Friends of Blake Harold, killed last week in a motorcycle accident, hold a car wash Saturday in San Gabriel to raise money for his funeral.

The shocking news came in waves. First, my son called and said Blake died. Then my other son had it on his Facebook. My wife and I were shocked.

Blake Harold, 20, was killed on March 12 when a man driving a Toyota Matrix crashed into the motorcycle he was riding at Emperor Avenue and Rosemead Boulevard in Temple City. Blake died at the scene of the crash. No one else was hurt.

Blake graduated from Temple City High School in 2008 with my older son and played on the freshmen and sophomore basketball teams with both my sons at Temple City High School. He was always playing basketball at Temple City's Live Oak Park as well.

The staff at Temple City High School raised money this past week, led by Janet Smith, PTA president. We wanted to help Kimberly, Blake's mom, with the funeral costs so we went down to the Carl's Jr. with our cars and also made a donation. I remember Kim Harold working sometimes two jobs to help make ends meet and raise her three sons. I would often give Blake and her other basketball-playing son Steven a ride in my car during summer basketball game tournaments.

To help out Kimberly, donations can be sent to: Kimberly Harold, 5716 Sultana No. 7, Temple City, CA., 91780.

Services for Blake are Thursday in Los Angeles.

This morning's 4.4-shaker literally jolted me upright from a deep sleep. It was a quick, hard shove that lasted only 10 or 15 seconds. Thank God. It opened cabinet doors in my garage, on the china cabinet, and knocked over some photographs. But as far as I coould tell, we had no damage.

I live in Temple City, which you don't normally associate with Whittier. But anything along the "Whittier Narrows" fault or any movement underground "just east of Los Angeles" affects many, many of us here in the San Gabriel Valley and beyond. The Associated Press reported people feeling this morning's quake from San Bernardino County to Santa Monica. Someone felt it in Oceanside, I read on a blog.

So, calling it a "Whittier" or as the TV local news did right after it hit, a "Pico Rivera" quake is misleading.

As evidence, I remember the 1987 Whittier Narrows Earthquake which hit on Oct. 1, 1987 with a strength of a 5.9 magnitude. I was living in Monrovia and was exercising on our hard wood floors of our 1924 bungalow. That shook like the dickens. That quake, albeit much stronger, caused $350 million in damage, some of that in Pasadena and Montebello area, and the temblor killed eight people. A woman died from a collapsing parking structure at Cal State Los Angeles. A utility worker near Muir Peak in the San Gabriel Mountains was crushed to death by rubble. Those are both pretty far from Whittier.

So, this Southern California quake was a wake-up call for all of us, not just those in Whittier or Pico Rivera.

Today, at 5:30 p.m., a moderate Republican group that calls itself "the New Majority" will be hosting a debate in Costa Mesa between GOP gubernatorial candidates Meg Whitman and Steve Poizner.

That's the good news.

However, since the recent Steve Poizner TV ads, in which he uses the words "illegal aliens" by declaring war on the undocumented, he wants to make this match-up a re-run of that old "Saturday Night Live" sketch featuring Billy Crystal as the "you-rook-mahvelous" character. In the 1982 sketch, David Susskind host the battle between Fernando Lamas or Ricardo Montalban and he asks: Who is more macho?

Now, Poizner and Whitman are arguing who is tougher (more macho) on the issue of illegal immigrants. In his ads, Poizner says he will "save the state billions by cutting taxpayer-funded benefits to illegal aliens." He also told the press he would "yank illegal immigrants from schools" and even send the "CHP to the border" to enforce illegal immigration.

Memo to the desperate Steve Poizner: Wasn't this tried under Prop. 187, which was thrown out by the courts?

Also, doesn't this kind of illegal immigrant bashing hurt Republicans who run for state office? That was what hurt Gov. Pete Wilson when he tried to run for re-election. It also turned numerous GOP voters against Republican candidates in almost every statewide election in California since then.

