Charles Hurt from the Moonie...er...Washington Times has a problem with a bike share program in the nation's capitol: "Unlike Sarah Palin or Tina Fey, or whoever it was, I really can see Russia from my front porch. Or, at least, I can see broken-down socialism.
That is because across the street from my house on Capitol Hill is a loud, clanging "Capital Bikeshare" docking station. It is one of the locking ports for those fat, red communal bicycles you see peddled all over town by commune enthusiasts. (Say that fast, and it sounds like you are saying "commun-ists.")
For a small membership fee, users can pick up a bike at any of 165 such docking stations and proudly pedal themselves to work, school or to pick up Chinese food. The little black wire basket on the front is sturdy enough to carry a briefcase or a carry-out order of tofu. The bikes are shaped like the old-timey "girl bikes" without the crossbar, making them suitable for un-liberated women in skirts as well as these so-called "metrosexual" males everybody keeps talking about in these parts.
For the urban environmental warrior (who, curiously, chooses to live in a densely populated concrete city), the benefits of the communal bike program are endless.
Having people pedal around on these bikes, they say, means fewer people riding pollution-emitting city buses and fewer cars clogging the roads. And healthy riders means less of a burden on socialized medicine. These people get very excited talking about all the upsides.
Oh, and the smugness with which these pedaling heroes pump away! I have seen proud drivers of Priuses look away in shame as they ease by in their bio-electric and sometimes spontaneously combustible vehicles.
This communal bike program is a success from their tingling toes through their throbbing hearts all the way to bright, gleaming faces. It makes them feel so good!
But there are problems.
The most obvious one is that you can check out a bike and pedal yourself anywhere your heart desires — so long as it happens to have a docking station for your bike. (The bikes don't come with locks, and these geniuses haven't yet eliminated bike theft — even of crappy, fat red ones.)
If your destination just so happens to have a handy-dandy bike-docking station, you better get there early or hope that not everybody is going in the same direction at the same time. Such as what we happen to call "rush hour," which only occurs every single weekday, twice a day.
So, what happens is, these noble warriors ride their bikes to work in the morning, only to discover that so has everybody else. And all the docking stations are filled up. So they have to wander around in search of a place to dock their bike so they can get to work.
This leads to another problem where all the bikes end up in a concentration of places. So at the end of the day, a belching environment-killing truck must come around and redistribute the bikes.
After early complaints about this problem, central planners did what central planners do. The program didn't need to be eliminated. It needed to be — made bigger.
So far, after the latest expansion, the whole scheme has cost taxpayers more than $8 million. Much of that comes from federal taxpayers, so you, too, can take pride in this.
My personal pride in the program reached a new level last week after reading about a woman in my neighborhood who was talking on her cellular phone. A thug rode by on a bike, slapped her and swiped her phone.
And proudly pedaled away on the big, fat, red Capital Bikeshare bicycle. "
This is an open thread.
George Zimmerman is headed back to jail.The Orlando Sentinel reports :
"In a shocking turn, Circuit Judge Kenneth Lester has revoked George Zimmerman's bond in the shooting death of Trayvon Martin.
Zimmerman now has 48 hours to turn himself in to authorities.
The decision came after the revelation that Zimmerman and his wife may have conspired to lie about thousands of dollars in donations they'd collected before his bond hearing.
In a new motion, prosecutors accused Zimmerman and his wife of lying to the judge during a bond hearing about money they collected for his defense.
Prosecutors allege Zimmerman's wife knew about the donations her husband had collected through a PayPal account, but didn't mention the money at his bond hearing.
The account ultimately collected about $200,000, his attorney later revealed.
"Defendant has intentionally deceived the court with the assistance of his wife," the motion says. "During the jail phone calls both of them spoke in code to hide what they were doing."
Does a lot for his credibility. Who thinks Zimmerman will plead out?
Posted by: Cal | June 01, 2012 at 08:52 PM
Well, you never know, it’s still Florida after all.
