So, currently there are signs up and down both sides of Somerville Ave. saying that there’s no parking on those streets due to an ‘emergency’. Well, that’s all you can read of the signs as you drive around looking for parking due to the fact that everyone who usually parks on Somerville Ave. is now parked elsewhere, anyway. If, however, you take a closer look at those signs, they say that there’s no parking there on 4/30 and 5/1 from 7:30 pm until 6:00 am or so because they’re painting bike lanes.

Painting bike lanes? Bike lanes are great and all, and I wish there were more of them in general. But this is just an absolutely moronic way to go about it. The most obvious reason that it’s a completely moronic thing to do is that Somerville Ave. is currently being re-paved. For the past, I don’t know, 6 months or so, they’ve been very very very slowly working their way from Union Sq. towards Porter Sq. tearing up the roads and repaving them. Now this is definitely an essential thing for them to be doing as the state of Somerville Ave. is, in a word, abysmal. So, in general I heartily approve of both these measures.

The problem is that they’re doing it in the wrong order. Unless they’re planning on not fixing up all of Somerville Ave., which seems somewhat ridiculous since they’re already investing time and money in the project and disrupting just about everyone’s lives for it now, or they’re planning on somehow, miraculously finishing the rest of Somerville Ave. tonight and tomorrow, they’re just wasting a bunch of money here. They’re going to spend the next two days painting bike lanes on the street only to tear it up and re-pave it in another month or so (if we’re lucky).

This just strikes me as a tremendous waste of money. Also, it seems kind of odd for them to be painting bike lanes on a street that doesn’t really have car lanes painted on it. I guess we’re not really far enough away from Boston to escape the sphere of city planning moronicism.

I may disagree with him on some (perhaps most) of his policy position, but I have a hard time not liking Obama. Perhaps one of the biggest criticisms I see leveled at him is that he is without substance, that he makes a big deal of broad phrases but has no meaning to back them up. This criticism is completely unfounded, and he’s demonstrated so on many occasion. Despite the fact that I have many disagreements with his policy ideas, I still think he’s one of the most appealing candidates currently in the race and would make an excellent president. I just might vote for him.

I think this speech may be a little old, but it’s new to me, and very good:

Ridiculous fifth-grade name aside, I suppose this is a big day. Not for me, however. This morning I drove Jessi over to our polling place to vote in the primaries before work. I suspected it wouldn’t really work, but I decided to go in and see about voting myself. My name was in the rolls, but rather than the familiar D, R, G, W, or, apparently, U next to my name there was a very cryptic and unknown symbol: L

‘L, what’s L?’, said the woman checking people off in the book. ‘Do you know what L is?’ The gentleman next to her mused, ‘L? Liberal? That’s Democrat, right?’. My clarification that L stood for Libertarian didn’t really clear things up very much, and they ended up having to make a phone call to …someone who told them that there was no Libertarian ballot and that I wasn’t eligible to vote. I figured this was probably the case as I hadn’t heard anything from either the state or national party about primaries, but it was disappointing none the less, especially as we have a local, George Phillies of Worcester, in the running for the LP presidential nomination. Phillies also happens to be my favorite candidate for President being not only a Libertarian, but a science fiction author and college professor as well. With any luck he’ll get the nomination and I’ll actually get a candidate that I want to vote for this time around (in ‘04 none of the candidates I liked got their respective nominations: Dean, Nolan, McCain; I’m not longer a McCain supporter however so his likely nomination this year doesn’t really help things). Oh well, at least I won’t be barred from voting in November.

Which brings me to another topic I’ve been meaning to discuss: a particular ballot question. Come November there will be a rather important question on the ballot, the question of whether or not to end the Massachusetts state income tax. If you check out their website it sounds like they actually have a decent chance of passing this. It was on the ballot before in ‘02 and just barely failed with only 45.3% of the vote. That was with very little publicity and the media presenting it as a cause that couldn’t possibly succeed. However with that strong a showing in ‘02, no one can claim this time around that it has no chance. It very clearly has a chance, and therefore media reaction to it has been a little more positive this year. They’re also investing a lot more in publicity to spread awareness, so I think there’s a very good chance this might pass in November.

