In November of 2003, President George W. Bush secretly flew to Iraq to serve Thanksgiving dinner to American troops. I thought it was cool as hell. Some of my Democratic friends sniffed and dismissed it as a stunt. I remember thinking that even if it was completely a stunt, it was still cool as hell.
I had been against that particular American misadventure from the very beginning. I was correct in believing that it was a monumental mistake, one that would cost thousands of American lives and obscene amounts of money, and would neither make this country any safer nor get us any closer to finding the people responsible for the attacks on Sept. 11, 2001. Furthermore, the invasion of Iraq was based on “intelligence” that an eighth-grader could have seen through. (Remember those nonexistent weapons of mass destruction?)
I was in complete agreement with going into Afghanistan to look for Osama bin Laden. If I had been president, I would have used every asset available to hunt him down to show him and the world that if you mess with the United States, there will be swift and fatal consequences. With that in mind, the Iraq invasion served only as a huge distraction from what should have been the only mission.
Nevertheless, American troops were serving in Iraq and the American president went halfway around the world to be with them on a day that’s important to all of us. I’m sorry, but you just can’t hate on that.
I would like to think that I’m open-minded enough to give credit where it’s due in all such situations. What I’d really like is for some people to be open-minded at least once in their sorry, narrow lives.
A recent poll shows that more than half (53 percent) of those surveyed now think that we should keep Obamacare and make whatever fixes to it that are necessary. (It will probably need several tweaks over the next decade or so, but simply calling for its repeal does not a fix make.) After the initial rollout cluster-blunder, the system is working remarkably well. Millions are signing up, the sky isn’t falling, and it appears to be a nice addition to the American safety net that includes Medicare and Social Security. As a matter of fact, the implementation of Obamacare is proceeding much more smoothly than did that of either Social Security or Medicare, and you can’t find an American who thinks we should get rid of either one of those programs. (Except maybe Martha McSally.)
But I turned on the radio the other day and heard 20-years-past-his-time Rush Limbaugh blathering on about how it’s not too late for Republicans to repeal Obamacare. The fight’s not over. Really?!
The Republicans may well ride the death rattle of the argument against Obamacare to victory in November, but to what end? Two years of political gridlock with Obama still sitting in the White House? If that’s the Republican strategy—two years with nothing done about immigration, jobs or the economy—it will lead to an astronomical ass-whuppin’ in 2016.
I just don’t understand why, after six years of simply screaming “No!” and not offering an alternative, opponents of Obamacare can’t let it go. As petty as they are, I don’t expect them to tip their hats, but they ought to be able to offer a collective shrug and move on.
A local example of this is brewing and it’s not going to be any prettier. For decades, downtown Tucson was considered a delightful mess by a handful of people, while most other people simply considered it a plain old mess. It was more Forbidden Zone than Destination and, as the years went by, Big Plans for Downtown came and went. Untold millions disappeared down the Rio Nuevo rabbit hole and nothing ever got done. While civic leaders held meetings and made plans, the Republicans’ response never changed. “Let the free market decide,” we were told.
But now, apparently, that tune is changing. We hear nothing but screams from Republicans and we’re not sure whether they are screams of derision or screams of pain from having done such an abrupt one-eighty.
With the modern streetcar set to begin operations in a couple of months, a new report shows that there are more than 1,500 new housing units and 50 new restaurants, bars and cafes along the streetcar route. An estimated $800 million of private-sector money is being invested along the route. I may have to consult with an economist, but that certainly sounds like free-market activity to me.
Republicans now argue that the streetcar is helping to turn downtown into a satellite community of spillover housing for University of Arizona students. What’s wrong with that? If I had the money, I’d open a 24-hour Subway sandwich place on Congress today. Downtown is going to have a different demographic and a decidedly different vibe. That will be good for some and bad for others. Just last week in this paper, Margaret Regan wrote about whether the government-subsidized arts district will be able to survive in the new downtown.
I think the streetcar-centric revitalization is going to work. I’m certainly hoping that it works. For too many decades, the university has used Tucson solely for its own purposes. I think that a little symbiosis will go a long way here.
