(cross posted everywhere)

For those fed up with the unfairly high cost of prescription drugs, Proposition 79 provides a simple solution: Proposition 79  will use the purchasing power of the state of California to negotiate deep, enforceable discounts on prescription drugs for millions of Californians.

The drug companies have raised a record-breaking $80 million dollars to run false and misleading ads around the state; They also have sponsored a sham counter-measure, Prop 78, that looks similar but lacks enforcement–it allows the drug companies to decide which drugs get discounted, which get excluded, what levels the discounts are set, whether the drug companies participate at all, and if enough don’t, the program ends.

In order to fight against the most expensive ballot campaign in the history of the nation–financed by the ultimate special interest, the drug companies, the Proposition 79 knows it needs to do something different.  Something never done in the history of ballot campaigns.

Instead of having Proposition 79 fought on behalf of consumers, Proposition 79 will be fought by consumers, those fed up by the drug companies’ unfair prices. The consumer, health, senior, and community groups behind Proposition 79 are turning the campaign over to the people. We’ll let consumers, on the Internet, design and choose the campaign TV ads for this campaign.

The drug companies are notorious for their false and misleading advertising and marketing tactics, for their products (with the disclaimers about all those side effects!), and in this campaign. Numerous newspapers, from the Sacramento Bee to the Orange County Register, have cited their ads as false and misleading.

We don’t need to do that. All we need to do is simply tell voters the differences between the measures (78 lack enforcement, 79 has it), who supports which measure (the drug companies versus consumer groups), and who benefits (Prop 79 provides deeper discounts to twice as many Californians).

As an example, the AIDS Healthcare Foundation has produced one ad that the Yes on 79 Campaign is beginning to air. But we are looking to YOU to help us design and pick an ad that we can use in the final weeks of the campaign.

The Alliance for a Better California, with the Yes on 79 campaign, will host this new contest, “No Disclaimer Needed Ad Contest: Better Ads for Cheaper Drugs.” But the best way to confront the drug companies is to participate and to enter!

Here’s how it works:

1. Make your own ad that tells Californians about the differences between the consumer groups Proposition 79, and the drug companies’ sham Proposition 78.  The ad can be video, animation, text and images, or even simple text and audio.  Be creative. The only restrictions are that the ad must be on message, be 30 seconds or less in length, and that you have the legal rights or license to use to all content you include.
2. Between now, and  11:59 P.M. October 16^th 2005, submit your ad in MPEG or Apple Quicktime format to BetterCA.com’s contest site. Include your contact information – and let us know how you would like to be identified on the site (full name, first initial last name, first name last initial, nickname, etc.).  
3. All the submitted ads, except those that are judged to be inappropriate by the administrators, will be made available for viewing on the Alliance for a Better California’s website.
4. Beginning at 12:01 A.M. on Monday, October 17^th 2005, BetterCA.com community members will judge the submitted content based on the clarity of message, the originality and creativity, and most importantly the overall quality and impact of the ad. Community judging will end at 11:59 PM, Tuesday, October 18^th 2005.
5. At the close of community judging, the site administrators will tabulate the results from the community, and select the top 5 entries. These will be posted and announced as “Community Favorites.”
6. A panel of media experts, who will again rate the entries on clarity, creativity, quality and impact, will judge the community favorites.  The entry with the highest average rating from our panel of media experts, will be declared the overall winner. The winner will be announced on or about  Wednesday, October 19^th, and will be featured on BetterCA.com. The winning ad may even be broadcast all over California.

You can help us defeat the big drug companies, and get cheaper prescription drugs more Californians can count on. submit your ad today, or contribute to help air the winning ad.

Please see the official rules.

Help us spread the word, link back to this post or the main contest page on BetterCA.

( – promoted by SFBrianCL)

It’s getting to be that time of the year I guess.  Yup, it’s fire season.

A wildfire, fanned by the first Santa Ana winds of the season, has charred 17,000 acres along the Los Angeles-Ventura county border, forcing hundreds from their homes and closing schools today.

The fire, which more than doubled in size from this morning’s estimates, remains “far from being over,” said Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yarovslavsky at a morning press conference. But diminishing winds made officials cautiously optimistic.

Looks like it’ll be another big season.  Hopefully the rains will come earlier this year.

Thy are fawning over cash at Join Arnold:

Thank you donors.  A story: I was with a rich guy the other day who offered to give a million dollars to Arnold’s reform campaign.  I was a little too lost in the moment… thinking about Dr. Evil and the One Milllllllion Dollars phrase and all to really reflect on it at the time but I did have a quiet minute to think afterwards, and got all sappy and well, I  just want to thank our donors.

