New year, old thoughts. Some verbalized for the first time.
It won’t happen this year. In all likelihood, it probably won’t ever happen: But I’d like to see state Senator Juan Vargas beat Congressman Bob Filner in an election.
I don’t have any particular affinity for Vargas. I’m not fed up with Filner.
However the two have waged memorably snarky and at times heated campaign battles with Filner emerging victorious in all of them.
Vargas is Miss Congeniality to Filner’s Miss America. He is the other team that played against the champion in the World Cup Final (or Super Bowl if that’s your preferred football).
Watching Vargas beat Filner would be a historical event of minnow-esque proportions, but an event nonetheless.
But with Filner running for mayor of San Diego and nearing the end of his political career and Vargas trying to win the congressman’s available seat, that upset victory won’t ever happen.
Too bad. It would have been like watching the Marv Levy- era Buffalo Bills finally win the Lombardi Trophy.
Speaking of also-rans, I’d like to see the Spanos family take their Chargers elsewhere.
I don’t care enough about the game or the franchise to give either much thought except for a couple of hours some Sundays in the fall.
But the team’s never-ending quest for a stadium is a distraction that hardly seems tolerable.
Would life go on for San Diegans if the Bolts bolted? Given that we get along fine from January through September without them, I’d say yes.
However, if life ground to a halt and an identity was lost because a football team left the region, then this county is more provincial then I’d care to imagine.
I’d like to see corruption charges filed against politicians in areas other than the South Bay.
I’m not saying I don’t want the District Attorney’s Office sniffing out white collar crime wherever it can. You go where the clues take you, I guess.
But in four years the District Attorney’s Office has pursued cases first against Chula Vista Councilman Steve Castaneda and now the Sweetwater Sweethearts.
To an ignorant cynic like me that suggests:
1) Political corruption exists only in the South Bay or
2) Politicians and contractors in other parts of the county are too smart to get caught.
Neither scenario is comforting but what are you going to do other than wait and see how the rest of the year plays out?
