Cross-Posted at Daily Kos.

Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s California Highway Patrol — I am not making this up — has taken to warning public interest groups they could be considered a “Homeland Security Threat” for capturing video to put on YouTube.

Here is the background. This is the final week of California’s legislative session, so lawmakers and lobbyists get together for literally dozens of fundraisers each day as legislators decide the fate of bills. Today’s LA Times headlined an article, Checks Roll In as Laws Flow Out which noted $193,000 moved Monday alone. Even worse, the lobbyist have found a new way to dodge reporting until after the session ends, making accountability reports like this LA Times story more difficult. The tactic is called “pledging” where the lobbyists show up at the big money fundraiser to demonstrate support for a legislator and talk shop, but the money doesn’t actually change hands until after the session is over to dodge the disclosure requirements.

To cast some sunlight on this process and help support this fall’s Clean Money, Proposition 89 initiative, a government watchdog group started showing up at the fundraisers with a video camera and started a website — Channel 89 — with links to all the YouTube video of the events.

The response: intimidation:

Proponents of Proposition 89, which would reduce the role of big money in politics, were warned by a California Highway Patrol (CHP) officer yesterday that they could be considered a “homeland security threat” as they filmed lawmakers and lobbyists wrapping up end of the session deals.

“When did the CHP become a private security force for corporate lobbyists? Prop 89, the campaign finance overhaul, will make the Capitol a public space again,” said Jerry Flanagan of the nonpartisan Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights (FTCR).

FTCR’s public interest news crew, Channel 89, was in the Capitol yesterday filming lawmakers and lobbyists as they exchange favors and campaign contributions in the final days of the legislative session. A CHP officer warned the Channel 89 staff that they could be considered a “homeland security threat” for filming the democratic process in the Capitol. Shortly after, Channel 89 staff members were stopped as they tried to interview Assembly Speaker Nuñez outside his office. The CHP called FTCR staff to suggest they were breaking the law.

It is easy to understand why the powers that be fear Proposition 89. In addition to strict contribution limits and tough enforcement, Prop 89 also creates public financing of elections in California. Not only would this clean up the special interest strangehold on the state, but by fundamentally reforming the political economy of the largest state, Prop 89 would be a beacon for electoral reform nationwide. Apparently, clean elections and accountability are a threat to Homeland Security.

You can stay up to date on this historic campaign at the Proposition 89 Blog.

(The Money Comes in, The Favors Go Out. It’s time to stop this cycle. So many issues would get a better crack at the apple if we didn’t have all this money flowing into Sacramento. Think about recommending this on Daily Kos. – promoted by SFBrianCL)

Cross-posted at Daily Kos

With the Katrina anniversary, there has been lots of talk about what government needs to do to protect citizens from another disaster. The other day, California Assemblymember John Laird told the Capitol Weekly, “We have less flood protection than they had in New Orleans. Sacramento is really not protected and the thousands of people who live here are at risk.” But this wasn’t a story about the anniversary, this was a report on how flood protection in California died a suspicious death in the legislature:

This week, just as Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata put on hold an eight-bill package of flood-protection legislation, one of his political committees received a $500,000 donation from the California Building Industry Association (CBIA), one of the package’s biggest opponents.

The donation is the single largest that a Perata committee has received since he became Senate leader in 2004.

In response, the California Majority Report noted, “As is the case with many policy areas that the legislature deals with, especially this time of year, eyebrows were raised about the timing of all of this.” In addition being a policy disaster that risks lives, these scandals harm people’s faith in government, decreasing participation in a vicious cycle that gives even more power to the special interests who run Sacramento.

In May, the Public Policy Institute of California polled on the issue (May 14-21, 2000 adult residents, +/- 2% MOE):

Do you think that campaign contributions are currently having a good effect or a bad effect on the public policy decisions made by state elected officials in Sacramento, or are campaign contributions making no difference?”

Good Effect	12%
Bad Effect	56%

The big money that controls Sacramento is so excessive, that it is easy to see why the polls show people realize how it is harming policy. If you check out yesterday’s San Francisco Chronicle, you’ll see an editorial blasting the “nasty moves” that special interests used to kill flood control. It is easy to see why people who pay attention are disgusted by the way Sacramento operates like an auction.

Special Interests Killing Universal Health Care Legislation

Yesterday, the California Assembly passed historic Universal Health Care legislation. This bill would save $8 billion a year and at the same time provide insurance for 6 million Californians. Sounds too good to be true? Well here comes the but…

Insurers have spent $3.7 million in campaign contributions in California since 2005.  Governor Schwarzenegger, who alone has received $765,000 from health insurers, has said he will veto the bill.

The big money has a proven ability to stop sound policy, and so California will waste $8 billion a year so that 6 million less people will have health insurance.

