Homeless hippy wins SD mayoral debate

[GhostMod 5000]

| "In the end, the largest applause of the first full mayoral debate of the election season wasn't won by Mayor Jerry Sanders or businessman Steve Francis. It was incited by the 25-year-old in a white t-shirt sitting between them, the guy who said he lives off of about $6,000 a year and boasts a head of robust dreadlocks that fall down nearly to his waist."

www.voiceofsandiego.org/articles/2008/04/04/news/02debate040408.txt

Also, from dude's MySpace:

I...
... live in a van
... have no steady job
... don't bath every day
... have an Apple laptop
... drink alcohol occasionally
... smoke cannabis frequently
... drink coffee nearly every day
... spend a lot of time at coffee shops
... don't want monogamous relationships
... am an Anarchist, Atheist, Revolutionary
... plan on building a political t-shirt business
... like to have passionate esoteric discussions
... plan on running for Mayor of San Diego in 2008


Now, all of you guys bitching and moaning about unimportant shit (btr), stop chasing Red Herrings and deal with the real threat to America!

[NOTTHOR]

Thanks for the info ghost. This is goddamn scary people. These hippies will be the end of the long run of prosperity that our country has had. "Man, we don't want a football team, man." Fucking hippy. Hippies don't understand why you would bring in things like football teams because they don't have any goddamn money, so they can't comprehend how people coming to town to see a ball game enhance the local economy.

[GhostMod 5000]

Are you just afraid to admit that the hippy has a point; state welfare for professional sports is a pretty stupid practice. Those lefty wackos at the brookings Institute seem to side with dreads boy.

we and 15 collaborators examine the local economic development argument from all angles: case studies of the effect of specific facilities, as well as comparisons among cities and even neighborhoods that have and have not sunk hundreds of millions of dollars into sports development. In every case, the conclusions are the same. A new sports facility has an extremely small (perhaps even negative) effect on overall economic activity and employment. No recent facility appears to have earned anything approaching a reasonable return on investment. No recent facility has been self-financing in terms of its impact on net tax revenues. Regardless of whether the unit of analysis is a local neighborhood, a city, or an entire metropolitan area, the economic benefits of sports facilities are de minimus.

www.brookings.edu/articles/1997/summer_taxes_noll.aspx

[NOTTHOR]

Oh look at me, I can post a decade old story written by a bunch of sports writing eggheads. I know that you don't like sports and the like, but when a professional sports team is really good, there is a huge amount of buzz generated in town for the team. People go out and buy stuff related to the team. People go to games. People pay $7 for a beer.

Since those guys are so certain of the deminimus impact of sports teams, I am at a loss as to why Oakland sought to condemn the Raiders. I know that the libs don't respect private property rights in the least, but come on.

There are four items that significantly differentiate America's great cities from armpits like Crapenport and Marshalltown: (1) the arts, (2) sports franchises, (3) shopping and (4) restaurants. State and local level industrial policy that bolsters the success of any of those 4 items creates an atmosphere in a city that makes it a destination. I see it every weekend as fatasses from several surrounding states converge on my neighborhood and walk 5 wide at a snail's pace with their Cubs or Bears jerseys and mandatory Cubs lid on backwards.

[GhostMod 5000]

So in other words, you are right Ghost, so I will now insult people to cover my ass. Nice.

[NOTTHOR]

Keeping a sports team in a town is not a stupid practice. Almost every weekend I see tons of tourists rolling to sporting events in Chicago. They are paying exhorbitant hotel taxes and sales taxes and parking taxes as well as spending money in the local economy. They sell nearly twice as many baseball tickets in the City of Chicago as there are people living in the whole state of Iowa. I know that you'd rather sit at home and watch the game on your 12 inch black and white because it's cool not to have a real TV, but 6 million paid fans attending ball games in a season has a huge positive impact on the local economy no matter what the anti-sports lobby leads you to believe.

Let me guess, you are just pissed off because you can't afford season tickets for the Hawks and so now you are on anti-renovation/new stadium rant.

With PSLs, suites and high priced tickets, parking and concessions, I find it very suspect when someone says that facilities aren't making a reasonable return.

[GhostMod 5000]

Good one, call me poor, maybe that will piss me off.

But back to reality. The majority of people going to Cubs games, I am only speculating here, but I would gather 90-95%, do not come in for the weekend to watch baseball. Most of the people filling the 42,000 seats at Wrigley are some of the 8 million who live within a short drive of the stadium. Even when I go to Cubs games, I don't stay overnight.