But this is a desperate Poizner trying to appeal to conservatives who will vote in a Republican primary. Even if he wins the primary (he is 30 points behind Whitman in the polls), it will be tough sledding to win a statewide race after taking this kind of stand.

Even most Republican lawmakers disagree with this hate-filled position.

Hector Barajas, the former state Republican Party communications director who now is working for Whitman, and was a frequent contributor to the SGVN opinion pages, made this statement: "To introduce himself in this way, by trying to divide and attack our community, marks the end of the Poizner campaign."

Ouch.

I would hate to see what those Republican-supporting businessmen and businesswomen (those who own restaurants, or farms, agriculture, etc.) think of Poizner's approach to illegal immigration.

They might not think he was so macho.

Joe wrote today, Friday, March 12:
Technology has changed the way we communicate. While we bury ourselves in a computer writing or researching, listening to talk radio in the background satisfies our need to be part of a political or economic conversation without moving our lips. Substantive talk is most rewarding, but its tough to do in a limited social setting as we always seem to be in a hurry to get a task accomplished before the next.

I received my degree in social sciences so I'm curious how people act and relate to others but I must admit that I've become more introspective and would rather hike in the local mountains at a quick pace and contemplate the thoughts of the day.

I was playing full court basketball at a local gym until a few years ago when I finally surrendered to the pain. I was playing with a lot of guys in their 20's & 30's but we didn't even engage in small talk. It was all about playing on a winning team so you could play again. They tolerated playing with a guy who passed the mid-century mark which was good enough for me as we perspired and yelled.

Cell phones allow us to make quick conversations through speech or text. Computers allow us to send our thoughts electronically sans verbalization.
Will substantive talk between people become as passe' as sending a letter through the post office? With all the corporate money given the okay by the Supreme Court to flood political campaigns, can substantive talk survive the machinations of the corporatists?

Are we doomed to repeat slogans through small talk from sound bites shaped by the economic royalists as warned by FDR?
-Joe Ruiz

Here's what I wrote:
'HI, can you believe that rain? It's like a monsoon out there."
"No, thank you. I don't like red-bean paste. It doesn't do it for me."
"I've been thinking a lot these days about joy. What is it and how do you get it? You ever wonder about that?"

The first two are conversation starters I've actually spoken to fellow humans. It's safe to call these examples of small talk.
The third is one I've said in my mind but never actually tried on someone, let alone a stranger or an acquaintance. Though I did bring up the topic of "joy" with a close friend on the phone back in December and also in my family Christmas letter. The latter is an example of what social scientists call "substantive talk."

Don't worry. There won't be a quiz at the end of this column. But there will be a question: What kind of talk do you prefer? Small talk or substantive talk? Why?

That's the same question researchers at the University of Arizona wanted to know. They hooked up 79 subjects with a hidden mic that recorded conversation snippets every 12.5 minutes for four days. Then they assessed their well-being by talking to their friends and learning how they spent their time, etc. Researchers concluded the happiest people in the study engaged in small talk one-third less often than the unhappiest subjects. Happy people have twice as many substantive conversations as unhappy people. Of course, this is part of a hypothesis that says connectivity with others -- deeper friendships -- makes people happier.

I am smiling right now. Because I am not a lover of small talk. I would much rather talk to people about solving the state budget crisis, wondering if they'd pay more taxes to save teacher jobs, or how they keep up an exercise routine without getting bored.

My poor grade in Small Talk 101 doesn't help me meet people. I admit it. That's why Brooklyn-based communications expert Don Gabor says small talk is indeed important because it is a gateway to "substantive conversations."

I disagree. I've been having small talk with people -- people I call friends -- for years. And it doesn't push my happiness buttons. I'd much rather ask them what their view of God is, or what do they consider the best qualities in a mate, or would they like to go hiking and talk about nature?

I joined the West San Gabriel Valley YMCA because it is the only gym I can stand going to. I abhor those high-pressure "health clubs" with their double-talking salesman and meat-market atmospheres.

