I’m still shoveling on the ‘Future of the Democrats’ post (there’s got to be a pony in there somewhere…), and realized that I need to cover the California propositions …
Here’s the full list and a brief summary, along with my quick position. I’ll follow up with an in-depth look at them as time permits this week.
For more information, I’ll recommend two sources: The League of Women Voter’s ‘Smart Voter‘ site, and the UC Berkeley IGS site. If you live in Los Angeles County, as I do, check out the Los Angeles County Bar’s Judicial Candidate Evaluations as well.Here are my recommendations:
1A – Restricts state government’s ability to swing sales tax revenues away from local governments; YES
59 – Constitutional amendment setting out a ‘right’ of public access to government records and proceedings; YES
60 – Limits open primaries (the parties counter to Prop 62); NO
60A – Designates that the proceeds from surplus property sales should go to paying down bonds; NO
61 – $750 Million in bonds to build, expand, equip, and furnish children’s hospitals; NO
62 – ‘Open’ primaries, in which the two top vote-getters in the primary will meet in the general, regardless of party; YES
63 – Expands mental health services by taxing the incomes of those making over $1 million; NO
64 – Limits the ability of attorneys and plaintiffs who are not actually harmed to sue; YES
65 – Similar to 1A, it’s backers have thrown their support behind 1A; NO
66 – Limits the applicability of ‘three strikes’; NO
67 – Funds emergency medical services with a telephone tax; YES
68 – Tribal gambling initiative #1; NO
69 – Authorizes the gathering and retention of DNA samples from anyone arrested for a felony to help create a state DNA database; STUCK IN THE MIDDLE
70 – Tribal gambling initiative #2; NO
71 – Stem cell research; NO
72 – Mandates that certain California employers provide health care coverage; STUCK IN THE MIDDLE
Stuck in the middle on prop72?! This proposition will make it even more onerous to open or maintain a business in CA. This _is_ socialism. If it passes businesses will flee this state, saddling more of the burden on those few businesses that have to stay but forcing them to limit further hires. This about it, if you were an employer looking to expand your operations would you do it in CA if you had this added tax?
Prop72 is a job killer.
mfish –
Yes, absolutely that’s the bad news about it. The good news is that by reducing uninsured ‘no pays’ at emergency rooms, and possibly by reducing emergency room headcount because people get preventitive care, overall health insurance rates may decline somewhat, and other government services – equally necessary to business – may be able to be maintained.
I’d prefer a more comprehensive bill – one that offered businesses a simplified business tax code, for example as a carrot, while also working on health insurance costs, allowing small-business ‘pooling’, etc.
Hence the undecided…
A.L.
For an interesting contrarian view on prop 59, read “this”:http://www.livejournal.com/users/redhawke/146171.html
I posted about Props 60 and 62 explaining why I’m for them. 62 is sold as an “open primary”, but it isn’t. It institutes a two-round general election.
Anthony –
If 60 and 62 both pass, they contradict each other, and the one with the most votes will prevail. 60 precludes open primaries.
A.L.
AL,
I’m curious as to why you support 62. It appears, to me, to be an attempt to institute runoff elections. The ‘only the two top candidates get onto the final ballot’ aspect clearly points to a runoff-style system. I would very much like to see real runoff elections instituted, as I think it would both increase the ability of credible third parties to make a decent showing, and eliminate the problem of splitting the vote between multiple candidates whom you support. But usurping the existing primary race strikes me as a very backward way of going about it.
Aside from the fact that the structure actually precludes it from ever being extended to the Presidential race, it takes away the ability of parties to nominate their own candidates, and isn’t likely to make sense to many voters, who would naturally think that primaries are a purely party concern. How well does primary voter turnout compare to the general election, and how likely are people to realize that the primary ballot IS the general ballot once this passes?
