All posts by David Dayen

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CA-20: Costa sharpens his knife for another twist

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It’s really beyond the point of tolerance for Bush Dog Jim Costa, who represents the district with the worst well-being in America for its residents.  As Republicans dishonestly try to bully Democrats with their meaningless “Drill Now” chant, despite the fact that offshore drilling wouldn’t lower gas prices and would do nothing to secure the energy future of the nation, Costa has joined up with a bipartisan group seeking a “compromise” (read: giving in to Republican fantasies) on energy.

A bipartisan group of lawmakers seeking to craft a compromise on energy legislation includes politically vulnerable members, according to a partial list of members obtained by The Hill.

Reps. Neil Abercrombie (D-Hawaii) and John Peterson (R-Pa.), who organized the group, have kept the list of participants under wraps since the recent announcement of its formal launch.

Abercrombie and Peterson previously indicated the complete list of members would be released last week but later reconsidered, saying certain members could be face political problems if their names were released.

Reps. John Tanner (D-Tenn.), Gene Green (D-Texas), Nancy Boyda (D-Kan.), Nick Lampson (D-Texas), Jim Costa (D-Calif.), Dan Boren (D-Okla.) and Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) are part of the group, according to the list.

The group met on Wednesday […]

The bill that is being crafted breaks significantly from Democratic leadership on the topic of offshore drilling.

Boren, Costa, Green, Lampson and Nunes twice voted no on the Democratic leadership’s “use it or lose it” energy drilling bill.

It’d be one thing if Costa were actually a “vulnerable member,” but his “opponent” this year, Jim Lopez, has no records with the FEC, hasn’t updated his campaign website in a month and a half and hasn’t had an event in the district since March.  Costa is about as vulnerable as Iron Man.  So one must conclude that he plans to sell out the Democratic Party on energy as a matter of principle.

It is completely absurd to open up the Outer Continental Shelf to drilling when there are over 60 million acres of leased public land lying fallow.  The last people with any interest in lowering gas prices are oil execs; they want offshore leases so they can keep them in reserve and tell their stockholders how much cash they’re sitting on.  So Costa simply wants to enrich oil company bigwigs at the expense of the middle class, and ignore the serious risk to the planet in stalling on departing from the failed energy policy of the past.  This man shouldn’t dare even call himself a Democrat after the work he’s done in the 110th Congress.

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Open Thread: News Of The Good

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We spend an inordinate amount of time on the bad of California politics here on the site.  And with a system this dysfunctional, there’s a lot of bad to go around.  But as the budget hostage crisis continues, and state workers don’t know if they’ll be able to afford their bills come Monday, I wanted to at least recognize some of the positive developments around the city and state:

• The Governor signed a bill today banning trans fats in all state restaurants and bakeries by 2011.  Combined with the law signed earlier this week to crack down on the sale of downer cattle in US groceries, and the LA City Council moving forward on a one-year moratorium on new fast-food restaurants in South Los Angeles, this is a good week for food safety, nutrition and public health.

• As mentioned by Shayera, the Los Angeles City Council voted to ban plastic bags by 2010, if the state does not mandate a $0.25 charge for every bag by then.  Additionally on the environmental front, there’s also the statewide green building code adopted by the California Building Standards Commission, and another passage for the third year in a row, of a port container fee which would be invested in fighting pollution (Hopefully this time the Governor will sign it).  This too is good.

• Leland Wong was convicted yesterday on 14 counts of public corruption and bribery while he was LA City Commissioner.  Accountability is good.

• In Orange County, the Laguna Beach City Council, which is majority Republican, became one of the first to publicly oppose Prop. 8, the hate amendment.  Saying no to hate is good.

• Unfortunately, not everything is good.  Foreclosure rates are skyrocketing nationwide, more than doubling in the second quarter.  In one incredible example, almost 1 in 20 homes in Merced have been lost to foreclosure, the highest rate in America.  Wow.  Not good.

• A couple more good things: PDLA is kicking off a Legislative Education Project and assigning progressive scores to individual Congressmembers (The first, David Dreier, has a 0).  They’re also going after Lou Dobbs for his criticism of their deeply unserious notion that health care is a human right.

What set off Dobbs’ eruption? Apparently it was his correspondent reporting that PDA “is urging the Democratic Party to adopt a plank at the party’s convention in Denver, guaranteeing accessible health care for all.”

You can help us push back against Dobbs and other media demagogues.

Within a day, you’ll be receiving a follow-up email from Norman Solomon, co-chair of PDA’s “Healthcare NOT Warfare” campaign, about our efforts to bring the principle of guaranteed health care for all into the heart of the Democratic Convention in Denver. And ways you can participate throughout the country.

For now, I want to ask you to click here and help PDA talk back to the media attacks now underway against us.

They should take the lead on Dobbs the way Color of Change took the lead on Fox News.

Health Care

The Health Care Reform Coalition Has Its Epiphany

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(Not totally a local issue, but it involves a lot of local players, and continues on a subject that gets a lot of attention around here, so I thought I’d share.  Reprinted from my site.)