And sorry, but I am going to trust the findings of the Brookings institute and the FED, both of which have done studies on the economic impact of professional sports teams, and have found that the beneifts are very small. But why should I listen to real economists when I have a know it all dbag lawyer with antecdotal experience in Chicago tell me what to think?

[NOTTHOR]

If towns want to collude to get rid of the subsidies, good for them, but until they do, "market" for getting a sports team will be some help in financing a stadium. Well run and well developed facilities will finance themselves. Listen to the Fed, they'll tell you how inflation is less than .5%. If they have such a problem with municipalities financing stadiums, they should push for a rewrite of the tax code so they can't float tax exempt bonds to do so.

Municipalities do a careful cost-benefit analysis before helping to finance a stadium and they conclude that the net impact on the town justifies the expense. Even if it's an economic wash, who the hell gives a shit? The non-economic benefits of a team are high. It's the same argument as why we partially subsidize the arts, which I also have no problem with.

[mattahawk]

deadhead4life said:

Good one, call me poor, maybe that will piss me off.

But back to reality. The majority of people going to Cubs games, I am only speculating here, but I would gather 90-95%, do not come in for the weekend to watch baseball. Most of the people filling the 42,000 seats at Wrigley are some of the 8 million who live within a short drive of the stadium. Even when I go to Cubs games, I don't stay overnight.

And sorry, but I am going to trust the findings of the Brookings institute and the FED, both of which have done studies on the economic impact of professional sports teams, and have found that the beneifts are very small. But why should I listen to real economists when I have a know it all dbag lawyer with antecdotal experience in Chicago tell me what to think?

Better to be a dbag lawyer than a teacher who can't spell.

[GhostMod 5000]

I think you are finally starting to get it. The fed di discover that while economic impact is negligable, social impact is higher. People are willing to pay more property taxes to live in an NFL city.

However, like the Brookings guys noted, is investing $600 million in the Chragers the smartest way to spend that $600 million? It will probably have some small benefits, but is there a wiser way to spend it.

Let us look at Indianapolis and the new Lucas Oil Stadium they are buiolding for the Colts. The Colts are chipping in $100 million in the expenses, leaving $575 million to the city and the State of Indiana.

Now I think about the news last week about high school graduation rates. In Indianapolis, only 30% of kids graduate high school.

Now I am not saying that throwing a bunch of money at schools would magically solve anything, but don't you think that it does make our society look just a teensy bit jaded when we are willing to invest so much money on sports but not on education?

Now I will play hypothetical economist guy, but do you think the city of Indianapolis would benefit economically more from speding 500 million on a football stadium that will be used 20 times a year, or a joint investment in education, law enforcement, infrastructure development and urban renewal? I don't know to be honest, but I know what seems to make the most sense. But I also know what most people in Indianapolis would rather have.

[GhostMod 5000]

mattahawk said:

deadhead4life said:

Good one, call me poor, maybe that will piss me off.

But back to reality. The majority of people going to Cubs games, I am only speculating here, but I would gather 90-95%, do not come in for the weekend to watch baseball. Most of the people filling the 42,000 seats at Wrigley are some of the 8 million who live within a short drive of the stadium. Even when I go to Cubs games, I don't stay overnight.

And sorry, but I am going to trust the findings of the Brookings institute and the FED, both of which have done studies on the economic impact of professional sports teams, and have found that the beneifts are very small. But why should I listen to real economists when I have a know it all dbag lawyer with antecdotal experience in Chicago tell me what to think?

Better to be a dbag lawyer than a teacher who can't spell.

I think it is more like a teacher who can't type

[NOTTHOR]

Indianapolis has a cottage industry in sports toursim. They have a NASCAR race, the Indy 500, the Big Ten Tourney, frequently host the NCAA tourney, etc. They know a thing or two about how to bring in out of town cash with their dome. The stadium will probably be used for a bunch of crap other than the Colts, like NCAA tourney games, concerts, etc. World class facilities help attract sports tourism, so they are probably making a good investment. If only 30% of the kids there graduate from high school, they better push hard to get an MLB team, too. Beer Man is a respectable occupation that does not require a high school degree.

Indy is like a big Neck Moines, but my guess is that if Neck Moines spent that kind of cash trying to get a team, it would fall flat on its face because Neck Moines sucks even worse than Indy and no one will want to visit no matter how nice the stadium is.

[Chuck Storm]

bigtimeralph said:

If towns want to collude to get rid of the subsidies, good for them, but until they do, "market" for getting a sports team will be some help in financing a stadium. Well run and well developed facilities will finance themselves. Listen to the Fed, they'll tell you how inflation is less than .5%. If they have such a problem with municipalities financing stadiums, they should push for a rewrite of the tax code so they can't float tax exempt bonds to do so.

