Tag Archives: Election 2005

Arnold Schwarzenegger

Victory: Governor’s Campaign Fined

(The ABC has come up with a nice win against Schwazenegger’s poorly named “California Recovery Team.” Congrats! – promoted by SFBrianCL)

(cross-posted on BetterCA.com)

The Fair Political Practices Commission has issued a ruling today against Arnold Schwarzenegger’s California Recovery Team.  The FPPC is finally holding CRT and the Governor accountable for violating campaign finance laws last year and has ordered that they pay a stiff penalty of $200,200.

The Alliance sued the CRT last fall for failing to disclose $25,600,000 of expenditures, as required by law.  In March, the California Court of Appeals ruled in our favor, stating that either the FPPC could penalize the governor’s CRT or the Alliance could file our own lawsuit to recover damages.  It may have taken seven months, but our legal process has worked the way it is supposed to.  This sends a message that the Governor has to play by the same rules as everyone else.  It is a victory for all Californians and our justice system.

This $200,200 fine is one of the highest in FPPC history.  The funds are payable to the General Fund of the State of California.  It may be buried on the Friday afternoon of the July 4th weekend, but we couldn’t be more pleased with the resolution.

San Francisco

[From NCP] Initial Evaluation: SF Ranked Choice Balloting

[Originally posted at NorCal Politics on February 16, 2006]

I don’t have too much to add to this BeyondChron story on the first run at ranked choice balloting in San Francisco. The long and the short of it seems to be this:

  1. No need for expensive run-off elections (the last one cost the city $3M);
  2. Higher voter turnout; and
  3. Higher voter turnout in traditionally low-turnout neighborhoods and ethnicities.

There’s also a strong argument that IRV tends to select candidates who reflect the true preference of the electorate, as:

  1. There’s no penalty for truly voting your first choice first, which avoids the “don’t vote third party” problem; and
  2. If candidates are sufficiently extreme to reflect only a small core consituency, the system will settle on the more moderate candidates who represent the natural compromise candidates.

All of which means, of course, that it threatens both of the existing party establishments and the pundit class who make their living on complaining about the status quo while doing their best to maintain it.

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[From NCP] Victory

[Originally Posted at NorCal Politics, November 9, 2005]

Well, that’s a victory for California:  we nixed the first six.  And the last two, which is only moderately unfortunate.  I’d like to think we did our small part here at NorCal Politics.  The returns are below the fold.  Governor Schwarzenegger’s power grab got a serious smackdown.  In fact, of his Propositions, the Proposition that lost by the largest margin (Prop 76) is the Proposition that was most closely tied to his office.  I don’t think that’s a coincidence

Now that this election is over, NorCal Politics will be doing some administrative work for a couple weeks, but there should also be ongoing posting on various topics of interest, including the iniatives that are underway for the 2006 ballot, various primary races, and whatever else comes up.

Continue reading [From NCP] Victory →

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[From NCP] No on Proposition 77: Reason #3

[Originally posted on Norcal Politics, November 7, 2005]

This is the last installment in my No on 77 series.  It was supposed to have been completed long ago, but the day job and a virus conspired against that timeline. 

Bottom Line #3:   Why are Republicans and their Big Business allies funding the campaign for Proposition 77?  Why are they pushing Proposition 77 now, in a special election when turnout will be low?  The short answer is that there’s something in it for them, and they want to ram it through as soon as they can.  It’s not about principle — that’s a flat out lie.  As described before, it’s all about Republican power.

Continue reading [From NCP] No on Proposition 77: Reason #3 →

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[From NCP] No on Proposition 77: Reason #2

[Originally posted at NorCal Politics, October 25, 2005]

Bottom Line #2:  Even if you support nonpartisan redistricting (and I do), Proposition 77 is not the way to do it.  It is (a) procedurally flawed, (b)  is unrepresentative of the voters of the State of California, and (c) likely to reduce legislative representation of Democrats and minorities.  Proposition 77 changes the California Constitution, and it will be difficult to change it again.  Even if the Republicans were willing to adopt a similar model in Texas (which is unlikely) to balance California’s choices, we have to get the solution to this problem right the first time, and Proposition 77 does not get it right.

Procedural Flaws 

The clearest criticism of this problem comes from the California League of Women Voters:

County elections officials are concerned that a redrawing of the lines immediately after the November election could not be done properly in time for the 2006 elections. If the process is rushed through, public input may be compromised.