This article appears in May 8-14, 2014.
There will have to be a lot of drunk U of A students to make thing work. Good luck with that. We have a trolley but the potholes are still terrible and we are paying off the TPD sick leave to the tune of how much..?
This pathetic excuse for a City had better figure out what is really important.
As the city center, downtown, becomes rejuvenated and repopulated many will never give up on naysaying. With the advent of convenient public transit, infilling with new modern infrastructure the next step to completing the transformation from hitch post town to upscale twenty-first century city is upscale housing.
New residential housing in the form of high-rise condominiums with dual use lower floors and underground parking will help complete the transformation. Congratulations to Mayor Rothschild’s leadership of the progressive City Council to make things move forward.
The financial world will be following the seniors to Tucson for one reason, they will want to take advantage of the money to be made here. People who cut loose and invest in Tucson now will profit in the future. People make value to a city, so watch out Tucson more people are coming.
What’s good for Tucson isn’t necessarily what’s good for Tucson’s citizens. We are the ones who get to decide whether the streetcar is good for us, and we vote with our feet. If nobody rides it, then shut it down. Lesson learned. I personally would like the streetcar route expanded to include the airport and at least have it go to El Con mall. As it stands, I have to drive downtown or to the U of A west entrance to even get on the thing, so I does nothing for me…yet. Let’s hope it works and it expands to include non-student areas.
Wow!!! You mean Tucson is actually on the verge of getting real, working, up-to-date public transit? I really have been away a long time.
I doubt very much if that many business will be created next to this street car to no-ware. This is Tucson, what will really happen is many of cars will be not working, there will be many accidents along the way with cars. After all the design is so bad and the area it goes through so narrow, they have taken to giving tickets to people who “park to far from the curb”. The public outrage from that has just started. This folly to no-ware is just a means for the U of Sports/Research to expand it’s campus with Tucson tax-payers footing the bill.
It is still and always will be SUBSIDIZED and that still and always will be a dirty word. Other words come to mind: expensive, stupid, foolish, and two words, four miles. It all adds up to money from you for them.
@ Ex- Arizonan, no they are not. As Tom wrote in the article the trolley will serve only one demographic, to get people from the U of A to downtown. It will be a success if the goal was to tap into the students for dining, drinking and rioting downtown without having to drive afterwards. Tucson needs to worry about jobs creation and stop the good jobs from hauling ass out of the old pueblo, like Raytheon who has daily shipments on semis leaving the facility or the possibility of DM shutting down. I don’t think the financial future explosion is coming from rich retirees heading here. Its already too crowded and traffic is horrible. Why would you move here?
I live downtown and I think it’s a success even though it hasn’t started carrying passengers yet. Yes, the parking and biking situation is a bit troubling… but you can always ride up a side street and park in a garage. But the vibrancy downtown makes my heart sing, and students are just one essential part of that mix. If you want the vanilla, thirty-something, I could be anywhere in the US chain feeling, there are still plenty of places in town to get that.
You don’t think the university is taking advantage of Tucson with building that streetcar which was privately organized by the Dean at the u of a? This is a private deal between the small hands of wealth and the school, you are a fool to think for one minute that the city officials give a damn about the artists and independently owned businesses. Good luck that all these new expensive restaurants have the clientele to keep them open. Most people who live here cannot afford to go to those places regularly, and the ones that can don’t want to deal with the downtown scene. Instead of working on bringing some employment to this city and working on its infrastructure, it choose to waste its money on a stupid trolley that does nothing for the city as a whole. This town is ran by a bunch of bum Fuck idiots, and to make it worse it has the people believing in their moronic ideas as well which says alot about you.
When I go downtown I cannot believe how poorly designed the streetcar right-of-way is…bad for people and cars. The selected route is idiotic, but it serves the needs of a few…westside speculators and the U of A.
Tucson has no urban thinkers or visionaries, it is just one ill-conceived, ineptly executed and never completed project after project.
