One of the positions that Arnold takes that is most antithetical to his so-called “moderate” status is his position on the minimum wage.  Sure, he’s happy to raise it a buck now.  But what is Arnold afraid of when he says that he is against indexing.  Indexing would tie the minimum wage to some measure of inflation, presumably the consumer price index (CPI).  If Arnold believes that the state’s minimum wage workers should get $7.75 in two years (as he has indicated), why does he not think they deserve the same amount of real dollars in five years?  In ten years?

More in the extended…

Sen. Tom McClintock, R-Thousand Oaks, said the bill’s intent was to alter natural market forces that determine what employers were willing to pay for labor.  “In the world of reality, the Legislature cannot do that,” he said. “It may as well command the tide not to come in.”

Schwarzenegger vetoed a less aggressive version of the bill last year, which would have raised the minimum wage by $1 over two years without the Consumer Price Index component.  This year, the governor signaled a willingness to sign a bill increasing the minimum, but spread over three years instead of two and without the indexing provision. Officials in his administration also sought to tie the minimum increase to legislation that would have weakened a law that requires overtime pay after an eight-hour day or 40-hour week.
“The governor’s concern is that this bill ties government’s hands and does not provide the flexibility it needs to address changing economic conditions,” said Vince Sollitto, a spokesman for the governor. (SF Chronicle 9/8/2005)

First of all, Mr. McClintock: You are wrong.  In this reality, the reality that real Americans live in, the minimum wage is an important floor.  Do we really want a country where employers can pay $2/hour?  The answer to a large majority of Americans is no.  Why would we work towards making the poor poorer?  And, I would also point the Republican duo to Myth and Measurement, a report on minimum wage increases by David Card and Alan Krueger that inicates that minimum wage increases don’t actually decrease the number of jobs.  Rather, minimum wage increases stops employers from bottom-feeding and gets more people to work.  And by the way, here in San Francisco, we’re using the tide for our own purposes: energy creation, Go Gav!

No, it’s become painfully clear that the hard-right CRaP (California Republican Party) is concerned more that certain monied interests get a few more bucks than ensuring that our workers are paid a fair wage.  In America, we have standards that must be met.  A constant amount of real dollars, accomplished by indexing, would be a truly fair wage. 

And if we’ve learned anything about Arnold Schwarzenegger since the recall election, it’s that he’s bought and paid for by his “non-special” interests.  You see, according to Arnold and his “running-mate”, Tom McClintock, California’s poorest workers are “special interests” but big businesses aren’t.  See, don’t you get it? Rich people: voices of the people, Poor people: Special intersts.  But whatever you call them, one thing is clear: Arnold always serves his “interests”:

The bill is opposed by industry groups that are among Schwarzenegger’s biggest backers, including the California Chamber of Commerce, the California Manufacturers and Technology Association and the California Restaurant Association.

(Round and round she goes, which Arnold will you get? Nobody knows. – promoted by SFBrianCL)

My first diary at calitics. I was sent by dday over at DailyKos . . .

(Also available at DailyKos and My Left Wing)

 You may fool all the people some of the time, you can even fool some of the people all of the time, but you cannot fool all of the people all the time.

            — Abraham Lincoln, 1858

   There’s a sucker born every minute.

            — not Abraham Lincoln

How does this sound for a campaign promise:

In an attempt to offer substantial remedies for California’s healthcare problems, gubernatorial candidate Phil Angelides today will propose installing new medical clinics in as many as 500 elementary schools, his aides said.

Angelides campaign officials said the candidate has embraced the idea of adding hundreds of new school clinics but would likely not make a formal proposal and flesh out details of the plan until next year, if he is elected.

Ho-hum. Pretty tame stuff, right? Candidate X says he’s going to change A, B and C, but is light on the details – and besides, there’s not much he can do until after he’s elected anyway, right? Typical challenger’s election-year puffery.

