(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.

In 2003, Arnold Schwarzenegger announced his candidacy for governor by claiming that he would fight politics as usual.

Here’s how it works: Money goes in. Favors go out. The people lose. We need to send a message: Game over.(CADem.org)

Has that happened? Well, qualitatively we all know that this hasn’t happened.  We know he’s taken hundreds of millions of dollars. We know he’s been a slave to corporate interests.  He’s vetoed bills that his corporate masters don’t approve of.  He fights for corporate interests at every turn, and he’ll throw anybody under the bus for few bucks or some added power.  Unions, the environment, uninsured children, you name it.

And we’ve seen how the money comes in with unsuprising timing.  But, he’s also been so obvious as to engage in a pattern of appointing big donors to government positions.  This from the not-so-liberal San Diego Union Tribune:

But Schwarzenegger has carried on the political tradition of providing favors – in the form of coveted state appointments – to generous campaign donors.

At least 13 of Schwarzenegger’s appointees, their spouses and their companies have contributed more than $1.4 million to his campaigns, according to campaign disclosure forms and a review by the Foundation for Taxpayer and Consumer Rights.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has received sizable campaign contributions from people he has appointed to the Del Mar Fair Board. Contributions include money given by the board member, spouse and businesses owned by either.

Schwarzenegger has hired some donors for key positions in government, but has also made several appointments that bestow prestige rather than pay. He has named five major donors or their spouses to the unpaid Del Mar Fair Board, one of the most sought-after appointments in state government. (S.D. U-T 8/28/06):

Incidentally, one of the appointees: Brent Wilkes, the good buddy of Duke Cunningham and Dusty Foggo. He’s since resigned.  Do you think it’s because ol’ Brent is a known agent of bribery?

So Arnold: The money comes in, the favors go out. Now we just have a whole lot more money coming in, and a whole lot more favors going out. You want change? Vote Phil. Vote Yes on 89.

(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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It’s that time of year again.  Yes, the legislature session is soon coming to a close.  And what better opportunity to rake in the bucks for the upcoming elections?  The legislature has 75 fundraisers scheduled for the final 19 days of the session.  Wow! That’s more than 3 a day.  Those lobbyists will have some busy social calendars.

But don’t you fret about Arnold Schwarzenegger.  He’ll be raking in the dough during the end of the session. Oh, and incidentally, it’s also the time when he’ll be deciding the fate of these lobbyists’ bills.  Isn’t that convenient:

The solicitations to lobbyists — members of the third house, as they’re often called — don’t come only from legislators.

Despite previous calls for fundraising blackouts during the legislative session and when he is considering which bills to sign or veto, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger will hold two Sacramento events in August — breakfast Thursday at $22,300 a plate and a$10,000-a-head cocktail reception featuring former New York Mayor Rudolph Giuliani.

In 2004, the GOP governor raised $2.7 million during August and September when he was weighing whether to sign or veto legislation. (SF Chron 8/9/06)

This governor, the governor who was going to bring the hammer to special interests, has been a virtual hoover of special interest cash.  it’s getting out of hand; the people can no longer reach their legislators.  It’s now a game for the super rich and big business.  Hiram Johnson would understand that it’s long past time that we dealt with the problem.  The Clean Money Initiative gives us an opportunity to make this reform a reality.

Hiram would be proud of this initiative.

Arnold Schwarzenegger spoke at the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco.  I had the honor to view the Governor’s splendid presentation.  Ok, that’s all I could do of that.  After making the crowd wait in the very hot, very stuffy Herbst Theater on what could be one of the hottest days in SF of the year, he strolls in 45 minutes late.  I can deal with that, but then he strolls on stage to pronounce how he has “sold California.”  Yeah, more like “sold California out,” but I held my tongue.  No point getting thrown out of there. I sat through his whole “selling California” lecture and waited for the Q&A portion.

One of the first questions was something to the tune of “Why do we go over there and support the Chinese regime that has been brutal to its citizens, especially the Falun Gong.” Well, I’m pretty sure Arnold didn’t know what or who the Falung Gong was and preceded to say how business is business and how they don’t muddle in the affairs of our government and we shouldn’t mess with theirs.  Well, that’s all well and good, but we don’t systematically suppress any religious organizations as the Chinese government does.  But, Arnold is no Chinese scholar, so I could understand his confusion.

However, Arnold is supposed to be an expert on California politics.  You know, maybe he would know what all of the propositions were on the upcoming ballot. Like say, Proposition 89, the CAN’s clean money initiative.  When asked about Prop 89, he hemmed and hawed about how he would have to read the proposition but he supports clean money.  Well, ok he supports clean money, but well not so much the clean part.  When the moderator asked him whether he actually supported public financing, Arnold immediately said no.  Perhaps he should take a look into at least a two sentence summary of all of the propositions.  It would be nice to have an informed governor. Frank at CPR has a good post on this.

But what really set me off was Arnold’s absolute denunciation of “universal health care.” In one sentence he said it was unacceptable to have 6.7 million Californians without health care, and then he states his hatred of “universal health care.” He goes on to say how he is against government interference.  What is Arnold afraid of about “universal health care.” Is it that universal health care would yield the worst results in terms of cost effectiveness in all Western industrialized nations? Nope, can’t be that, because the U.S. (and our wonderful private insurance system) already hold’s the title for that.  Is there any moral argument that you can present to me that those with the least are less worthy of medical than those with the most.  I challenge anybody to present me with such an argument.  What is more basic of a right than the right to live a healthy life?  We owe every one of our citizens, from rich to poor, the same level of care.  There should be no distinction, but Arnold is A-OK with such class distinction.

No, what Arnold really fears about the evil “universal health care” is the well of GOP dollars that might dry up.  And that is putting money over lives, a morally inexcusable position.