I’ve already sent off my absentee ballot voting no on both of the primary-related measures. I voted against 60 because I would like to leave open the possibility of a true runoff (or preference-rank) style election in the future. But I’d like to hear your thoughts on it.
A.L., I’d be curious as to the “whys” on Props 66, 69 and 71, which in many ways are the flashpoint propositions.
Mind you, there’s a left-of-center argument against 71 that a) it’s a gift of state money to a major industry and b) the state should not be increasing its bond indebtedness as a matter of course.
66 and 69 caused a great deal of controversy at the CDP and I’m wondering how you arrived at your conclusions on this.
Not that I know all that much myself, but 62 sounds like it was made up by people who don’t know anything about political science. Seems to me that it would make it even harder for third parties to crack the final two, since they could now both be from the same party. So I oppose both 60 and 62.
Real reform would be to ditch the two-party system altogether by implementing PR for the state legislature, boards, etc. and IRV, Condorcet, or Approval for the single-seat races. Then you wouldn’t need primaries in the first place.
A.L. “Funds emergency medical services with a telephone tax; YES”
What does telephone service have to do with emergency medical services?
Wouldn’t a telephone tax be highly regressive?
Adding more taxes and regulations on telephone service will hamper the integration of telephone with other communications technologies. Decades of special taxing and regulation have distorted the communications marketplace. This proposition is a step in the wrong direction.
In short, because I don’t think we’ll eliminate gerrymandering soon enough, and because the local parties (the CA Democrats and GOP) are prisoner to the worst elements in the national party mix.
So one can’t get nominated by the GOP unless one is fervently right-to-life and anti-tx, and one can’t get nominated by the Dems unless one is a pander-bear to everyu noble cause.
I’d like to see more moderates like Riordan in office here, and this is pretty much the only way to do it until the state parties get reformed or die off.
A.L.
A.L.,
Maybe this speaks to your “future of the Democrats” piece —
“So one can’t get nominated by the GOP unless one is fervently right-to-life and anti-tx, and one can’t get nominated by the Dems unless one is a pander-bear to everyu noble cause.”
I’m curious what California district you’re in, especially if California reflects a coming national trend. The local GOP long ago went where the state GOP is headed now, i.e., a district formerly represented by progressive Republicans in the old Hiram Johnson/Earl Warren tradition, and whose party apparatchiks drove the normally-GOP elected officials (e.g., Milton Marks, Peter Behr) into re-registering as Democrats.
(Arnold is the exception that may prove the rule. He’s Governor because he’s 1) the kind of social moderate/conservative fiscal that appeals to voters here in Marin and elsewhere, 2) he knows enough, as an actor, about publicity and image to _not_ blindly follow the political consultants, and 3) he ignored the state GOP and ran in his own right. Very much worth considering if you write about California politics).
Also, don’t think that the usual suspects “will get the automatic support”:http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2004/10/10/BAG6D96REG1.DTL of local Democratic interest groups. To have the three main local papers endorse a moderate Republican over the presumptive State Senate successor to John Burton is worth thinking about when you write that “future” post.
I’m also curious because I was privy to the debates over the CDP’s positions on the November ballot propositions. Considerable conservative sentiment to support Prop. 69 and oppose 66. The pandering was on both sides.
Meantime, the real left in these areas has drifted into the Green column.
Question is, whether this will become a national trend, where the GOP increasingly becomes a party of certain rural counties and faith groups and the Democratic party finds itself outflanked to its left.
BTW, on California itself, I recommend “Peter Schrag”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0520243870/qid=1098998995/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/104-6267947-1167137?v=glance&s=books&n=507846 and “Kevin Starr”:http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0520243870/qid=1098998995/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl14/104-6267947-1167137?v=glance&s=books&n=507846 to the WoC readership. Question becomes, whether, and how, California points to future trends and how much of it is simply unique to California.
Bob, your points are good ones, and feed my notion that there is a large, disenfranchised ‘moderate middle’ – but you need ot get to them, and Arnie could do so because of both his wealth and the weight of his celebrity (and sheer competence).