There’s something of a consensus that Netroots Nation didn’t offer enough adversarial panels and instead largely consisted of bloggers agreeing with one another.  But that’s not true.  I personally witnessed the most adversarial panel of the weekend, and it was spectacular, because finally, both factions of the debate about health care policy on the left were able to come together and understand the political contours of the brewing fight in the Congress.

over…

The panel was entitled “Time for Action: How the Netroots Can Lead on Healthcare Reform,” and was put together by Eve Gittleson, who blogs at Daily Kos under the moniker nyceve.  There’s a good liveblog of the panel here, but what you need to know is that Gittleson stacked the deck.  She had some great health care activists who are doing great work in different areas of the space: Giuseppe Del Priore, MD, MPH a New York cancer surgeon; Hilda Sarkisyan, whose daughter, Nataline, died after being denied a liver transplant by Cigna; Rocky Delgadillo, Los Angeles City Attorney, who is pursuing civil and criminal investigation into insurance practices; Geri Jenkins, RN a member of the Council of Presidents of the California Nurses Association/National Nurses Organizing Committee.  And then Ezra Klein, associate editor for The American Prospect and a health care policy guru, appeared at the end of the panel.  The aforementioned speakers were all powerful advocates.  Sarkysian, whose family HAD health insurance and still couldn’t get their daughter what she needed, said bluntly “This is not a good country anymore.”  Del Priore discussed the need for doctors and patients to handle questions of care and the need to arrest insurance executives for their crimes in denying coverage.  Rocky Delgadillo outlined the schemes, like rescission (even based on spousal applications), that insurers are engaging in to maximize profit at the expense of patient care.  He also mentioned how California regulators ignored a million-dollar fine to Blue Cross because they feared they would lose the case if it went to court, which is just unbelievable.  And Jenkins argued that the insurance industry will play no role in reforming health care, and we need to move immediately to a not-for-profit system.

Good points all.  And then Eve turned to Ezra:

Eve: Ezra, why does HCAN want to condemn Americans to this kind of system? I get confusing emails from Elizabeth Edwards and MoveOn talking about the atrocities of the insurance industry, then marginalizing the only viable solution. Can you explain this new Edwards HCAN initiative, the TV commercials, etc. . . What’s it all about? What are they trying to do? It seems there are three initiatives on the table–676, Wyden  and HCAN.  What’s wrong with Wyden and Edwards? And a follow-up…what can we realistically expect from President Obama?

I hope you don’t mind that I’m sand-bagging you. I love you, really, Ezra. I just don’t agree with you on this point.

This apparently startled Mr. Klein.  But for him to not know the position of Eve and the CNA and an activist like Hilda Sarkysian speaks a lot to his cloistered state in Washington.  Because I know all about this fight.  I made one positive comment about HCAN upon their launch and took massive amounts of crap for it.  I was called a defeatist and admonished for not being true to the cause.  My only point was that having an organization with $40 million dollars to spend on calling out health insurers on their garbage is going to be tremendously helpful to whatever reform we get through the Congress, and furthermore I didn’t see them having much of a place at the table in the policy debate.  In other words they were finally an organization concerned with moving public opinion and playing the health care debate out on political grounds rather than policy grounds.  And on the panel, Klein echoed the importance of politics over policy:

You can take a lot of approaches to health reform. You can emphasize policy, politics, principles, or some mix thereof. Judging from the panel, Health Care for All, and the California Nurses, could use a bit more politics in their approach. It was a panel about “health reform” — not care or policy, but “reform” — at a conference of engaged politicos that never mentioned the Senate, or votes, or the conditions required for presidential signature.

There was a lot of talk about “fighting” insurers and other special interests, but not much about what that fight will look like, or where it will take place, or who decides the winner. My argument, was that, for reformers, insurers aren’t the real enemy. Setting them up as the opponent actually gives them too much credit. Insurers are stupid, profit seeking beasts — the enemy is American politics, and in particular, the structural feature of the US Senate that have repeatedly killed health reform in the past. No matter what your policy preference, that’s where your organizing has to be focused, because that’s where the actual fight happens: In Congress. Not on panels, or on blogs, or among the Left. In the US Senate, where you have to get to 60, or at least figure out how to get rough Democratic unity for using budget reconciliation and then convince Kennedy and Carper to vote “aye” on the same bill.

This is basically the same argument Ezra makes continuously on his site, but it appeared to hit the audience like they never heard it before.  And considering that it’s largely the correct analysis, it was generally well-received, I thought.  I spoke later with Eve, who told me that she had a conversation with someone from HCAN and “they are not the enemy.”  What a concept – all elements of health care advocacy on the left working together, for a change, toward a common goal.

Now granted, this week they all had a big juicy target.  AHIP, the health insurance lobby, put together a fake grassroots front group called The Campaign for an American Solution.  Of course, that “solution” involves funneling more cash and customers to the same broken insurance system we have now.  Now, who was the very first group to coordinate a counter-attack on this front group on the first stop of their listening tour in Columbus, OH?  That’s right, HCAN

Well, that didn’t take long.

A day after Politico reported the health insurance industry is launching a health care reform campaign next week, the progressive reformers are firing back.

Health Care for America Now announced Friday that it plans a news conference and a rally next week to counter the insurance industry’s Campaign for an American Solution, which launches in Columbus, Ohio, on Tuesday with a roundtable discussion among uninsured locals.

“They’re pretending that the health industry represents the American public, and we need to make it really clear to them and the public that all they represent are their own profits,” said Richard Kirsch, national campaign manager for Health Care Now.

Indeed they did attend the launch, and got to ask some tough questions, confronting the head of AHIP and asking her how an insurance industry group could possibly be objective in pushing for lower rates and higher quality coverage when they are concerned solely with the profit motive.  It got heated, and I’m glad they did.  And all of a sudden, Daou’s Triangle started closing.  Rep. Pete Stark came up with a great quote:

“America’s Health Insurance Plans’ new ‘Campaign for an American Solution’ rings as true as the tobacco industry’s efforts to end smoking. There is nothing grassroots about it. It is designed, financed, and coordinated through their Washington trade association with the singular goal of protecting their profits.

“I hope it is true that these companies intend to be a positive force in health reform efforts, but I tend to be cautious when the fox starts drawing up plans for a new henhouse.”

