(Sorry to interrupt the anti-Blackwater high. This article was written by Frank Russo, and originally appeared at California Progress Report. Disclosure: I do some work for Prop 93. Frank does not. – promoted by Brian Leubitz)

I was taught in law school to treat with suspicion and closely examine any sentence that starts off with the phrase, “It is clear that…” and assertions made without evidence. We know from history that big lies are repeated often enough that they are accepted for the truth.

Every time this year that it appears that the legislature has gotten close to a deal on health care or water or actually made progress on some pressing issue Californians care about, there is an eruption of bald faced statements that “They’re just doing that because of term limits” from the nattering nabobs of negativism.

As we are getting close to the end of this year, I’ve asked a dozen or more observers of the Sacramento scene, what would have been different this year had a proposition to change term limits not been placed on the ballot. The folks I’ve talked to include many who are cynical about the political process–yet none of them have been able to come up with a good answer.

I submit to you that we would have had the same dynamic and the same results had term limits not been on the ballot. The Governor would have had the same insistence on a health plan that’s never had a single legislator supporting it or willing to introduce it. He would have the same position on SB 840–the single payer bill the legislature passed in 2006 and would have vetoed it, as he did to AB 8, the health bill that passed this year. He would have the same position on water and we would be at loggerheads over what to do. We would have had the same budget stalemate. The same bills would have passed and the same bills would have floundered.

The chattering started with the introduction of the bill to move the presidential primary from June to February 5. Taken a look at the political calendar for 2008 lately? It would have been pretty lonely having our contest in June. Did all those other states move their primaries because of term limits too? Would we have moved our primary up had the sugar plums of term limit changes not been in the heads of our legislators? Or would we have left it in June when it would have been like a beached whale without meaning? In past elections cycles, California has moved our presidential primary up to an earlier date. Why did we do it then?

Last year–2006–the legislature adopted an on time budget. When there was a move to try to get a budget on time this year, the tongues of some started wagging about the Democrats in the legislature–“They’re going to cave to the Republicans and sell us out, just to get a budget because of term limits.” We all know what happened.

One denizen of the Capitol surmised there may have been one consequence of term limits being on the ballot. With all this talk about Democrats single-minded about term limits, it may have hardened Senate Republicans into thinking they had a good hand to play and led to the crazy hold up of the budget by the gang of 15 figuring the Democrats would jettison Attorney General Jerry Brown’s ability to enforce California’s environmental laws to appease them and look good for those February voters. But in the next breath he said, there’s no proof of that either.

There may yet be a deal on health and water. But it seems to me that if term limits were uppermost in the motivations of our lawmakers that these would have been sealed in the regular session and certainly earlier than the holiday season. It’s a little late for these to have a major impact on the term limits proposition–with most of the fundraising, support and opposition of organizations, and the like already set. The budget would have been passed in June–before they were dragged through the mud, too.

On the contrary, in milieu of money politics and despite the siren song of Proposition 93, the Democrats have held to the course they would have taken in its absence. The California Correctional Peace Officers, the state’s prison guards were an early contributor to the yes side on term limits changes, but have publicly stated that they have shifted to the no side which they are heavily funding precisely because the legislature in the final hours of the regular session did not pass a stealth bill to deal with contractual problems they have had with the Schwarzenegger Administration.

Do politicians want to win? Sure they do. They want to be popular with the voters. They want to be loved–and appreciated. That was the same in 2006, an election year when they passed global warming legislation, an increase in the minimum wage, and other significant legislation. They’re trying to do the same on very difficult and complex issues–health and water–that have bedeviled many prior legislative bodies here and in other states. Seems to me that their detractors want to have it both ways–if they are successful to dismiss it as improperly motivated–and if they fail to deride them as well for not accomplishing in those areas. Heads I win, tails you lose.

I am voting for Prop 93, not because of its effects on the current crop of legislators, but because of my philosophical beliefs that voters should be able to elect and re-elect those they wish and that those in other districts shouldn’t be able to limit my choice if I am satisfied with my state Senator and Assemblymember. Also, because I’d like to see more experienced legislators based on my observations before and after term limits went into effect. We have one of the most restrictive term limits laws in the nation. I’d like to see legislators with some serving up to 12 years in their house so there will be a longer vision about California.

Those are the public policy reasons I’m basing my vote on, not the mud that is being thrown by those who make allegations without evidence.