Last week, while shooting hoops because I suddenly became bored with the treadmill, I saw the staffer (he's the guy with arms like tree trunks) chatting with a member. The young man was talking about his girlfriend problems. From my healthy bit of eavesdropping, I could tell their conversation went beyond small talk.

Well done, I thought. Then I asked my wife, Karen, about it. She said guys find a gym a safe place to hang out in and talk. It used to be the barbershop. And in my Temple City neighborhood, the donut shop, where a group of older men would shoot the breeze over a maple bar and a cup of hot coffee. Often, I was tempted to go up to them and ask: Do you enjoy small talk or more substantive discussions? I now ask you the same question. Be honest.

If us guys stick to superficial topics like the weather and sports, is it because we aren't happy?

Hmmm ... How about those Angels. The Lakers really need to get their act together. You think it will finally be warmer this weekend?

.....
I also got an email from Bill Bell, the former editor of the Whittier Daily News who always loved to write columns (still does) by talking to people in Uptown Whittier about substantive topics.
Here's to some deeper conversations this weekend. Cheers!

I've got a local chip on my shoulder the size of Mount Wilson. When I get all riled up as I did this past weekend, it can be a parochial whine that resembles a full case of sour grapes.

But I don't care if people call me a homer. Because this is where I've lived for nearly 30 years, where I bought my first home, where I've raised my children, where I've worked as an indefatigable advocate.

While visiting the Bay Area last weekend, I stumbled upon a National Park Service park in the middle of the city called the San Francisco Maritime National Park. It was closed for renovation during prior visits but since 2008 has blossomed under the U.S. National Park Service's tutelage.

Again, as someone who enjoys biking along our San Gabriel River, hiking the trails of our foothills and majestic San Gabriel Mountains, the parallels between the NPS restoration there and our dream of a coordinated, restored river and mountains "park" here became as clear to me as the view of the bay after the fog lifted.

Our rivers, our mountains, our trails, even nearby county parks (Schabarum Park, Whittier Narrows Recreation Area) are precious resources. And while access and trails have improved, they are still a hodgepodge of open space without any true connecting thread.

One of my passions is photographing the relics in the mountains that sit rotting or lay victim to thieves and graffiti hounds.

Ruins of Deer Park in the back country behind Monrovia Canyon (off Ben Overturff Trail)

Mount Lowe Railway, Crystal Lake Campground (now getting a face-lift), Deer Park, Henninger Flats, Dawn Mine, Follows Camp, the Bridge to Nowhere, even the Mount Wilson Observatory need help. Many have tried to restore these places and while their efforts are laudable they are usually underfunded.

The former Rep. Hilda Solis, now President Obama's Secretary of Labor, had proposed making the San Gabriel and Rio Hondo rivers part of a national recreation area. This would bring one coordinating agency, with one set of rules, to tie together our resources and make them more accessible to the public. This could be the answer to our forest as well, which through vandals and fires (and sometimes, as in arson, are related) are destroying historic structures. The Vetter Mountain Lookout was lost in the recent Station Fire, a place I remember visiting with a buddy back in 2002. Gone are the 360-degree views it offered of a back country of canyons and tree-covered mountains and silent beauty.

In San Francisco, the NPS is nearly finished restoring the Aquatic Park Bathhouse built in streamline moderne architecture in the 1930s. The adaptive re-use for the basement includes a senior citizen center and exercise room. Upstairs is gallery space and a veranda with views of San Francisco Bay and the Golden Gate Bridge. Tile mosaics of fanciful fish have been restored to their original brilliancy. Inside, wall-to-floor murals damaged by seeping water were returned to their original condition.

Next door, the Hyde Street Pier has become a shining gem of the NPS. I boarded the 1886 square-rigger Balclutha, a tall ship used to import salmon from Alaska to the famous cannery in San Francisco. NPS displays throughout the ship explained the ship's journeys using captains' logs and personal journals of seamen.