HCAN called up the hotline for the Campaign for an American Solution that they set up for the public to provide input… and they got an answering machine.  They’ve trickled this out one by one and pretty much ruined the launch of AHIP’s front group.  That’s REALLY important for the future of health care reform.  Because on the policy the views are far closer on the left than most people imagine.  Everyone knows that whatever system is ultimately put forward can be paid for in a far better manner than the current wasteful, inefficient system.  So expense should never be a deterrent, meaning we can build whatever system we choose and it is extremely likely to go revenue-neutral very quickly once we eliminate the shoddy budgeting of the current broken system.  We know that health insurers will not jeopardize their profit margins unless they’re forced to.  Once you recognize these two realities, the policy goals become fairly clear.  The political goals have to include attack dogs pushing back on the false memes of the right and the insurance industry, and pressuring the Senate to do the right thing.

Now Obama’s plan includes some better regulation toward insurers (including guaranteed issue and community rating) and a public option to compete with the private insurance market and take the step toward a sequential single-payer.  (His latest addition to the plan, a tax credit for small businesses who offer quality health care, is borrowed directly from the Clinton plan, raising hopes that eventually he’ll just borrow all of it, as he should).  Despite this being a fairly modest set of reforms, McCain and the right are going to denounce it as government-run “Hillarycare” anyway.  So it’s vital to have a broad coalition to give as good as they’ll get from the right and give the lawmakers backbone to push the policy forward.  Matt Stoller writes:

Coalitions are strange beasts, with multiple moving parts, but they are also the only way anything gets done.  A coalition has a core of organizers behind it, and a variety of groups out in front who each take different roles.  Some people can talk to Republicans, some people can talk to Democrats, some people threaten, some people cajole, some people talk to businesses, etc.  HCAN is driven by labor in the form of SEIU, the NEA, AFSCME, and United Food and Commercial Workers, as well as groups primarily funded by labor such as Americans United for Change and the Campaign for America’s Future.  It is also driven by direct mail and Foundation based organizations,  such as La Raza, Planned Parenthood, Center for American Progress Action Fund, Center for Community Change, and the National Women’s Law Center.

Stoller goes on to make the point that HCAN should broaden their mandate and make this a fight about general health, and I agree.  Going after convenience stores that sell fatty, sugar-laden food to kids sounds like it could be a part of their mandate.  The farm bill, the transportation bill (more mass transit and more livable, walkable cities means healthier lives), and others could be brought onto the field of battle.  But the larger point is that coalitions of this nature are built because they work.  And the benefit is that they give lawmakers breathing space to do their job and the spine to do it right.  This moment in health care demands that everyone understands the political spade work necessary to reach the desired outcome.  So out of the ashes of that contentious NN panel came something pretty special.  Groups across the center-left ideological spectrum working together to end the health care crisis in America and restore treatment as a basic human right.

Arnold Schwarzenegger, Budget

John Chiang: Working Class Hero

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It does appear that our state Controller has basically said “No Dice” to the governor’s plan to punish state workers for his own leadership failures.

While the governor is poised to order the cuts on Monday, state Controller John Chiang, who is responsible for disbursing state workers’ paychecks, said Thursday that he will refuse to go along with the governor, setting up a political standoff and a possible legal fight.

“The authority to issue people’s paychecks is mine. I have both constitutional and statutory authority,” said Chiang, a Democrat. “Frankly, (the governor) is just trying to make me do something that’s improper and illegal.”

The same exact thing happened in 2003, with Steve Westly refusing to cut salaries as then-Gov. Gray Davis requested.  And Westly got his way until the budget was eventually signed on August 2.  This basically throws the whole issue into the courts and delays the implementation of any salary cut.  And that’s a legal fight I relish having.  For too long the chief executive of the state – and in some cases, the legislature – has absolutely overstepped their authority with regard to fiscal matters.  The most egregious example is their raiding municipal government and transit funds to fill in the cracks of the budget deficit, which leads to ridiculous outcomes like cutting bus service at a time when mass transit should be expanding.

But Chiang standing with workers and holding on to his authority as a statewide elected official is just as important.  We elect a governor, not a king, and this encroachment on the jurisdiction of other constitutional officers is illegal and increasingly dangerous.  State workers who are rallying against the proposed cuts should understand that they have a champion in John Chiang, and that his decision deserves their support.  The California Democratic Party has a petition you can sign to stand with the Controller in this effort.

UPDATE: As informed by the CDP, State Sen. Dean Florez asked the Legislative Counsel for an opinion on Schwarzenegger’s authority to slash wages, and the Counsel agreed that he didn’t have it:

SACRAMENTO – Senator Dean Florez, D-Shafter, sought to alleviate the fears of state workers contemplating how to pay their bills on the federal minimum wage, while heading off a potential lawsuit between the Governor and Controller at a time the state can least afford it, by releasing a Legislative Counsel opinion stating that the Governor does not have the power to order such a cut to workers’ salaries.

“If the Governor really intended this as more than a ‘motivational’ gimmick, he clearly did not do his homework,” said Florez.  “He is making reckless and false threats against the people who keep our state running, causing undue grief to innocent people — many of whom are already struggling to get by – and I really believe he owes them an apology.”

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CA-26: Americans United For Change Hit Dreier On Drilling

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Today Americans United for Change, the progressive advocacy group that is visiting districts throughout the country on the “Bush Legacy Tour,” hammered David Dreier for being a tool to Big Oil and special interests.  From their release:

With gas prices above $4, Americans United for Change, the progressive issue-advocacy group that recently launched its national Bush Legacy Bus tour, blasted Rep. David Drier today for standing in the way of lower gas prices for California families by voting against meaningful legislation to release 70 million barrels of light, sweet crude oil from the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve into the open market and replace it with heavy, sour oil that is tougher to refine – a move that has historically brought down gas prices and strengthened our national security.

