A Lesson in Demographics..."Orange County Is No Longer Nixon Country"

"Orange County Is No Longer Nixon Country"...Say What???  Gotta admit, the title in the e-news caught my eye...so I clicked on the link. 

As I read about the transformation of what was once perhaps most legendary of all Republican stronghold areas anywhere in the country into a place where registered Republicans now number a 70-year low of a mere 43% of registered voters, I stumbled upon one of the best quotes I've ever read on the REAL benefits of demographic diversity. And I just want to share it with you...if only to put into a little perspective some of the immediate and tangible benefits of the inevitable march of demographic change we're seeing today in the U.S. 

To read the whole article, which I do recommend and which you'll likely find politically informative and more even-handed than you might imagine...especially to those of you who see the NY Times as a bastion of the liberal press...see http://www.nytimes.com/2010/08/30/us/politics/30orange.html?_r=1&nl=us&emc=politicsemailema1

But the real gem and grin-inspiring quote from the article (to me, anyway!) was this, to wit, paragraph 7 about the transformation of Orange County:

Manuel Gomez, the vice chancellor of student affairs at the University of California, Irvine, said the county where he was born 63 years ago is almost unrecognizable to him today. “With diversity comes more cultural voices and political voices,” he said. “And certainly better food.”

Could anyone say it better???  Maybe we could do without all the culture wars, racial hatred and religious angst during these demographic upheavals if we just focused on the end result and benefit...better food!!  Think about it!  :)

All the best!  GM/GQPublic

Thinking aloud this evening and wondering why...

Why do we even have elections for Judges?  The way it is now, unless you happen to know a Judge or a candidate personally, how can you really know or learn enough about them to actually make an informed decision about whether or not you should vote for them?  For all intents and purposes, while the legal community may know or know of these candidates as colleagues, it scary to think that among most of the rest of the voting public, voters could (and probably are) simply picking 'names' rather than actual jurists!

Solution:  Let the legal community elect Judges!  They can learn about and know their peers better than anyone else out there.  Think about it relative to the medical community:  They don't leave it up to the public to elect surgeons and other specialists to high ranking positions, they keep that evaluation and award that position based upon peer review and the candidate's education and merit! 

Of course, there's always the 'let's get rid of all the lawyers' crowd railing against giving so much power to the lawyers!  For my money, though, I'd rather give that 'election power' to those who have proven they have the reading, writing and reasoning ability that Law School requires them to have to get through it...and who probably can be expected to give some circumspect thought to whom they vote for to be a Judge...than to give it to the largely uninformed public. 

Just my two cents' worth on this subject.

A shamelessly commercial plug...!