The USA Today published a story describing the Wal-mart connection to the Governator:

SAN FRANCISCO — Wal-Mart (WMT) and its founding Walton family have emerged as big backers of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, giving about $1 million in the past year
***
Wal-Mart and the Waltons now rank No. 15 on its list of the 100 biggest donors to Schwarzenegger-controlled campaign committees, says the Foundation for Taxpayer & Consumer Rights, a non-partisan government watchdog group.

And why might the Waltons and Wal-Mart want to give so much money to Ahnold’s campaign committee’s?  Oh, yeah, because they get a nice quid pro quo…

First, Ahnold vetoed a bill which would require release of statistics about forcing labor onto public assistance:

One union-backed bill, which Schwarzenegger vetoed early in October, would have forced the state to disclose names of companies whose workers get government health services meant for poor residents.

So, Wal-Mart doesn’t want the citizens of California to know about the way they treat their workers and how many of them are being subsidized by the state.  There have been several stories about that issue, including a story about Wal-mart contributing to the bankruptcy of Tenn-Care, Tennessee’s Medicaid program. This practice allows Wal-mart to subsidize their business by raising costs for the state.  Thus, their prices are not so cheap after all.  

Ahnold then vetoed another anti-Walmart bill:  

A second bill, vetoed last year, would have stopped employers from locking workers inside workplaces — a policy Wal-Mart has when employees stock shelves and clean floors after closing hours.

The bills reflect issues creating a public relations nightmare for the USA’s biggest private employer, with 1.3 million workers, as it expands in California, the USA’s biggest market. Critics including Wake-Up Wal-Mart accuse it of endangering workers by locking them in stores, and of reducing its health care costs at taxpayer expense.

In other words, Wal-Mart is putting the lives of their employees at risk in order to save a few bucks.  Now, I know that’s not a huge surprise, but this practice is an egregious violation of both personal dignity and decent working conditions.  Apparently, Ahnold is really opposed to the idea of…uh…shoplifting?  Well, maybe, or perhaps it could be this:

The Wal-Mart and Walton political gifts appear in new public campaign finance documents. They show that the same day Schwarzenegger vetoed the health care disclosure bill — Oct. 7 — his California Recovery Team logged a $250,000 gift from Christy Walton. She is the widow of John Walton, a Wal-Mart director who died four months ago. In the next three weeks, the Schwarzenegger-backed Proposition 77 campaign got $250,000 from Wal-Mart Chairman Rob Walton and $100,000 from Wal-Mart. Those gifts and others followed $200,000 to the Recovery Team last year from John Walton about two weeks after Schwarzenegger vetoed the lock-in bill.

This is just another example of Ahnold’s devotion to the special interests.

Enough is Enough!

Scooter Libby,not only directly connected to the Veep but also not well reported a special assistant to the President, is headed to the Slams. The Veep is under investigation. Rove is not only under investigation but is forming his own legal team and has retained a PR firm from Colorado that is expert in crisis management.

Tom Delay apparently has a hair stylist, makeup artist and smile coach for his arraignment mug-shot and acts as if he is still in charge of the House of Representatives.

Senator Bill Frist, a Doctor, makes diagnosis via video and now has a ‘blind’ trust whose Trustee’s report directly to him at least once. And he’s under investigation.

David Dreier, CA-26, is supposed to succeed Delay until his supposed gayness gets too public and he’s shoved down the row for a man, Roy Blount, who himself may soon be under investigation for a series of fundraisers that wound up benefiting a charity that employed his wife and others. Jack Abramoff and Jim Ellis, both recently having legal problems are in that picture too. Story here.

At least 154 dead in New Orleans hospitals and nursing homes…Jeb Bush trying to take the heat for the poor performance Florida performance after Hurricane Wilma….

Enough is Enough

Reform, reform and reform has to be our bywords in these next elections.

In CA-48, Steve Young, Democratic nominee issued this statement:

“It is time to stand against those who have lost their moral compass in the pursuit of partisan advantage.   Republicans object that investigations are criminalizing politics,but the indictments of Tom DeLay and Scooter Libby, and investigations of Representative Duke Cunningham, Senator Bill Frist, and others in the most powerful positions in the Executive branch prove the charge.  The assailants are still on the march, threatening to undermine our democratic ideals.

We need leaders in Washington who understand that our nation’s needs are more important than the politics of personal vendetta. The Republican Party has lost its way.  There can be no excuse for endangering the secret life of a loyal public servant to settle old debts.  When I am elected to Congress, accountability to my constituents will be more important than partisan politics.”

These are some of the reasons that Steve Young continues a vigorous fight in a Distict that many consider unwinnable. Yet we on the inside of the campaign know of the multiple plans, operating simultaneously, to bring voters to the polls and swing this election.[Excuse me if I don’t reveal our strategic plans in detail in public.]