Municipalities do a careful cost-benefit analysis before helping to finance a stadium and they conclude that the net impact on the town justifies the expense. Even if it's an economic wash, who the hell gives a shit? The non-economic benefits of a team are high. It's the same argument as why we partially subsidize the arts, which I also have no problem with.

1. It's only "market" because that's what the monopolistic sports leagues have set it at.

2. Municipalities do a careful cost-benefit analysis and determine that the number of votes they'll get by keeping a team is greater than the number of votes they'll lose by pouring more taxpayer dollars down the toilet.

3. Even if the non-economic benefits of sports teams are high, who cares? Those teams would exist regardless of whether stadiums were being replaced every 20 years to further line the pockets of million athletes and billionaire owners.

4. Towns can't collude because they're in a classic prisoners dilemma. Leaving aside the fact they don't know each other, there's always going to be an incentive to cheat.

I know that you and your big government liberal allies love the millions of dollars in graft and hundreds of union jobs that building new stadiums produces, but those of us stuck with the tax burden don't particularly care for it.

[NOTTHOR]

Dude - you live in the suburbs. Your share of the tax burden is negligible. Go ahead and start a class war against Reinsdorf. Let's see who wins, you and your liberal anti-sports ilk or Mr. Reinsdorf. The poors who drive their 83 Tercels in the fast lane on the Ike will still be there and you'll still be pissed off. You're also pissed off because the Illini won't play a football game at Soldier, but when they get floated the tax beneifts of a renovation, you're the first one draped in the white flag of surrender talking about how awesome Ron Guenther is for renovating Memorial Stadium. You're really salty about that Soldier rebuff though. They're playing in Detroit and Saint Louis, but pissing all over the town with the most Illini fans. So don't blame those of us who want to make sure there are attractions in Chicago because Ron Guenther is a fuckstick. Blame yourself. Last time I checked, a helluva lot of people come into Chicago from shitty towns like Lisle to watch sports, but there sure isn't a reverse trend going on.

I go watch all of Chicago's sports teams and think that people like you should have to subsidize my ticket price through gas taxes, parking taxes and tolls. I don't want the Sox to move to Albuquerque like the 'topes did.

Bince you have a problem with the big mean monopolistic sports leagues, you should get some cash together and take on the NFL. The XFL and USFL had some great business models that you could copy.

[Chuck Storm]

bigtimeralph said:

Bince you have a problem with the big mean monopolistic sports leagues, you should get some cash together and take on the NFL. The XFL and USFL had some great business models that you could copy.

Not surprising that a guy that doesn't understand simple economics would make this statement. There's a reason we have laws that regulate monopoly businesses in this country.

Sure, the government could have just said "get some cash together and take on Exelon", but that ignores the harsh reality that there are industries where monopolies are going to exist.

US sports leagues are going to be effective monopolies. As such, they're ability to bilk taxpayers for millions of dollars should be limited.

[NOTTHOR]

Thank you for pointing out that there are laws that regulate monopolies. Given the incentives that Congress has built into the laws for private enforcement actions, you should go after those big bad monopolies that you hate so much. You can move back to your birth state, California, and file suit against all the big mean sports leagues ('cept the MLB). You can propose your judicial activism all day and all night and convince the 9th Circuit that monopolies are bad and that you and your feminist cronies hate sports because so many women get battered on Super Bowl Sunday. You will probably win a billion dollars and break up the sports leagues.

As ghost said above "People are willing to pay more property tax to live in an NFL city." You live in the shitty western 'burbs, outside the tax zone of the Chicago sports teams. Yet I vaguely remember multiple occasions of you and me tossing back cold ones whilst watching games in the box at the United Center, Comiskey and Wrigley, boxes which were likely partially funded by a little help from Cook County and Chicago taxpayers. I think the marginal $3 a year more I pay in taxes to support these boxes is more than paid for on my personal income statement, as I don't have to pay for beer in the box and the box keeps me from having to mingle with the poors.

Given the fact that most redblooded meat eating non-leftist thinking Americans like to have various pro sports teams to pull for, the taxpayers/voters in municipalities that are planning big facilities can vote for ultra-leftists like Noam Chomsky who will abolish all sports in America if that is what they want. It's clearly what you want autochomsky.

You and your white flag waving liberal allies don't understand concepts like nationalism, so the idea of team spirit is foreign, too.