(I’ve now included some stuff on Dan Walters. Enjoy. Disclosure: I do work for Yes on 93. – promoted by Brian Leubitz)

UPDATE: I saw Dan Walters’ editorial when I wrote this post this morning, but if you’ve read Calitics very long you’ll see that I’m not really feeling his analysis.  But Bill Cavala says it far better than I.  Over at CA Progress Report, Bill lays into Dan Walters:

Dan Walters should have been a writer for PRAVDA.  He knows all the tricks of making propaganda look like journalistic analysis.
Today he twists the report of the nonpartisan Center for Governmental Studies. 

Well, Dr. Cavala should know that few are as adept as Dan Walters at spinning what might look like up to you and me into down for his Bee column.  Just like Kevin Spillane of the official No on 93 campaign, Walters does a fine job of turning what is essentially an endorsement of Prop 93 into something else.  It’s a gift I suppose.  But, more to the heart of the specific issue here is that Walters is still miffed that there is no redistricting reform on the ballot. He apparently thought that the two had to be linked. However, the only person who linked the two reforms was the Governator.  More from Cavala:

But Walters goes further, attempting to bolster the argument of the paid “No” on 93 campaign, which argues that we should condition our term limit vote on an evaluation of the Speaker and of the Pro Tem. Specifically, Walter’s writes, “once the term limit ballot measure was launched, they reneged on redistricting reform, without so much as an explanation”. To whom did they “renege” on such a promise? To Walters?

The dubious connection between redistricting and term limit reform was made by the Governor. He announced last winter he’d support the latter in return for the former. Both Democratic leaders tried to accommodate him – difficult, because he hasn’t a clue as to what “redistricting reform” means”. They failed in that effort, but not “without an explanation”.

The Pro Tem’s efforts stalled because Speaker Pelosi was unwilling to chance her Speakership and Democratic control of the US House of Representatives to the roll of the dice. Her opinion not only carries moral suasion within Democratic circles, it carries the certainty of a highly funded “No” campaign that would have split the party in a Presidential year. Perata ultimately offered to sacrifice the Senate’s redistricting authority over Senate districts and was turned down by the Republicans.

But, including the backstory or a real explanation would take up more than his allotted word limit, and really throw off his rhythm. And you know Dan is always a-rockin’ to the beat. However, instead of picking the facts that work with his opinion, perhaps we’d be better off with “Just the Facts, Dan.”

Original story over the flip.

A friend of mine, Sasha Horwitz, that I graduated from UC Berkeley’s policy school wrote a report a little while ago about term limits. You can download the PDF here. It took a bunch of research from a previous PPIC report, some analysis of some capitol watchers and pundits (like um, the force of nature that is Dan Walters), and synthesizes it in with some original analysis to come up with a finding that Prop 93’s twelve year plan would “improve some of [California’s term limits] structural weaknesses.”

So, it’s hard to see the report as anything but an endorsement of Prop 93’s purpose.  But, as in any academic report, there is a lot of hemming and hawing. That’s just good 8-fold path analysis. Mad Props to Sasha, but it also grants a lot of wiggle room for political spin. You know as somebody who’s worked in politics for a while, and who has been educated in public policy, it’s pretty clear that there are some inherent conflicts there.

And so, we get the spin in Steve Harmon’s MediaNews report. Follow me over the flip…

From that article:

Richard Stapler, a spokesman for “Yes on 93.” “And Prop. 93 retains what’s good about term limits. We applaud the study’s findings.”

Kevin Spillane, spokesman for the “No on 93” campaign, countered that the study affirms term limits’ benefits and debunks some claims made by proponents. (MediaNews 11.26.07)

See? That’s some serious spin. Spillane, who does a lot of work on behalf of Howard Jarvis initiatives, manages to make some lemonade out of those lemons. In the end, what Mr. Spillane is arguing is that we should reject Prop 93 not because it’s bad policy, but because he doesn’t like people messing with his group’s law. He doesn’t dispute the underlying fact that this reports thinks that our system will be better after Prop 93. He just spins some more.

Look, before Prop 93, we had term limits. After Prop 93, we have term limits. This year out of the 80 Assemblymembers, 38 were freshman. What business could sustain such turnover? Yet, that is exactly what Spillane is advocating. How can we expect good results from our government when we don’t give them a reasonable chance of success?