Okay, so much for the hypothetical scenario. Let’s try this real-life example, from last week’s newspaper, of a sitting governor who’s actually running for re-election:

Criticized for failing to offer substantial remedies for California’s healthcare problems, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger today will propose installing new medical clinics in as many as 500 elementary schools, his aides said. [snip]

Administration officials said Schwarzenegger has embraced the idea of adding hundreds of new school clinics but would likely not make a formal proposal and flesh out details of the plan until next year, if he is reelected. [emphasis added]

This coming from the ostensible leader of the most powerful state in the Union – the 6th largest economy on the planet – who could, if he chose, “make a formal proposal and flesh out details of the plan” right now if he were actually serious about doing something about it.

But he’s not.

He’s just trying to win an election.

Tell me this guy won’t say anything – anything at all – to get elected.

Here’s another example: Schwarzenegger hosted a “healthcare summit” at UCLA last week.

Schwarzenegger himself has offered few detailed proposals on healthcare during his nearly three years in elective politics. The governor said Monday he was open to all ideas and ready to begin a thorough examination of healthcare with an eye toward announcing a comprehensive proposal next year if he is reelected.

*coughbullshitcough*

How stupid does he think we are, anyway?

Evidently, pretty stupid. Schwarzenegger has been blatantly pandering to almost every interest group you can think of, trying frantically to convince them that he is “one of them,” that they can trust him to take care of their interests if they could only see it in their hearts to keep him in Sacramento.

Just two days ago, he announced the appointment of the former Congressman who oversaw the Clinton impeachment trial to a seat on the Superior Court in Orange County, thus sending the right wing into paroxysms of ecstasy.

Soon after the governor’s news release announcing [James E.] Rogan’s appointment went out Monday, conservative commentator and blogger Jon Fleischman issued an e-mail alert to his readers. He called Rogan a “superstar on the Republican side of the aisle.”

Hmmm, okay, a little red meat for the wingers, n’est-ce pas? But here’s what set off the Pandering Alert:

Schwarzenegger’s office made the rare move of announcing Rogan’s intended appointment although the position won’t be open for two months. Rogan is replacing retiring Judge Susanne Shaw, who leaves Sept. 30.

Gee, now I wonder why he would do that? Hmmm . . .

Rogan’s appointment comes amid criticism from conservatives who objected last week to Schwarzenegger saying that there was too much prejudice and hatred in the debate over immigration. And some Republicans have said with disdain that nearly 45% of Schwarzenegger’s appointments to the bench have been Democrats or independents.

He also, for good measure, on Monday signed an essentially meaningless “environmental accord” with British Prime Minister Tony Blair – one that is so toothless that industry groups were positively gushing:

  [The Western States Petroleum Association’s] chief operating officer, Catherine Reheis-Boyd, [said] Monday’s agreement “recognizes the importance of using market-based mechanisms to address the challenging issues of climate change. It acknowledges the very real risks to our economic future if we don’t move with care and deliberation.“

In a statement, Allan Zaremberg, president of the California Chamber of Commerce, applauded Schwarzenegger and Blair for their actions, including proposals to examine the true costs of greenhouse gas regulatory programs, adding, “Knowing what climate change policies will do to California’s economy should be a prerequisite of any statutory change…. Unfortunately, some state policymakers continue to encourage the imposition of an arbitrary, California-only mandatory emissions cap program.”

Hey, it was a great photo-op, though!

 So much for “Arnold the Environmentalist.” Oh! Did I mention he’s opposed to Proposition 87, which would use revenues generated from oil drilling in California to fund alternative-energy research and development – this in spite of the fact that more than 60% of Californians support the measure?

He’s also trying now to weaken the provisions of a bill that would toughen standards for greenhouse gas emissions in the state. Gee, I wonder why?

The governor announced a proposal last summer to reduce gases like carbon dioxide that cause global warming, and he has already begun to make the idea a centerpiece of his re-election campaign.

But many business groups, including key Schwarzenegger allies like the California Chamber of Commerce, are adamantly opposed to strict caps and are lobbying against the bill. Schwarzenegger risks upsetting industry if he signs the bill, but many political observers believe his global warming rhetoric will look hollow if he doesn’t enact the law.

Rock, meet hard place.

Tough call, eh, Arnie?

I’m sure his decision would have been made a lot easier if he and his administration hadn’t accepted more than $2 million in various contributions from oil interests since 2002.

