I think that my bullshit tolerance for Marin County, CA, has about reached critical mass. Somehow, it never fails; when I start spending enough time in any given community, I will find a reason to hate it, and hate it vehemently. In the nuclear wasteland I grew up in, there were any number of things to cheese me off, most revolving around rampant, head-up-ass conservatism and there being too little to do. In college, it was rampant, head-up-ass liberalism and Entitlement Syndrome, while in Southern Oregon it was more conservatism - now with increased head-up-ass-ness - coupled with weird, post-menopausal New Agey thinking and a roving cadre of cannibalistic senior citizens who had a bad habit of eyeing me hungrily every so often. But in Marin, there's something far more insidious afoot. Let me fill you in a little. Marin, proud home of American Taliban John Walker Lindh, is not a poor place, nor is it conservative. Far from it. Liberalism (ditzy liberalism, at that) is the order of the day, as the place was settled largely by cast-offs from the Haight-Ashbury movement , and the population seems to consist mostly of middle-aged former hippies, most of whom have no shortage of cashola. Another important Marin fact: Land is at a premium here, and how. A small ranch house - one which might be considered lower-middle-class housing just about anywhere else - can easily command a price of $400,000-$1,000,000, depending on its location. $1,200 for a studio apartment is considered "low rent." A low-income salary for a family of four is about $64,000 per year. Which might sound pretty good, except that the defining factor is cost of living, and most of the jobs around here do not compensate for cost of living. No, most jobs pay about what they would anywhere else, particularly the working class ones. So most respectable, working- or middle-class jobs will put you solidly in the low-income bracket. As a result, an increasing number of working- and middle-class individuals can't afford to live where they work and need to commute in, whether they be teachers, police officers, firemen, engineers, or me. There has been a movement of late to alleviate the problem by building lower-cost housing units for those who can't afford $2,000 rent. However, it has been hampered at every turn by squalling, not-in-my-backyard "liberals" who harp on endlessly about their "quality of life" and how they don't want to "erode the charm" of the county's "open-space areas" by allowing non-rich people to live there. But wait, there's more! Few places micro-manage property development like Marin does. Want to build an addition to your house? You'll need an environmental impact report, and you'll also need to jump through a few other bureaucratic hoops designed to discourage you. And if you can get that, well, then the proposal will go before the City Council, where they will ask local residents to weigh in on the issue. This might not be so bad, except that these measures are being used to hold up any progress toward the construction of affordable housing. Whenever a site is chosen for development - like, say, property belonging to a Catholic boys' school - local environmentalists pour out in droves to protest, saying that construction and subsequent habitation of the area will have grave effects on the local flora and fauna. Other arguments simply revolve around the statement, "I like driving by it." Which is fine, but there's no place else to build, and I don't see these self-professed Champions of the Common Folk volunteering that their luxury condos be bulldozed instead. Perhaps I could take their claims of environmental concern more seriously if it weren't for the following: 1. There are twice as many cars as there are people in Marin, and 2. Most of those "cars" are gas-guzzling SUVs, which are consistently driven by stupid assholes who drive, predictably enough, like stupid assholes. And finally, 3. This is the only place in America, or the world for that matter, where environmentalists would actually oppose a light-rail project. Apparently they think it would encourage more people to live in the county. Ah-ha, now we're getting somewhere. City Hall is complacent on the issue; the town of Corte Madera, for example, has been sued many times over the past 10 years for failing to come up with a plan for affordable housing, and the state is beginning to take action. Still the council sits on its collective fat white ass, shrugging its shoulders and saying, "Look, it's not like we hate poor people..." My vocabulary fails to come up with a term or phrase that adequately relates the frustration I feel while reading about this issue every day, so I'll simply resort to the following: RRRRGAAAAAAAAGGGGHH! *ripping noises* FUCK FUCK BLOODY FUCK BASTARDS FUCK! STINKING ELITIST HONKY PIGFUCKERS! FUCK! I HOPE YOU CRASH YOUR SUVS INTO YOUR LUXURY CONDOS AND YOU ALL DIE IN A BIG FIREBALL, AND THE FIREFIGHTERS CAN'T SAVE YOU BECAUSE THEY HAVE TO COMMUTE IN FROM OAKLAND! YOU HEAR ME!? GRRRRGH! RRRRRRRGGGHHH!! I feel better now.