If you read Calitics at any time between 2007 and 2010, you'd have seen a site focused on the same problem now facing the country as a whole: how to keep a government, an economy, and a society functioning in the face of Republican obstruction. The latest nonsense surrounding the so-called "fiscal cliff" shows that the House Republicans have learned well from their Sacramento counterparts. The method is the same: make Democrats do what they otherwise would not do by threatening to block passage of crucial legislation, then up the ante by rejecting initial deals and demanding even more once Democrats have shown they will make concessions to avoid the predicted disaster that comes with legislative inaction. The resulting deals were destructive to the state's economy and safety net, worsening the already bad financial and social crisis.
For a long time, Sacramento Democrats argued they had no other choice. We heard from Speakers of the Assembly and Presidents of the Senate that unless concessions were made to obtain Republican votes, budgets would not be passed and people would suffer. Republicans made good on their threats and delayed budgets - the 2008-09 budget was three months late. Now we're watching a similar script play out in Congress.
Here in 2013, California is in a very different place - precisely because of the lessons learned from the era of Republican obstruction. Voters approved a tax increase to help schools. The state budget is headed toward surplus. Budgets are passed on time and without hostage tactics. State government is starting to become functional again.
That did not happen by accident. It happened because Democrats and progressives decided they had enough of Republican obstructionism and developed a plan to stop it for good. The plan included smarter legislative tactics, but the real keys were changes to the political process as well as an unprecedented organizing effort, all aimed at the same core goal: restoring political power to the people, not allowing it to remain concentrated in an extremist fringe.
The first step requires being honest about how politics now works. Another veteran of those California political wars, David Atkins, observed that expecting Republicans to act rationally is to misunderstand how the party operates:
The Republican electoral chips are stashed safely in gerrymandered hands, and any losses over fiscal cliffs or debt ceilings only hurt the President and the nation's perception of government. There's no downside for the GOP in bluffing every time in the hopes that the President will fold. Why not? When you're playing with house money, it makes sense to go all in on every hand.
This realization led California Democrats and progressives away from focusing on the specifics of a deal and toward the kind of process and political changes that would end the obstructionism for good. Once it was realized the problems were deeper, people started working on the lasting solutions.
In 2009, after yet another bad budget deal, progressive organizations began meeting to plan the way out. Everyone agreed that the rule requiring a 2/3 vote of the legislature to pass a budget was a key part of the problem, as it gave Republicans leverage. Getting rid of that rule became a top priority for the 2010 ballot - with majority rule, Democrats would never again have to make deals with Republicans to pass a budget.
But it was also agreed that the electorate had to be expanded. Nobody knew what kind of electorate would show up in 2010, and Meg Whitman was already making it clear she would spent as much as it took to try and win the governor's race. Public confidence in the Legislature was at an all-time low, creating conditions that Republicans could potentially have exploited to win more seats, particularly if the 2010 electorate was more conservative than the historic 2008 electorate.
So work began on mobilizing hundreds of thousands of new and infrequent voters among the progressive base. Many of these voters were people of color, and many were low income. Their values were progressive, but since Democrats and progressive organizations had generally failed to reach out to them, they were not a regular part of the electorate. The Democratic Party under its new chair John Burton and its new executive director Shawnda Westly pursued this on one track while the progressive coalition led by labor unions pursued the same goal on their own track - to be clear, this wasn't coordinated, and no laws were violated in the process.
Progressive organizations, websites like Calitics, and an increasing number of Democratic elected officials also began adopting similar messaging. They pointed out that Republicans did not share California's values, that they were willing to destroy the state to impose their extremist values on a population that did not want them, and that the only answer was to take away their power to do that. It was made clear to people that problem wasn't bad legislators unwilling to "come together" but that a group of extremists had used loopholes to block good things from happening and to cause people harm.
The result was that in 2010 California bucked the red tide that hit nationally. Democrats won huge victories, sweeping all statewide offices and taking back the governor's office by a 13-point margin. Prop 25 passed by an even larger margin, ending the annual Republican hostage tactics on the budget. This was the result of the voter mobilization efforts that had begun in 2009.
The coalition for change did not stop there. In 2012 the progressive groups continued their voter mobilization work, this time to beat back the anti-union Prop 32 and to pass the Prop 30 tax increase. That mobilization in turn helped elect a Democratic supermajority, leaving Republicans with no more political power of any kind in state government.
They were helped in their work by a late but pivotal voter registration innovation. In September 2012 the Secretary of State's office announced online voter registration was available. Over 1 million people registered online, and many of them were the younger and diverse voters that are key to a progressive future.
The supermajority victory was also enabled by a change that the Democratic and progressive groups had originally opposed. Redistricting reform passed at the 2008 election in the form of Prop 11, and was upheld by voters in 2010 when a repeal effort reached the ballot. I was one of many progressives who opposed this reform. But the work of the Citizens Redistricting Commission proved me wrong. It ended a 20-year Republican-friendly gerrymander, creating fair districts that reflected modern demographic realities. Republicans now had to defend turf that had previously been artificially safe, and as a result they lost four Congressional seats to Democrats, along with the Democratic supermajority in Sacramento.