But, wait! You’re saying – wasn’t Ahnuld the candidate who promised us during the recall campaign in 2003 that he wouldn’t accept money from – <cue ominous organ music> – SPECIAL INTERESTS??? <cue sound of woman’s blood-curdling shriek>

From a commentary by Jeffrey Nunberg in the New York Times shortly before the 2003 recall election (emphasis added):

Arnold Schwarzenegger began his campaign to lead California by pledging to become “the people’s governor,” vowing that he would accept no money from the “special interests who have a stranglehold on Sacramento.” When it turned out that he had accepted contributions from developers and other wealthy individuals, he explained that those weren’t special interests but merely “powerful interests who control things.”

What he had meant, he said, was that he would refuse contributions only from public employee unions or other groups he might have to negotiate with as governor. He apologized for the confusion by saying, “I was not articulate enough to explain that.”

“Public employee unions or other groups he might have to negotiate with” as governor – in other words, YOUR special interests, not MINE. Because, Lord knows, he won’t be negotiating with developers, insurance companies, energy interests, or Big Pharma – noooo – remember, “handing out favors to” is not the same as “negotiating with.” In case you missed Ahnuld’s halo, here he is on CNN last year, reminding you of his unimpeachable integrity:

I cannot be bought. I have plenty of money myself. No one can give me $100,000 and think that I’m going to go and change my policy or my thinking.

– but don’t let that stop you; you can still give him $100,000. Actually, you can only give him $22,300, the legal limit in California. But if you have enough family members or employees with deep pocketses, you can ratchet that right up. Take a look at Ahnuld’s top donors so far for this election cycle. You’ll notice that he has, indeed, received plenty of money from special interests of all kinds – real estate development, energy, pharmaceuticals, insurance, finance, health care, entertainment, high-tech – from both within California and out-of-state. Contrast that with Angelides’s list, which reveals many more unions, and far fewer big-business interests.

Schwarzenegger is hoping California voters have short memories when it comes to his lies about special-interest money. But those lies aren’t all he’s trying to get away from. Ahnuld has been a veritable Running Man when it comes to a slew of issues he’d rather voters forget: running from racism, running from sexual harassment, running from residue of his father’s Nazi past,  running from his involvement with Enron and the California energy crisis in 2001 –  

 and running from George W. Bush.

Schwarzenegger made a big deal about appearing at the 2004 Republican National Convention to endorse the incumbent President. But last month, when Ahnuld went to the White House to attend – along with George W. Bush – a dinner in honor of the Special Olympics and its founder, Schwarzenegger’s mother-in-law, Eunice Kennedy Shriver? Mmm, not so much:

Usually a governor will brag about going to the White House, especially if the president is in the governor’s own party. But with a president as unpopular as Bush is in California, it’s no wonder the governor is mum about the visit.

The governor’s official schedule, put out daily by his office, listed “no planned public events” for Monday. [snip]

CBS 5 : “Will you ask President Bush to campaign with you?”

Schwarzenegger: “I don’t need anyone to campaign with me. I think this is all between me and the people of California.”

Tuesday, at an event near Sacramento, the governor was asked about why his office was silent on his White House visit.

“When I decide when I’m going, which many times is the last minute — I’m a very improvisational person — so I think that my office gets caught many times off-guard, also,” he said.

Ahnuld told a slightly different story to the Scripps newspapers:

Though the governor’s office noted he was out of state, it did not say where.

“This was more a personal trip because my mother-in-law, who is 85 years old, you know she celebrated her birthday, and at the same time the White house celebrated all this great work she has done since 1968 when she started Special Olympics,” Schwarzenegger said.

As Doctor Evil would say,

Riiiiight.

Even when Ahnuld magically responded within a day to President Bush’s veto of federal funding for stem-cell research by proposing a $150 million loan to California’s stem-cell research program, state Dems called bullshit on Schwarzenegger’s, uhh, bold and principled stand:

In 2004, 59% of voters passed Proposition 71 to authorize $3 billion in bonds to fund stem cell research. But litigation has paralyzed the bond process. A Superior Court judge issued a strongly worded ruling in May in favor of the state, calling the bonds valid. However, the plaintiffs – taxpayer and religious groups – have vowed an appeal. If Proposition 71 is deemed unconstitutional, the state loan would not be repaid.