Wow, I get sappy as well when somebody tries to buy an election.  It’s really so sweet.  It couldn’t possibly be that he has an ulterior motives; he just has nothing better to do with his million dollars.  It’s all quite sickening.

You know you are having a positive effect on the media when the other side tries to keep them from even talking to you.  The following report comes from one of our campaign staffers down south.

The cloudy weather hovering over Irvine yesterday morning paled in comparison to the fog that rolled in as the Schwarzenegger campaign orchestrated yet another staged and scripted “town hall” meeting.

Apparently tired of sharing the spotlight with those pesky nurses, teachers and firefighters who oppose the Governor’s damaging agenda, the campaign handlers today attempted to stop TV cameras from filming the opposition out in front of the Hyatt Regency Irvine.

With security blocking off the main driveway where protestors stood, TV crews were shuttled to the back of the hotel and were initially told they could not film protestors and return to the event.

Perhaps the Governor’s Hollywood version of a “town hall,” doesn’t include real people actually sharing their opinions. As Schwarzenegger’s true colors continue to shine through, his campaign promises ring even more hollow…

“…There is no such thing as democracy in the dark,” Schwarzenegger told the San Jose Mercury News in September of 2003.

“I will open up the windows and doors of government,” he said on the campaign trail.
But apparently those doors are only open to high-dollar campaign contributors and those who will read the Governor’s campaign cue cards on command…

Business as usual for the governor, as his approval ratings go down in a heap with his promises.

Campaign Update

Netroots

From our new Netroots page:

You can help the Alliance for a Better California defeat Arnold’s nasty little November election from the comfort of your desk, couch, coffee house, or where ever you access the net. We’re reaching out to the netroots to help build a successful campaign to quash Schwarzenegger’s plan, and bring real reform to California. Sure, the word netroots gets bandied about an awful lot these day – but here at the Alliance, we truly are dedicated to building an online grassroots community dedicated to real change in California – and to the defeat of Arnold’s special interests election.

• We’ve enlisted online advocacy whiz Joe Trippi – the dean of the Dean Internet campaign – to help us develop a community that works, and that speaks to people like you- who want to be involved on their own terms.
• We’ve brought two full time bloggers on board to maintain the site, and to bring you fresh content and insight every day.
• We’re listening to your suggestions. How can we improve BetterCA.com? How can we get you more involved? You can directly contact either of our bloggers – myself, Julia Rosen, and Drew Tappan – with your suggestions, tips, even whispered rumors you think might be of interest to the campaign, or the website.

Read more on our Netroots page, including html buttons and other ways to get more involved.

New Ads

We went live with new ads today on Proposition 75.  As always you can watch the ads on our television page.

New Microsite

In conjunction with the ad launch we went live with a new site, www.MillionairesforProp75.com, a spoof designed to inform Californians of the real force behind the governor’s special election – his multimillionaire special interest backers and their national anti-tax agenda.

As always, the door is open over at BetterCA, come join our community discussing the special election.  43 days and counting.

(crossposted at Booman, MyLeftWing and dkos)

You should add Calitics to the blogroll at leftyblogs.com

http://www.leftyblogs.com/california/blogroll.html

( – promoted by SFBrianCL)

The forces that favor corporate greed over the rights of the working man are gearing up for an all out war.  In California, on November 8, these forces, aligned with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, will to try to sneak through a devious anti-worker proposition that will weaken the clout of the unions.

Paying reverance to his multi-national corporate masters, Arnold will do anything and say anything to make you believe passing Proposition 75 will be somehow beneficial for anyone, somehow, somewhere, at some time –but it is not.

What is really behing Proposition 75 is the ongoing wish of greedy corporate giants to further weaken the union’s ability to get the things done in the way they feel they need to, in order to fight back.

In essence, Aronld wants to take away the union’s clout and increase the clout of his corporate masters. Weakening unions hurts the worker’s ability to organize and use collective power to demand improvements to their lives, health care, and working conditions –when fighting against rich and nearly-immovable corporate powerhouses. If proposition 75 passes, unions will be further hamstrung in their efforts, which help promote policies that will help workers.

In Los Angeles a “black-brown” coalition landslided in the first latino mayor in over a century. It may take such a coalition again in California to beat back these initiatives that will make it harder for the poor to rise up and for the middle-class to have decent lives.

Yes they could do it in Los Angeles, can they do it also throughout all of California? In the face of the charismatic governator? Will this growing coalition of workers and their allies once again stand up, show up at the polls, and show who is going to be setting the agenda for California’s future?

From what I have seen, I am sure we can.

