Nationalizing Measure CL

Get Out the Pig Grease, Dave, and Start Smearing

We think we've now finally seen the single most childish argument to vote for Measure CL. It appeared in Saturday's copy of the Claremont Courier:


What is with this seeming attempt to nationalize Measure CL? What Could This Mean?

The intellectual foundation, if you want to call it that, for this otherwise inexplicable injunction is helpfully provided in the same issue of the Courier by the redoubtable Dave Nemer. We are not going to reproduce his Piece (O.S.) here. We have standards. But suffice it to say its a bunch of paranoic drivel with schizoid overtones. It also shows a pathological need to "belong". It is a smear, done up in his trademark smarmy tone.

Where most people in this community would applaud diversity coming together, Nemer sees "strange bedfellows". He very quickly dismisses the other personalities publicly associated with No on CL, to focus in on the one who supports his strained argument. Here it is (to save you the trouble of reading his screed): No on CL is a Tea Party Plot.

It appears he expects the No on CL side to spend their "less than $4000 (total reported raised in Daily Bulletin, Friday, October 29) restating the Yes side's arguments. Hey--here's a thought--maybe the Yes side could spend some of its $130,000 from outside Special Interests to honestly address some of the cost and planning issues instead of sending out ten or twelve glossy city-wide mailers filled with nothing but Pablum--or maybe it's Ensure. These political mailers don't even tell the community this is a bond. Instead it's presented as some sort of "Magical Mystery Initiative" that will make Claremont schools all better if we just vote for it. Pay no attention to the men behind the curtain. (big contractors, architects, investment banks, and consultants)

Where did this stuff take root and grow? No place other than the airy-fairy precincts of Pomona College. Four of the five named signers of the ad above, David Menefee-Libey, Eleanor Brown, Dan O'Leary, and Len Seligman are on the Pomona College faculty. Wendy M.-L., spouse of David, is at Harvey Mudd College.

We hope Claremont is smarter than to be taken in by the middle-school social group politics that passes for informed discussion in Our Town. We are not sure.