Schwarzenegger spokeswoman Margita Thompson said that, although the governor could have taken such action earlier, the court ruling persuaded him that the state would ultimately prevail. With the Bush veto, he “felt it was critical to take action to ensure that stem cell research continues,” she said. Schwarzenegger has been a longtime supporter of stem cell research and endorsed Proposition 71, his staff said.

The Republican governor’s move could also help him win over moderate voters by drawing a sharp distinction with the president, who is unpopular in California. The action drew derision from the governor’s opponent in the November election, Democrat Phil Angelides, who called it a “smokescreen to cloud the memory of California voters that it was Arnold Schwarzenegger who campaigned for President Bush in Ohio and helped put him back into office.

“For the past year, while I was fighting for immediate funding for the California Institute of Regenerative Medicine, the governor failed to lift a finger to stand up to the anti-research activists,” Angelides said in a statement.

California Democratic Party spokesman Roger Salazar said in a statement that Schwarzenegger “sat silent as his supporters took Proposition 71 to court.”

Oooh, so it could be trouble for Ahnuld in November if California voters have Total Recall – he’d rather they fall for his not-so-True Lies.

Tomorrow in Part 2: The Triangulator has real problems: prisons, unions, and – gulp– immigration.

Today’s California Blog Roundup is on the flip. Teasers: Phil Angelides, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Richard Pombo, Buck McKeon, CA-50, voting, Republican corruption, Proposition 88, prisons, immigration, global warming.

Governor’s Race

• From My Left Wing, occam’s hatchet systematically sets up and knocks down pretty much every Schwarzenegger move so far. o.h. says this is part 1 of 2, though I’m not sure what’s left for part 2.
• Schwarzenegger needs to make a call: either pander to his nativist base or do the right thing and reject their bigotry.
• Pandering to extremist Republican base, Schwarzenegger rewards extremist Republican with judgeship. Not all that surprising, except that this particular extremist Republican was one who used to make Arnold ashamed to be a Republican. Bet Arnold hoped this one would slide under the radar.
• Shorter Frank Russo: Schwarzenegger’s a greenhouse gasbag. That photo-op with Tony Blair generated yet another promise for Schwarzenegger to judiciously study a problem after he’s re-elected. If Schwarzenegger were serious, he’d throw his support behind AB 32 [Warning, PDF].
• PowerPAC points us to a profile of the Real Phil Angelides — not the straw man that the Republicans have been putting up. (Also from PowerPAC, a web ad from Phil.)
• Julia Rosen has some more detail on the money race. Schwarzenegger’s Bush/Cheney campaign team seem to be big spenders.
• Really big spenders: $16 Million in the first 6 months of the year, without a primary opponent.

Jerry McNerney / Paid-For Pombo / CA-11

• Advisor to Paid-For Pombo suggests death for Connecticut residents who oppose drilling in ANWR. No, seriously.
• Paid-For Pombo is just another extremist Bush Republican, one of the Mayberry Machiavellis, with no policy, only politics.
• I don’t know how many times I can say this: Paid-For Pombo just flat out hates the planet. Where does he think his kids will live when he’s helped destroy their world?

CA-50

• Lots of people posting on the lawsuit demanding a hand recount in CA-50, but I’m going with Words Have Power for this topic WHP asks a good question: “Interestingly, since he has already been sworn into office, Brian Bilbray can not be removed from his position, even if a recount shows that he actually had fewer votes than Francine Busby. How would the Republican congress handle that little issue?” This way, I’m betting.
• In related news, Courage Campaign and Chris Bowers did an interesting post-mortem poll in CA-50.

Other Republican Paragons

• Wow. Great point-by-point indictment of Buck McKeon, selling out his district for campaign contributions.
• Ah, the Republicans… always willing to screw over working people (and their theoretical “principles”) just a little more than you thought they would. And don’t forget, they’re screwing the poor while helping poor little rich girl Paris Hilton.

Propositions

Educational Justice has an interesting take on Proposition 88. And please, EJ bloggers, for the love of all that’s holy, stop with the giant colored fonts.

