{"id":9021,"date":"2009-06-01T23:00:00","date_gmt":"2009-06-01T23:00:00","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2009-06-01T23:35:23","modified_gmt":"2009-06-01T23:35:23","slug":"the-sacramento-syndrome","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/2009\/06\/01\/the-sacramento-syndrome\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sacramento Syndrome"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dan Walters is touting a UC Riverside poll<\/a> on budget issues that interviewed 276 respondents, 63% male<\/b>, with a 42-38-11 split among Democrats, Republicans and independents.  He does this with a straight face.<\/p>\n

It barely matters what such a flawed poll shows, but I’ll mention it anyway.  According to 276 people, 57% support the 2\/3 requirement for passing a budget, 24% preferred a simple majority, 6% in between, 4% other (?), and 6% don’t know.  Given the bad methodology, these numbers mean nothing.<\/p>\n

But I’ll tell you who has historically taken numbers like these as the gospel’s truth and used them to mute themselves about any reform efforts for thirty years.  That would be the leaders of the California Democratic Party.  And they latch on to any poll numbers showing a view like this as a blunt instrument to kick hippies, not a starting point<\/b> for the political advocacy and opinion leadership that can and should be done to change perspectives.<\/p>\n

Here’s the problem, in a nutshell.  In 1978 California passed Prop. 13, and Democrats have run for cover ever since.  They should have put up a fight immediately.  But instead, Democrats cowered in fear of losing power, despite the demographic shifts in the state since the mid-1990s, so they lay low and never advocate for the necessary reforms, and buy completely into the myth that the 70’s-era tax revolt remains alive and well, and they take public opinion polls like this as static and unchangeable through anything resembling leadership.  Obviously Republicans are insane in this state, but they can barely manage 1\/3 of the legislature (and if we had a half-decent campaign apparatus among California Democrats they’d lose that too) and shouldn’t be feared in any respect.  Yet our Democratic leadership exists in a post-1978 fog, a kind of “Sacramento Syndrome,” where they’ve come to love their captors on the right, and have bought into their claims.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the David Binder memo<\/a>, with ten times the poll respondents and a clear majority favoring a broad swath of tax increases over spending cuts to deal with the deficit, goes unmentioned by virtually everyone in this state.  And in that desert, voters go vainly on a futile search for leadership.  They find nothing but shell-shocked politicians.<\/p>\n

…As if on cue, view for yourself the craptastic “Post-Budget Reform Push” press release Assembly Speaker Bass just dropped.  You’ll be thrilled to know that your state government will be more “user-friendly” when leaving AIDS patients and the poor to die on the streets.  You can almost smell the fear coming off this press release (on the flip):<\/p>\n

BASS LOOKS TOWARD POST-BUDGET REFORM PUSH<\/p>\n

SACRAMENTO-Assembly Speaker Karen Bass (D-Los Angeles) today announced the California Assembly will begin preparing information and analyses on ways state government can better serve Californians.  The move is in advance of a joint Assembly-Senate government reform effort expected to begin in July following passage of solutions to the state’s budget deficit.<\/p>\n

Bass released the following statement regarding the effort:<\/p>\n

“As the Budget Conference Committee continues to meet and we work to resolve the state’s budget deficit, Senator Steinberg and I are also looking ahead to developing a bicameral, bipartisan, back-to-basics approach to reform what is wrong with California’s system of government.<\/p>\n

The following are examples of goals this effort could include:<\/p>\n

Making government more customer-friendly.<\/p>\n

Giving Californians more value for their tax dollars by making government more efficient and accountable.<\/p>\n

Cutting through the gridlock caused by outmoded rules and undue partisanship-gridlock that only leads to late budgets and last minute decision making.<\/p>\n

Consolidating agencies and functions so they make sense and save money.  Not just blowing up boxes, but also folding, stacking and storing others more efficiently so the ones we need fit the room we have for them.<\/p>\n

Building on the upcoming recommendations of the bipartisan Commission for a 21st Century Economy so our revenue system makes more sense.<\/p>\n

Making government more transparent and accessible from around the state.<\/p>\n

The Assembly will immediately begin compiling a wide variety of ideas, information and input on these areas.  This way the bicameral reform effort will have the resources and data they need to move forward quickly and effectively with a lot of the necessary groundwork already out of the way. <\/p>\n

We will also be looking at ways to involve outside experts and stakeholders, as well as increase public participation in the reform process.<\/p>\n

Senator Steinberg and I have been talking frequently about this, and I know he and his team are making similar headway in the Senate. I look forward to sharing our collective information and working together to help give Californians the government they deserve.”
\n
 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Dan Walters is touting a UC Riverside poll<\/a> on budget issues that interviewed 276 respondents, 63% male<\/b>, with a 42-38-11 split among Democrats, Republicans and independents.  He does this with a straight face.<\/p>\n

It barely matters what such a flawed poll shows, but I’ll mention it anyway.  According to 276 people, 57% support the 2\/3 requirement for passing a budget, 24% preferred a simple majority, 6% in between, 4% other (?), and 6% don’t know.  Given the bad methodology, these numbers mean nothing.<\/p>\n

But I’ll tell you who has historically taken numbers like these as the gospel’s truth and used them to mute themselves about any reform efforts for thirty years.  That would be the leaders of the California Democratic Party.  And they latch on to any poll numbers showing a view like this as a blunt instrument to kick hippies, not a starting point<\/b> for the political advocacy and opinion leadership that can and should be done to change perspectives.<\/p>\n

Here’s the problem, in a nutshell.  In 1978 California passed Prop. 13, and Democrats have run for cover ever since.  They should have put up a fight immediately.  But instead, Democrats cowered in fear of losing power, despite the demographic shifts in the state since the mid-1990s, so they lay low and never advocate for the necessary reforms, and buy completely into the myth that the 70’s-era tax revolt remains alive and well, and they take public opinion polls like this as static and unchangeable through anything resembling leadership.  Obviously Republicans are insane in this state, but they can barely manage 1\/3 of the legislature (and if we had a half-decent campaign apparatus among California Democrats they’d lose that too) and shouldn’t be feared in any respect.  Yet our Democratic leadership exists in a post-1978 fog, a kind of “Sacramento Syndrome,” where they’ve come to love their captors on the right, and have bought into their claims.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the David Binder memo<\/a>, with ten times the poll respondents and a clear majority favoring a broad swath of tax increases over spending cuts to deal with the deficit, goes unmentioned by virtually everyone in this state.  And in that desert, voters go vainly on a futile search for leadership.  They find nothing but shell-shocked politicians.<\/p>\n

…As if on cue, view for yourself the craptastic “Post-Budget Reform Push” press release Assembly Speaker Bass just dropped.  You’ll be thrilled to know that your state government will be more “user-friendly” when leaving AIDS patients and the poor to die on the streets.  You can almost smell the fear coming off this press release (on the flip):<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[117],"tags":[3262,223,107,132],"class_list":["post-9021","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-117","tag-3262","tag-223","tag-107","tag-132"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6Pvhz-2lv","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9021","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/54"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9021"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9021\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9021"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9021"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/calitics.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9021"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}