Let’s start local, and that means, of course growth and development. This isn’t news; it’s been on the public table for quite awhile, but we haven’t talked about it before. It was spread all over the front page of The Union this week, and those of us who live around Grass Valley and Nevada City often try not to think about what’s going on down at LOP. The proposal is to fill a big chunk of the remaining open land at Higgins Corner with mucho retail buisness, a 60,000 square foot Bel-Air supermarket, a free-standing Starbucks with a drive-through just to run a few local coffee merchants out of business, and a couple more fast food joints. If this one gets built, all they’ll need is a couple of motels, and the approach to LOP will look just like entering Rocklin. This one hasn’t come before the planning commission, so public hearings are yet to come, but I suspect this type of development is exactly what the people in LOP want. After it’s built, however, they’ll complain about the traffic and say they want Highway 49 upgraded to a freeway. Sitting here in Nevada City, that kind of development is easy to ignore, but it shouldn’t be. It’s creeping closer to us every year. Don’t be surprised if Starbucks sweeps up the next vacant store on Broad Street, maybe right next door to Java John’s.

The Grass Valley Planning Commission has a bunch of new development on its near future agendae, but it’s mostly residential so the issues are different. Most of the locations are what they call "infill" as opposed to sprawl. Still, the usual concerns about traffic are at the front of the opposition. Habitat for humanity wants to build nine houses on Ivy Street and the neighbors are squawking, apparently because they think it will attract residents they don’t particularly want as neighbors. You know, people without much money who actually build their own houses.

Sometimes, it ends up not as bad as it seems when the public debate is going on. Many development proposals, even ones which are approved, never get built. Maybe the developer can’t raise the money or decides that changes in the economy necessitate putting the money somewhere else. Some of ‘em just flake off. That makes it tough. You have to wait until construction starts before you know it’s really happening, but if you want to make sure it doesn’t happen, or at least influence what happens, you have to start working at it years before.

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Last week, the House of Representatives voted 256-153 for a non-binding resolution supporting the current blood bath in Iraq being staged by the Bush gang. That’s horrifying on one hand, but on the other it means that 153 congressmen now want to get the U.S. troops out of Iraq, and that’s a lot more than when the thing started.

The Senate begins it’s debate this week on the same topic, but with an approach from the opposite direction. The non-binding resolution before the Senate is a vaguely worded call for a phased withdrawal of troops, but sets no goals for any specific numbers or dates. Democrats say this spineless resolution is designed to refute the idea that the donkeys favor a "cut and run" approach to Iraq. It took many years of painful persuasion, but Nixon finally cut and ran in Viet Nam. I suspect the Democrats could pull down more votes behind a cut and run platform. People who don’t usually bother to vote would pour out of the woods and the woodwork to vote for that candidate, but the geniuses in Congress who control the party don’t have the huevos for it. Our own Senator Feinstein, among others, has her name on the line as an author of this bill. She thinks of it as an effort to minimize the public perception that the party is divided on the war, but she can forget it. Another bill authored by some other Democrats is being introduced calling for complete abandonment of Iraq by the U.S. by July of next year.

The mainstream U.S. media are cooperating with the Bush gang by repeating that nonsense about how the U.S. remains to support the rebuilding of the country, guide the country into a democratic government, and fend off those pesky insurgents who really aren’t insurging about anything except the presence and the well-documented brutality of the U.S troops. The Bushwhacker has been portrayed as pumped up and ecstatic since the murder of al-Zarqawi. At a rare press conference, talking about a timetable for withdrawal, he pumped his fist and said, "Don’t count on American politics forcing my hand, because it’s not going to happen." He says great progress is being made toward completing the mission, whatever it might be.

Here’s the scorecard on the progress: 2500 Americans dead by conservative estimates; over 2000 Iraqi civilians dead just last week; push that number into six figures for the entire U.S. occupation; no more than four hours a day of electricity, bad water, bad sewage disposal, daily car bombings and well-armed men shooting at anyone and everyone on every street in town. The only measurable progress seems to be that the U.S. seldom drops bombs from airplanes anymore. That’s the kind of progress that makes cut and run look like a political winner for any Democrat who has the hair to say so, but the big shots who claim to be Democrats act like they’re afraid their own car will be bombed. Maybe they’re right.

When you’re marking your scorecard on violence in Iraq, the U.S. has the most firepower but isn’t really in the same fight. No matter what the U.S. does, the Sunis and the Shiites will continue exterminating each other just as they’ve done for centuries. For the Shiites, blowing up Americans in humvees is just a hobby. If that mysterious mission we’re supposed to be completing is to bring peace to Iraq, forget it. The politics and culture are firmly rooted in sectarian violence. Cut and run? It sure would hurt to leave all that oil behind.

For months, now, we’ve been seeing stories almost daily about the trial of Saddam Hussein, but not once have I read a word about the nature of Saddam’s defense. I mean, does he claim he didn’t do it or does he, like Bush, claim that all his homicidal deeds are legal?