Sifting through the wreckage

Queen Califia and her amazon warriors - Maynard Dixon, Frank Van Sloun

Mark Hopkins Hotel, San Francisco

It is known that to the right of the Indies there exists an island called California very near the terrestrial paradise; and peopled by black women among whom there was not a single man since they lived in the way of the Amazons. They had beautiful robust bodies, spirited courage and great strength. Their island was the most impregnable in the world with its cliffs and headlands and rocky coasts. Their weapons were all of gold . . . because in all the island there was no metal except gold. And there ruled over that island of California a queen of majestic proportions, more beautiful than all others, and in the very vigor of her womanhood. She was not petite, nor blond, nor golden-haired. She was large, and black as the ace of clubs. But the prejudice of color did not then exist even among the most brazen-faced or the most copper-headed. For, as you shall learn, she was reputed the most beautiful of women; and it was she, O Californias! who accomplished great deeds, she was valiant and courageous and ardent with a brave heart, and had ambitions to execute nobler actions than had been performed by any other ruler — Queen Califia.

Las sergas de Esplandián (The Adventures of Esplandián), written around 1510 by the Spanish writer Garci Rodríguez de Montalvo

I am back up in San Francisco, getting set up for the Hillsborough Antique Show in San Mateo. Somehow I pinched a nerve in my back driving up in the cramped rental van and I am pretty miserable. Add the election results and I am in real pain. Giants fans are positively giddy.

I guess it could have been worse for our country. Angle, O'Donnell, Buck, Whitman, Fiorina, Tancredo and Miller can now hopefully disappear, and maybe never be seen again on the public stage. Rand Paul is in and Boehner will be the new speaker. In Iowa, three Supreme Court Justices were removed for having issued rulings that were seen as favorable to gay people. So much for an independent judiciary.

Proposition 19, the Marijuana Initiative went down in smoke. I looked at the voting county by county and couldn't help notice that Mendocino, Lake and the other big bud growing counties were firmly against legalization. Maybe the status quo didn't want anyone cutting into their action.

Nice to see my home state stay blue in a country getting redder by the minute. Nice try Meg and Carly, we didn't buy it.

The markets are happy. Traditionally they have favored the electoral balance that occurs with a Democrat Executive and a Republican Congress. Perhaps we don't really want change in this country after all. Maybe having a split electorate helps ensure that things move along soberly and paralytically. The Republicans are claiming a mandate and have announced plans to gum up the works. Bipartisanship looks impossible in this heated climate with its attendant rhetoric. Republican moderates are now as rare as hen's teeth in the political arena.

Perhaps it was foolhardy for Obama to tackle something as far reaching as health care reform while we are in the grips of such a financial crisis. I would not want to bet on him winning another term. How does he make something positive out of the rest of his tenure in office?

I don't see any olive branches being offered by McConnell and the new victors. It is going to stay ugly. We are pretty evenly split as a people. We liberals may have to go back on defense. Fine. The Republicans may need our help someday enacting their agenda. You know the agenda: race baiting, polluting, anti gay, creationist, licking the corporate boot, anti abortion, anti worker, anti union, privatizing social security, doing away with medicare, anti consumer protection, erasing the barriers between church and state. I hope that we will remember their obstructionism in the future. Payback is always a bitch.