Daily Archives: June 13, 2008

California

How John McCain Can Win the Golden State of California

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If McCain wins California in November, he almost certainly will become the next president of the United States. Barack Obama would find it extremely difficult, if not impossible, to receive the 270 needed electoral votes without the 55 from California. He could conceivably still win the election if he is able to make up those electoral votes by winning almost all of the swing states, which McCain is highly competitive in.

On the surface, McCain looks like a reasonably good match for California. He is a relatively moderate Republican, he is strong on the environment, he talks about low taxes and ending waste, he retains a somewhat maverick image, and he could be popular with independents. He is, broadly speaking, in the same mold as California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, who will campaign vigorously for him.

But there is a one big difference between Schwarzenegger and McCain, and it has enormous political implications: Schwarzenegger supports abortion rights and McCain does not. This single issue has the capability of being the deciding factor for whether California goes Republican or not. So McCain has no chance of winning the state, right? Not necessarily, he may have a chance to win over the  presumptive Democratic nominee Barack Obama.

Barack Obama supports giving drivers licenses to illegal immigrants, which is extremely unpopular among a majority of Californians. Schwarzenegger successfully exploited opposition to such drivers licenses in both of his elections, and McCain would have a shot at winning California by exploiting it also. Dan Schnur, who was McCain’s communications director in 2000 and is now a political strategist based in California, says the drivers license issue could trump the abortion issue when it comes to McCain. A majority of Californians do not support legislation for allowing illegal immigrants to receive drivers licenses. “Even some Democrats who are pro-choice would turn to McCain over the issue of drivers licenses,” Schnur said. “There is a pretty straightforward template for winning California: You do what Schwarzenegger did two years ago, which is run to the middle on the environment and most social issues, draw a stark line on taxes and an even starker line on illegal immigration and driver’s licenses.”

Most people do not know the make up of California’s voters; there is a broad middle there and it will go for the right kind of candidate. According to the California Secretary of State’s office, California has a current voter registration that is 43.0 percent Democratic(6.7 million voters), 33.3 percent Republican (5.4 million voters) and 19.4 percent Independent (2.9 million voters). This means that California is a blue state, but with enough Independents to shift the balance to John McCain.

The current Governor of California is Arnold Schwarzenegger, a pro-choice Republican, who deeply and sincerely supports fellow Republican John McCain. In endorsing McCain, Schwarzenegger lauded the Arizona senator’s crusade against wasteful spending, his national security credentials and his environmental and economic stewardship. Schwarzenegger is highly popular among those 2.9 million independent voters who are still deciding on which candidate to vote for. His endorsements and rigorous campaigning for McCain just might make the case to the undecided voters as to why McCain will be the better president for the United States.

The Hispanic vote in the Golden State is also a huge factor, 14% of likely voters are Hispanic or of Hispanic descent. McCain’s popularity with Hispanics may give a boost in the numbers, allowing him to win the state. A majority of Hispanic voters were spilt between Hillary Clinton and John McCain, with Obama getting a small percentage. If John McCain can continue to appeal to these voters they could easily give him the state.

When Hillary Clinton dropped out of the race and endorsed Barack Obama, a majority of Clinton supporters were expected to support Obama. Now some former Clinton supporters are supporting John McCain, who may just tip the scales in favor of John McCain. If he can continue to appeal to Clinton supporters and the 2.9 million independents and not loose his conservative base, then he will be successful in winning the Golden State of California.

Budget

Republicans on budget: No Mas of No Mas

The other night I received an e-newsletter from my Assemblyman, Republican Roger Niello. Here’s some of what it said:

“We begin this year’s Budget Conference Committee with the assumption that billions of dollars will be raised from new, unspecified taxes.  This is a fantasy of the majority party only.  Pushing only for higher taxes and refusing to consider any significant budget savings is irresponsible and reckless.  Republicans have been very clear that there is no support for the massive tax increases that have been proposed.  As the conference committee begins its work, I hope that we will work together to find significant budget savings and pass the necessary reforms to balance the budget without raising taxes.”

I sent Mr. Niello this response:

“You begin this year’s Budget Conference Committee with the assumption that billions of dollars will be raised from new, draconian budget cuts.  This is a fantasy of the minority party only.  Pushing only for significant budget savings and refusing to consider raising revenue is irresponsible and reckless.  Democrats and the people of California  have been very clear that there is no support for the massive program cuts thatt have been proposed.  As the conference committee begins its work, I hope that you will work together to find needed revenues and pass the necessary reforms to balance the budget without cutting essential programs and services.”

