hbo's series 'the wire' is one of the best--if not the best--thing ever made for tv.   on the surface, it's a story of cops trying to bring down a group of baltimore druglords; like all great dramas, its characters are driven, often by forces of which they themselves are unaware.  

the east side drugking is large, very pragmatic man known on the street as 'proposition joe'.

the governor of california is also a large, very pragmatic man who should be known as 'proposition arnold.'

pragmatic in both cases isn't so much a virtue, but a willingness to do whatever it takes to get what he wants.  what arnold wants now is for californians to pass four so-called voter initiatives (known as propositions here) in a special election he ordered last year after failing to convince state legislators to enact them into law

all four share a common theme: to enhance and increase the power of his office.  arnold, who assured us he wouldnt take money from special interests, has become his own special interest.   starting a week before he was inaugerated, he began hustling money from anyone and everyone and hasn't stopped since.  he even threw a hissy fit like a lil girly man when the president showed up recently to raise funds for the national party. arnie--who's raised a california record 80 million + since being in office--refused to meet with bush.  (i just realized i'd forgotten to find out who paid $100,000 to sit in arnie's vip booth at the rolling stones' tour opener, but i'm guessing it wasn't some poor boy who just wanted to play in a rock'n'roll band.)

thanks to schwartzenegger's reallife heroic cash collecting efforts, californians have to endure a tsunami of ads pleading, enticing and demanding we 'vote for props 74, 75, 76, 77'.   of the four, proposition 77 is the most egregious.  

so...what's the worst kind of activist judge?  

any one (and all) of  the three retired judges prop 77 would empower to redistrict the state.

there is definitely a problem with the districts as they current exist.  in 2001, legislators from both parties worked hand in hand to significantly lower the odds of being voted outta office.   schwartzenegger--taking a page outta the president's playbook--managed to figure out a way to make a bad thing even worse. 

 take the power to draw up districts from the legislature (as provided by our state constitution) and give it to three retired judges.  there's nothing to ensure all three don't come from the same part of the state...nor is there any guarantee these three judges wouldn't be members of the same faction of the same political party. 

in case you haven't realized it yet, these three appointed-not-elected retired judges don't have to answer to anyone they'd supposedly represent.   

it's such an abysmally dumb idea, ya gotta wonder if der governator is trying to prove brawn is brawn and brains is brains and neither the twain shall meet...in him anyway.   if you think i'm being unfair in saying that, please consider the following image. 

it's page one of proposition 77--exactly as it was submitted.   there are seven pages in total, all of which look like this if not worse.   for years my teachers swore they'd never seen anything like the stuff i'd turn in.  over time i became the benchmark by which other horrible submissions were ranked.   these guys have taken things to a low i couldnt even have imagined.   (if you wanna see the rest of this mess, go here Link )

i can't imagine anyone--whether to the left of scalia or the right of kucinich (or vice-versa) or any point in between--actually voting to pass this scam.   but then i didn't imagine i'd ever see ordinary people admitting (on camera mind you) to tv reporters...and thus millions of others, like the whole world...they voted for schwartzenegger.   i guess jerry springer and his ilk have rendered us shameless.