The SPR has been tapped or suspended before by the current President Bush, President Clinton, and the first President Bush and each time oil has been released the impact on prices has been dramatic and immediate.  For example, in 1991, oil prices immediately dropped by 33 percent. The 2000 exchange drove oil prices down by 19 percent. And the release by President Bush in 2005 resulted in a 9 percent drop.

“With gas prices hovering above $4 a gallon, Rep. Dreier was given a chance today bring real relief now to California families forced to make incredible sacrifices choosing between bills, gas, and food,” said Caren Benjamin, for Americans United for Change. “But without apology or question, Congressman Dreier chose to put his loyalty to Bush and his addiction to big oil cash ahead of relief for struggling Californians.”

I don’t know if the “Free Our Oil” campaign and focusing on the Strategic Petroleum Reserve is the most effective message, but clearly somebody has to show some leadership on the energy front.  Contrary to popular beliefs, Democrats are NOT being pushed out of this debate.  In a recent poll by The Wilderness Society, the public is split on the question of drilling or protecting arctic lands and offshore areas, and they believe 76%-19% that the best way to secure our energy future is to invest in new technologies and renewable sources rather than continue to drill.  In addition, by a 63%-31% score, those polled believe that the President’s proposal to open up ANWR and the Outer Continental Shelf to drilling “is more likely to enrich oil companies than to lower gas prices for American consumers.”  That’s why it’s so crucial for AUFC to note that David Dreier has taken $129,400 in contributions from oil company executives over the years.

There’s starting to be some real pushback on this “drill now” blather.  The Democrats put forward this SPR bill today and most Republicans took the bait of voting against it.  Jimmy Hoffa Jr. of the Teamsters, in a real game-changer of a move, came out with a very strong statement rejecting “drilling our way out” of this crisis, and demanding long-term energy solutions.  Democratic Congressional candidate John Boccieri from Ohio made this amusing Web video to mock his opponent’s reliance on drilling:

And just to your left, CA-46’s Debbie Cook has put together a comprehensive 10-point plan to realize Al Gore’s vision of receiving 100% of our electricity from renewables by 2018.

There’s work to be done – by candidates, policy wonks, advocacy groups, and regular people – but together we can beat back these shortsighted solutions and expose those who want to wed our energy needs to the failures of the past.

Arnold Schwarzenegger, Budget, California

Democratic Moment Is Now – Flubbing The Budget Would Kill The Wave

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I hope that the Speaker and the President Pro Tem and everyone that wants to get out of town and maybe give in on the budget pays attention to these latest Field Poll numbers.

The latest Field Poll shows that 54 percent of California voters hold a positive image of the Democratic party, while just 31 percent have a favorable view of the Republican party. In addition, likely voters were asked their pre-election party preferences for Congress in the fall election. That measure finds Democrats with a twenty-point advantage over the GOP, 48 percent to 28 percent.

The Republican Party in California is a dead letter, and there’s only one time a year they matter at all – when they hijack the budget negotiations.  They will continue to do so as long as they are not made to pay at the ballot box.

But in order for that to occur, Democrats must show some leadership.  And Speaker Bass’ statement, which obviously hinted at some kabuki dance among the leadership and the Governor, using the livelihoods of 200,000 state workers as a prop, was completely unhelpful.  The positive image that Californians have of Democrats is based on national trends.  If the state Democrats undermine it through giving up on the budget and succumbing to yet another compromise based mostly on deep cuts, without rectifying the overall structural revenue deficit, that image will disappear.  Because the impact will be extremely visible locally.  The Governor has failed working families time and again, and this latest outrage to threaten state workers, who never caused this crisis, to bear the full brunt of the pain, is a teachable moment.  Whether it’s Controller Chiang and Treasurer Lockyer simply saying “no” or the leadership hammering Schwarzenegger for this cruel proposal, some Democrat has to show leadership in this vacuum, or otherwise there will be no refracted glory in the Golden State from an expected Democratic victory in November.

And even this threat should be a part of every TV ad, radio spot and direct mail piece for every Assembly and Senate candidate with a shot at flipping a seat.

…quick update, the indications are that John Chiang is going to hold this up and send it into the courts, if necessary.  Meanwhile, SEIU is rallying at the Capitol at noon today in response; they represent over 95,000 state workers.  And Patty Berg has a good article in the Cap Weekly that frames the situation nicely:

Many people think government spending doesn’t affect them. They have jobs, don’t depend on subsidized childcare, are too young or too healthy for government healthcare. So they go throughout their day unaware of the myriad benefits they take from government.

They wake up and make coffee with water that arrives in their pipes with the help of water districts. It is clean and safe because of regulations and standards set and enforced by government. They eat breakfast made up of food products that are regulated and inspected.

They go to work on a road built and maintained by tax dollars. Or they ride a bus run by a municipal authority. No matter how they travel, they do it where traffic rules and general security enforced by public safety officers.

It’s true that some of us can pay to educate our children without government assistance. But almost no one could maintain their own police and fire departments. And none of us could ever build our own roads and sewers and highways and bridges. We only have those things because we share, because we bundle our resources through taxes and we elect people to spend it in ways that benefits all of us.

And yet, the every-man-for-himself crowd tells us that government is ripping us off.

That’s quite good, but I wish it wasn’t just in the Sacramento insider paper.