The Rest

• Cubanos, si! Mexicanos, no! Whaaa?
• Clearly, this is a failure in perception that needs to be fixed.
• Uneasy Rhetoric continues to thrash out ideas for renewing Downtown Sacramento.
• Despite knowing the need, the Schwarzenegger Administration did not even seek funding for mental health workers for the prisons in the budget process. So the Federal Judge overseeing the CDP has ordered them to do so. I can hear the howls of “activist judges” rising from the Republicans. If the Republicans don’t like judges stepping in, maybe they could do what’s right for a change.
• SF blogger/journalist jailed by Feds for refusal to turn over unedited tape.
• Housing bubble ending. Bad news for a lot of Californians.
• WiFi on CalTrain — sweet!
• Also sweet — Devil’s Slide to reopen early. The mess created by that closure was simply unreal.
• The Disgruntled Chemist returns to beer blogging. May I suggest he try an Anderson Valley Cerveza Crema or Barney Flats Oatmeal Stout?

(An excellent review of the positions of both candidates. Also, check out jryan86’s blog, Berkeley Bubble, it’s quite good and has some excellent original analysis. – promoted by SFBrianCL)

(Originally posted at Berkeley Bubble).

On a recent drive across the Richmond bridge, while trying to focus on the immense natural beauty of the San Francisco Bay, I couldn’t help but stare at San Quentin prison, which sits at the northern end of the span. As I drove past this prison, I realized that I didn’t want to live in a state where state prisons continue to explode, expand, and become permanent, visible fixtures, of our cities and counties, and of the California landscape.

Sadly, prisons have dominated our political landscape, and prison overcrowding has become a permanent problem.  On June 27, Arnold called for a special session to address the prison crisis in California, to deal with overcrowding of prisons.  As it turns out now, the Legislature will now consider prison reform beginning on August 7, 2006. And wouldn’t you know it, Arnold just happens to be running for re-election.

Unfortunately, the Terminator’s solution to prison overcrowding is to adopt the same, short-sighted policies that our state has adopted to alleviate traffic on our highways and roads –just build more (lanes) prisons. And Democrat Phil Angelides’ policy proposals for prison reform aren’t much better, as one might expect, as he attempts to cautiously court (or avoid alienating) moderate and independent voters concerned with crime.  This is the problem with resolving crises in the middle of election cycles–political expedience takes precedence over viability and policy prudence.

Read the flip for more about the the details on the various policy proposals for prison reform.

Angelides v. Arnold on Prisons

As this report from the Chronicle notes, Arnold called the special session in response to a special report by John Hagar, a special master appointed by federal district court judge Thelton Henderson to deal with use of force, discipline, and other pervasive problems among California’s 33 state prisons. In his report to the Legislature, Hagar highlighted serious problems with the administration of prisons and vast abuses on the part of prison guards, while noting that the state’s prison guard union has been an intractable obstacle to true reform.

  Arnold highlighted some of the issues facing the prison system:

“He noted that a system designed to hold about 100,000 inmates houses more than 171,000, and more than 16,000 inmates are sleeping in gyms, dayrooms and other areas of lockups not intended for housing.

Arnold also noted in his speech calling for the special session that in addition to alleviating prison overcrowding, he seeks to address the extraordinarily high recidivism rate here in the Golden State–apparently, it’s the highest in the nation, with 70 percent of inmates returning to prison after release. (Sounds like prisons aren’t rehabilitating most prisoners).

And here’s Arnold’s plan–build more prisons:

“The governor proposed a four-pronged approach: building at least two new prisons; enacting rules to suspend some state laws to allow the new prisons to be built quickly; shifting 4,500 female inmates from prisons to community-based facilities closer to their families; and opening new facilities designed to help male inmates adjust to life outside prison.”

Building new prisons really isn’t a long-term solution to the state’s prison overcrowding problem–in the short term, it may alleviate temporary overcrowding, but in the long-run, it really just ensures that we’re going to expand the number individuals we sentence to imprisonment, according to this source:

The problem is there is one solution put forward, and that is build, build, build. Increasing the number of cells will only increase the number of people in prison. “History teaches us that if you build them, you fill them”, says Rose Braz, national campaign coordinator for Critical Resistance, a prison reform organization.

***

It’s the Prison Guards Union, Stupid!