Also on display were tug boats restored with fresh coats of black and red paint, old ferry boats used to transport passenger cars from the peninsula to points East and North, and shrimp boats used by Chinese immigrants. Even the wood shop where boats are restored by NPS technicians was part of the display.

A National Park Service park in an urban interface? If it works in San Francisco, it can work here.
steve.scauzillo@sgvn.com

Swabbing my cheek for The Genographic Project. My DNA is set to hit the mail Tuesday. Results in six to eight weeks.

WHY are we so obsessed with the past?

For instance, after using a social networking tool such as Facebook, I was contacted by classmates from my alma mater, East Meadow High School in New York, (Class of 1976 -- Go Jets!) and Nassau College in Garden City, New York, where I earned my Associate of Science degree in biology.

I'm not one to look back. Just a glance at my high school yearbook picture frightens me. Reading e-mails from acquaintances I last spoke to on the playground of elementary school some 40 years ago has been both intriguing and disturbing. Hearing that a girl I had a crush on in sixth grade has been going through a rough, rough divorce and a paralyzing accident made me feel sad and also, ambivalent. It may sound cold, but I wanted to remember her as that happy-go-lucky girl with whom I shared some mischievous moments in grade school. Not as an adult with problems. I want my childhood memories to stay that way -- as memories of coming of age -- not today's realities.

At the same time, it was flattering to hear from Glen, a classmate from elementary school through high school, who is now the CEO of a healthcare advocacy group in Albany, write about the honorable profession of journalism I find myself in. Thanks, Glen, I think.
So when my wife, Karen, asked me to participate in an experiment to trace my ancestors through my DNA, I didn't immediately latch on to the idea. I have enough trouble getting along with my current relatives. Now I'm digging up ones from the past?

But being a man who appreciates science (I was going to be a plant biologist), I said yeah, why not.

Spencer Wells, who spoke at the Distinguished Speaker Series at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium on Jan. 13, is the leading scientist behind the Genographic Project. Wells, along with National Geographic Society, IBM and the Waitt Family Foundation, are using DNA samples of ordinary people to trace the pattern of migration on the Earth. In short, our DNA tell a fascinating story of human history -- better than any Facebook status or Twitter tweet.

So far, Wells has discovered that "the common ancestor of every man alive was an African who lived around 60,000 years ago." Genetic data say people started leaving Africa about 100,000 years ago for India, Southeast Asia and Australia (hence, the connection with the indigenous aboriginal people to Africa). From there, they traveled to Europe, then to Siberia and the Arctic and from there, to the Americas.

Wells said in our modern cities and suburbs, we live among people of different backgrounds. But we are separated from our relatives who can pass down stories from generation to generation. His genetic mapping project in a way takes the place of storytelling and oral histories. And redraws the picture of a forgotten human storyline.
So this weekend, I will swab my cheek, once in the morning and once again in the evening. My samples will be sent off to the project labs with only an assigned bar code. In six or eight weeks, I'll be shown a report through a web portal using my private log-on (no names are given or used). I'll update you all then.

But before I send off my DNA in a test tube, I have a decision to make. Do I ask them to trace my X chromosome, called the mitochondrial DNA, passed from mother to child, for a picture of my maternal ancestry? Or my Y chromosome, or Y-DNA, which will trace my paternal family roots. Since I'd like to discuss the findings with my mom, who is still very much alive, I may choose the maternal track. Only men have to make this decision, since women have two X chromosomes (and no Y).

I'll ask my inner scientist. Or maybe I'll let my wife decide. Either way, I'm getting excited about finding out the past.

I follow the s-shaped turnoff down beneath Irwindale Avenue. I wound around until I saw this billboard. This is where the Irwindale Gold Line station will be.

It lies in the shadow of those big, metallic beer tanks of MillerCoors, a place us San Gabriel Valley oldtimers call Miller Brewing. I can see it now. All those beer workers getting off shift, hopping a train home.