The lack of government and business community leadership is astounding in Tucson.
Bravo,Patrica. Very well put. Last week my wife and I were driving west on Congress when traffic came to a dead stop. Turns out a parked pick-up truck was out just far enough to block the street car. The traffic jam it caused was a nightmare. The morons that run this place had their little hearts set on a street car and that was that. Just one man’s opinion, I think the money would have been better spent on fixing the roads. But, what do I know ?
There was a better way in my opinion. No city yet has had the skill to decide on it, too bad. I think it would have fit Tucson perfectly and created a star with much less money and change to intrastructre. Please see what I mean:
http://www.taxi2000.com
“Republicans now argue that the streetcar is helping to turn downtown into a satellite community of spillover housing for University of Arizona students. What’s wrong with that?”
Well there Tom goes again with the demonizing Republicans kneejerk response. My guess is there are plenty of Tom’s despised Independents, Greens and even die hard true believing Democrats who are a bit angst ridden as the smoke settles on the UA Modern Trolley (Bus on Tracks). What’s wrong with that, Tom? Hundreds of millions of dollars going to a small percentage of the population, a transient group at that. Whatever happened to the quaint old formulation “the greatest good for the greatest number of people?”
So Tom, if the Modern Trolley does turn into an expensive subsidy-laden boondoggle that further depletes the general fund as ridership proves a fraction of what was anticipated and maintenance costs don’t simply take care of themselves, will you admit you were wrong and the “Republicans” and the rest of us who questioned the project from day one were right?
I hope the trolley does play a role in the revitalization of downtown and will gladly admit I was wrong. But harking back to the never to be mentioned Rio Nuevo, more dorms, restaurants and bars don’t make up for a quarter of a billion dollars lost or stolen that would have made the trolley a cool convenience instead of “that’s what we needed all along.” Oh and who was responsible for the Rio Nuevo fiasco, the Republicans? Look in the mirror Mr. Democrat.
Harry Red Dog–Well said!
Yes, let’s blame the Republican naysayer’s for any criticism of the massive expenditures, disruptions (and closures) of long-standing business in downtown, and safety and transportation hazards caused by Farley’s Folly of a Trolley. (I am not Republican, by the way). And the millions that the city (i.e., we taxpayers) gave to the UA through Rio Nuevo, money that was never returned, that was not enough for the UA honchos? Let’s throw in the streetcar for their benefit as well. And how much is the UA helping on the costs of this transportation system built almost totally for the benefit of its students? Answer: zip.
For the amount of money squandered on the streetcar we could have developed a predominant first rate bus system and provided it free of charge to every man, woman, and Liberal Democrat in Tucson. But such a system would have benefited the working poor rather than the idle rich. Instead, we will see millions more of our dollars spent on operations and maintenance of the Folly — money that will come out of the city’s general fund, money that could have been used for reduced bus fares, better service, and a myriad of other things that should have taken priority over the specialized transport of UA students, most of whom could probably walk from where they are to downtown.
For someone who has lived downtown for over 40 years, I can appreciate the revitalization that we are finally seeing after the blowing of hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars on the effort. Every new bar is cause of celebration in my eyes (Celtic DNA) just as every new restaurant whets the appetite, but — and here is the multi-million taxpayer dollar question: is it all sustainable? Or is the question of sustainability a right-wing naysayer plot to discourage progress as suggested by this article? We will all know after the first few years of the Folly operation when we see what is obliterated in the city budget to pay for this extravaganza. When the city programs that you care about are cut to pay for shuffling students 3 miles on the streetcar, WILL YOU ADMIT YOU ARE WRONG, TOM?
Let’s call it a streetcar named unquenchable desire — the desire to spend the peoples money.
Rio Nuevo and the Trolley Folley is nothing more than taxpayer funded UA expansion. Wake up dweezels!
The next step that the people in charge will push for is demolishing the Ronstadt Transit Center, because god knows they don’t want the valued citizens of New Scottsdale to be reminded that non-rich humans also live here. Having to look at poors on their way to The Playground or The Hub would just upset their poor little foothills sensibilities oh so much.