I can’t reccomend Kevin Starr enough to people. I think he captures something that is uniquely Californian within the uniquely American context,and that he stands as a perfect anodyne to Mike Davis.
I’m in AD 53, which is one of the more ‘middle of the road’ districts – and was in fact evenly nbalanced until the last redistricting, which made it a safe D seat.
More later – I’m crunching…
A.L.
OK, why work when you can blog –
On 64, I do support some modifications of three-strikes, but I’m very uncomfy with an initiative essentially designed to get one wealthy person’s kid out of jail. I also don’t like the fact that it was ‘packed’ with more murky sex-crimes laws in an effort to make it sound ‘tough’.
On 69, I’m stuck between civil-liberties anxiety (and strong memories of ‘Gattica’), and the notion that what we’re talking about is not that different than fingerprints, very often clears the innocent, and just nailed the SOB who was murdering homeless women in South Central.
I’ll try and expand on both.
A.L.
And as to 71, it’s simple. Two factors: States are crappy VC’s, so I tend not to believe that the money will be used well; and we are facing immediate crises in health care, water, sewage, roads, and education. As fun as it might be for elected and staff to get the government into exciting new arenas, I’m pretty focussed on getting them to deal with the messes that exist in the existing ones first. Think Mazlow’s hierarchy, applied to government.
A.L.
A.L., my support of 66 is mainly on the bit about narrowing the 3rd strike; I figure if Joe Klaas supports the measure it’s probably worthwhile.
(More info, at least on my side of it, on 66 and 69 are on the “No. Calif. ACLU”:www.aclunc.org website, which is supporting one and opposing the other.)
The argument that worked with the rank-and-file at the state Party conference was the privacy issue. Most of us support a felons’ database. But the proviso about (1) taking DNA from any felony arrest, even if released free-and-clear the next morning, (2) making collecting DNA retroactive and (3) making it near-impossible to clear your DNA record.
There are arguments for a crime database but not if it means tagging the innocent. And don’t think that DNA is a sure-bet vindicator; any lab test can be bungled. More to the point: _DNA is not just a fingerprint, and what 69 would collect is not just forensic info._ Everything is in there, including a family propensity for, oh, Parkinson’s disease, or maybe sickle-cell anemia, or God knows what the geneticists can read in the next 20 years. And since the medical industry is more interested in removing beneficiaries than diseases, this info, in private hands, means that you can be messed over for life.
(_That_ argument stung the Party delegates. You couldn’t bring about any kind of health care system — not even Prop. 164 — so now we’re at the medical insurers’ mercy.)
Difference between being tough on crime and being completely Stalinist. The old 3 strikes and this new DNA law is the latter.
I put up my own list, stealing A.L.’s format, over here, but for some reason the trackback ping didn’t show up on WoC.
I ended up down the middle on Bob’s two issues. Against, for the same reasons, on the DNA prop. I might support one that required something like a grand jury indictment, or maybe just a probable cause warrant from a judge, but there’s too much potential for abuse as written. I read the ‘3 strikes’ initiative in detail, and just think that too many crimes that indicate a violent nature on the part of the criminal were being removed from the strike list.
As a practicing VC, I agree with A.L. on 71 – governments make lousy direct investors. Set some clear ground rules and let the private sector fund this area – there’s already enough capital flowing to indicate that people who know biotech better than I smell potential.
Bob, the story you link to (on Carole Migdal’s arrogant campaign) makes my point for me. She’ll have won the Democratic primary by brute force, and it really doesn’t matter who the GOP nominates, does it?
If 62 wins, she’d damn well have to mind her P’s and Q’s, or face a strong challenger who could unite the more moderate D’s, the R’s, and those who just find her a despicable person.
I may make this story the centerpiece of my post on 62.
A.L.
