http://www.vickigray.com/ Vicki's View en-us mrhutchins@gmail.com 2007-02-21T20:22:13-08:00 hourly 1 2000-01-01T12:00+00:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000047.html The Federal Budget, like snow and cold rain, comes in bleak midwinter, and this year’s deepens the glumness of the season. How else to react to a budget that, when read as a moral document, reeks of immorality? It is... 47@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2007-02-21T20:22:13-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000046.html Word in Washington has long had it that the perception within the White House is that the way out of the deepening quagmire in Iraq is a broadened war against Iran. Losing in Iraq? Redefine the problem away. Iraq, the... 46@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2007-02-13T21:57:07-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000045.html Vallejoans for Responsible Growth would like to raise some urgent questions about Wal-Mart’s plans for a “supercenter” at Sonoma Boulevard and Redwood Street in Vallejo and its current stewardship of the site which is just one of several it seeks... 45@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2007-02-05T18:20:16-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000044.html Molly Ivins died night before last. A writer friend Back East e-mailed me the news. I wrote back the following: "My first reaction - Cancer sucks! And, yes, it does. But she vowed to keep writing till this war was... 44@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2007-02-05T18:14:13-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000043.html I offer here for your reflection –without comment, none being needed –some random thoughts on the eve of an announcement of a “surge and acceleration” ever deeper into Iraq. ********* Elections have consequences. President George W. Bush January 2005 *********... 43@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2007-01-07T19:45:47-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000042.html Respect! It’s a word I learned to use in a new way once a long time ago in Europe. It is, I learned, not just a leaden noun, but an honorific salutation, used to address someone, like a professor, of... 42@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2007-01-06T07:10:00-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000041.html Surprise! Surprise! The Times-Herald supports Wal-Mart in its effort to ram a 393,000 sq. ft. “supercenter” down Vallejo’s throat. Forgive me for choking…on my laughter. Evidently, all it takes to buy the support of the Times-Herald are a few full-page... 41@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2006-10-01T22:04:56-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000040.html A REFLECTION FOR SEPTEMBER 11, 2006 It’s September 11 again – five years on – and, once again, electoral season. And my fear today is that politics – the politics of fear – will stain our sacred memory, our shared,... 40@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2006-09-08T20:47:13-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000039.html Once was a time when we used to joke that military justice is to justice as military music is to music. You musicians get the point. Trouble is, military justice is no longer a joking matter. And we have moved a pace in other regards. Now we must add: military language is to language as…well…Orwellian “newspeak” is to reality. And unfortunately for those in the “reality-based community,” military newspeak has replaced standard American English as the lingua franca of the United States thanks to the spinmeisters in the White House and a pusillanimous press corps eager to lap up whatever Karl Rove, Tony Snow, and Ken Mehlman feed them. 39@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2006-08-25T18:50:50-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000038.html 38@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2006-08-10T22:09:34-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000037.html How was yours? The Fourth, that is. Mine was pretty good – sleeping late, a walk with the dog, some TV time with a shuttle launch and the World Cup, some gardening, and, of course, the obligatory barbecue and a... 37@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2006-07-06T19:25:06-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000036.html As someone else once said, I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. And I want to thank all Vallejoans who came out to vote last week. The turnout – far... 36@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2005-11-12T22:38:40-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000035.html Last night, October 25, 2005, a 92-year-old lady died in Detroit. We never met, but she changed my life…and all our lives. She was 42, when she boarded that Montgomery bus in 1955. I was 16, a sophomore in a... 35@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2005-10-26T21:14:25-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000034.html We’re nearing the home stretch and Vicki is running faster, stronger than ever. Here are a few events along the way at which you can catch up with her and share with her your thoughts on how our city should... 34@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2005-10-13T21:37:41-08:00 http://www.vickigray.org/archives/000033.html Recently someone who had read my literature asked “I know what you’re against. Now tell me what you’re for.” Fair enough, and deserving of a thoughtful answer. For all Vallejo voters deserve to know who and what they’re voting for and are right to demand that the candidates state clearly where they stand on the issues of importance to the city. I have tried to do just that in countless one-on-one conversations, in letters-to-the-editor, in op-ed pieces, and through vehicles such as this. Sometimes, however, such attempts at clarity and specificity get lost in a cacophony of meaningless 30-second sound bites and buried beneath the mounds of trashy signs. And they certainly don’t get reported on the news pages of the Times-Herald. 33@http://www.vickigray.com/ Column 2005-10-09T13:29:41-08:00