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Wherein I Praise Susan Davis AND Ellen Tauscher

They’re not two of my favorite California Congresswoman.  But their leadership on repealing don’t ask don’t tell comes to a head with a hearing today, chaired by Davis.

Democrats in Congress hope to ignite a drive to reverse the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy Wednesday with the first hearing on the subject since 1993, when President Clinton said gays could serve in uniform if they kept quiet about their sexual orientation.

Without this hearing, said former Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman John Shalikashvili, “you will never repeal the law. It’s a great idea.” He is among more than 50 retired generals and admirals who have said it is time to rethink the policy […]

Democrats on the House Armed Services Committee tried to have a hearing on the policy in April 2007, but opposition from conservatives in their party sank the idea.

Since then, “There’s another year in the war,” says Rep. Susan Davis, a California Democrat who chairs the military personnel subcommittee. “We want to start a conversation” that could put the issue on a front burner again.

Democratic Rep. Ellen Tauscher of California, the lead sponsor of a bill to repeal the policy, said she knows what military leaders would say if they testified.

“The military leadership will tell you that this is the law they’ve been given to operate under and that’s what they do,” she says, “which is a very different question of off-line and off-the-record, ‘Personally, admiral, what do you think?’ That’s the only way they could answer … differently.”

The Pentagon may be ducking this hearing, but they can’t hide from public opinion.  Over 75 percent of Americans would like to see DADT repealed.  The arguments about “unit cohesion” have been shown to be ridiculous, and the case of Arabic translators being fired for being gay have highlighted not only the absurdity of this policy, but the national security harm it’s actually doing.

The most fitting part of all of this is that Larry Craig supports Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.  Yeah, he would, wouldn’t he?  I’m sure he’d love to change the title to “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell, Just Tap Three Times,” but then…

UPDATE: Rep. Patrick Murphy (from my hometown) had a great hearing.  He kicked a little butt today.  Video on the flip:

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CA House Races Roundup – July Edition

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Greetings and welcome to the latest installment of the California House races roundup.  We’re just around 100 days to go until the election, and things are starting to take focus.  There are about a half-dozen seats where Democratic challengers have an outside shot at dumping the incumbent, and another six on the watch list in case something spectacular occurs.  One thing to note is that the Cook numbers are tied to the 2004 election, and given the demographic changes and cratering of the Republican brand I think they mean significantly less now – it’ll be interesting to see how all these districts change in November.

We have plenty of new information to judge these races, including 2nd quarter fundraising reports, national ratings from Charlie Cook and Swing State Project, additional DCCC targets, and the appearance of many challengers at Netroots Nation.  So this list is really about who I think has the best chance to retain or take over a seat, not necessarily who should (though that may come through in the writing).  Here are some helpful bits of information that I used to help judge.

FEC disclosures (you can search by candidate name)

Voter registration by Congressional district.

Swing State Project fundraising roundup

On to the report…

DEMOCRATIC SEATS

1. CA-11. Incumbent: Jerry McNerney.  Challenger: Dean Andal.  Cook number: R+3.  % Dem turnout in the Presidential primary: 53.7%.  DCCC defended.  This remains the only opportunity for Republicans in the state, and it is starting to slip away.  Dean Andal is proving to be incredibly weak at fundraising, having raised under $200,000 for FOUR STRAIGHT QUARTERS.  He’s not going to be able to get up on TV, and his opponent has not only outraised him but will get about a million dollars in ad help from the DCCC.  Freedom’s Watch threw in a few anti-McNerney robocalls, but that’s really no match for the political muscle of the D-Trip.  Plus, there’s a brewing Andal scandal over his participation in passing privileged information and securing developer contracts for a San Joaquin Delta College contractor.  As for McNerney, his vote for the FISA bill has caused outcry in the district, and national groups like Blue America won’t be lending a hand.  He has changed his position on medical marijuana in response to constituents, a symbolic piece of support with activists.  But I think he’s largely on his own in this race.

McNerney: raised $416K in the second quarter, $1.37m cash on hand

Andal: raised $174K Q2, $663K CoH

REPUBLICAN SEATS

I’m going to do four tiers in setting apart the top seats where we have challenges to Republican incumbents.

First Tier

1. CA-04.  Last month: 1.  Open seat.  Dem. challenger: Charlie Brown.  Repub. challenger: Tom McClintock.  PVI #: R+11.  % Dem turnout in Feb. primary: 44.7.  DCCC targeted.  Tom McClintock actually raised quite a bit of money in the second quarter, but it all got plowed into the divisive primary with Doug Ose.  Plus, he was able to go above individual spending caps because of the “Millionaire’s Amendment,” which was recently ruled unconstitutional, putting constitutional literalist McClintock in a bind over what to do with that money.  We’ve seen real awkwardness from McClintock over how to handle disgraced incumbent John Doolittle, with shows of support and rejections happening on alternate days.  Meanwhile, Charlie Brown is humming along.  He has a 6-1 cash on hand advantage, and he’ll also be the recipient of some ad love from the DCCC.  His courageous stand against the FISA bill, outreach to parts of the district harmed by wildfires, and the release of a good energy plan which stresses tax credits for alternative energy and government fleets going renewable (and opposing opening up new lands for offshore drilling, in line with the “Use It Or Lose It” plan from Speaker Pelosi).  Brown was beloved at Netroots Nation and looks good in polling.  This is obviously our biggest-priority pickup.