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L.A.’s Mass Transit Mess: How Metro Wasted An Hour Of My Life

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I’m heartened by the fact that there’s a sharp and pronounced move toward mass transit nationwide (the ridership levels are the highest since 1957) in the wake of $4 gasoline.  So heartened, in fact, that I wanted to join the movement.  My current commute to work is a straight line, rare in Los Angeles, where I could conceivably take Santa Monica Boulevard all the way from my house to the office.  I calculated the options for bus service, and figured I could save $2 a day and a gallon of gas worth of carbon emissions (L.A. buses are, for the most part, clean-air vehicles) without an appreciable increase in my commute time.  I went on the Metro website and located the proper bus route, and made out this morning to catch my ride.

It never showed up.  The bus route initially offered on the site was inaccurate, and a separate bus didn’t pick up at the stop offered.  There was no corroborating information at the bus stop, and after about a half-hour I just walked home and got in the car.

I believe I’ve remedied the situation and now see a way clear to using the proper transit system.  But the arduousness of the task is the real point.  At a time when gridlock is literally making Angelenos insane, and the reduction of just a tiny percentage of cars on the road would alleviate it, at a time when gas is so expensive that violence is breaking out as gas pumps and fuel thieves are resorting to siphoning gas out of engines, the structure of mass transit in the nation’s second-largest city is a total embarrassment.  I’m fortunate enough to be able to afford the high cost of gasoline and don’t need to use public transit; furthermore, I am able to stagger my schedule and the commute is not even that taxing.  But I want to ride clean, out of a sense of social responsibility and simple peace of mind.  Somehow the entire Northeast corridor can be lined with all sorts of rail systems and we can’t get a bus to stop every few blocks on a major artery serving multiple communities (Santa Monica, West LA, Beverly Hills,  West Hollywood, Hollywood, Los Feliz).  The city of Los Angeles actually has more density per mile than Portland, Oregon, which has an excellent public transit system.  There’s no ingenuity put into transit, or resources for that matter, and the overlapping jurisdictions of public officials just dissolve any policy prescription into a squabble among supervisors and city councilmen and the like.  They don’t even bother to update the signs; guess it’s too costly.

On the other hand, there’s a freeway in Marina del Rey that’s 2 miles long.  It’s probably the most unused freeway in America.  But it had a federal stamp of approval and was an accomplishment local pols could point to, so up it goes.

What character remains in L.A. is being crushed by endless parades of cars and the honking of horns.  The society has become hyper-local out of necessity (and actually the best transit systems, like the Big Blue Bus in Santa Monica, serve a small, local area).  But that could all change so easily, with a little personal responsibility and a bus that runs on time.

Marriage Equality

Kmiec: Fight the future and robo-babies: End Marriage Equality

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Reagan found some real bright lights to bring with him to the halls of government. One of them was one Douglas Kmiec, who served in the Office of Legal Counsel for both Reagan and Bush.  Before I rip into his argument against marriage equality, I will point out that Kmiec took a lot of heat for standing up and supporting Obama despite his history with Republican politics. Apparently on priest even denied him communion. I’m glad the Catholic Church, or at least some within it, feels it can tell Americans how to vote to this days. 2008 meet 1708.

But, Kmiec is doing his own share of fighting the future. Specifically, today he spits into the wind of marriage equality in the San Francisco Chronicle in an op-ed entitled “Should California amend its Constitution? Say ‘no’ to the Brave New World.” You can’t get much more future-phobic than that, right?

Follow me over the flip, and we’ll debate that…

First, Kmiec begins with the premise that the California Constitutional right to privacy and equal protection of the laws is something optional, open to the whim of the voter:

The initiative will restore to the people what was wrongfully taken from them: the right of self-governance and respect for the marital institution.

It’s an interesting argument from a constitutional law professor. Basically, he argues that we should put what the court deems a fundamental right up for a vote.  The rights of a minority should be voted upon by the majority. It seems it will happen, but the constitutionality of said vote will be determined, if it must, after November 4. The fairness is plainly lacking.

Kimiec continues to blast the definition of sexual orientation as a suspect class for the purposes of review for equal protection challenges.  He’s not going out a limb there as In re Marriage Cases is really the first case to do this. But, I’ll go out on a limb of my own and refer the reader to some of the past and present cruelty exhibited against the LGBT community. During the holocaust, gays were sent to the gas chamber along with Jews and the Roma. In America, gay gatherings were routinely broken up and attendees brutalized. Matthew Shepard and Gwen Araujo are recent reminders that such hate is still with us.

