Flechewounds

Category: Fiction

  • Proposition 99 – Yes on Yes

    Proposition 99 – Yes Means Yes

    Official Title and Summary

    Prop 99 YES MEANS YES

    • Requires that a Yes on a proposition means that the title of the Proposition has the force of law
    • Enables the Attorney General to enforce the law against prior propositions
    • Bars amendment to propositions to clarify them

    Arguments in Favor of Proposition 99

    DON’T VOTE ON TWEETS, VOTE YES ON YES MEANS YES. A small group of SPECIAL INTERESTS, TRIAL LAWYERS, INSURANCE COMPANIES and BIG CORPORATIONS want the voters of California to continue to be befuddled by poorly written, contradictory ballot propositions. Proposition 99 – the YES MEANS YES proposition changes that. A YES vote on Proposition 99 says NO to those SPECIAL INTERESTS, TRIAL LAWYERS, INSURANCE COMPANIES and BIG CORPORATIONS that want to expand the freedom of speech of California proposition writers, who work tirelessly at creating confusing proposition language.

    THE CURRENT RULES MUST BE CHANGED. Today, a proposition that is intended to say “NO” to something is often worded to require that you say “YES” to it, causing voter confusion. SPECIAL INTERESTS, TRIAL LAWYERS, INSURANCE COMPANIES and BIG CORPORATIONS pay thousands of dollars to proposition writers to come up with ambiguous titles that are no longer than the average tweet. Hidden behind these often unthreatening titles are propositions that CAN RAISE YOUR TAXES, CAN INFRINGE UPON YOUR PROPERTY RIGHTS and CAN FORCE YOU TO ACCEPT LIFESTYLES THAT ENDANGER YOU AND YOUR FAMILY.

    The SPECIAL INTERESTS fighting YES MEANS YES don’t care about YOUR CHILDREN, YOUR PROPERTY OR YOUR HEALTH.

    VOTING YES ON YES MEANS YES ends all of that. A YES VOTE ON YES MEANS YES brings clarity to the California Proposition process. Don’t say no to yes, SAY YES TO YES MEANS YES.

    Ashley Carbunkle President, California Association of Idiots

    Mike Johanson Officer (Retired), Donald Trump Taxpayer Association

    Rebuttal to Argument in Favor of Proposition 99

    Don’t let them fool you. SPECIAL INTERESTS, TRIAL LAWYERS, INSURANCE COMPANIES and BIG OIL COMPANIES want to limit your ability to PROTECT THE ENVIRONMENT, PROTECT YOUR FAMILY AND PROTECT YOUR PROPERTY. They want to INFRINGE upon the FREE SPEECH of Californians.

    Proposition 99 is misleadingly titled as “Yes Means Yes.” In fact, a vote for Proposition 99 is a NO vote to freedom of speech and your Constitutional Rights.

    DON’T GIVE THE SPECIAL INTERESTS ANOTHER TOOL to take money and property from you. VOTE NO ON PROPOSITION 99.

    A NO VOTE SAYS YES TO YOUR FREEDOM! SAY NO TO YES MEANS YES.

    Zoe Avila-Thomas President, California Proposal Writers Association

    Boris Yevchenko Professor of Linguistics, University of LaVerne and Shirley.

    Argument Against Proposition 99

    A YES VOTE ON YES MEANS YES MEANS NO to OUR SCHOOLS, OUR HOSPITALS, OUR VETERANS AND OUR CHILDREN.

    STOP SPECIAL INTERESTS, TRIAL LAWYERS, INSURANCE COMPANIES and OIL COMPANIES from taking away your RIGHT TO FREE SPEECH. VOTE NO ON YES MEANS YES.

    Right now, you are free to write and name a proposition as you see fit. Then, you can get signatures and put your proposition on a state-wide ballot and have it become law. Proposition 99 infringes on this right.

    Proposition 99 is a dangerous, wasteful proposition that will RAISE YOUR TAXES without giving one cent to SCHOOLS, HOSPITALS or THE ENVIRONMENT. Proposition 99 is the worst kind of STEALTH PROPOSITION AND MUST BE DEFEATED.