[…]

Proposition 77 requires that the redistricting plan adopted by the three-judge panel must be placed on the ballot and voted upon by the people of California. On that same ballot we would elect representatives from those same new districts! And, if the plan is rejected, the entire redistricting process would be repeated, including a vote on the new lines at the next general election.

The concerns of county election officials can be found in this document published by the California Association of Clerks and Election Officials.  Long story short, it would be almost impossible to implement the redistricting in time for the 2006 elections. 

Just for a start, the redistricting commission envisioned by Proposition 77 would have to take place in the two weeks between the official certification of the election results on 12/17/05 and the primary election filing deadline of 12/30/05.  Otherwise, the candidates and the voters would have no idea what districts they are in when they file.  And then what happens if the new districts are rejected in a 2006 election?  Which districts do the winning candidates represent?

Not Representative of Californians

Again, the California League of Women Voters has a succinct description of the problem:

Responsibility for redistricting should be vested in a bipartisan special commission that includes citizens at large, representatives of public interest groups, and minority group interests. This proposition establishes a commission of just three retired judges. In the near term, such a panel almost certainly will not be diverse in background or ethnicity.

And, as we saw yesterday, by way of PowerPAC Blog, retired judges are not remotely representative of Californians as a group:

The 2000 Census found the ethnic breakdown of the state’s 33 million people to be about 47 percent white, 32 percent Latino, 11 percent Asian/Pacific Islander, 7 percent black and 3 percent other. Slightly more than half the state’s residents were women and about 11 percent were ages 65 or older.

Retired judges have a very different look. Statistics maintained by the state Judicial Council show that nearly 90 percent of the retired judges are men. There’s no ethnic breakdown for them, but a study for the Assembly elections committee showed that about 4 percent of the judges had Spanish surnames and 2 percent had Asian surnames.

Superior Court judges now make $143,000 a year, so even a retired judge living on his pension is making far more than the $53,025 that was the average income for a California family in 2000.

As a side note, I find it fascinating that Proposition 77, being pushed by the Republicans (I just got my Republican Party slate mailer today) relies upon a limited number of unelected judges to make decisions affecting all of us.  Apparently the Republicans only hate "unelected judges" when they’re likely to do something the Republicans don’t like.

Effect on Democrats and Minorities

A survey of a number of different sources concerning redistricting methods turns up some startling consistencies.  First, the primary methods used to gerrymander out-of-power groups are simple to understand.  You pack them into a few highly concentrated districts.  Those you can’t or won’t pack, you crack and stack into districts so that they are reliably in the minority.  And finally, you try to ensure that the redistricting pairs incumbents of the other party in new districts, while keeping your incumbents in new, safe districts.  This has gotten much easier in recent years, thanks to increasing processor power and affordable software.

Now, Proposition 77 doesn’t, as a formal matter, allow pairing.  The judges who make up the commission are supposed to not take into account the address of any incumbents.  But, the combination of (a) Proposition 77’s focus on compactness and adherence to city and county boundaries as criteria for redistricting and (b) the absence of any consideration of what are called "communities of interest", will combine to pack Democrats into fewer urban districts and crack and stack minorities into majority-majority districts. 

For example, Arizona has a redistricting commission that uses compactness and contiguity as the criteria for district boundaries.  In 2004, Arizona went for Bush 55% to 44%, but 6 of 8 of its House Members are Republicans.  None of the House races were remotely competitive. The districts in which the Democrats won encompassed, respectively, Phoenix and Tuscon + Nogales.

Or take Iowa, with a redistricting commission that uses the same criteria as Proposition 77:  compactness, contiguity, and political boundaries.  In 2004, Iowa went for Bush 50% to 49%, but 4 of 5 House Members are Republicans.  Only one of those races was within ten percent, and that was the race in which the Democrat won.  Unsurprisingly, this district includes Des Moines.

Proposition 77 is not the solution to the problem of politicized redistricting.  As I’ve written, it amounts to unilateral disarmament by California Democrats in the face of Republican gerrymandering in other states, substituting a "rules-based" anti-Democrat gerrymander.

Vote No on Proposition 77.

Arnold Schwarzenegger

[From NCP] More On “Just Friends”

[Originally posted by Chuck Dupree at NorCal Politics on October 23,2005]

Bush and Ahnold, sitting in a tree…  The only real difference I can see between the two is that Ahnold was successful at something.  The something was crap, but he was a successful purveyor thereof.  He didn’t need friends of his fascist father to bail him out of every venture, like a certain President we know.

Thus, my view is that Der Gropenfuhrer figured his popularity would not benefit from being photographed beside Our War President, whereas the Leaker-in-Chief figured his popularity couldn’t possibly be hurt by being photographed standing beside the killer of the Predator.

