan of former president George W. Bush, but he was not to blame for
Sept. 11 and though mistaken along with our allies about Iraq, I
don’t think he deliberately lied about it; Trump’s accusation was
just a cheap shot.
By the way, the twins have
Common Core in their Nevada schools and don’t like it. In many ways
the part-time Nevada Legislature is better than ours, though. I was
watching the Grammys and flipping back to Fox 25 news, saw one of my
Citizens for Limited Taxation partners,
Chip Faulkner, interviewed on a report by Eric Rasmussen about
“missing state property costing taxpayers millions. Hundreds of
state-owned items, including many laptops and other electronics,
have been lost or stolen since 2012, according to Massachusetts
records obtained by FOX25 Investigates.”
Chip said that when he
agreed to do the interview, he expected to hear about a few
carelessly misplaced items, not millions of dollars — of not just
laptops — but bags of cash from state agencies that just vanished!
This is why we oppose tax hikes, period. Fortunately Gov. Baker
agrees with us and will be focusing on reforms.
His first priority has
been dealing with the MBTA and ignoring for now the pleas for a gas
tax hike. I remember an assault on Prop 2½ back in 1980: part of our
voter-passed property tax limit also limited T assessments on MBTA
communities to 4 percent. Instead, the T needed and got a 17 percent
increase. Since then it got a gas tax hike in 1990 and part of the
sales tax, which was increased by Gov. Deval Patrick. It should be
obvious that giving the T more money will accomplish nothing.
And speaking of Deval
Patrick: The mere mention of the name of this incompetent former
governor is one reason Republican senators are balking at replacing
the suddenly deceased Justice Antonin Scalia until their own
president hopefully appoints someone their own party can confirm as
the Constitution requires.
At first it does seem
unreasonable not to allow the sitting president his choice of
nominee late in his term, unless one has seen that precedent set by
Democrats when there is a vacancy during the late term of a
Republican president. And I get it — this is a very important
decision, one that can set the direction of America for the rest of
its life.
I know most Americans
don’t pay attention to the U.S. Supreme Court, until an election
year when some voters worry about a new president appointing someone
who will repeal Roe v. Wade or not validate our Second Amendment
right to bear arms. I saw the Court in the Kelo decision allow
private property to be taken from small businessmen and cottage
owners and given to developers, something which Trump supports and
most citizens, conservatives and liberals alike, deplored.
Instead of still trying to
choose the candidate I’ll vote for, and worrying about the Supreme
Court, it would have been nice to spend my birthday celebrating the
exciting MIT scientific validation of Einstein’s theory of
gravitational waves. As near as I can understand, our own Big Bang
may have been created by two black holes crashing into each other —
making the age of the universe so much greater than we had thought.
Puts my own age into perspective, for sure.
Of course MIT, at the time
it was publicizing its extraordinary achievement, had faculty and
students arguing that its superiors should be called “head of house”
instead of “housemaster,” which apparently offends someone. If life
began with magnificent scientific explosion, it could end by silly
petty political-correctness.
C’mon, next generation:
It’s your world now. Fix all this.
Barbara Anderson of
Marblehead is a weekly columnist for the Salem News and
Eagle-Tribune Publishing Company.