Brown: raised $355K, $675K CoH

McClintock: raised $1.27m, $117 CoH

Second Tier

2. CA-46.  Last month: 4.  Incumbent: Dana Rohrabacher.  Challenger: Debbie Cook (Responsible Plan endorser). PVI #: R+6.  % Dem. turnout: 47.2.  I’m still concerned that the numbers aren’t quite there in the district, but I’m upping Cook this high because I have to acknowledge her achievements.  First, she’s outraised Rohrabacher two quarters in a row, and from what I’m being told, this has a lot to do with Dana and his wife (also his fundraiser) calling Republican backers and getting the phone slammed in their ears.  The Cook Political Report moved the race to Likely Republican, the only such move among competitive California races.  And there are indications that the D-Trip is at least taking a look at this race.  Most of this is happening because Cook is a compelling candidate.  Read her interview with Open Left or watch her interview with Talking Points Memo and you can see why.  Her environmental activism, competent fiscal management in Huntington Beach, and the fact that she’s not a ridiculously corrupt nutjob like Dana Rohrabacher makes for a fantastic profile.  This is probably too high, but there are some great signs here.

Cook: raised $110K, $97K CoH

Rohrabacher: raised $86K, $388 CoH

3. CA-50.  Last month: 5.  Incumbent: Brian Bilbray.  Challenger: Nick Leibham.  PVI #: R+5.  % Dem. turnout: 50.8.  DCCC targeted.  Nick Leibham outraised Brian Bilbray in the second quarter, and took in a nice haul of $245K in his own right.  He’s been gaining some attack points for criticizing Bilbray on wanting to debate on the radio and not in the district, and calling on other states to drill offshore but not California, an incoherent position.  The D-Trip put Leibham on their Red to Blue emerging races list, and dropped radio ads in the district tying him to Bush (MP3 here).  Leibham needs to articulate an agenda rather than just slam Bilbray forever, and that agenda needs to be a true contrast, but there is some movement here.

Leibham: raised $245K, $267K CoH

Bilbrary: raised $210K, $528K CoH

4. CA-26.  Last month: 2.  Incumbent: David Dreier.  Challenger: Russ Warner.  PVI #: R+4.  % Dem. turnout: 50.2.  DCCC targeted.  Warner was very focused on fundraising in June and yet came up short of beating David Dreier in the second quarter.  The problem is that Dreier has nearly two million dollars in the bank, so there’s a nearly 40-1 cash disadvantage, including campaign debts.  And despite the positive signs in the district, that’s tough to overcome.  Warner is going to need outside help, and the Bush Rubber Stamp project is a step in the right direction, but I don’t know if they’ll have the kind of money needed to meet the challenge.  There’s not much here to get me excited at this point.

Warner: raised $161K, $125K CoH

Dreier: raised $247K, $1.9m CoH

5. CA-45.  Last month: 3.  Incumbent: Mary Bono Mack.  Challenger: Julie Bornstein.  PVI #: R+3.  % Dem. turnout: 51.3.  The district is ready for a Democrat, and the symbiosis between Manuel Perez’ hotly contested Assembly campaign and Bornstein’s is going to help her in ways that aren’t being respected by the experts.  I still think this race is being undervalued.  However, Bornstein has been fairly invisible, from what I can tell, since the June primary.  And Bornstein got significantly outraised in Q2 as Mary Bono recognized the challenge she is facing can only be overcome with money.  In cash on hand she’s not far out of sight, however, and if Bornstein proves to be a solid and aggressive campaigner and benefits from increased Latino turnout in the Eastern Coachella Valley, there’s still a shot here.

Bornstein: raised $125K, $121K CoH

Bono: raised $336K, $421K CoH

Third Tier

6. CA-03.  Last month: 6.  Incumbent: Dan Lungren.  Challenger: Bill Durston. PVI #: R+7. % Dem turnout: 51.8.  This remains my sleeper pick in California.  The fundraising numbers were close, with Dan Lungren raising $173K to Durston’s $125K.  Lungren is trying to pivot to the center, coming out for nuclear warhead reduction with Russia, and the “X Prize” for battery technology promoted by John McCain.  But he’s firmly in the drill now, do nothing camp (despite voting against the “Use It Or Lose It” plan), and he’s lying about Democratic plans for tax increases.  Then there’s this bit of hilarity:

At a town hall meeting a few months ago Rep. Dan Lungren (R-Gold River) was adamant about denying citizenship to babies born in the United States to non-citizens. He lumped the infants into the same category as immigrants who cross the border illegally. He went so far as to sponsor a bill to deny citizenship to babies born to non-citizens.

In a classic flip-flop, Congo Dan “is backing the bill giving the Department of Homeland Security 30 days to process visas for entertainers,” says the Los Angeles Times.

Durston has publicly challenged Lungren to debates, and has a nifty comparison chart on his website that shows he’s truly running a campaign of contrast.  Keep an eye on this one.

Durston raised $125K, $189K CoH

Lungren raised $173K, $615K CoH

7. CA-52.  Last month: 7.  Open seat.  Dem. challenger: Mike Lumpkin.  Repub. challenger: Duncan D. Hunter.  PVI #: R+9.  % Dem. turnout: 47.2.  Calitics got to chat with Mike Lumpkin at Netroots Nation, and we were fairly impressed.  He talked up all the “Conservative Republicans for Lumpkin” signs he’s seeing in the district.  One thing he mentioned worried me, however: well over half of the voters in the primary thought they were voting for Duncan Hunter’s father, the incumbent.  That makes this almost not an open seat, and with Hunter’s fundraising advantage, it’s going to be an uphill battle.

Lumpkin raised $129K, $54K CoH

Hunter raised $338K, $198K CoH

Also Noted

8. CA-44.  Last month: 8.  Incumbent: Ken Calvert.  Challenger: Bill Hedrick (Responsible Plan endorser).  PVI #: R+6.  % Dem. turnout: 49.3.  Bill Hedrick tried to hit Ken Calvert over earmarks, and certainly there’s still a lot of smoke surrounding Calvert’s dirty dealings.  But in a low information district, Hedrick needs a lot of money for name ID, moeny he doesn’t have.

