Comments on: Secret to NH State Senate Female Majority: It Doesn’t Pay

By: DLS

DLS — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 16:34:49 +0000

“NOW you enlighten me about what looks like a pretty cool Cleveland blog!?”

I'm neglectful or otherwise “challenged,” Jill. [self-directed sarcasm]. Sorry for the tardiness.

By: DLS

DLS — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 16:32:55 +0000

Jill, I enjoy touring "gritty cities" even though they represent in large part as failed a model as Detroit's business model (still a failure after almost thirty years to change after the Chrysler crisis so long ago).* It's interesting that there and in related places such as Upstate New York, many people stay put, not only growing roots, but refusing to leave. I hope it's worth the cost and effort for those who stay there. Our nation's history is a story of migration and we'll continue to see the mean population center move south and west** and with high taxes and home prices and other events, we see superimposed on the famous migration to California in past times, the "spinoff" of people from California thoughout the West, the Eastern phenomenon of people going south, and the massive growth of Florida in the following material (the top-migration-flow maps are the most interesting here). (Note also areas where people stayed put, 30 years...)

http://www.census.gov/population/www/cen2000/ce...

If the Big Three in Detroit fail, which is likely, even more people will be leaving Detroit metro and other parts of Michigan, and other places. (At least four cities in this metro area with auto plants have sought federal assistance if this happens. This is in addition to Detroit city, which is simply suffering from being run like Zimbabwe -- the new mayor cannot determine the current state of the city's finances, cannot make sense of what passes for financial records and accounts, at all -- and is in worse shape than other more vital cities elsewhere that are also seeking a bailout -- Atlanta and Phoenix, for example. Detroit city is so bad it's unfair to associate it with liberals or Democrats. Perhaps federal receivership and a Marshall Plan for it and the metro area should be in order, if not demoting Michigan to territorial status and applying reconstruction and revitalization to most or all of the state, not just Detroit and DET metro. It might be just the perfect test case and experimental subject for any Obamanian economic, employment, and infrastructure spending.)

* Most people don't realize that Cleveland isn't the horrible place of 1960s and 1970s legend, nor Pittsburgh, to name someplace else. Cleveland actually is nice there on the lake, and I enjoy visiting the Lakewood area to the west of there when I'm in the area, too.

** I did a geometric series based on post-World-War-II migration based on successive Census data, and as I had guessed, Oklahoma City would be the approximate mean population center of the USA by 2100, and that's where a relocated federal capital should be placed, for those who like to speculate on such things. (This century Omaha or more fitting, Kansas City-Independence would be preferred for historical reasons as well as being closer to the current mean population center.)

By: NewHampshire

NewHampshire — Wed, 26 Nov 2008 01:34:49 +0000

Figures it would not take long for someone to make a gender issue out of this! No one has ever expected to be paid for their stint in the legislature, male or female.

The gains are that people are willing to vote for a woman as well as a man.
Trouble is not which gender is in there, but the fact that they are all radical leftists in the majority. This is where NH is troubled, because this governor and his lefist majority have caused a $1B deficit.

If women are more frugal, power to them. If not, vote them out I say.

By: Jillmz

Jillmz — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 22:15:34 +0000

Hey! After all these months, NOW you enlighten me about what looks like a pretty cool Cleveland blog!? Sure – embarrass me!

(sarcasm)

I've never heard of that blog – will definitely blogroll it and take a look. I'm trying to figure out what I'm doing next – have a few ideas, having a lot of coffee and lunches w/people who I hope have some good ideas. I'm actually thinking about a woman's PAC for Ohio left of center candidates. But nothing sure yet – at all. I'm open to all ideas.

By: DLS

DLS — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 15:42:45 +0000

Jill, overall this looks like a positive development, which most of us would expect to see, not only in New Hampshire but elsewhere. This isn't the 1960s and nobody (outside caricatured Religious Right stereotypes and the odd cult community, our lightweight version of the Taliban) finds it "odd" (much less outright wrong) that women are in political office. (Those of us who have worked for women before aren't surprised to have bosses who happen to be female, either.) Certainly there is no need (as with other interest groups on the Left) for Perpetual Victimhood Arrested At Or Around The Year 1965, Incorporated, or perversions of proportional representation in legislatures as creepy forms of affirmative action, demanding seats be allocated according to the exact complexion of populations as defined by sex, race or ethnicity, age, and so on. (Random selection from the population that is to be represented, the _entire_ population, is the only fair method that approaches this.)

P.S. You're staying put so far as I know in Jillville (on the Lake), but you probably know others who have stories of various kinds to tell like the people on this site. Maybe someday places like _that_ will share news stories similar to Wyoming (female suffrage) or, contemporarily, New Hampshire.

http://burghdiaspora.blogspot.com/