...And That's My Opinion©
By Sandy Goldman
The Alphabet and the Bar of Soap
Altho it never applied to girls because they never
used them, when I was a young boy there were certain words that were not
allowed on the playground. To do so was
to invite an immediate appointment with a bar of soap sternly administered by
the reigning adult. S__T was one of
those words. When I grew older and graduated from the playground to the park where,
with little supervision, we would use the F_ word. In college the forbidden word (or at least the thought) was
S_X. Later T_X was not be spoken
of—income, real estate or any other.
And now there are new
forbidden words and/or thoughts: the T.I.F. word for instance. For the uninitiated that means Tax Increment
Financing. It has become the new
naughty word, not to be spoken at least in Rogers Park. So what is wrong with
the T.I.F. word? Some say it leads to gentrification ((known as the G word).
Is that so bad? Well, some say
it has a negative influence on diversity (the D word). But no one wants to talk
about blight (the B word).
If the T.I.F. word trumps the D word and the results are
good, is that so bad? If T.I.F. and G equals Q (quality retail, restaurants and
business) is that so bad?
It seems that the
direction taken by the tired old radical philosophers of the 60’s, or their
present proponents (T.O.R/60) - is the preservation of the tired old sophomoric
philosophies of socialistic manipulation (S.M.) They seem to fear improvement
(the I-word) except in terms of T.O.R/60; chain stores (C.S) are bad, upscale
restaurants (U.R.) are bad. Let them be no more successful than past social
tinkers (Social Science 101).
History and
neighborhoods are replete with examples of market forces (M.F) taking
precedence over socialistic thought (S.T). It is simple Economics 101.
So if M.F trumps S.M
what the F is so bad?
T.I.F.-M.F—G—Q! Watch out! The S.M.s will surely be coming
after me with a bar of soap !!!
...And that's
my opinion.
And I'm Sandy
Goldman
Send me your e-mail address or those of others who would be
interested and I'll add them to my rapidly growing database of readers.
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E-mail Sandy: smgoldman@ameritech.net