As on most issues, prison reform faces a major obstacle–interest group politics.  On this front, it’s the prison guards union, the California Correctional Peace Officers Association (or “CCPOA”) that has blocked, stalled and gutted repeated attempts at reform.  And while it looked Arnold “the reformer” had originally sought to combat the power of prison unions in his January 2005 State of the State address (proposing a new $6 billion corrections agency that would seek to counter the influence of the prison guards union and reduce incarceration rates), since that time, he appears to be backpedalling and catering to CCPOA. Check out this excerpt from a great article in the Ventura County Reporter:

In something of a reversal laid out in this year�s State of the State speech and announced again with new emphasis on June 26, Schwarzenegger has proposed a $3.6 billion gift to the union � an expansion of the state corrections system, easing crowding by building two brand new prisons at $500 million each, shipping as many as 5,000 illegal immigrant prisoners to other states, and moving 4,500 nonviolent women inmates to community facilities closer to their families. 

The CCPOA loves policies that encourage new prison construction because it guarantees them job-security and income security.  So it’s in their interest to kill any prison reform that seeks to reduce the number of prisons, seeks to promote rehabilitation, or heaven forbid, seeks to reduce the number of prisoners in our prisons.

Terminator denies this is politics–but check this excerpt from the Chronicle article :

“Speaking at a conference of state district attorneys in Newport Beach, Schwarzenegger characterized jam-packed prisons as being in crisis and warned that courts could take over the system and “order the early release of tens of thousands of prisoners.”

Again, echoes of a campaign of fear, from Pete Wilson’s 1994 anti-immigration platform of yesteryear. And what better place to talk about prisoners and crime than the bastion and heart of California conservatives–good ol’ Orange County.  Some of Pete Wilson’s old campaign advisers now advise Arnold, and I’m sure they’ve told him that prisons are a solid wedge issue that can divide Dems and undermine Angelides.  Sadly, spreading fear and scaring voters isn’t going to be productive in resolving this policy crisis… Courts ordering the release of more then ten thousand prisoners? Not going to happen.

No matter what Arnold says or does, calling a special session less than six months before Election Day means that this becomes a de facto political maneuver.  So Phil Angelides has to weigh in with his own plan as well.  And while this one smacks of election-cycle calculations and considerations in its moderate to conservative tone, Phil’s plan isn’t that much better than Arnold’s:

“On his first day as Governor, Angelides will immediately:

Expedite hiring of staff for both prisons and parole
Immediately increase prison capacity by opening two unused prisons
Personally contact the federal judge who holds California’s prison health care system in receivership and schedule a meeting within 30 days
Name the Cabinet Secretary and top-level managers at the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation and give them 90 days to produce a prison recovery plan that will:
A. Increase prison capacity by building new prisons and assuring completion within 3 years of authorization
B. Improve and expand rehabilitation, education and job training
C. Improve mental health and substance abuse treatment
D. Provide a new focus on juvenile diversion programs
E. Set a goal to take the prison health care system out of federal receivership by the end of Angelides’ first term

Obviously, Angelides is trying to appeal to the center of the California spectrum in this election year, hence his emphasis on prison construction and capacity.  Here, Angelides isn’t that much different from Arnold.  However, parts B and C of his plan show a glimmer of hope, but again sound more like aspirational statements than detailed policy solutions. I’m not going to second-guess Phil’s campaign advisers on this one.  But I will second-guess the viability of these policy reforms–unless Phil  puts and emphasis on rehabilitation, education, job training, and mental health, his plan won’t resolve the current crisis.

The Legislature is now slated to take up prison reform as part of the special session on August 7, following their summer vacation.  However, as this report details, the reform package adopted will have to be comprehensive, sweeping and meaningful, and not just a band-aid solution, to help quell criticisms that the special session is purely a politically motivated one designed to further Arnold’s re-election…

How about Sentencing Reform?

If the Legislature really wants to solve the prison crisis, they should pay heed to the recommendations of the American Bar Association and the Deukmejian commission, for starters.

Here’s some of the ABA’s recommended reforms:

-Lengthy periods of incarceration should be reserved for the most serious offenders, who present the greatest danger to the community;

-Alternatives to incarceration should be provided to offenders who pose minimal risk to the community and appear likely to benefit from rehabilitation programs.