On the other hand, the Democrats do themselves no favor by harrassing the Gubernator for not hanging with his non-friend.

They’d be better off trying to come up with some proposals of their own.  This is the microcosm of the national macrocosm: Democrats afraid to mention their own ideas, hoping to win because the Publicans self-destruct.  True, they will self-destruct, taking the country with them.  But the Democrats need a platform, more specifically a non-corporate platform, to take advantage of this.  Following the Kathleen Brown playbook (“I’m one inch to the left of my opponent, so you have to vote for me”) will not work.

Arnold Schwarzenegger, Budget

[From NCP] No On Prop 76

[Originally posted at Norcal Politics by Lane Schwark on October 23,2005]

The LA Times has an article today that should serve as a warning to anyone considering voting in favor of Prop 76. Entitled "Would State Budget Cap Pinch Like Colorado’s?", the article looks at how a similar cap in imposed in Colorado 13 years ago has "strangled" that state’s government. The Republican Governor and even the Chamber of Commerce want the cap lifted for five years so they can catch up.

The problem: Colorado’s spending controls appear to have worked too well. Now some of the most strident fiscal conservatives in Colorado — long viewed as a model for others considering such restraints — say the cap has strangled government. There is talk of closing community colleges, privatizing the university system, releasing inmates early.

Owens said he never saw it coming.

"I don’t think it was designed to cripple government," he said of the Taxpayers Bill of Rights, or TABOR, amendment his state’s voters approved. "This is an unintended consequence."

Continue reading [From NCP] No On Prop 76 →

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[From NCP] No On Prop 75

[Originally posted at Norcal Politics by Stephen Green on October 23, 2005]

Those who wrote and are pushing for the passage of Proposition 75 on the ballot want us to believe that it’s up to us to protect the members of California’s public employees unions from their unions.  If we fail these poor people, their unions will use part of their dues to support political causes or candidates that individual members may not approve of.  We need to do this, the pro-75 people say, because these union members, who have the power to decide whether or not they will join the union, who have some control over who holds office in their unions, and have some say, through elections and conventions, to determine how the unions’ energies and resources will be channelled, apparently lack the ability to exercise these choices in their own best interests.

How absurdly paternalistic is this measure?  This is part of the text of the proposition:

  • "Section 2(e) Because public money is involved, the public has a right to ensure that public employees have a right to approve the use of their dues or fees to support the political objectives of their labor organization."

 What public money are they referring to here?  They apparently consider the salary paid to public employees to still be public money, to be spent according to the dictates of the public, after these employees have received it in their paychecks.  They not only think they, and the voters of California, have a better idea of what’s in the best interests of public employees than these employees’ unions do, they also think they have a better idea of how these employees should spend their money than the employees themselves do.

Although public employees have suffered job losses and wage stagnation along with other California workers over the last five years. through the efforts of their unions they have competetive wage and benefit packages, including sick and vacation leave and health and retirement benefits.  They have, through their unions’ efforts, work rules that protect them from arbitrary or capricious actions by their employers.

I have no doubt that these unions support causes and candidates that their members don’t universally support, but stockholders in corporations and taxpayers and voters in cities, counties, states, and nations don’t get to opt out of financially supporting things those entities stand behind.  The backers of Prop 75 somehow feel that labor unions alone should bear such a burden, that union members alone should have such a privilege (isn’t this concern for the union members by the yes-on-75 people touching?).

Labor unions are inherently political organizations and this is particularly true of public employees labor unions.  Things that are settled in collective bargaining in other industries are often settle in the legislature or at the polls for public employees.  We need look no farthr for an example of this than Propostion 74, on the same ballot, which would extend from 2 to 5 the number of years public school teachers must work to achieve tenure.

In truth, the problem here is that when labor union get involved in politics, they tend to support progressive causes and candidates.  They tend to support the same kinds of things for Californians in general that they support for their members through collective bargaining.  Higher wages, better access to health care, and a more comprehensive social safety net.  These are things that the backers of Proposition 75 are, for whatever reason, opposed to.  These people will work to silence the organized voices that advocate for such things.  That’s what this is about.  The backers of Proposition 75 want to raise barriers  to organized labors ability to work to strengthen their members’ rights at the polls and in the legislature, to block labor’s ability to support progressive causes that benefit all California workers.  Because the backers of Prop 75 have an agenda that is unpopular among Californians, they want to silence the voices, particularly the organized voices, that oppose their agenda.