    Lets face it, poorly informed voters are the only ones confused by “confusingly” worded propositions. Well informed voters learn what their vote means and know what they’re doing. Don’t hand even more power to LOW INFORMATION VOTERS.

    Think about it, had Proposition 99 been the law before 2012, gays would have had even more years to pervert the minds of children through their sham marriages. Illegal immigrants would have been able to marry their way to green cards through homosexual marriage and even more of these people would be taking food stamps, clogging our schools and abusing our health care system.

    By carefully wording propositions, we can avoid this. People can draft propositions that will garner the blind support of LOW INFORMATION voters by simply structuring and naming it in a certain way. DON’T LET THE SPECIAL INTERESTS TAKE THIS RIGHT FROM YOU.

    VOTE NO ON PROPOSITION 99. PROTECT YOUR RIGHT TO SAY YES – VOTE NO ON YES MEANS YES.

    Zoe Avila-Thomas President, California Proposal Writers Association

    Boris Yevchenko Professor of Linguistics, University of LaVerne and Shirley.

    Rebuttal to Argument Against Proposition 99

    DON’T LET THEM SCARE YOU AGAIN.

    THE SPECIAL INTERESTS, TRIAL LAWYERS, INSURANCE COMPANIES and BIG CORPORATIONS are at it again, trying to convince you that it is important for NO to mean YES and YES to mean NO. They are continuing to try to use the “freedom of speech” as an argument to TAKE AWAY YOUR RIGHTS, ALLOW ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS INTO THIS COUNTRY, AND WASTE YOUR MONEY.

    YES MEANS YES means simply YES MEANS YES. No longer will Californians be faced with a choice of YES meaning NO, or NO meaning YES. It forces proposition writers to make these things clear so that any registered voter, regardless of education, income or language, can VOTE YES when they mean YES.

    SAY NO TO SPECIAL INTERESTS – SAY YES TO OUR CHILDREN, OUR FAMILIES AND OUR HEALTH. SAY YES TO YES MEANS YES.

    Ashley Carbunkle President, California Association of Idiots

    Mike Johanson Officer (Retired), Donald Trump Taxpayer Association

  • The Apartment

    The Apartment

    Sandra brought the one of the last small boxes upstairs. We had finally done it, finally after three years of dating, of trying to figure out where we left this or that — at my place or hers — we were going to be in the same place, waking up in the same bed, every day. Just a little more furniture and a few more boxes to go.

    As soon as my head finished with the words “every day,” a knot formed in my stomach. In the rush to move together, to cement our relationship, I had forgotten how much I cherished those days, usually once or twice a month, where I was able to wake, alone, without prompting from an alarm clock or another being with an ever-so-slightly different biological clock.

    Sandra was a great woman to be with, this relationship never seemed to be a mistake, and the desire to be apart was a desire to be alone, no more. And now, being alone, here in Los Angeles, would be a rare thing.

    Sandra saw the concern in my forehead and asked “are you OK?” At that moment, as if on cue, a large, brown cockroach ran from the baseboard to the center of the room. I jumped back.

    Sandra, originally from New York, took no mercy on me or the roach, launching her left sneaker onto the roach quickly and effectively. An audible crunch, leaving a three inch circle of roach juice on her shoe and the floor. Yuck.

    “You just killed the welcoming committee” I said jokingly. “In this neighborhood, they don’t bring the new neighbor a pie, they take it from them… one bite at a time.”

    Sandra’s eyes followed the wall. As quick as a cat, she moved. Crunch, splat and another circle of roach juice. I opened my computer and looked to see if I could find the landlord’s number. I dialed, panicking as every dark spot in the apartment seemed to move. The call went to voice mail.

    “Mr. Landry? This is Mike Rafael. We seem to have a problem here with roaches. Please call me at 323-555-1212 when you get this.”

    Crack, splat, crack, splat. Sandra had killed another four in the last minute. They started appearing though cracks in the floor — coming up from nearly everywhere. Hundreds, no thousands of them.