Balletshooz blogs at Alphaliberal.com

Just got my CA voter information guide (you have to download the pdf)for November 8th’s special election.  I don’t know about your state but we get these humongo books printed in the smallest print with an analysis by the state’s legislative analyst, followed by argument in favor, rebuttal to the arguments in favor, argument against the initiative, followed by a rebuttal to the argument against the initiative.  Always enough to make my eyes cross but this year, yay, I’m a bit more versed.

Very quickly, Prop. 76 is CA’s state spending cap with lots of extras. With regards to public education, not only is it capping spending, we’re talking a huge amount of money per pupil which will be lost permanently, $600, in a state where school funding is lower than many states.  

Prop. 76 will overturn the minimum school funding protection voted in by Prop. 98 in 1988. Even more chilling is how Prop. 76 will give even more power to the Governor to cut the budget (remember he has line-item veto powers already) without oversight.

And so yesterday, I turned to the “rebuttal argument against Prop 76” (p. 31 to all of you who has a voter information guide) and see our Secretary of Education, Alan Bersin, listed as a writer for the rebuttal against 76, along with the president of the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, and a UCLA econ guy (with ties to Brookings and received grant money from the Bradley Foundation).  Take home point: Bersin supports Prop. 76, the one which will really hurt our public education system.

Bersin is a Democrat but he came to Sacramento trailing huge clouds of controversy after he beat up the school system in San Diego as superintendent.  I’ve previously written DLC seems to love him, which says a lot about why a Democrat would be out there supporting the forces behind the Governor. And his appearance with the Governor recently in SD is even more telling where his allegiance lies. It’s obviously not with the kids in public education.

From a SD paper:

Alan Bersin, the former superintendent of San Diego city schools, who now is serving as the state’s education secretary, appeared at Friday’s event and spoke in support of the ballot initiatives.

“It is our last clear chance and we have a hero – a real action hero – to lead us,” Bersin said.

Breaking!!!! Well, not really.

The governor released his positions on all the special elections initiatives today. It’s clear he has the wrong priorities for the state.  He represents a small number of wealthy contributors.  We represent 2.5 million working Californians.  His positions on every issue is opposite of ours.  The governor chooses to attack nurses, firefighters, cops and teachers and we speak out on their behalf.   He supports big drug and energy companies instead of the everyday people of the state he pretends to lead.   Arnold has made it his goal to consolidate power for himself and his companies; we are trying to stop this ploy couched as “reform”.

Schwarzenegger said he was a politician -that he would be a different kind of governor- but the only difference is more broken promises.  Line up his supporters  and then look at ours.  He has big drug companies, right-wing anti-tax advocates like Grover “drown it in a bathtub” Norquist and Lew “I think [sic] that Joe McCarthy was on target.” Uhler, and his own staff who thought it’s a great campaign idea to collect nasty stories about teachers, and to build a “phenomena of anger” against the dedicated people who keep us safe and healthy.  We have 2.5 million firefighters, nurses, teachers , police officers, health care workers and average everyday people who have devoted our careers to helping others.

In  our universe,  cutting school funding by more than $600 per student is a bad idea. Taking cops off the streets and firefighters out of firehouses is a bad idea. Cuts to pre-school and child health programs are bad ideas.  In less than two months the voters will decide what universe they are living in.  Governor,  if you believe all that, and health care benefits and pensions for public employees are a bad idea you must be living in an alternate universe.

In a little over a month, voters will decide which universe they live in – and we’re willing to bet – it’s a real one.

Crossposted on the BetterCA blog

Campaign News and Notes

It has been a busy week for the Alliance and for your intrepid bloggers.

Communications:
Acting on a press release from us the AP confronted the JoinArnold campaign about their “tell on a bad teacher” webform.  They immediately pulled it and the resulting AP story ran in 73 papers across the country.

Site additions:
We have been working hard to get new content up.  Right now we have downloadable flyers targeting various constituencies. More in various languages coming soon.

Friday is Bubba blogging.  Our trusty Alliance mascot/pet, the redbone hound now has his own feature, the Bubba Files.

Field:
There have been a number of actions this week, including the defense of the CTA building for people who thought it would be a good idea to hold a press conference attacking the union in front of the headquarters.

On the Air:
Arnold has gone live with his ads.  We have done some analysis/breakdown of each.  As always all of our ads are available for your viewing pleasure.

Comming Soon:  
Look for an official netroots outreach page filled with ways you can help the campaign.  For those kossacks with their own blog think about adding a link to us in your blog roll or grabbing the html Alliance button.

For the official weekly campaign update signup on the BetterCA site.