In the interest of full disclosure, I have to reveal that I am a public employee, but not a member of a collective bargaining group or a labor union.  As with other non-union workers in our society, however, I enjoy most of the benefits my job offers because labor unions, through the power of collective bargaining and organized public advocacy, have raised the level of expectations that individual workers have of their employers.

Arnold Schwarzenegger

[From NCP] Arnold Inserts Foot Again

[Originally Posted by LSchwark on Norcal Politics, October 21, 2005]

California’s First Lady, Maria Shriver, will be hosting a women’s conference next week, the "Governor and First Lady’s Conference on Women". This was the conference where, last year, Governor Arnold made his famous remark calling nurses "special interests" and boasting "I kick their butts every day". A women’s conference was an especially unfortunate venue for issuing a smackdown of a profession that is heavily populated by women. It was also the point at which people began resisting his agenda with a passion and his poll numbers started to sag.

So you might think he would make an effort not to ruin his wife’s conference this year. Well, you’d be wrong.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, at a Monday press conference, may have fueled the political fire when he said his wife might use the conference to talk about her view of the election ballot issues.

"You will hear from her," said Schwarzenegger after being asked a question about his wife’s positions on the special election measures.

Schwarzenegger, giving a plug for her women’s conference, then promised, "I think she’s going to talk about that there … and you will see what she thinks about my work and the initiatives and what we are trying to accomplish here."

But that has prompted a curt — and definite — denial from Shriver’s office.

Shriver won’t "use this inspirational day to discuss the upcoming special election — or her views on the various reform measures," said Terri Carbaugh, her spokeswoman. "It’s a day free from politicking, free from partisanship, free from electioneering. And the women who attend can feel safe from the political warfare that is naturally pervasive in the days prior to an election."

I can only imagine that this has Arnold in the doghouse, big time. I mean, it’s one thing to issue a statement that overshadows the conference once, but two years in a row? Even better, we may never learn her position on the issues. Her spokesperson has this to say:

As to the governor’s comments suggesting that Shriver would take a political stand at next week’s event, Carbaugh said she could not explain them. Indeed, she said he could not predict when or if Shriver would ever go public on her views on the special election.

"It’s important to remember that Maria comes from a journalist point of view, and as such, how she votes and the position she may or may not have, she tends to keep private, like most California journalists," she said. "She’ll cast her votes at the ballot box and leave it at that. "

Before I leave this issue, let me just note the actual measures he wants his wife to endorse:

  • Prop 74: Blaming teachers for the problems in out schools by extending the probation period for tenure from two to five years. That means teachers could be fired without cause for three years longer. How does this put kids first? It doesn’t. It just means more teachers will leave the profession after a few years. Teacher turnover is already a problem. Making it worse seems like a bad idea, to put it mildly. Moreover, as this AP article points out, the proposition is so poorly written it actually makes it harder to fire teachers after they have tenure.
  • Prop 75: Targets public employee organizations (such as teachers, nurses, firefighters, police — some of Arnold’s biggest critics) by adding additional requirements meant to restrict their participation in political campaigns. Once partially muzzled, it would be much easier to target schools, medical services, fire and police and other services for cuts if the proposal passes. It’s fairly plain — if the people who most understand what effect the cuts will have are partially silenced, the public will have a harder time learning of the true effects of further proposals.
  • Prop 76: Setting school funding limits that even the state legislative analysis admits will likely result in a "ratchet effect" (see page 3, second column of the PDF) that lowers future school funding levels following years where money is short, as growth would be limited by previous years’ funding levels. Again, like nursing, teaching is a profession populated largely by women.

Now, there are lots of ways to characterize these things. You could call them anti-worker and anti-education. But teachers are affected by all three and nurses by the "stifle yourself" Prop 75. I don’t think it’s unfair to add anti-women to the list.

No wonder Maria wants none of this at her conference.

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[From NCP] No on Proposition 77: Reason #1

[Originally posted at NorCal Politics on October 16, 2005]

I tried to write just one post about all of the reasons that Proposition 77 is such a bad idea. It got far too long, so I’ll be serializing it this week. The first installment is below.

Bottom Line #1: You can’t separate Arnold Schwarzenegger’s “neutral” redistricting plan from the larger Republican strategy of creating a permanent majority by changing the field of play. Schwarzenegger’s plan is part of a pure Republican power play, just as much as the Republican redistricting of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Florida and Tom Delay’s infamous redistricting of Texas.

Continue reading [From NCP] No on Proposition 77: Reason #1 →