It is an odd location. But who knows, perhaps it will actually serve other manufacturing and office jobs near Irwindale Ave and the 210 Freeway.

Two of our local community colleges this week received full accreditation status.

Rio Hondo College in Whittier and Citrus College in Glendora.

Rio Hondo fought its way back after the accrediting institution for community colleges gave it a warning last year. The Western Association of Schools and Colleges' (WASC) Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges said the school was lacking in institutional and leadership areas.
This week, as reported by our reporter Tracy Garcia, the WASC returned full accreditation for the next six years. Congratulations to Rio Hondo College.

At Citrus, the college continues its excellent standing. On Wednesday, it learned its accreditation was re-affirmed for another six years. "The fact that our accreditation was reaffirmed validates Citrus College's effectiveness in meeting our institutional mission through the dedication of our highly qualified faculty and staff, and through the institution's outstanding academic programs and student support services," said Citrus President Geraldine Perry in a written statement. Kudos to them. In fact, Citrus has always done such a great job that they are hardly in the news.

As the UCs become more expensive, and the CSUs cut back on enrollment due to budget cuts from Sacramento, our community colleges become even more important to high school graduates looking to continue their education. In fact, a lawmaker in Sacramento thinks so much of community colleges he is floating a bill that would allow them to offer bachelor degrees.

What do you think of that?

Taken Friday morning at the intersection of Arrow Highway and Live Oak Avenue in Irwindale. A part in the weeks' long clouds.

I heard about the snow levels at 2,000 feet and as I saw a brief break in the clouds, I pulled over and shot this while looking up at the San Gabriel Mountains.

Blue skies? Remember them?

There's a blue gill in a fresh water lake in North Carolina that can't reproduce if something called selenium is in the water.

Scientist then universally ordered that water discharged into "the waterways of the United States" can't contain selenium at concentrations above 5 parts per billion (that's with a "b," an amount so small it's tantamount to a grain of salt in a vat of water). Selenium, a naturally occurring metal, is not harmful to humans even up to 10 times that concentration.

There's this government agency called the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that's in charge of enforcing the Clean Water Act, which goes back to the fish in North Carolina and the selenium levels.

What does this fish have to do with us folk who live in urban Los Angeles County? Here's where the fish tale begins to rot from the head.

That same EPA, based of course in Washington, enforces what is called the Comprehensive Environmental Response Compensation, and Liability Act (CERCLA), better known as the Superfund law. The idea is to clean up polluted waterways to standards set by the EPA.

Here in Los Angeles County, the naturally occurring metal is popping up in discharge water coming from a ground-water treatment plant - an EPA-approved Superfund site - in the Puente Valley. Not to belabor this, but the Valley has had polluted ground-water since the first stain
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of carcinogens were found in a well in Irwindale in 1979 - more than 30 years ago. OK. Back to our fish story. The ground water is pumped and cleaned to drinking water standards using carbon and ultra violet light, then sent along Puente Creek (near Whittier), down the San Gabriel River and after blending with millions of gallons of other water, to the Pacific Ocean. But the treatment process - set to reach full tilt in about six months - recently came to a screeching halt (everybody now, all together) BECAUSE OF THE SEX LIFE OF A FRESH WATER FISH IN NORTH CAROLINA.

Another way of looking at this is like a science fiction movie, "When Two Laws Collide!" Under CERCLA, the ground-water cleanup was coming along swimmingly. Northrop Grumman had agreed to pay for the cleanup! There were no more nasty court fights. No more fingers being pointed. In fact, the corporate giant wanted to get cleanup underway and done asap because time is money. But cleanup of the underground Superfund site was not OK via the Clean Water Act. And the agency responsible for enforcing both of these laws - the EPA - wasn't aware of the discrepancy.

"The left hand and the right hand weren't talking," said Grace Kast, Water Quality Authority executive director.

What's a conflicted government bureaucracy to do?