9. CA-42.  Last month: 11.  Incumbent: Gary Miller.  Challenger: Ed Chau.  PVI #: R+10.  % Dem. turnout: 44.0. Ed Chau has only $12,000 in the bank compared to Gary Miller’s $950,000.  That’s game, set and match, but questions have been raised once again about Miller’s potentially criminal actions (like his financial stake in getting an OC tollway built), so indictment is still on the fringes of possibility here.

10. CA-48.  Last month: 12.  Incumbent: John Campbell.  Challenger: Steve Young.  PVI #: R+8.  % Dem. turnout: 45.1.  Young is touting a poll (and I like that he’s touting it on ActBlue) showing that he’s up six points after biographical and issue information is distributed.  The problem is he has no money and lots of campaign debt, so how will that information get out there?  

11. CA-24.  Last month: 9.  Incumbent: Elton Gallegly.  Challenger: Marta Jorgensen.  PVI #: R+5.  % Dem. turnout: 50.6. Marta Jorgensen has a fairly nice website, but the money isn’t there to make this all that competitive, and she’ll need an Elton Gallegly slip-up. (Of course, she spent $1,375 on the primary and won, so ya never know…)

12. CA-41.  Last month: 10.  Incumbent: Jerry Lewis.  Challenger: Tim Prince.  PVI #: R+9.  % Dem. turnout: 46.3.  Tim Prince is also challenging Jerry Lewis on earmark requests, but Lewis has been pretty adept at escaping scrutiny in the district.

Central Valley

A Bush Dog Revels In Poverty

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Considering all of the rural areas and dirt-poor urban centers in the country, you have to be a little surprised that Jim Costa’s Central Valley district is the worst in the country for quality of life.

Poverty, poor health and low graduation rates have put the San Joaquin Valley’s 20th Congressional District dead last in a new national scorecard that ranks the well-being of residents.

Even notoriously grim Appalachia fares better than the congressional district that sweeps in Fresno, Kings and Kern counties, the study made public Wednesday shows. The assessment of health, education and income ranks the district 436th out of 436 districts nationwide.

CA-20 has the lowest rate of college graduates in the country, just 6.5%. The median annual salary is just $16,767, and life expectancy is 4.5 years lower than in rich, high well-being areas like the Upper East Side of Manhattan.  It’s an appalling set of numbers.

We know the challenges in this district.  Factory-style farming has lowered the air quality and increased the public health risks.  As income inequality stratifies, places like the Central Valley get left behind, even more so in a California with a 6.9% unemployment rate.  A lack of development into 21st-century jobs causes a brain drain, and higher energy prices cripple rural America.

And there’s a residual benefit.  A dirt-poor district is a district that doesn’t vote heavily or pay much attention to politics, paradoxically so since they need to the most.  And so we get Representatives like Jim Costa, whose district has the lowest participation rates in the entire state.  Which means he can vote the wrong way on issues like FISA or war funding and not get much feedback about it from a constituency that’s struggling to survive.  In this context, his desire to return federal funds to the district or improve quality of life would seem to be low, at best.  It’s a vicious circle: poverty breeds inattention, inattention breeds bad lawmakers, bad lawmakers have trouble improving poverty.

We need less legislators like Jim Costa who seem more interested in pleasing their corporate contributors than the suffering citizens in their own districts.  The problem is how to reach a low-information constituency, and how to make that connection, that sustained political power and engagement is vital if we want to end poverty and build the post-carbon, post-agrarian economy that would lift up whole regions like the Central Valley.

Uncategorized

California Pols at Netroots Nation – A Roundup

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By my count, we had nine local and federal candidates or elected officials from California joining us in Austin for Netroots Nation.  So much for the adage that us dirty hippie bloggers are to be avoided at all costs.  These candidates and politicians represent the foundation of a progressive alliance that can transform the party and the state over the next decade.  And they all received varying degrees of support at the convention.  Here is a brief roundup in alphabetical order:

1) Secretary of State Debra Bowen – Debra apparently accepted the invitation to appear on a panel about election reform by replying on Facebook.  She is one of our favorites because of her progressive credentials, her commitment to election reform, and her accessibility.  Far from dropping in for the panel and dropping out, she took time to hang out with plenty of us Caliticians.  In fact, during the netroots candidate event, she was simply watching the proceedings when Christine Pelosi called her to the stage – it was not her intention to come as a candidate, but to just attend the conference.  That said, there was a lot of talk among the California delegation about Bowen’s plans for the future.  At least four California convention-goers told me they would quit their jobs to work for Bowen if she sought higher office than the Secretary of State.  She has a bright future and, judging from the reception she received, a national profile.  She is one of our best hopes to get a real grassroots progressive into a legitimate position of power.

more on the flip…

2) Charlie Brown (CA-04) – Charlie has been to all three Netroots Nation events, including the first two when it was known as Yearly Kos.  He is a hero among this community, and he has a lot of support here.  In fact, he proved it with a very well-received appearance at the Lurker’s Caucus.

One of the people attending the caucus was Charlie Brown.  He was there to do what a great many political candidates came to the convention to do — speak to people, press the flesh, make them aware of his campaign and expand awareness.  I was taking a seemingly arbitrary route around the room in calling on people to talk about themselves, and Charlie was one of the first people I called on.

Obviously there was a great interest in him, and there was a lively give and take between the attendants and The Colonel for about 15 minutes.  He cheerfully answered questions and gave us all a good measure of him.

