« Establishing The Criterium | Main | Finally Getting Loaded »
August 10, 2007
Invade Durham
|
|||||
| Historically the City Council has been responsible
for hiring the City Manager. Since I will be the first elected City Manager
I'll be accountable to "the people". The downside of this is
that I need to pander to a few interest groups to ensure I get
support during my campaign. I've come up with a bold plan that allows me to pander and solve many community problems. We must invade Durham. The Pandering: Save the Soil: Like many of you I have been concerned about the encroachment of agriculture on our prime development lands. Farms and orchards in Durham are exposing our top quality soils to increased global temperatures and harsh weather. We've got to protect the soil by building homes over it, and we have to do it for the children. Converting all of Durham to a gated community would also increase our tax income. Save the Planet: By now everybody knows this equation... Green House Gas Emissions - Carbon Offsets = Kyoto Protocol Levels If we can't balance this equation by June 13th, 2014 we'll all die (I think from an asteroid strike). You could reduce emissions, but that would be hard. If we increase our offsets we can still save the planet. Once we have Durham we have the dump. And with the dump we can build methane recovery systems to offset our increased emissions. The Plan: Now that I've got the development and environmental interests behind me it's time to formulate an invasion strategy. Durham is a farming community, and so we can expect a lot of well armed farmers with corn fed bruisers for kids. We will also need to weaken their government. Removing the Farmers: Farmers are a tough nut to crack, especially almond farmers. But if we can export 6-12 Starbucks coffee shops to Durham we can do it. First, the Starbucks will just sell coffee to draw the farmers in. Then we will begin 24 hour poetry readings and hire bad acoustic guitarists to sing about college-life angst. After a few months of inflicting our downtown culture on the farmers they are likely to flee. Or become beatniks. So that problem is de fanged. Bankrupting the Government: Directly after the first Starbucks opens we'll parachute in (under cover of darkness) the Butte Environmental Commandos First EIR Regiment. These able men and women are trained to inflict massive cost increases on public projects. They do it by challenging EIRs. They once stopped a merry-go-round from being built in Oroville when they successfully proved that the city had not counted the hairs on every squirrel's tail at the project site. Breaking Their Back: With farmers fleeing and public projects floundering we've nearly reached our goal. Our last effort involves papering Chico State and Butte College with advertisements for multiple, ongoing, kegger parties in Durham. Emergency services will crack as they deal with Chico-style riots, and a lack of municipal party ordinances. At the culmination of this trio of trials the people of Durham will either demand that Chico step in and run their community, or they will be in no shape to fight an annexation battle. It's even possible to kill two birds with one stone. While the keggers are ongoing, we could fence off exits from Durham. This would keep the college party crowd out of Chico. They could still take their classes remotely by using the computers at Starbucks. Problems Solved: So there you have it. In one concerted effort I've pacified home builders and environmentalists, increased tax revenue, removed drunk college students, and prevented an asteroid strike. Who ya votin' for now! |
|||||
|
|||||
CI Challenge: Can you guess what it is? Winner: Rainman, see comments below. |
Posted by Lon at August 10, 2007 07:54 AM
Comments
Looks like a screen shot from the film "Watership Down".
Posted by: rainman at August 10, 2007 08:40 AM
Damn you rainman. Damn you all to hell!
Yes that is a screen capture from the opening sequence of Waterhsip Down, where the mythology of how rabbits came to be is described.
If my memory is correct I think that image would be what the used to represent God.
Lon
Posted by: Lon at August 10, 2007 08:49 AM
It's a good thing I didn't submit a guess (involving a drain, a nipple, and a Spirograph) or I would have embarrassed myself. Close call.
Well, I'm about to embarrass myself, Mr. G., but darnit, your blog entries (read in reverse order after a week of mind-numbing minutiae and a cocktail) have reduced me to a quivering, drooling, giggling BLOB. Cocktail notwithstanding. You ROCK! I enjoy what you write and how you write it. Thank you!
Posted by: Laurie at August 17, 2007 10:28 PM