Just because a bunch of overpriced restaurants and nightclubs have opened up does not mean our economy is improving. These establishments do not provide a substantial amount of jobs, nor do they cater to regular Tucsonans.
Who knows, maybe the street car will actually be useful, and maybe it will pave the way for something bigger and more useful later on similar to the MAX light rail. But then again, maybe it’s just an overgrown SunTran on a railway track.
Wow – and the mis-information continues. Be nice if folks did some research before commenting…but, alas, that’s too much like work.
I wonder what City employee gets to hose out the trolleys of U of A student vomit from a night of drinking.
The UofA is a growing monster, it’s obvious just look around the growth there in the last 10 yrs. We could of put that trolly money to so many more worthwhile programs to help build the city as a whole, But they blew it.
And it’s not just Tucson. .many other cities do it nationwide ..but I just care about here for as long as I have to live here.Vote out the idiots with money and power would be a good start.
@Mark Robert, if you think Tucson is overcrowded, chaotic, and filled with traffic, Northeastern cities are a living hell. Also the medical care is terrible–nothing to do with insurance, it’s just that doctors back East tend to trade on their egos more than actual medical knowledge. And the taxes are wicked. Just a thought.
You speak the truth,Sir. I lived in N.Y. for 34 years. If I had a farm in N.Y. and a home in Hell, I’d sell the farm and go home.
CW13 sez “But, what do I know ?”
Answer…obviously not much.
Go downtown, Go trolley.
It’s all a matter of perspective. Just because the construction industry has been happy to make their buck building all this new stuff doesn’t necessarily mean we’ve created a sustainable community economy. That said, it could work. What the city seems to be hoping for: an enormous amount of new student housing is built basically all at once, with the hope that many, many thousands of new out-of-town students and their parents are drawn to the U of A because of this all-new happenin downtown & streetcar to the U (which isn’t an impossible hope, especially in a nice mild environment like Tucson). It’s betting on the U being able to expand its programs quickly enough and well enough to provide a desirable education for these many, many thousands of new students (or we’ll have a ghost town of new construction downtown- there aren’t exactly a ton of great career opportunities opening up here after all), and hoping Tucson quickly finds it’s turned into a Texas-sized university town. Basically, asking out-of-town parents to contribute a boat-load of new property and sales tax $ into the city’s coffers. It could work. And there’s even a chance a greatly expanded, new-vibe university (and attendant research etc) could actually draw real career-worthy employment to Tucson and downtown instead of an ever-coming-and-going student base.
If it DOES work, and suddenly the city has a lot more property/sales tax $, do you think you could, pretty pretty please, FIX THE *AMNED STREET CRATERS everywhere for the rest of us residents? Why thanks all ya’ll who we’ve entrusted to spend our tax dollars only to give us greatly-increased vehicle maintenance costs 🙂
I miss my Tucson (though not AZ in general). Try Tacoma, WA for a spin and tell me about bad roads, poor design and difficult navigation!
CW13, I don’t even *have* a farm. Looks like it’s back to hell for me!
The naysayers aren’t wrong. This two bit town has bungled every project they’ve put their hands on. Parked cars, looks like a bus, only RECENTLY occurred to them that it has to run until the bars close, the “honesty” system of paying the fare. And who the hell pays for the electricity and at what cost?
There is a lot wrong with this picture to give “the naysayers” good reason and credibility. You think we WANT it to go bad??? If you believe that for one minute, your tunnel vision & arrogance is mind boggling. Just because we look outside our “wants” and place priority on “needs” and so look at the big picture does not mean we wish failure. In order to find success with anything in life, you need to start with a solid foundation, a structurally sound foundation, if you have any hope of future success & prosperity; Be it relationships, a new business, morals, or reviving a town. This whole thing screams “foundational defect”. Unless of course your goal was to just siphon money and fail to begin with. In which case, bravo, you have a job well done. I am sure Tucson will be raising taxes again soon to pay for yet another failing project, because it would seem it is what the powers to be in this town are good at. Who cares if the very citizens they are milking for money are the ones they are screwing over. In the private sector they would be in the unemployment line long ago.