    Crack, splat. Crack, splat. Crack, splat.

    I picked up two of the most valuable boxes to put back into the van. After I put them in the truck bed, ten huge, brown, disgusting roaches crawled out of the bottom box. They scurried into the front of the truck. There was no stopping them.

    Sandra followed with a couple of clothing boxes. She dropped them in the van and one popped open. Another twenty or so jumped out of the box and scurried to the front.

    “Let’s get out of here” I said. Sandra nodded and we went over to her Mazda and hopped in. No roaches! We pulled away, the boxes sitting in the wide open van as we pulled the U-ey. At the first stop light, Sandra pulled off her shoes and tossed them into the overgrown weeds next to the sidewalk. We sped off, driving as fast as we could — to the PCH, then up toward Oxnard. Not a roach to be found.

    Back at the apartment, Mr. Landry walked around the truck carrying a soggy, full grocery bag and smiling. Then he went inside and looked at the open boxes. As soon as he entered, the tide of roaches scurried into the cracks, like water flowing down a storm drain. He phone beeped, the deposit had cleared. “Thanks, guys! You did an exceptional job today” tossing the grocery bag, full of half rotting food, into the apartment below. He picked up a pretty new iPod, popped the earphones in, and pressed play, dancing out of the apartment to the sounds of another triumph.

  • Brothers

    Michael was always the stronger of us, even though I was a year older. Not quite Irish twins, but almost. As soon as he could walk, he pretty much got his way around the house. A toy? His. The biggest ear of corn? His. And there was never a question about who rode shotgun. Either he beat me out of it, or mom and dad put him in the back seat. He was a master at concealing his rather tyrannical nature from them – they thought we got along swimmingly.

    I was 43 years old when I got the call. It was Mirasol. “Michael has kidney disease and needs a new kidney.” At that point, I hadn’t spoken to Michael in about 5 years — since we read dad’s will. After growing up with such a tyrant, I was always a little reluctant to confront the bully, let alone get terribly engrossed in his life. Lets just say we grew apart.

    I had met Mirasol once before the wedding, at the annual family Passover meal that my ex-wife and I used to host. Michael brought Mirasol to dinner. She certainly was cute, had one of those delightful Cuban accents, and seemed pretty smart. But my brother-in-law, Wally, who still seemed to be stuck in the 60’s, pretty much ended all conversation when he asked whether Michael thought it was a good idea to marry the domestic help. That night, that dinner, was the beginning of the end of my marriage.

    Wally was such an asshole and for a long time I wondered how Tracy avoided that trap. But she could only avoid herself for so long, and the last three years of our marriage were a series of sharp, angry periods interspersed with time away from each other. She was Wally’s sister, and frankly, I’m glad the divorce swept lots of that away. Every family has a black sheep, and I hoped that Wally was our representative to their society, but in reality, I was the oddball of this bunch.

    Anyhow, Mirasol was asking if I could go get tested to see if I was a match for Michael. I hesitated for a second – she heard that and started welling up. I relented.

    Turns out that Michael should have played the lottery that day – my tests came down as a 95% match. More than simply “compatible.” There was a chance that I could save my brother’s life.

    The transplant surgery went well for both of us, I was at work in two days, and Michael got out a week later. For a while, we talked every day, then three times a week, then every Sunday… It finally petered out and we went back to living our parallel lives.

    About two years later, I find Mirasol on the other end of the telephone again, this time crying. “Michael’s dead” she said. It hit me like a rock. My brother – my younger brother – the one with my kidney in him – has passed. I went to the funeral, not sure if I was saying goodbye to Michael or to my kidney… as I now had only one.

    Now, ten years after that first call, I find myself in the hospital, ill with advanced kidney disease. Unlike Michael, I have no one backing me up. I’m on the transplant list, but unlike Michael, I don’t have a brother to cover for me. And it turns out that, while our organs matched each other, our blood type is very rare.

    As my remaining kidney fails and the dialysis machine keeps me from poisoning myself too quickly I realize that, once again, Michael got the last laugh again. I guess I’ll see him again soon.