That said, I don’t want it to, I think we should keep the income tax. Well, that’s not entirely true either, I don’t want the income tax, but I think that repealing it right now is the wrong thing to do. This is Massachusetts, after all, and with a democratic legislature and Deval Patrick in the Governor’s office I find it unlikely that, even given an $11b drop in tax revenue, the state is going to put the brakes on any spending. Instead they’ll just look for different ways to bring in money like increasing the sales tax, increasing fees, and just generally taxing more things. One area where spending is probably likely to fall, however, is local aid. A lot of the cities and towns of Massachusetts are already suffering from anemic income and getting very little help from the state. This clearly isn’t going to improve if we stop giving the state part of our paychecks. So how are those municipalities going to keep making ends meet? Easy, they’ll keep doing what they always do and raise property taxes. I pay enough in property taxes as it is (about three times more each quarter than Jessi’s mom in Illinois pays in a year), and I find property taxes to be by far the more egregious kind of tax.

Think about what it means to have to pay property tax. Essentially, it means that you can never actually own property. In all but name, the State owns your property and you merely rent it from them. Don’t believe me? Try not paying your property taxes and see what happens: the same thing that happens if you stop paying your rent. You have to pay for the privilege of living on your own land! I say that rather than repealing the income tax, by far the better thing to do would be to repeal property taxes. This would a) strengthen the right of people to own property, b) reduce the cost of living significantly by lowering rent as well, and therefore c) reduce the prices of goods and services by lowering the costs for the providers and sellers.

Now, maybe repealing the income tax would actually be successful. Maybe next year we’d get a budget that was $11b lighter (wasn’t that one of Patrick’s campaign promises anyway?). Maybe Massachusetts will implement something like the FairTax on a state level, and prove one and for all that either it can work or it can’t. Probably not, but one can hope. Regardless, I think our first priority should be repealing property taxes. I would much rather see that happen, and I think it’s a revenue loss that could be more easily and quickly accommodated (rent assistance payouts, for example, would suddenly become much lower which would free up more money for local aid to compensate). But we’ll see what happens in November. I may even vote in favor of repealing the income tax just on principle; if it passes and our legislature and governor surprise me by taking it in stride there could still be some good that comes of it.

There are obviously other topics for me to write about, but I’m quite busy lately and this is one that I both want to keep on top of and want to spread awareness of.

Anyway, just a quick update for now. Now that the new Republic of Lakota website is back up, they’ve continued to make improvements. The biggest is the addition of a discussion forum. It doesn’t have a whole lot of traffic just yet, but it’s still relatively new so hopefully that will change. Certainly I think the existence of the forum will help drive traffic to the site and therefore spread awareness, and hopefully some good things will come of it.

For the record, I’ve registered on the Republic of Lakota forums with the username ‘josho’.

I’ve just discovered that there is a new website for the Lakota Freedom movement: www.republicoflakota.com (the old website forwards to it). The new website is, in my opinion, a little better looking and, more importantly, better organized. There’s a separate section explaining their motivations, as well as one explaining the history of the movement. I do think it would be helpful to their cause if they added a news section or blog with an RSS feed to make it easier for people to keep track of what’s going on (and help their search rankings).
Most importantly, however, they have addressed the criticisms leveled at them that they do not actually represent the Lakota people. They say that they have had ongoing communications with traditional chiefs and treaty councils for the past three years, and have been in consultation with the traditional treaty councils of: Pine Ridge, Porcupine, Kyle, Rosebud, Lower Brule, Cheyenne River, Standing Rock, and Flandreau.

I hope that this means they actually do have some legitimacy behind them, although there still hasn’t been any real mention of them in the news. But I’ll be continuing to follow the story and hopefully something actually come of it.

Edit:
It appears that republicoflakota.com is now down, and currently displays only a GoDaddy domain parking page… (Thanks, Windtalon, for the heads up.) I’ve emailed the people in charge (the Means) and let them know, so hopefully this will be resolved soon.

Edit 2:
The site’s back up now.

I’ve been doing some more research into the authority of the Lakota Freedom movement to actually declare independence for the Lakota Nation. From what I can tell, even amongst the Lakota there’s a lot of confusion about the issue. The man largely behind the movement appears to be Russell Means, a Lakota activist and one-time gubernatorial candidate, and there are mixed feelings, to say the least, about him taking the role of spokesman. Some say that even if he did have the authority to represent them, they wouldn’t want him to. Others appear to be all in favor of what he’s doing and hopeful, if not confident, that the U.S. government will acknowledge him as a representative of the Lakota.