Yet Kmiec and many of the conservative opponents to In re Marriage Cases  argue that orientation should not be a suspect class. I don’t know how much oppression one community must suffer before we become suspect, but I expect that few communities suffer from discrimination more than the LGBT community.

But, wait, I haven’t gotten to the point where Kmiec really jumps the shark yet. That comes later. Now he comes up with tired and patently ridiculous concerns over procreation and marriage. I assume Kmiec will encourage all women past menopause to live out their lives in solitude.

Beyond correcting the court’s disregard of the separation of powers, insisting upon preserving the link between marriage and procreation: 1) promotes the orderly continuation of the species; 2) avoids the uncertainties of single-gender effects on children (most parents readily recognize the distinctive contributions of male and female in child rearing); and 3) takes respectful account of the difficulties of accommodating religious freedom that arise subsequent to the legal acceptance of same-sex marriage. Oddly, and incompletely, the California Supreme Court managed to ignore these important issues in its 170-plus page opinion.

Yeah, it could be that the Justices ignored it because there is no real evidence of these “problems.” 1 is patently ridiculous given the concerns of overpopulation and the fact that we don’t even grow enough food to feed those who are alive today. 2 is completely unproven and would also lead to the banning of gay adoption (not at issue with this initiative) and more concerning for privacy reasons and to all Californians, sexuality aside, this argument would lead to governmental regulation of procreation and single parents. We aren’t overturning Griswold, Mr. Kmiec. Finally, to 3, the courts and the legislature have specifically enunciated that religions are not bound to recognize any sort of civil marriage procedure.

Next Kmiec tries the old tried and true FoxNews ArgumentTM. I suggest their are problems, so why can’t you just say I’m right because these problems might exist. In other words, follow me as I go round and round rhetorically.

The proponents of same-sex marriage insist that inventing gay and lesbian marriage harms no one, but the above concerns suggest otherwise. Moreover, it overlooks the national and global decline in fertility, which threatens the economies of Europe and contributes to the weakness of our own.

See, I made up some terrifying problems, so you must listen to me or humanity will perish. boogy boogy boogy!

Now comes the shark-jumping. Kmiec argues that marriage equality somehow inherently leads to designer babies and artificial wombs. This “slippery slope” argument isn’t even worth slapping down.

Separating marriage from procreation may also have other remote, but frightening, ill consequences. Society should be skeptical of wider use of asexual procreation. An earlier dark moment in U.S. history employed eugenics to forcibly sterilize the mentally disabled. The push for artificial wombs and the genetic manipulation of intelligence already peppers scientific literature – a push that would no doubt grow, accommodating even the minimal same-sex desire for simulating natural child birth – claimed to be of interest for 20-30 percent of same-sex couples.

Well, that 20-30 percent number sounds real authoritative. I bet you asked a lot of people there. Oh, and by the way, artificial insemination is already legal.

But, one parting nod to the preposterous depopulation argument.

In a depopulating world, the claim that there is a universal right to marry regardless of gender becomes a frightening ally of a claimed universal right to access to genetically engineered children. People should reject this claim by returning traditional marriage to its rightful place.

Hey, Doug, the world isn’t depopulating. In fact, population is rapidly increasing. Depopulation is only a concern in rich nations due to xenophobia and nativism. So, yes, Europeans are decreasing in absolute and relative numbers, but there are plenty people to replace them. Unless, that is, some people aren’t quite as good as the Europeans.

By the way, if you read this far, you’d probably be interested in Eva Patterson’s pro-marriage equality op-ed in the Chron today

California

Where is the California Democratic Party Heading

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At this weekend’s California Democratic Party Executive Board meeting, the most important thing will be to see whether the Party wants people to respect the party. As of late, the CDP hasn’t made much of an effort to earn respect and instead hasn’t seemed to even give much of a damn.

For instance, the scandal over the $4 million “refund” to Fabian Nunez was disgusting on so many levels, not the least of which was the fact it occurred on the same election day where we spent less money on GOTV while losing the gubernatorial race in a landslide year. So tactically, the CDP needs to choose a new direction and not just honor Howard Dean at a cocktail hour but embrace the successful 50 State Strategy in California.

When it comes to policy, there has been a push to out-do the strategic blunders. There was the Net Neutrality disaster at last year’s San Diego convention, in fact the whole process to subvert small ‘d’ democracy was a disgrace. And that was followed up by the Diane Feinstein censure fiasco at the last E-Board meeting, featuring CDP Staff embarrassing themselves.

In this era of reform, with delegate elections and a new chair coming up soon, how do you see this weekend playing out? Will the CDP be like the DNC under Terry McAuliffe or Howard Dean? Transactional or transformational? The way things have been done or cross that bridge to the 21st century?