The governor’s finally launched his own television campaign – spending his lagging political capital to explain to Californians why he’s wasted millions in taxpayer dollars on this off year travesty of an election. One of the ads, seemingly titled “package” by the Schwarzenegger campaign, explains why Arnold thinks you should vote for them. We thought we would help them get their facts straight:

You know the special election is more important than I thought. Making new teachers work successfully for five years before they get tenure and a job for life is a good idea.

It’s a bad idea. Proposition 74 will make it harder for our schools to attract the talented new educators that we need to strengthen California schools. Teachers don’t have a job for life. They have the right to due process that keeps overzealous bureaucrats from unjustly firing educators who’ve spoken up for kids, given tough grades, or advocated for better classroom conditions. The current system already allows schools to dismiss teachers who don’t measure up.

Stopping government labor unions from taking workers money for politics without their permission makes sense.

The Supreme Court assured that workers who don’t want their organization dues spent on politics can opt out, and not pay the money. Proposition 75 just adds additional paperwork to a system that already works – it’s unnecessary, and unfairly targets only our police, firefighters, nurses, and other public employees.

Controlling spending to end state deficits and ballance the budget is better than raising our taxes.

The governor likes to threaten Californians with higher taxes – but he’s really only interested in grabbing power so he can unilaterally cut vital services and school funding and give big tax cuts to his wealthy backers.

Having independent judges draw legislative districts instead of the politicians is better for us voters.

Arnold’s plan for redistricting takes the responsibility for drawing legislative boundaries away from your elected representatives, and gives it to his political appointees. How is that better for California voters?

Lets face it Sacramento is screwed up, anything we can do to change it – I’m for.

The changes the governor is proposing don’t fix anything. Sacramento is screwed up because instead of working with the legislature to enact real reforms, the governor wants us to do his job for him. We all want to fix what’s wrong in Sacramento – but the Governor’s special interest election will just create more problems, and cost taxpayers millions.

Arnold’s package isn’t what he wants you to think it is. It’s just another political power grab.

(Darnit…forgot to promote! – promoted by SFBrianCL)

Cross-posted at MLW.
No, Mr. President, not the Levy family from LA.  California has its own set of levees that could come tumbling down in a earthquake or flood.  The Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Delta has an intricate network of levees that began in the 19th Century:

Developers first thought levees 4 feet high and 12 feet at the base would protect Delta lands from tides and river overflow, but that proved inadequate fro Delta peat soils. By 1869, substantial levees had been constructed on Sherman Island and Twitchell Island by Chinese laborers, and in 1870 and 1871 the owners reaped bountiful harvests of grain and row crops. Small-scale reclamationprojects were started on Rough and Ready Island and Roberts Island in the 1870s, but the peat soils showed their weakness as levees. The peat soils would sink, blow away when dry, and develop deep cracks and fissures throughout the levee system. Sherman and Twitchell Islands flooded annually in the early 1870s.

However, we now face the more serious consequences of the failing of the levees.  Today, of course, they have a touch of modern engineering and use cement and other modern materials, but they are dangerously vulnerable to earthquakes.  According to the LA Times:

“To make them basically earthquake-proof, you would probably have to start over with a brand-new levee system,” said Les Harder, acting deputy director of the department and an engineer who helped put together a 2000 state analysis of the delta’s seismic risk. “I think it’s going to be unlikely we would ever make the whole delta today earthquake-proof.”

Now, if they were to breakdown, we are talking about much less human toll, but a substantial financial burden.

The threat is well known. A big quake rumbles across the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta, knocking out dozens of the primitive levees that guard the state’s main water crossroads. A key source of water for nearly two out of three Californians and the nation’s biggest fruit and vegetable garden is shut down for months, maybe even a year or two.

The California heartland produces vast amounts of produce for the nation.  Additionally, it supplies much of the water for Southern California and much of the West.  But even fixing the current 1,100 miles of levees will be very expensive…

Schwarzenegger last week asked the federal government for $90 million to improve some of the most critical levees in the delta and the Central Valley. But that is a fraction of the $1.3 billion in repairs officials say it will take just to bring the delta levee system up to basic standards. And that would do little to protect it from earthquake damage. The state Department of Water Resources can’t even say how many billions more it would cost to do the seismic work.

Several solutions have been suggested.  Most controversial is the idea of building a canal to bring water down to Southern California.  This would provide additional water for SoCal, but there is concern that the Delta will be completely dried out by the insatiable thirst of Southern Californians.  It will also be costly, likely several times the cost of simply repairing the levees.  The federal and state government need to make the levees a priority, especially after we have seen what water has done to New Orleans.

Photo from LA Times of a Sacramento area flood.