The Chronicle also chimes in with its own suggestions:

We have argued numerous times on this page about the need to revise the state’s controversial “three strikes” law. But we recognize that, especially in an election year, too few politicians are brave enough to touch laws affecting inmates with violent or serious felonies in their backgrounds.

That’s why the Legislature and the governor should begin with reforming laws affecting inmates who commit nonviolent or so-called “victimless” crimes.

And here’s the recommendations from the Corrections Independent Review Panel, which was chaired by former Gov. George Deukmejian. Unfortunately, although the CIRP “was originally appointed by Schwarzenegger… (it) has consistently ignored its cogent insights and recommendations”. (For the full Deukmejian report, go to this page. Here’s some of the key parts of the Deukmejian report:

The Deukmejian report suggested providing inmates an incentive to reduce their prison time by increasing the “day-for-day credits” they could earn if they participated in a range of educational, vocational and drug-treatment programs. It also called for replacing the “determinate” sentencing system with one in which a judge would impose a minimum “presumptive” sentence and a longer “maximum sentence.” In order to be released after serving the shorter “presumptive” sentence, an inmate would have to complete a “program plan” assigned to the inmate on his or her arrival in prison.

And it looks like some politicians in Sacramento are listening to the ABA and
“We can look at bricks and mortar, but we have to look at sentencing reform and parole reform — that’s where change is needed,” said state Sen. Gloria Romero, D-Los Angeles, who carried unsuccessful legislation this year that would have amended the state’s three-strikes law to lessen the use of lengthy sentences for some non-violent offenses.

So here’s the problem–it’s the politics of entrenched interest groups and short-sighted politicians seeking re-election that has really doomed prison reform thus far.  Furthermore, because our political process has become so reliant on the intiative process, with politicians often punting on controversial issues so that the public can directly vote on them, our state has enacted thousands of new laws on stiffer sentencing  and prison construction, but few that really address the root causes of what drives individuals to resort to crime and violence.

Part of the problem here is California’s initiative process, which has helped churn out a criminal justice regime replete with a myriad of bizarre mandatory sentencing and parole laws that flood our prisons with prisoners, often for minor crimes, and keeping prisoners locked in due to a lack of rehabilitative policies and mechanism.

The initiative process, which produced the infamous “three strikes law,” has created a system where wealthy interest groups roam about the political landscape like sentinels, destroying reform proposals through costly ad-campaigns which scare electoral majorities away from voting reform and leading them to support  short-sighted policies that they believe will provide them the most “protection.”  Few voters can often intelligently discern what particular initiatives will actually do given the complexity of prose used by drafters, so they look to campaign ads and direct mail for heuristic cues.  In short, interest groups have turned a process originally intended for reform, into a forum filled with confusion and scare-mongering, an environment no better than the smoke and mirrors of turn of the century insider politics.

Ultimately, I do think we need to adopt policies that de-emphasize construction of new prisons, and emphasize rehabilitation and allevation of the root social causes of crime and violence.  If you’re interested in taking action on prison reform during this special session, check out this great website committed to ending the  spending spree on new prison construction.

Conclusion

What’s at stake here is a budget line item that just keeps ballooning out of control, one that threatens to rob California of economic vitality and balanced budgets…according to the Ventura County Reporter,

Since 1985, the number of state prisons has increased from 13 to 33, all of them overcrowded every step of the way, and the state’s Corrections budget has ballooned from $923 million to $5.7 billion in 2004.

And looking at the 2006 budget, we see that this number will increase to 8.6 billion!  The problem with constantly investing the public’s money in new prison construction is that prisons are a TERRIBLE investment from an economic perspective–they don’t produce much, and are mainly a drag on the state’s coffers and economy. (Plus, they’re really ugly and not-at-all-pleasant).  From an economic perspective, it is far sounder policy to invest in more productive sectors–such as research institutes and universities.  But unfortunately, due to poor planning and a lack of vision, California has gone down a dark and dreary road.  California has basically turned into a garrison state–one in which the number of state prisons vastly outnumbers the number of University of California campuses statewide.

I think the issue of prison reform is both a matter of common sense, as well as an issue of deciding what you want California to look like 50 years from now.