California, Economy

Sad.

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(Cross-posted at Living in the O.

Somehow, over the past few months, the recession hadn’t effected me much. Though I don’t make a lot of money, my job at a non-profit is secure – I don’t have to worry about getting laid off or having my employer go out of business. I also don’t have a car so gas prices haven’t really effected me. And though I’ve noticed the increase in food prices, this has mostly been offset by the amount of produce I’m now growing.

I of course was aware of the recession and had heard lots of stories about people not having enough money to fill up their tanks to drive to work and some who were buying less bread or less milk because they could no longer afford the steep prices. I’m acutely aware of the global food shortage and its causes (ethanol production, drought, increased demand, etc.).

But up until yesterday, the recession hadn’t directly touched me and I don’t think I had realized how bad it is.

Yesterday morning, me and my girlfriend went to breakfast at Mama’s Royal Cafe. If you haven’t been there, Mama’s is an Oakland institution. It’s been around for more than three decades, and on weekends for breakfast, there’s always at least an hour wait for a table. Well, at least there used to be.

We hadn’t been in for many months so we were a bit shocked when we walked in and it was nearly empty. Sure, it was a Wednesday, but even when we’ve gone on weekdays, it’s usually at least two-thirds full and sometimes there’s even a short wait.

My girlfriend mentioned something about this to our waiter and he said that maybe it was because of the heat (it was a hot day, but not that hot) and also the economy’s been so bad.

That’s when it hit me – if the economy’s so bad that places like Mama’s are empty, what does that mean for less established businesses? I thought of my favorite downtown Oakland Indian restaurant that unexpectedly shut down a couple months back and realized there must be many more stories like that.

There are still lots of restaurants in Oakland that are doing brisk business, but they’re in neighborhoods that have a bigger draw. It’s still impossible to get a reservation on a weekend at Dona Tomas or Pizzaiolo in Temescal, and Old Oakland restaurants seem to be busy too. But places like Mama’s, that aren’t in heavily foot-trafficked areas and have to depend on their own draw, are really suffering.

Then last night I got home and CBS was featuring a really depressing story about gas prices and food banks. Basically, food banks are suffering four-fold. First, they have to pay more in gas to deliver food. Second, they are not getting as much food donated because of the food shortage. Third, individual donors aren’t giving as much because they’re trying to make ends meet for themselves. And on top of all of this, there’s more of a demand for the food they provide to the community

An hour after watching this segment, I got a call from my sister, who sounded like she was in tears. She had just gotten laid off from the job she loved working at the House of Blues in LA. When her boss told her the news, her boss started crying, saying she didn’t want to let my sister go but the directions were coming from corporate headquarters – apparently, they’re laying off several employees around the country. Even though my sister felt like her coworkers were family, her ultimate boss didn’t see her that way – she’s just an expendable cost.

In one sense, I’m really pissed that this happened to her. But I can also understand what companies like the House of Blues must be experiencing – I mean, in this economy, who has expendable income for entertainment?

So yesterday was pretty depressing, but I guess it was a needed reality check. No matter who you are or what you do, the recession’s going to effect you in some way. There’s really no avoiding it.

Kind of ironically, I finished reading Robert Reich’s memoir last night (which I highly recommend) and couldn’t help but feel really angry at Clinton and what he didn’t get done. I really hope that Obama does a better job at investing in our nation and protecting all of us from experiences like my sister’s.

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What to Watch for at E-Board

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There are a few things of note going on at the California Democratic Party’s E-bored meeting.

DNC races: Dave has some very serious questions about what the DNC candidates plan to do about the primary schedule. Fortunately for us, I hear there is going to be a “speed candidating” event at the E-bored. I’ll be sure to ask some of the candidates about these issues.

Also, there’s a “progressive slate” running, for more info on that, check Mayme Hubert’s diary.

Propositions: Lots, and lots of them. The ones that might be interesting are the “Republican Voters First” initiative, the solar initiative, and a few others.  I’ll be posting sporadically from e-board and will do my best to update on the props.

On the solar front, former Assemblywoman and future Senator Fran Pavley sent out a letter today to the Resolutions Committee opposing the solar initiative, stating that it is poorly drafted and could do more harm than good.  There is a ton of money in this one, so it might be a little controversial.

On the“Republican Voters First” initiative, Steve Westley’s big donation should put this one in play too. I imagine Westly will show up, as he’s usually at these Dem events. Not sure what the result will be, but the California Democratic Council endorsed it.

Anyway, who’s going to be there? And hey, if anybody has a credential they aren’t going to use, let me know. I could use a proxy.