Special Interests New Deregulation

Public safety and health care aren’t the only areas where big money dominates in Sacramento. While lawmakers are holding dozens of fundraisers as they wrap up the legislative session, AT&T lobbyists are hitting the jackpot:

The Public Utilities Commission (PUC) gave AT&T and smaller Verizon permission to raise telephone rates at will, even as a telecommunications deregulation bill — a bonanza for AT&T and a bane to consumers — sped toward passage in the state Senate, jammed with last-minute amendments. […]

AT&T, while publicly billing the deregulation as beneficial competition in the video market, has not promised any rate reductions or other specific consumer benefits. It has poured nearly $18 million into lobbying efforts over the last few months, and $500,000 into direct political contributions during this election cycle, noted FTCR. That does not include contribution pledges made during legislators’ mad dash of fund-raising during the last three weeks of the legislative session, which ends next Thursday. These contributions will not be known until after the hundreds of measures still coming to a vote are passed or killed.

Yes, it sounds exactly like what went on during electrical deregulation, but as with flood protection, government can’t learn from past mistakes when special interests are running the show.

Solution: Proposition 89

Proposition 89 is the Clean Money and Fair Elections initiative that California will vote on this November. Put on the ballot by the California Nurses Association of anti-Arnold fame, the proposal addresses that systematic problems that are holding back good policy on a wide array of issues. Here are the details of Proposition 89.

Strict contribution and expenditure limits
Prop. 89 ends the fundraising madness with constitutional limits so regular voters aren’t drowned out by big money.
* Proposition 89 bans contributions from lobbyists and state contractors
* Proposition 89 limits contributions from corporations, unions, and individuals to state candidates
* Proposition 89 limits corporation donations to initiatives to $10,000

Clean Money public financing of political campaigns
Prop. 89 levels the playing field so new candidates can win on their ideas, not
because of the money they raise.
* With Proposition 89, candidates who agree to spending limits and to take no private contributions qualify for public funding
* Under Proposition 89, $5 contributions from voters required to prove viability
* With Proposition 89, lean candidates receive enough to run competitive campaigns. They can’t raise money beyond public funds

Tough disclosure and enforcement for politicians
Prop. 89 stops candidates from hiding behind negative ads and punishes politicians who violate the law.
* Proposition 89 makes wealthy self-funded candidates disclose the amount of personal funds they will spend
* Under Proposition 89, publicly financed candidates must engage in debates
* Proposition 89 imposes mandatory jail time and provides for removal from office of candidates who break the law.

The Challenge

Of course, the special interests who dominate Sacramento are spending at least as much money to stop Proposition 89 as they spend for each issue where they want to dominate the debate. While we won’t have as much money as the opposition, what we do have is a great initiative, a reality-based argument, lots of supporters, and trusted organizations like the League of Women Voters, Common Cause, California Nurses, the Consumer Federation of California and the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights all aggressively and creatively working to pass the initiative.

We would also like to have your support. We have started a campaign blog to keep supporters up-to-date and would appreciate it if supporters would sign up for email updates. Thanks for reading all the way down.

(Some info from the Good People over at Yes on 89. – promoted by SFBrianCL)

Dan Walters has been covering Sacramento politics for decades. In California, state senate seats larger than congressional seats create a reality where the most populous state is the most expensive state when it comes to campaigning.

Last week, a solid measure for re-districting died in the legislature. The big money, special interests have a strangle-hold on Sacramento and won. Dan Walters wrote:

Redrawing their own districts to fix elections and insulate themselves from voters’ whims is generally and accurately regarded to be the most cynically self-serving act that state legislators can perform.

However, strangling redistricting reform after months of pledging to place it before voters and thus elevate the level of lawmakers’ civic standing may be even worse — and that’s exactly what California’s legislative leaders did late last week.

The comic-opera end to the redistricting saga — leaders of the Legislature’s two houses pointing fingers at each other while continuing to insist that they really wanted reform — confirmed anew that even the most jaundiced view about the petty, self-interested motives of California legislators is merely realism.

It should be evident to any even halfway objective observer that the Legislature is an abjectly dysfunctional body, chronically incapable of responding effectively to the issues that arise from a fast-growing, fast-changing state. That malaise has many roots, but one of them is the essentially closed nature of legislative politics, which are disconnected from the socioeconomic reality of the state and driven by the wishes of a relative handful of powerful interest groups.

If government assigns value to money, we have an auction. If goverment assigns value to people, we have a democracy. That is the goal behind clean money, the reason for Proposition 89. Prop. 89 ends the fundraising madness with constitutional limits so regular voters aren’t drowned out by big money. To return democracy to the voters and stop the Sacramento auction, Proposition 89 bans contributions from lobbyists and state contractors.

But more importantly, Proposition 89 levels the playing field so new candidates can win on their ideas, not because of the money they raise. With Proposition 89, candidates who agree to spending limits and to take no private contributions qualify for public funding.

Proposition 89 stops candidates from hiding behind negative ads and punishes politicians who violate the law. Prop 89 makes wealthy self-funded candidates disclose the amount of personal funds they will spend. Under Proposition 89, publicly financed candidates must engage in debates. Prop. 89 imposes mandatory jail time and provides for removal from office of candidates who break the law.

Sacramento is broken, even long time observes like Dan Walters are disgusted by what is going on. It isn’t the same-old, same-old — things have gotten worse.

This fall, we can reform Sacramento by passing
Proposition 89.

—–
Yes on Proposition 89 ~ Proposition 89 Blog
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