Well, before you summon visions of FEMA and Hurricane Katrina, we must give EPA a chance to redeem itself. The good folks at the WQA, which was formed by the state Legislature to expedite ground-water cleanup and return our aquifer to a pristine state, wants the EPA to grant Northrop a temporary waiver to allow cleanup to continue while new solutions are explored. One solution could involve piping the discharged water as reclaimed water for parks, cemeteries and freeway medians. But that would take more pipes, a capital outlay of another $16 million. To treat this water with advanced "reverse osmosis" would cost another $20 million.

Many are asking, why spend $20 million to help a fish's progeny, a fish that is not even in our waters? Some are asking for a biologist to study what would happen to our fish here in the San Gabriel River if discharges with 7 parts per billion of selenium are allowed.

There's a chance that this fish story could have a happy ending. Otherwise the cleanup of our aquifer - the Valley's water lifeline - could be caught on a stray hook that will take years to untangle.

This "Santa dollar" was given out by the now defunct Home Federal bank, which according to Angela Carter of West Covina, was once located behind the K mart on Orange Avenue.

In journalism school, professors teach you not to become friends with sources. It's a mindset that's served me well these past 29 years.

Not so easy to do with letter writers.

They are a passionate breed. People who want so much to get their opinion "out there" that they're willing to go public and even face opposition. They know the art of cajoling you to print their letter.

I respect that, a lot. I used to tell my young journalism students that "friendly nagging" is a good habit to nurture for a reporter or a public relations person. I was used to that because I have an Italian mother.

Milford Walker of West Covina was all of the above. Passionate. Colored unmistakably by a definite point of view. And a bit of a nag, to be honest.

So when he would call, I didn't always look forward to it.

"Steve, I don't want to take up too much of your time," was the polite way he would start every conversation. It usually led to me hearing his well-informed opinion on such issues as unions, health care, government or the automobile industry. By the time we were done conversing, I had learned a lot and couldn't care less about the deadline that had just passed (though my bosses could!).

Milford passed away on Dec. 29. He was 82. And although it has been less than a month, I miss his pointed calls and compassionate stances.

"He was always up and ready for a debate," said his widow, Melba, who spoke to me by phone Thursday.

Former West Covina Mayor Nancy Manners sent me an e-mail about her remembrances of Milford. They met in 1984 during a precinct walk when she was running for City Council. He told her he wanted a ban on fireworks and Manners picked up the mantle. Eventually they were banned by a vote of the people. "When we prevailed I was his hero forever," she joked.

Milford worked for Ford Motor Co. in Pico Rivera. During his retirement, he would write letters to the editor urging us to buy American cars. "... what better way to start showing your fellow neighbor you care for him or her? What better way to fly the American flag?" he wrote in a published letter about a year ago.

He was an unabashed union booster who was greatly upset over the recent failures of the American automobile industry. He supported universal healthcare and was a big fan of filmmaker Michael Moore, especially his movie on the topic, "Sicko."

"He was a very dedicated Democrat and he didn't care who knew it," Manners told me. A liberal in the early 1980s in West Covina was much more of an anomaly than today, when Democratic voters outnumber Republicans. Yet Walker held to his convictions even though "he was willing to listen and learn from opposing views," Manners wrote.

Milford always had trouble working computers and had a friend e-mail his letters these last few years. I pray now he's sitting at a computer posting links with ease while advocating for the working man.

* * * * * *

Letter writer Angela Carter remembers the old Home Federal bank in West Covina behind the K-mart on Orange Avenue. When it went out of business, the tellers handed out "limited edition Christmas Dollars" (see photo above) and she mailed one to me in its original envelope. The legal tender was "adorned with Santa's smiling face" affixed over Washington's headshot.

Her handwritten note melted my heart: "I was thinking back to your column about your mail carrier dad and his pockets full of Christmas cards that he would let you open. I wanted to send you one of these so maybe as he looks down from heaven, he can watch you open this card."

Maybe those J-school profs were wrong.