This is the last Congressional Election of 2005. Why wait for 2006 to start the massive change in Congress needed to overcome this culture of corruption?

The Steve Young for Congress Campaign believes that those who are, in their hearts, pro-choice, pro-reproductive rights, who want to end the Iraq War as soon as possible, who are anti-corruption and pro-medical research can be motivated to vote on December 6th. And majority of those will be Democrats and Independents but there will also be disaffected, disappointed Republicans.

Just today, Oct 29, 2005, in the Orange County Register is a front page news story
of the former State GOP Chairman saying, with other things, “I think his base is alienated”.

With a projected District turnout for the final General Election, on the heels of the Statewide General Election November 8, of less than 22%, simply achieving a final vote that would normally be considered awful will win this race.

Don’t give up on the CA-48 regardless of the Primary numbers or the Conventional Wisdom. Non-conventional planning, hardcore execution and a motivated Candidate gives Democrats in CA-48 a real chance for change when change in most needed. Support us with good thoughts at least and more if you can. We have 38 days to go…and we will use every one of them.

Our motto? Enough is Enough!

(Me likes cartoons! – promoted by SFBrianCL)

Yesterday afternoon, Consumers Union posted its new animation in support of Prop 79. We hope everyone enjoys it.

http://www.consumersunion.org/MedicineCity

More than that, we hope it comes in handy as a way to share information about Prop 79 with folks you know before election day. There’s plenty of information, and a quick link to the Prop 79 campaign’s response to all the TV ads that Pharma has been buying over the last few weeks.

Thanks for taking a look!
Kathy Mitchell
Consumers Union

(Grover, and not the good one, is insidious… – promoted by SFBrianCL)

When I notice the Governor blaming Davis or the Democratic Legislature for the ‘mess’ or the ‘broken system’, I get really ticked off mostly because I think there’s more to the dynamic than just the Dems. Just as bad: his idea of ‘reform’ as the solution to the ‘broken system’. Yeah right.  

One example too late: now we know ‘taking it to the people of Cah-li-for-nia’ means putting on a special election for corporate interests at taxpayer expense.  Let’s not fall for that one again.

As is my wont, I think it’s time to shine some light on two strong Norquista influences having a lot to do with our mess/broken system/dysfunction. I won’t disagree this mess/broken system/dysfunction exists; my purpose is to call attention to these other elements.

Item One: The Norquist Pledge, which renders bipartisanship a farce.

I first heard about this Pledge from State Senator Sheila Kuehl in a speech she made once. You are kidding, was my short reaction.  She said every Republican must sign this Pledge before they run for office as a Republican.

But it’s real. Here it is straight from World News and Report, not just in a paper by some obscure partisan academic hack:

This winter, Kentucky State Rep. Stephen Nunn considered doing what would have been unthinkable a decade ago: supporting a tax hike. So, having signed antitax crusader Grover Norquist’s “no new taxes” pledge during his 1996 race, Nunn wrote Norquist to rescind the pledge. He quickly discovered that it wouldn’t be that easy. Norquist replied by outlining the arduous process for getting off the pledge list maintained by his group, Americans for Tax Reform. Nunn would have to hold a press conference with Norquist–and win re-election on a pro-tax platform. “I do not have the power to release you . . . ,” Norquist wrote. “Only your voters can do that.”

This threat of the Pledge means there is no room for bipartisanship. Some of you may recall the vividly angry quote by Norquist describing bipartisanship as the equivalent of date rape.  

BTW, Sheila Kuehl suggested the way to get around the pledge is to vote in as many Dems as possible everywhere.  Excellent point.

As for the Governor’s frequent threats about raising taxes if we don’t pass 76, well, what a very interesting thing to say. Do you think he’ll raise taxes given his pledge to Norquist? Nah. Doubt it. More likely the Governor is misspeaking his talking points again. It would blow my mind if someone asks him to clarify this at a press conference or at a town hall.  

Item Two: The 2/3 Majority Vote to pass a tax

Oh, another Norquist coincidence! Well, that’s alright because I’m a coincidence theorist.

The 2/3 majority vote happens to be part of another Norquist 50 state agenda (the so-called paycheck deception scheme is another).  In fact, they’d like to see a super-majority vote in all the states.

The equation: when you add the Norquist Pledge plus the 2/3 majority vote into the Sacramento equation, you get total legislative gridlock.

So the next time you hear about the “Broken System Needing Reform” refrain from the Governor, remember the Norquista elements: the Pledge and the 50 state campaign to shut down legislatures everywhere. The Governor is painting the problem as being the hapless hopeless Democratic dweebs in the Legislature. For the record, I don’t buy into this characterization of our Democratic legislators but, believe me,  I know many many many many others who believe this about our Dems in the Legislature.  No wonder their popularity is so low.