Posted by: BlackRhino | June 01, 2012 at 10:47 PM
Did any of you catch John Curley's rambling monologue the night after the Seattle shootings? Frankly i couldn't stand to listen after a few minutes and put a blessed end to his crapola. Unbelievable. Somehow he managed to turn the tragedy into just another selfreferential ego trip- Everything apparently, all, leads back to John, in the end. He started his crow cawing with a series of vignettes from his days back east, in the big tough city. First up, riding a NYC subway in the middle of a stabiing where everyone ignored it. Then he went to a NYC friends story of a body landing behind him on the sidewalk and the indiffeence of the shopkeeper his friend breahtlessy reported the death to. It seemed he was trying to trivialize the tragedy we all had just suffered here. Who knows what the point of this horse's ass'es speech was eventually going to be. I found these self-referencing personal stories from his past back east life, at that time of the entire city's grief, to be offensive. His strange little speech was inappropriate, irrelevant- and even asinine. Mostly asinine. Like Curley.
Posted by: Reverend Beamer | June 02, 2012 at 07:11 AM
East Coast N.Y.C-Philly area interlopers in our fair city of Seattle, and environs, like John Curley, should only be given a five- year provisional residency, when they first move out here, after which they are to be given a comprehensive "Jackass Test". If they fail, their residency here is to be terminated. Curley obviously would have been sent packing decades ago.
Posted by: Reverend Beamer | June 02, 2012 at 07:39 AM
John Curley is one of the most astute radio personalities on the air in this area. He, along with Luke burbank are the new generation in talk hosts. They both have incredible senses of recall and are very quick with reasoning and deductive conclusive decisions. They immensly compliment the air waves and both are getting more popular by the day. In my opinion, those who would criticize them are simply jealous of their talents and success.
Posted by: DontWorryBeHappy | June 02, 2012 at 07:58 AM
bwahahahahahaahaha...oh..my...god...
Posted by: Reverend Beamer | June 02, 2012 at 08:01 AM
If Curley's point was eventually going to be, after his seemingly interminable circumlocution, how great it was to see the heroism of the tho guys in the cafe, and the lady who gave CPR to the carjack victim, with the maniac still there, he should have just gotten straight to the point. At most, a VERY fleeting reference to the indiffernece to crime victims and death that has gone on in New York and other big cities back east would have been appropriate.. He shouldn't have brought himself personally into the story at all. Not the time and place for it. It simply takes attention away from the victims and the heroes of the previous day. A writer for the Huffington Post did a story about the heroes and heroines of the Seattle shootings , but he didn't preface it with a bunch of rambling paragraphs concerning his personal history. He didn't reference himself at all.
Posted by: Reverend Beamer | June 02, 2012 at 08:29 AM
I noticed in Curley's "subway story", that he apparently never pulled the "stop the train " handle himself, as he was implying would have been the right thing to do. He was told to shutup about the stabbing by other riders and did nothing, like them. This guy is a putz who undoubtedly would have been cowering under a table at Cafe Racer , not standinp up and throwing stools at the gunman like the hero Adam in the Huffington Post story about the Seattle shootings.
Posted by: Reverend Beamer | June 02, 2012 at 09:24 AM
this is all" in my opinion" about you only, of course, Curley.
Posted by: Reverend Beamer | June 02, 2012 at 09:43 AM
Uncle, I just checked in with my laptop after returning to my room from a tanning session on our private beach here at the Hotel Martinez, Cannes, and read your series of posts on Curley. I must say congrats. You speak for legions. Tomorrow morning i leave for Paris and a connecting flight back to Seattle.
Posted by: Tommy008 | June 02, 2012 at 10:07 AM
So anyone want to guess what Dori's big announcement is on Monday?
a. He is choosing a new name that isnt a girl's name.
b. He is replacing Ron and Don and will now have a 7 hour show.
c. There is no announcement but it will get 4 more people to tun in on Monday.
Posted by: Walt | June 02, 2012 at 11:09 AM
One will just have to tune in (like one normally does) to find out. My guess would be that he may be formally introducing a co-host?
His ratings will continue to soar.
Posted by: DontWorryBeHappy | June 02, 2012 at 11:50 AM
How do remedy jet lag, T008 ?
Posted by: KS blathers | June 02, 2012 at 12:00 PM
He walks upstairs and gets a beer, then goes back down stairs to choose another Walter Mitty character.
Posted by: Walt | June 02, 2012 at 01:19 PM
Bingo!
Posted by: DontWorryBeHappy | June 02, 2012 at 01:23 PM