Just what our downtown business owners need the least: another
subsidy-dependent, socialist bottomless pit into which they pour
their hard-earned tax dollars. Can we learn from history?
Dear Editor:
Just what our downtown business owners need the least: another subsidy-dependent, socialist bottomless pit into which they pour their hard-earned tax dollars. Can we learn from history?
If the “father” of Santa Clara Valley transit, the Patron Saint of Light Rail (Heavy Socialism), the Executive Director of the American Public Transit Association, the Executive Director of the Bullet Train (High-Speed Rail Authority), the Executive Director of the Norman Y. Mineta International Institute for Surface Transportation Policy Studies at SJSU, the Patron Saint of transport socialism, the namesake of the old SP Depot in San Jose, can implant another Black Hole here, then forget downtown – it’s toast! Instead, we ought to seize the opportunity to teach our grandchildren and future generations a valuable transportation lesson.
On this the centennial of the formation of the notable partnership of Lev Trotsky and Vladimir Ilich Ulianov, who is better known to history by his pen name “Lenin,” imagine the valuable lessons that we could teach them. Simple. Just re-name Gilroy’s “Transit Hub” the Marx-Engels-Trotsky-Lenin-Stalin-Diridon-Gage Ministry of Truth.
Instead of erecting Rod’s statue out front, sitting astride a steam locomotive like a transit Paul Bunyan, why not duplicate Lenin’s Tomb. It would be more in keeping with his philosophy. Call Rod’s diorama “Emperor Transit First Arrives at the Pearly Gates.”
Museum patrons and our grandchildren could view a history diorama inside of Rod’s Last Judgment Day where he meets Saint Peter’s witnesses. Benjamin Franklin says to Rod, “Didn’t you read Poor Richard’s Almanac that I left you; Madison, Washington, Hamilton and the rest of us at the Constitutional Convention carefully crafted America to be all about private enterprise and business-friendly government.” The giant Little Jimmy Madison says to Rod, “I warned you in 1787 in The Federalist No. 41, ‘A bad cause seldom fails to betray itself.’ ” Then Father Abraham says to Rod, “You forgot my first transport business in Salem, Illinois, long before I became a transportation attorney. What I said in 1865 in my Second Inaugural Address was, ‘No man should dare to ask a just God’s blessing to wring his bread from the sweat of other men’s brows’ – you got it just backwards. I signed the legislation creating the transcontinental railroad as private-sector business, not government-owned. You got that backwards, too.”
John Gilroy can lead a long line of bankrupt former Gilroy business owners, who in life had their small businesses killed off by the Small Business Killers in our local and state government. The Big Four partners, Governor Stanford and Messrs. Hopkins, Huntington and Crocker, can drive by on a buckboard tossing silver dollars as Matthew Josephson describes them doing in The Robber Barons (1933). And JFK, who signed the legislation creating USDOT, says to Rod, “What I said in 1961 in my Inaugural address was, “Ask not what your Country can do for you; ask what you can do for your Country’ – you got it just backwards.” Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman says, “In 1962 I explained that democracy and socialism are incompatible in capitalism and freedom. Your philosophy won’t work – ask Lenin.” Down in Hell, overhearing their conversation, Lenin nods his burning head in agreement. Secretary Mineta says, “Remember what I said to you Rod at the IISTPS way back in 1995, “The crucial question in transportation today is: ‘What should government do and what should it leave to others.’ You answered my Crucial Question just backwards.” Lenin nods again. Sen. John McCain says to Rod, “I told you and the American people in 2002, ‘Amtrak is a failed experiment.’ ” Again, Lenin nods. The docent smiles and reminds his audience to remember the California tax revolts of 1978 and 2003.
Imagine the impact on the young learners as each generation forms-up its cohort of private-sector entrepreneurs for their onslaught against the phalanx socialist business-killers in local government!
The VTA diorama could be entitled “Lies, Lies and More Lies,” or “How Socialism Nearly Destroyed California and America.” Museum patrons and our great-grandchildren could see how generally accepted accounting principles were corrupted and distorted so that transit agency financials and local government officials could deceive the voters about their financial results. Instead of using GAAP to reveal multi-billion dollar deficit-causing, small business killing, Soviet-style carriage of passenger “business,” the PR blitzkrieg social engineers at VTA, with the Legislature’s blessing, can be seen concealing massive fraud and waste of tax dollars. For example, the losses reported by the old Gilroy Dispatch way back on 8/12/03 of “$160 million VTA deficit” would be translated by Truth-in-Transportation, your docent at the museum, who steadfastly applies GAAP, and reveals the true multi-billion dollar VTA losses by including all the tax subsidies that our small business owners and homeowners had to pay to keep their Soviet-style system running.
If this generation cares at all about the legacy that it will bequeath to the future residents, terminating Caltrain, Amtrak, stopping Bullet Train, privatizing public-sector transit in all modes, should be our primary task. Otherwise, Gilroy’s local elected leaders, who subscribe to Rod’s Soviet philosophy, and the voters who elected them, will be remembered as leech-loving medieval physicians who spoiled the American dream for them forever. Caveat viator!
Joseph P. Thompson, Gilroy
Submitted Thursday, Aug. 14