The discussion about this issue seems to be the same, regardless of which side of the always-complex relationship between the U.S. and American Indian nations you happen to be on. The fact that everyone is questioning whether the delegation that went to Washington had any authority to do so makes me suspect that they probably did not. However nearly everyone, myself included, also seems to think that even if it’s nothing but a PR stunt, it could turn out to be a tremendously effective one. It certainly raises the questions (or would, if the media was actually covering it… I still haven’t found any coverage of this in major US sources, maybe on Monday) of the legality of the way we (the U.S.) have treated the Indian nations, the true nature of the supposedly sovereign nations created by the reservation system, the reality of Indian dependence on the U.S. government, the desirability of freedom and independence, and whether or not the more recent treaties have been honored any better than past ones were.

If nothing else, I think this will be successful in raising these questions on the reservations where it is, at least, getting more attention than off of them. Probably unsurprisingly, I, for one, think every step that can be taken towards true independence should be. Obviously it would be complicated for everyone if a completely sovereign nation sprung up in the middle of the country, especially if others were to follow. I’m currently in New Mexico outside Santa Fe, and driving from here to the Albuquerque airport next Wednesday I’ll pass through about 5 or 6 different reservations. What would happen if they decided to become fully independent nations as well? Nevertheless, I think it is extremely important that we look at the treaties that we’ve signed, understand what obligations they entail, and examine whether or not we’ve actually lived up to them. The treaties were theoretically supposed to be for the benefit of both sides. Were they? If they were, are they still? If they’re not, they should either be re-negotiated or gotten rid of entirely.

The declaration made this week was almost certainly timed to take advantage of the upcoming elections. Now, in particular, we’re all questioning the wisdom and benefit of pursuing imperialistic policies abroad. Before we can even hope to answer those questions we need to answer the questions surrounding our imperialistic policies at home. Putting real thought into these questions and trying to answer them will, I think, be of tremendous benefit not only to Lakota and other Indian nations, but to us as Americans, and to all the peoples we currently do and will deal with abroad.

Well, it seems that the Lokata Independnce story is starting to get picked up in national sources …kind of. It’s made it into USA Today’s On Deadline blog: Lakota withdraw from treaties, declare independence from U.S. It’s not much, but it’s a start. Hopefully next week will start to see the story make it into some of the bigger outlets. Also, I was very surprised to find that if you do a Google search for ‘Lakota independence’, my previous entry is the number two result. Cool for me, not so much for the Lakota or whoever is handling their media relations. I’ve also found, thanks to digg, a map of the Lakota nation.

The story is getting some international coverage though:

• In the UK
• In Africa
• In Canada
• In the Netherlands

There is, of course, some question as to the reality of this movement. It’s being said by some that it’s nothing but a political stunt by the American Indian Movement. Certainly the AIM was involved, but I’m not sure that necessarily means the whole thing is a farce. Some more research into the matter is called for. I, for one, would like it to be real, and to actually happen. But it seems that even among the Indian community they’re saying that it’s nothing but grandstanding and that the delegation that went to Washington didn’t actually represent them. Well, I’ll still be following to story to see what happens.

I haven’t seen a whole lot of coverage of this, and what I have seen hasn’t really had all the much information. But apparently the Lakota Sioux have unilaterally withdrawn from all treaties with the United States and are taking steps to emphasize their sovereignty including plans to issue their own passports and drivers licenses, as well as opening diplomatic relationships with other countries. The most interesting step they’re taking, to me, is the offer to allow U.S. citizens to move to the new Lakota Country where they can live tax free so long as they renounce their U.S. citizenship. This move could serve to attract the talent and marketable skills that they will need to survive as a fully independent nation, but only time will tell. They’ve also announced that they will be pursuing energy independence through renewable sources such as solar, wind, geothermal, and bio-fuels.

The best coverage of this that I’ve seen so far comes from the Indigenist Intelligence Review. It also contains the only link I’ve found so far to their website: lakotafreedom.com. Unfortunately, due to the recent news exposure, the site has exceeded it’s bandwidth allotment and is inaccessible. I’ve attempted to contact them in order to offer some of my own hosting for the interim, but have yet to hear back. Edit: the website is apparently now back up, so we have a first-hand source of information.