Now, there are a couple of things here that make this moment extraordinary to me.  First of all, the odds were very slight that there were any people in this caucus who were from his home district.  And this was the Lurkers Caucus, a group whose only unifying distinction is that they don’t blog!! But here was Charlie, in a convention filled with bloggers, talking to the very people least likely to blog his appearance. (Yes, I’m blogging it now, but he didn’t know I was going to be there…)

Secondly, after he spoke, we still had about 50 minutes of the caucus and we had resumed moving around the room, giving people opportunities to express themselves.  Now, I know that Charlie was not there to share his lurking experiences.  He was there to campaign.  I fully expected him, and would not have blamed him in the least, to quietly slip out of the room in search of more campaigning opportunities at the convention.  In fact, that’s part of the reason I kind of steered the circuit of speakers to allow him to speak early.  But Charlie stayed for the entire session, listening to people explain why they don’t blog!

It was indicative of the respect Brown has shown for this entire community, from top to bottom, and it’s what’s going to make him a great Congressman from the 4th District.  This is one of the top races in the country from the perspective of the netroots.

3) Debbie Cook (CA-46) – I think Debbie Cook, Annette Taddeo and Alan Grayson were among the most well-received newcomers at the event.  Cook’s passion for environmental and energy issues matched up perfectly with the overriding concerns of the entire conference, which helped a lot.  At the Energy Panel she sat on, along with Alaska Senate candidate Mark Begich and Oregon Senate candidate Jeff Merkley, people in the room told me she was the most impressive.  And Talking Points Memo was similarly taken with Mayor Cook, as can be seen in this interview for the popular site.

Cook switched her flight so she could make the Netroots candidate event on Friday night.  I think she served her candidacy a great deal through this appearance, and considering that in-district donations to her campaign passed 70% in Q2, she has a lot of potential to raise her national profile online.

4) Rocky Delgadillo, LA City Attorney – Delgadillo, who lost to Jerry Brown in a primary for the Attorney General in 2006, appeared on a health care panel that I thought was the most interesting of the entire conference.  I’m going to do a larger story on it, but Delgadillo’s work in this area, rooting out corruption and illegal acitivity among health insurers, was justly recognized.  I didn’t see him walking around the conference.  Here’s a great diary from nyceve at Daily Kos about his efforts.

5) Mike Lumpkin (CA-52) – Calitics actually held an extended breakfast conversation with Lumpkin, running in the open seat created by Duncan Hunter’s retirement.  Here’s a pic:

That’s me, my subpar breakfast, Brian, Mike Lumpkin, and Lucas.  Photo by Matt Lockshin.

I thought Lumpkin was pretty good.  He’s a former Navy SEAL with 20 years of experience in counterinsurgency and command techniques, serving in both Afghanistan and Iraq.  Notably, his plan for Iraq includes a total withdrawal of all forces, leaving no residual troops.  He tends to frame most of the issues in terms of national security, which I guess is to be expected, and he talked about securing the border as well as energy security as two of his major issues on the campaign trail.  Duncan Hunter’s son, also named Duncan Hunter, is his opponent, and in the primary polls revealed that a substantial portion of voters thought they were casting a ballot for the incumbent, so this is not really an open seat in the traditional sense.  Still, this is a race to watch, and I appreciated Lumpkin taking the time to talk with us.

6) Gavin Newsom, San Francisco Mayor – Mayor Newsom walked around the hall on Saturday, showed up at our Calitics/Alternet Books party, and introduced Van Jones on Sunday morning.  Joe Garifoli has a little interview on why he attended:

Newsom is no stranger to online communication. He’s been regularly courting Bay Area bloggers for stories that the uh, ahem, other news poohbahs in town aren’t into. Just this week, he chatted up the city’s wind power project with a handful of local and statewide bloggers. He’s a Daily Kos and Huffington Post regular reader and occasional poster, and he copped to following threads around Facebook. “I really don’t have time to be on there,” he said of the social networking time suck.

“I’m not a convert, I’m one who recognizes the power and extraordinary influence the netroots have. Not just with politics, but it’s about a different interactions with people.” He went to Austin because “I wanted to understand more fully the intensity behind those names. We actually met ‘Bill in Portland Maine.'”

Clearly Newsom was there to build a profile for a statewide run for governor, and I thought that was generally successful.  There seemed to be a buzz around his visit as he walked the halls, and the crowd was receptive to his Sunday morning message, which focused on the environment.  Some were skeptical of the message, and I hope he clarifies his position, but when I spoke with him, I found him very willing to engage on the issues.  I asked about prison policy, one of my hobby horses, and while he wasn’t fully informed on the topic, he expressed a need to drill down and asked me personally to provide him with whatever information I could muster.  You bet I’ll do so, and I respect anyone in politics willing to have a two-way conversation.

7) Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the House – You may recall she had a little discussion with some dude on Saturday morning.  That’s been well-covered elsewhere.  Speaking to Pelosi’s staffers, I can tell you that she enjoyed the back and forth and expected MORE of a grilling, which may have been a fault of the organization or the perhaps too-respectful commenters themselves.

8) Russ Warner (CA-26) – This was Russ’ second Netroots Nation, and he did his best to focus on meeting as many people as possible.  I did tend to see him and his campaign staff just about everywhere.  He delivered his passionate message about his son, who was in attendance, at the Netroots candidate event as well.

9) Steve Young (CA-48) – Steve is running for Congress but he’s also a member of the community, and during the California caucus he was as active as anyone in participating in the discussion.  The numbers he’s been showing around on his race suggest there is a real chance here, and I hope he got a lot out of the event.