The next time you are crossing the Richmond bridge up to Marin, ask yourself if you like staring at prisons amidst the natural beuaty of our state, and ask yourself if you’d like to live in a state where prisons dot the urban and rural landscape.

(Cross-posted to Daily Kos and MyDD. – promoted by SFBrianCL)

The AP combed the financial records of both state parties.  Guess what? The California Republican Party (or CRaP, as I like to call it) loves those unlimited donations:

The California Republican Party has raised $12.3 million this year, most of it in unlimited donations, according to campaign finance reports reviewed Tuesday.
***
In June, after the bitter Democratic primary, the Republican Party spent $4.2 million on ads for Schwarzenegger, who has been the party’s main fundraiser.

Since the beginning of the year, the Republican Party received $2 million from Alex Spanos, owner of the San Diego Chargers; $1 million from T. Boone Pickens, the Texas oil tycoon; $1.5 million from A. Jerrold Perenchio, the founder of Univision; $250,000 from Chevron; and $150,000 from Joseph Weider, the fitness magazine owner who is an old friend of Schwarzenegger’s. (LA Daily News 8/2/06)

Check out the flip for more about the CRaPpy Unlimited Donors.

Yup, Mr. Alex Spanos gave $2 million to the CRaP.  And how did Mr. Spanos make his money you might ask?  Well, the Chargers owner was a real estate developer.  Yup, Mr. Schwarzenegger’s good buddy built apartments in Southern California. Oh, and a bonus, Mr. Spanos wrote a book that has a foreword from Rush Limbaugh.  Aww, shucks Arnold, you sure know how to pick your friends.  The praise for the book has some interesting “leaders” besides Limbaugh from sketchy sports owners like Al Davis to business heirs like Barron Hilton, grandfather of Paris Hilton.

Who else gave to the CRaP.  Well, it seems Big Oil loves CRaP.  It seems T. Boone Pickens is interested in Arnold.  You might know him, and love him, from such campaigns as the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, to which he gave $2 Million, or Progress for America, to which he gave $2.5 Million.  It seems Mr. Pickens makes quite a bit of money (over $1.6 BILLION last year), mostly off natural gas. 

Right along with Mr. Pickens is good ol’ Standard Oil of California, Chevron.  Chevron invested $250,000 in CRaP.  It’s quite interesting for a governor who claims to be Green to be courting donors for his party from big oil.

Mr. Schwarzenegger promised the voters of California that he would clean up Sacramento.  He didn’t need special interest money.  It turns out the only special interest money from interests that don’t support him are really special interests.  Nope, Arnold & Big Oil…they’re just good friends.

So, remember when you see those CRaP ads proclaiming Schwarzenegger an environmenatlist just who paid for that ad. The real environmentalist is Phil Angelides

For three out of four of them, the answer is “no.”

Seventy-five percent of California hospitals — 335 in all — have at least one building in danger of collapse in a major quake.  You can find if your local hospital is on the list at:

http://www.seiucal.o…

Twelve years after Northridge, 17 years after Loma Prieta, and a full 34 years after more than 50 people were killed in the collapse of buildings at Olive View Hospital in Sylmar and the VA Hospital in San Fernando as a result of the San Fernando earthquake, and California is about as prepared for the Big One as New Orleans was for Hurricane Katrina.

So why isn’t seismic retrofitting of hospitals included in the $38 billion in infrastructure bond measures proposed for the November ballot?  And why does the California Hospital Association want to eliminate the 2008 deadline for making “collapse hazard” hospital buildings safe?

The infrastructure bond package on the November ballot will include money for roads, schools, and, in the wake of Katrina, levees.  Yet while every Californian knows what the number one threat is to our public safety (and it ain’t terrorism), the amount set aside to prepare our frontline emergency facilities for a major earthquake is zero dollars and zero cents.

The issue is too basic even to qualify for meaningful political debate.  It’s a simple question of cause and effect: if we don’t prepare for the disaster we all know is coming, we’ll be unprepared when it happens.  Yet still, the short-term financial interests of the hospital industry somehow continue to prevail over the governor and the legislature.

It’s like watching the dysfunctional political process that ushered in the failed Katrina response unfold all over again.