I’m extremely interested to learn more about what’s going on, and will be doing my best to keep on top of the story. Unfortunately it doesn’t really seem to have been picked up by any major news outlets, which is unfortunate. In particular it will be interesting to see how the U.S. government responds to this. In theory it’s completely legal, and they were technically already sovereign. In practice, the sovereignty of the various American Indian nations has always been tenuous at best. A few other nations, however, including Bolivia and Venezuela, have apparently already expressed their support.

We were watching the Republican debate the other night, and every time Alan Keyes was on the screen I just couldn’t shake the feeling that I had seen him before in some other context. Something about his facial expressions and the way he moved just really reminded me of someone else.

Here’s a video of him from the debate to give you an idea of what I’m talking about:

It was still bothering me a couple hours after the debate until it hit me! I knew who he reminded me of! This guy (YouTube)!

Am I crazy, or could that totally be a young Alan Keyes?

Never fear, my fellow Americans, our borders are secure! So secure, in fact, that a law abiding US citizen traveling home from a friendly nation with which we have very good relations can barely get into the country. Ok, that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but that’s what it felt like. I had a great business-related post all planned out for when I got back, but now I feel inclined to post about this instead.

As you should know if you’ve been paying attention, I’ve just come back from Jamaica where I was for my uncle’s wedding. I’ve been to Jamaica tons of times; I started going from before my memory starts, and there are pictures of me there in diapers. I’ve had plenty of annoying trips going through customs and immigration (usually in Miami), but this time definitely takes the cake.

There aren’t, apparently, any direct flights from Boston to Montego Bay, so instead I flew JetBlue to Ft. Lauderdale where I caught an Air Jamaica flight to Montego Bay. Coming back I simply reversed the trip.

As an interesting aside, when I was buying my tickets I discovered this:

Apparently the USSR is still alive and well, but you can only get there through Jamaica.

Anyway, back to the point. My schedule gave me an hour and a half between my two flights in Ft. Lauderdale. I have never had immigration take that long (except maybe going into Manchester this past spring…), even going into China has always been a breeze when I’ve done it, so I figured I’d be fine.

The first problem was that they were simply unorganized. The passport control area was designed have probably about 10 lines all feeding different desks. Instead, they had set it up as one single long line that snaked through the room (because it was way too small to accommodate even a single flight’s worth of travelers despite having obviously been renovated pretty recently). They didn’t even separate out the US passport holders from the rest, which would have completely solved my problem. 45 minutes later I was less than halfway through the line because, despite it being incredibly obvious to anyone that their setup wasn’t sufficient to accommodate even a modest number of people, only about half of the desks were actually staffed. About an hour later I finally made it through, picked up my bag, went through customs (very quickly, thankfully), then got on the shuttle to take me to the other terminal where I’d catch my next flight. At that point there was only about 30 minutes before my flight boarded which essentially meant that I couldn’t make it. First off, they won’t let you check in less than 30 minutes before the flight (and I hadn’t checked in online before, which turned out to be a good thing), and second it’s very rare to spend less than a half hour going through security. Fortunately, I had a solution. Since my flight hadn’t actually left yet and probably wasn’t even boarding yet I hadn’t technically missed it yet. That meant that, while I was on the (surprisingly long) shuttle ride between terminals I was able to go online with my iPhone and change my itinerary to a later flight. JetBlue is very good about changing itineraries, and they only charge you the difference in the ticket price (if any) plus about $25 service charge. So when I got off the shuttle, all I had to do was check into my next flight and go through security. Security, as I expected, probably took about 45 minutes to an hour because, again, they didn’t have enough people working causing a huge bottle neck so there was no way I could possibly have made my flight.

So I bought some books, and waited 4 hours for my flight. I ended up leaving just a little after I was supposed to arrive in Boston originally, and landed in Boston at around 10:30 at night. Fortunately, Jessi was there to pick me up so I didn’t have to deal with the vagaries of the T nor the exorbitance of a taxi.

Despite all that though, I had a great time in Jamaica. I got to spend time with my family that I rarely see, and meet some interesting new people. I also was able to get a few good pictures that I’ll be posting online once I figure out how to get them onto my computer (I used to just use the built-in card reader in my monitor which I no longer have, and I’m not sure where the cord for my camera got to).

So, that’s my border crossing rant. Stay tuned for that business-related post I promised earlier.