The Norquista influence has made a difference in California politics. Unfortunate we’re not hearing about it.

Even more to the point: if the Governor’s initiatives win in California’s very Special Election, it will become even more difficult for the real people’s voice be heard as the public interest unions become diminished in their voice (esp. Prop. 75 and Prop. 74) and as the Governor gains amazingly scary powers to cut the budget without any adult oversight, which is Prop. 76.

Instead, it’ll be government by the Rich People, for the Rich People and by the Rich People after this special election. And, darn, we even paid for this election, hoisted on to us by the Rich People.

If you’re ticked off as I am, please get your britches into an Alliance phone bank or join the local California for Democracy office to help get out the vote.

It’s a bummer we paid for this corporate election but we might as well show up and vote.

( – promoted by SFBrianCL)

A new PPIC poll comes out tomorrow.  There’s a summary of the poll at the LA Times:

A new poll to be released Friday by the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California is expected to show that Schwarzenegger’s ballot propositions have made no appreciable gains in recent weeks, despite heavy TV advertising by the governor.

None is drawing support from a majority of likely voters.

Well, here here to that!  That is great news.  PPIC is generally far more reliable than S-USA, and apparently, Stanford. But here’s some specific good news.  

Prop 75

And the fate of one measure, the anti-union Proposition 75, now seems a tossup after having been favored by a 25-point margin only two months ago.

The importance of defeating Prop 75 can not be underestimated.  It’s a vile wretch of a proposition that would require massive new efforts from labor organizers, essentially silencing most unions.  And in return, what do we get for that? Well, “paycheck protection” of course.  Not that employees already have the option of opting-out or anything.  It essentially takes the voice away from workers while allowing the corporations to go on singing.  Now, on Monday, Ahnold announced that he intended to support a bill which required express permission of stockholders for corporations to give money to political causes.  I’ll believe that when I see it.

It’s coming down to the wire now.  I’ll follow up with the PPIC poll tomorrow.

( – promoted by SFBrianCL)

It turns out Phil Angelides is running a funny campaign.  Now, not that bad kind of funny, I mean actually funny.  His campaign put out a cartoon mocking the Governator called Arnold’s Neighborhood, playing off Sesame Street.

And speaking of Funny, the Governor himself is quite the jokester!  At the beginning of yesterday’s town hall meeting, The Governator’s sound was having some issues. Perhaps, but it also could have been some planned joke, that we’ll never know.  Anyway, Ahnold joked that “it must be Perata somewhere in the back messing with my sound.”  Yet another helpful comment from the man who was going to work with both parties.

And on to the meeting itself.  I recorded it and was going to stream some clips, but FOX 2 took care of that for me. They’ve provided a page with links to several clips.  Hopefully it will be up until the election is over.  A classic line from Ahnold: “I’m not smart enough to understand all of this and the history of all this.” in reference to Prop. 74’s requirement for 5 year teacher tenure.

In my estimation, Perata won this debate.  However, Ahnold’s star power still has some strange hold over Repuplicans that I can’t really understand.  Polls are all over the place, so who knows how the Propositions are doing.  It was nice, though, to have an informed discussion about the special election.  It would have been better to have both Perata and Ahnold on stage at the same time, but I’m guessing Ahnold’s handlers wouldn’t have any of that.

(As I said, all 77, all the time – promoted by SFBrianCL)

Not that it should really affect the outcome either way, but there was an article in the LA Times about the actual nuts and bolts of getting the state ready for Prop 77.  However, I think the more important part comes later (see the bold)

It’s hellacious for us,” said Stephen L. Weir, Contra Costa County registrar. “The rules under which we’d have to operate are pretty much impossible.”

Proposition 77 would require three retired judges to redraw California’s political districts “for use at the next statewide primary and general elections,” presumably June and November 2006.

The drawing of new districts wouldn’t take long. Some experts say it could be done in a few days with computer mapping software.

But for the people who oversee county elections, getting new boundaries for 120 Senate and Assembly seats, 53 congressional seats and four Board of Equalization districts would merely be a first step. They would have to redraw 25,000 precincts to fit the new districts, reassign polling places and tell voters how to find them.

All of that would have to be done by March so sample ballots could be prepared and mailed before the June election. Officials probably wouldn’t get new maps until late December.

Political districts are usually redrawn by the Legislature once every decade, based on new census data, and then county officials have months to update their systems to match the maps. Opponents of Proposition 77 say that pattern should continue, because an estimated 3 million residents are new to California since lines were last drawn in 2001.

As I’ve said before, I support the concept of reform of the redistricting process (i.e. Reform Ohio Now), but how this is accomplished through Prop 77 is wrong.  However we do draw the map, whether it is through the new retired judge panel or whatever, it should be done after 2010.