A.L., It’s an interesting story but be careful: it may be more of an argument against our apportionment system, California and national, in which very few districts are in play. Picture this, A.L.: if 62 had been in effect we in the 3rd Senate District would have had NO Republican, Green, Libertarian, Peace & Freedom or Free Cheese Party on the November ballot. Just two liberal Democrats fighting to see who’s more “true”.
(Same would be true in a safe GOP district.)
Same thing goes for my other local districts: 6th Assembly and 6th Congressional.
This way, at least, when Carole p.o.’d the local editorial boards — the Marin Independent-Journal, Santa Rosa Press-Democrat, Pacific Sun — they had the moderate GOP guy as an option. (She lost all 3 endorsements of otherwise-Democratic papers, a Triple Crown.) And, it did encourage GOP moderates to maybe remind voters here that not all GOP fits the stereotype.
So by all means use the article but bear in mind that there’s more to it than your first reaction. And, maybe you should read up on the old cross-filing system, which in theory would supposedly free California from the Party system but in practice it froze us solid. Instead of the Progressive Republican Party boom we got the Senator from Formosa (i.e., Bill Knowland).
Think about it …
Hmmmm….
FYI, here’s Mitch Kapor against Prop 71. (Via Ross Mayfield)
If you’re voting in the Los Angeles area, there’s something called “L.A. City Measure O” on the ballot which concerns revamping the storm-drain system to prevent pollution and more. This measure will be the *very last item* on the Nov. 2 ballot.
Here’s a description from this KTLA endorsement
link:
http://ktla.trb.com/news/politics/elections/ktla-ed-endo16oct16-lat,0,7688698.story?coll=ktla-home-utility
” Think of Measure O in the same way — unexciting, expensive, necessary. The city bond measure would fund hundreds of projects to clean up polluted beaches and rivers, safeguard and recharge local groundwater, upgrade the city’s overtaxed flood-control systems and increase green space.”
There’s no organized opposition to this measure–and much of the media has come out in favor of it (e.g. LA Times, LA Weekly, KTLA), along with the mayor, etc.–but apparently, a lot of people haven’t heard about Measure O and without a 2/3 majority vote, it won’t pass.
Warren Olney did a short interview with a proponent of the measure (Mary Nichols, former secretary of resources under Governor Davis) on his KCRW radio show, “Which Way L.A.”, which you can listen to here:
http://play.rbn.com/?url=livecon/kcrw/g2demand/ww/ww041027Increasing_Taxes_for.rm&start=00:13:41.057&end=00:18:48.536&proto=rtsp
One more pro-Measure O piece:
http://www.laweekly.com/ink/04/48/news-lewis.php
And, for balance, here’s an anti-Measure O piece:
http://www.dailynews.com/Stories/0,1413,200~25405~2483558,00.html
–DC
As for the people working on proposition 62 not knowing anything about political science; i worked on it, and i have 2 degrees in it. I totally agree that there are better voting systems out there, but there are a lot of clear reasons to run with the open primary in 62. It legislatively replaces the system that is in place, so it does not make it any harder to change it to another voting system in the future. It actually makes it easier. If you think voters are having a difficult time making the step from a closed party primary to a modified blanket primary but they will somehow make the leap from the former to an instant run-off, you should probably take some poli sci refreshers yourself. baby steps my friend, baby steps. Proposition 60 puts the current system in the constitution, so if you ever want to see any system other than closed party primaries, you should be fighting that tooth and nail. I personally think that a Condorcet Runoff delivers the best results, but i know that there is no way the voters would go for it… yet. The fact is, it delivers more responsive politicians than the current system. It’s not perfect, but it’s a step in the right direction. Also, “harder for third parties to crack the final two”, the last SF mayoral race, that is run like prop 62, had a Green facing off against a Democrat. Sure the Green Party probably won’t make the ballot in Bakersfield, but that’s because there are not enough constituents there. That’s democracy, for better or worse.