Calif. Gov. Scorns Bush Response to Levees

[chequita guevara]

Cuz the majority are slaves to the minority in the American political system?

[Dinner]

Originally posted by DinoDoc

Pre-emptive disaster declarations are only issued when a catastrophe was imminent, he said.

Is this not true or is it a change of policy from past admins?

The governor asked Bush to do something and we got nothing. That's the bottom line. The above is just a crutch to justify inaction.

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Oerdin
The governor asked Bush to do something and we got nothing. That's the bottom line.

I'm having trouble seeing the nothing you got.

[Dinner]

"We will allow you to pay full market value to use the Army Corp." = Jack cheese.

[DinoDoc]

Considering the fact that the Corps is almost entirely controlled by Congress, I'd expect authorization for more help soon. I'd also take a good hard look at the people who represent me in Congress and ask them why the $1.4 billion the Corps has spent on civil works projects during the Bush presidency hasn't been used to repair the levees before now.

[GhengisFarb™]

Does this mean there will be more Major League sports looking for temporay homes next year? Our deal with the Hornets is almost over.

[Dinner]

We're getting rid of the Chargers in San Diego but that has nothing to do with flooding and everything to do with extorsionist demands from the owner. The major league monopoly laws need to change because right now they create an artificial shortage of teams resulting in owners making their yearly "pay me $X or I will move the team".

[GhengisFarb™]

I heard the Sonics might be moving, anyone hear in updates on that. I was kinda hoping our local corpate headquarters would sponsor them so we could have the Sonic Sonics.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Oerdin
We're getting rid of the Chargers in San Diego but that has nothing to do with flooding and everything to do with extorsionist demands from the owner. The major league monopoly laws need to change because right now they create an artificial shortage of teams resulting in owners making their yearly "pay me $X or I will move the team".

Extortionist demands?! He's saying he'll pay the entire cost of the building, he just wants the land provided by the city! That's a pretty damn fine deal for a city, especially after they helped pay for Petco Park while the Chargers get screwed over.

[DaShi]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
George Bush is Lex Luthor?!?

The incredulity of it is one of its advantages to Bush. No one will believe it despite the rising evidence.

[Dinner]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Extortionist demands?! He's saying he'll pay the entire cost of the building, he just wants the land provided by the city! That's a pretty damn fine deal for a city, especially after they helped pay for Petco Park while the Chargers get screwed over.

He said he'd front $400 million if the city gave him $1 billion in land. **** that! That is extorsion especially since just 6 years ago the city spent $80 million refurbishing Qualcom to suit his taste. The city even went further to give him a 100% ticket deal where every unsold ticket is paid for by the city at face value yet the city can't give the tickets away to poor people. The guy has a sweet heart deal where he just can't lose but he wants more money. He wants a $400 million new stadium so he can get 25 new corporate boxs which he can rent out at $1 million each per year. **** him.

The monopoly exemption which major sports teams get is horrible they should lose their anti-trust exemption and be slapped with a million anti-trust law suites until they stop this blackmail.

[Dinner]

Seriously this is a major problem. Congress got bribed into passing a law where the major league sports are exempt from anti-trust laws but those should be removed so that every city without a franchise can sue to get one.

Once these ****ers are over a barrel they can either agree to new terms or go bankrupt. I'd love to see a set up like Europe has with it's football teams where there are a bunch of ranked leagues and where teams move up or down between the various leagues depending upon how well they do in a season. Get 1st place then you move up a league while if you get last place you fall down into the lower league.

That's real competition and if a team wants to move to a different city then that city can easily get a new team. An owner like the one of the Clippers would quickly find himself with a worthless team because he's to greedy to invest into winning players. As it is he just loses (this year excepted) 90% of the games and then makes money off of the league profit sharing. Screw that! Let the ****ers work for their money or sink like everyone else.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Originally posted by Oerdin
The monopoly exemption which major sports teams get is horrible they should lose their anti-trust exemption and be slapped with a million anti-trust law suites until they stop this blackmail.

Ah, knee jerk-ism which has become your speciality...

NO MAJOR LEAGUE SANS BASEBALL has an anti-trust exemption. I'll say it again. NO MAJOR LEAGUE SANS BASEBALL has an anti-trust exemption.

Please get it right before spouting your falsehoods.

He said he'd front $400 million if the city gave him $1 billion in land.

He's paying for most of the stadium. The city would just have to give up the land to build the stadium on, and then could sell the rest of the area to developers (the plan was half stadium and half new shopping and developments, which would, of course, pay for themselves in tax revenues.

Just because the San Diego municipal government is corrupt doesn't mean they get a free pass on keeping an NFL team. They sprung the money to get the Padres a new stadium, but then told the Chargers to stay in the old one. Who's going to go for that type of disrespect? When the Chargers are originally from Los Angeles and were stolen by San Diego in the first place?

[Dinner]

No, you are wrong. His plan was the city would give him all of the land where Qualcomm stadium is half of which would be used for a new stadium and the other half he'd get to develop into houses, offices, and yet another mall. That's the half worth $1 billion. Let's face facts here; if the city wanted to sell that land at face value it could pocket the $1 billion, pay $400 million for a new stadium, and pocket the remaining $600 million. Why let him have it?

Of course the fact remains the plan wouldn't work because if the existing stadium has just enough parking then how can a new stadium get by with just half as much? Next is the fact that most people in this city are sick of paying millions to a man who doesn't deserve it while our roads go unrepaired plus we still have a $2 billion pension deficit which our Republican leadership has put us in to and we can't borrow money because 1) they cooked the accounting books and Wall St won't loan money until an outside audit is completed but 2) the current city council isn't co-operating with the outside auditors because they know they've broken the law and they're afraid of going to jail so they've lawyered up. The result is the city is held hostage until this mess is resolved which could take years. The obvious solution is to vote the guilty bastards out of office so new people who won't impede the outside auditors can be brought in but like most states the city has gerrymandered districts so it is very hard to get rid of incumbants.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Let's face facts here; if the city wanted to sell that land at face value it could pocket the $1 billion, pay $400 million for a new stadium, and pocket the remaining $600 million. Why let him have it?

Then offer to build the freaking stadium! The city just paid for 70% for a new stadium for the Padres (about $300 mil, IIRC), while telling the Chargers to stay in a stadium built in 1965 and opened in 1967! Of course the Chargers want a new place after the Padres got one!

And I note you didn't even address my anti-trust point. The reason that baseball teams usually DON'T MOVE is because they have an anti-trust exemption. MLB can tell a team that they have to stay. This is why before Montreal moved to Washington, the last MLB team that moved was the Washington Nationals in 1960 to Texas to become the Rangers.

Meanwhile in the NFL teams move all the time. Why? Because they DON'T have an anti-trust exemption. Al Davis sued the league in '80 when they tried to block him from moving his team from Oakland to LA and won based on anti-trust law (ruled in '82). That opened the gates for the Colts to move from Baltimore, the Raiders to move back to LA, the Rams to move to St. Louis, etc.