Voted, and how

Early voting is much like voting absentee, and, in fact, you can simply hand in your absentee ballot, if you have one. It's worth taking a moment here to debunk a common misconception about absentee ballots: absentee ballots count the same as any other vote, electronic or otherwise. There was a rumor a while back that absentee ballots are only counted in the event of a tie, but this is patently false. The election results are not certified until ALL ballots are counted.

If you're in Alameda County, you can vote in Oakland:

Alameda County Registrar of Voters
1225 Fallon Street, Room G-1, Oakland
(510) 272-6973

Monday - Friday
8:30am to 5:00pm
Saturday and Sunday
10:00am to 3:00pm

You do not need to show an ID to enter the building (though they will x-ray your stuff and make you walk through a metal detector), and you do not need to show ID to vote. You can vote on a Saturday or Sunday, so no problem for the Observant. Have I eliminated all of your excuses yet? Go vote! I did.

Here's where I went on the State and Local Measures:

1A HIGH SPEED CHOO CHOO
YES
Amtrak currently has zero incentive to keep an efficient, timely passenger train service from the SFBA to LA; passenger service is a losing business for them, and they'd much prefer to simply ship freight and be done with it. If they weren't mandated by law to have such a service, they would drop it like a rotten potato. If we're going to subsidize transportation up and down the state, let's at least get something reasonable for it. This Cali Shinkansen would be just the thing. Added bonus: less traffic waiting for a commuter flight from OAK/SF to LA.

2 ROOM FOR FOOD CRITTERS
YES
The food-from-critters industry is just that: an industry. They're not in it for healthy food-critters or healthy customers; they're in it for money. And the easiest way to make money in the food-from-critters business is to grow/sell more-more-more. Space equals cost, cost eats into profit, and that means that space is a no go. Industries like these need regulation the same way that children need boundaries; without regulations, we're back to Upton Sinclair's The Jungle. Honestly, though, the thing that pushed me over the edge on this one was part of the rebuttal from the No crowd: "[Prop 2] puts Californians at risk for AVIAN INFLUENZA." That's right, giving chickens room to stretch would expose them to Bird Flu, and then we'll all die. Folks, if we can't catch infected birds before they reach your table, we're already DOOMED.

3 MONEY FOR MEDICINE
YES
Others have pointed out that Oakland's Children's Hospital already has money from the last go around, and this is true. More importantly, some of the money from this bond goes to research facilities. For those of you who played a lot of Civilization, I want to translate this for you: this is funding SCIENCE. SCIENCE has a lot of secondary benefits to society apart from the number of rooms you have at hospitals for sick people (though those are important, too). Me, I'm a huge fan of new TECH.

4 THE ANTI-JUNO THING
NO NO NO
Insert usual rant about keeping your hands off an already functional system. If you don't want teen abortions, teach and encourage birth control, including the pill, the morning-after pill, and condoms.

Side note: you know what I want? A vaccine against STDs and pregnancy (and addiction, but more on that some other time). I want to be able to hand my future daughter or son the ability to go out, have a good time, and not have to worry about anything more devastating than heartbreaks. I frankly wouldn't care if my daughter/son was having sex with other kids her/his age just so long as she/he was being personally responsible and careful not to get hurt. If we had a vaccine like that, the people who keep pretending to care about unborn babies could get down to their actual, real agenda: hating their own bodies. Have fun.

5 SENTENCING FOR CRIMES NOT CRIMINALITY
YES
This measure still allows Judges to make judgement calls on whether the kid in front of them is a recalcitrant or an idiot. That's a good enough cap on this for me.

6 MO PO PO MONEY
NO
This is a well-meaning measure, but the answer here is more LOCAL police, especially in Oakland and Richmond. Simi Valley doesn't need a grant for a new cruiser-- and frankly, neither does Piedmont.

7 THE RENEWABLE ENERGY INITIATIVE FROM THE RICH DUDE FROM AZ
YES
It took me the longest time to work out just what the hell this thing was about. I mean, the NO crowd is really, really impressive... but what are they asking me to vote against? Turns out that the main push for this is for huge solar arrays in the desert. This is... ambitious and insane, but insane in a not-bad way, more like a "hey, what if we added a 'mouse' to control the device through a graphical interface' kind of insane. Briefly: a solar array out in the desert would, in theory generate oodles of energy that could then be used to power the entire state. The initial costs, mind, would be simply mind-boggling, but the payoff-- oh, sweet green mama. This would make the Hoover Dam sound quaint. This is the science of science fiction, and it's a huge gamble, but it could work out well. Live I mentioned early, I like new TECH.

8 BAN TEH GAY
NO NO NO
Never mind that the Yes crowd is lying through its teeth about CA making teachers teach pro-GBLT material to kids in our schools or that the entire measure is being funded by the Church of Latter Day Saints. Never mind that. What it comes down to is this: religion has no place in determining who gets to get secular marital rights. Just as Jews can't be forced to eat pork (a la Christian Spain circa 1000 AD), Christians can't be forced to step on pictures of Christ (Japan, 17th century), and Muslims can't be forced to spit on the Koran (Guantanamo, early 21st century), so too should no one be forced to obey the restrictions of any religion in a secular society. Render unto Caesar and all that. Keep your Church in church.

9 MORE VINDICATION FOR VICTIMS

Society needs laws to protect the innocent from the bad people, and society HAS laws to protect the innocent from the bad people. This goes too far.

10 THE RENEWABLE ENERGY INITIATIVE FROM THE RICH DUDE FROM TX
NO
We're getting closer to a reasonable measure, but the push to natural gas, while enticing, is not the way to go. (Also: we're not really any closer to clean coal, and even if we were, it would still be a long time before we could get coal in a way that doesn't make the Appalachians as flat as Kansas. Come on, Barrack, find another way.)

11 LOOK MA I'M REDISTRICTING
NO NO NO
We NEED a new method for redistricting based solely on the number of people living in a given patch of ground, yes. We don't need another committee to come up with a plan, especially when the only criteria for selecting that committee is political affiliation. Knock it off, folks.

12 ACRES AND A MULE
YES
War is not good, sure, but we do need incentives to keep our armed forces staffed. Turning former soldiers into contributing members of the housing market sounds like a good idea to me.


As I always, I'm most concerned THAT you vote, no matter HOW you vote. Go vote!