Kat, your comments are well thought out and make a ton of sense. Too bad they’re wasted on Tommy and his army of deaf liberals who only hear what they want to. That ought to rile ’em up !!
O.K. Thanks for letting us know you’re not the source for current events and foreign policy. Invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq are war crimes. Bin Laden was dead in late 2001, but maybe that undersea search for his “burial at sea” is still in progress. By the way, the running joke was the plastic turkey Bush was holding. Have a bite. So the IRS isn’t going to shake us down for the cost of Obamacare? We’re not being forced by our government to support the insurance industry? The NSA had nothing to do with SCOTUS members ruling it constitutional? I feel so much better!
Actually, a smart use of downtown is to fill it with a student consumer base. So what’s the cost of this convenient snockered ride home? Apart from the millions Pima County spent to prevent a forensic exam of the RTA ballots still sitting in Iron Mountain now for eight years? Still reporting on that phony left/right puppet show distracting us from the developers and bureaucrats who really run the show? Should we expect anything more?
@CW13: Of course you mean PULITZER Tommy, right reptile?
Right, rodent. Flattery will get you everywhere. Glad to see you pay attention to what I write.
If she did, …she wouldn’t be Tammygirl, or would she?
You have to be nuts to ride a motorcycle. Today is a good day to die or crippled.
Traffic horrible and traffic jams a nightmare? Y’all must not get out of town much. Want to see some traffic? Try Dallas, Houston, Atlanta, Fort Worth, Chicago, LA, Phoenix, or Seattle. Tucson has NO traffic compared to those. The other afternoon I was cruising west on I-20 from Valencia to Miracle Mile at 4:45 in the afternoon and traffic was moving non-stop at a smooth 55. That doesn’t happen in any of the cities I mention.
Now, as to the trolly, it’s worthless to me. I live in the Foothills, not because I’m rich but just because it’s where I happened to land, and my pard and I would love to patronize the cafes and bars downtown, but guess what—try to park. Having beat the reaper into our 7th decades but still liking to get out of the compound for a little fun and food, we would come downtown if only we could find a parking place. Neither of us are up for walking more than a block or so (arthritis is in your future if you live), so usually we try to park but if, after 15 or 20 minutes of circling we can’t find anything, we give up and head back east or north, as we have done the last three times we tried for downtown fun.
Real cities have public transportation that’s on your street, unless you live in LA. In Bangkok I can step outside and find a Tuk-Tuk that will whisk me on a breathtaking and hair-raising ride anywhere I want to go quickly and cheaply. In Tucson you’d better have roller skates or a skateboard if you want to use public transportation because it doesn’t go anywhere you want to go for dinner, and if it does you have to leave 3 hours ahead of time and it will have stopped running before you’re ready to go home.
Still, I hope the trolly makes it. Denver has a thriving and bustling downtown with a trolly that runs up and down the 16th Street Mall, stopping every block and running from 5:00 am to 1:30 am and IT’S FREE! What will Tucson’s buggy charge to ride it? Think I’ll hop on and off that thing to explore the neighborhood and try the bars? Of course not, not if I have to pay the full fare every time.
Once again Tucson shows it doesn’t have what it takes to plan and carry out much of anything. I predict the trolly will be Rio Nuevo on wheels. Something like Tuk-Tuks would be great, but of course the city would never approve such things because they are patently unsafe, loud, noisy, and only have 3 wheels. The Armory Park Neighborhood Association would be horrified because they didn’t exist 100 years ago, and the bus and taxi folks would scream like pigs caught under a gate.
So Tucson will remain the CAN’T DO CITY IN THE DESERT.
G from foothills, right on! Doesn’t mean we can’t attempt to do better with public transit. Ridership means less street traffic in the future. Let everyone that can pay four-bits ride the new trolley. Correct change only.
Guillermo: The I-20 runs through Tucson? Who knew?