Without naming names, he clearly was aiming his latter comments at former Vice President Dick Cheney, who has found a way to criticize and lead a partisan wave of attacks against the president during a time of war.

It's too bad that we can't get back to what we had in the months after 9/11, a country that was working together, not trying to destory each other from within. I agree with Obama, but of course wonder if his words will have any impact.

So for now, I don't have a title for this decade. Instead, I can only write about the 2000 years as filtered through political news and my own prism of experience. Here goes:

In November 2000, we tried something new. We brought local commentators into the newsroom to write about the presidential election as it was unfolding. When there was no winner it made for some creative hedging. One time campaign strategist Ted Snyder of Whittier wrote: "In a presidential election this close, a mandate is an illusion."

Another memory from Nov. 8, 2000 was jumping out of my car, putting a quarter in the news rack next to the Albertson's and picking up our newspaper with the headline: "A nation divided." It was a huh? moment. The next day's headline was equally on the money: "Countdown to history," as was the following day's banner hed which was simply, "To be continued ..."
It was some way to start a decade.

In September 2001 we went from indecision to incredulity. Waking up, I turned on the news and in the next minute, saw the second plane plow into the World Trade Center. New York City, my hometown, was under attack.

Here in the SGV, the bright sunshine falsely declared nothing was wrong. My wife and I sent our elementary school students to their first day of school that year. At night, I attended a Bible Study in Arcadia and my son, Andy, who was 9, handed me a pencil-and-crayon drawing he made in school that assured me things would be OK. Something of blue skies and an eagle. Earlier that day, a few of us in the newsroom gathered on the sidewalk for a group hug and more prayers. We wrote an editorial and slapped on the headline, "Why did it happen here?" and included a drawing of the Statue of Liberty crying.

2002 and 2004 summers were fun, for those were years my son, Andy, won Little League championships. In '02, I remember sitting in the stands in Long Beach at a state 9-and-10-year-old state tournament, reading about the Anaheim Angels and their lock on first place. The Angels won the World Series that year for the very first time and haven't won one since. In '04, the Temple City National Little League won district -- the first time our little city took that trophy since 1980. No Temple City majors team have won the trophy since then.

On Oct. 7, 2003, the state voters got real worked up and recalled Gov. Gray Davis and put Arnold Schwarzenegger in his place. But new people don't make as much difference as new systems. Here's hoping the system of governing California changes in 2010 with a new constitutional convention and the beginnings of redistricting reform.

Also in 2003, the state suffered some of the worst wildfires in history. A picture on our front page showed Arnold hugging a fire victim. He would do that a great many more times this decade.

In 2004, George W. Bush -- as our newspapers aptly put it -- finally got his mandate. I remember interviewing voters who made me proud to be an American.
"I was nervous but I feel I am doing the right thing," was how 42-year-old first-time voter Nancy Holmes of West Covina described her emotions. "Now I can speak my mind," she told me.

Elections come and go and they affect us differently. I remember the phone calls on my cell when the media declared Barack Obama the winner in 2008. I remember all the winners and losers from school boards and city council races -- too numerous to mention in this small space. They, too, made up a political decade that was filled with chills and spills.

The question is, will an extra 30,000 troops help us accomplish our goals in Afghanistan? And second, what are those goals? I would've liked to have heard more on the latter from the president.

Still, it showed wisdom when he spoke almost as much about Pakistan as Afghanistan. Our maneuvers in Afghanistan, rooting out the Taliban, turning weaker, less-committed Taliban to our side (or to the side of the Afghanistan government) and helping the Afghan troops and security forces stand up on their own, are all important. But so is working closer with Pakistan. I noticed Obama spoke about our relationship with Pakistan, which he said should be based on mutual respect and mutual trust. That has not been the case. It remains to be seen if we can trust Pakistan to work together with us and our increased troops, when Pakistan has implicitly harbored terrorists in their midst, or in the very least, done little about them.

These indeed are perilous times.