In short, the steps to stopping Republican obstruction in California involved changing the rules and changing the electorate:
• Ending a supermajority procedural rule (Prop 25)
• Growing the electorate through massive organizing
• Making it easier to vote (online voter registration, easy access to vote-by-mail)
• Ending gerrymandering (Prop 11 redistricting commission)
• Naming the problem (calling out Republican obstruction)
To stop the extremists in the House GOP from destroying what remains of America's safety net and obtaining their dream of drowning government in a bathtub, a similar path must be followed nationally. David Atkins, now chair of the Ventura County Democratic Party, laid out the rules that need to be changed to stop extremist obstruction. Notice the similarities to the list that worked in California:
The only thing that allows Republicans to take their hostages in the first place is a series of arcane rules that give the minority undue influence. Among those rules are:
• Gerrymandered Congressional districts
• Dysfunctional filibuster rules
• Disproportionate Senate representation
• Corrupt lobbying laws
• Campaign finance laws that give outsized political influence to a few billionaires
• Archaic electoral college rules
• Discriminatory workday elections
California's problems are not solved, not by a longshot. There's still a lot of work to do to repair the damage from 35 years of a right-wing tax revolt and the inequality it helped create. But the opportunity to fix those problems now exists. The nation as a whole will not be able to overcome extremist obstructionism and have a chance to solve deeper problems until these types of changes are pursued.
Progressives should continue to pay close attention to the details of any deal in Congress, and continue to organize around them. But it's time to pursue the bigger changes that are needed to put an end to the obstruction, to fix the broken parts of the American system of government that the extremists have been exploiting.
New Brown appointment could signal willingness to look at reform
by Brian Leubitz
Gov. Brown's pick to run the prisons system, Jeff Beard, has some experience in the field; he ran Pennsylvania's system for more than nine years. That's all well and good, but there is an interesting note in his background:
Beard is not shy about voicing opinions on where the criminal justice system fails. He told Pennsylvania lawmakers that heavy reliance on incarceration of low-level offenders "has proven to have limited value in maintaining public safety."
In a 2005 commentary, Beard called on the corrections community to "rethink who really belongs in prison." He sought an end to popular "scared straight" programs he said actually increase the likelihood released inmates will commit future crimes. "We must have the will to put an end to feel-good and/or publicly popular programs that simply do not work," Beard wrote.(LA Times)
For years, former Sen. Gloria Romero and others tried to get some attention on this issue, to little avail. Despite the huge issues with overcrowding, there wasn't the real traction to get our sentencing system overhauled with anything nearing a sane process. Maybe this is a kick in the pants for this process.
If we are to really refocus our spending on the priorities that actually matter to Californians, and are going to make our communities safer, we have to do that by actually trying to make them safer. We have to really rehabilitate prisoners, not merely warehouse them. We have to get them out of the system, and prevent the massively expensive cycle of recidivism.
When that cycle is broken, we both save money and get better results in our communities. It won't be easy, but it is a necessary task.
Prop Zero, the insightful blog from NBC and Joe Matthews, is calling it quits:
Over the past three years, we've offered thousands of posts from leading authorities on California within the NBC universe (your lead blogger has contributed 1,512 posts, the NBC computers tell me). Terrific editors at NBC stations in LA, San Diego and the Bay Area shaped the site and in many cases saved your lead blogger from himself.
It has been a wonderful run. But after this election, I was exhausted, and had come to feel like the blog had run its course. NBC, which had supported Prop Zero strongly despite its relatively small audience, saw things the same way.
The state is in a different place than it was three years ago -- still facing profound challenges and governance problems, but with different leaders, a different political context, and different burning issues. After a rash of ballot measures and reform efforts, we may be entering a lull in efforts to fix California -- and those efforts were a focus of this blog. And on a personal level, I'm eager to focus more time and energy on my rapidly expanding duties at Zócalo Public Square. (Prop 0)
To be completely honest, Calitics is now the creaky oldster of the California politics blog world. Not sure how that makes me feel, but I certainly understand where Mr. Matthews is coming from. However, his was, and remains, an insightful voice on California politics.
On a related note, if you would like to write for Calitics, from any progressive perspective, this is your forum. If you give me a heads up, I'll work with you to get your work more attention. As you have noticed, I've been a bit scattershot on my own posting on the sight, and I'm sure new voices would be more than welcome.
FPPC looks to clean up the initiative gathering money bonanza
by Brian Leubitz
It was rule-making week over at the FPPC, and they served up a few rules of note. Starting with something on the initiative front:
The people who pay for petition drives in support of statewide ballot measures can no longer hide their identity, thanks to a regulation adopted by the state's Fair Political Practices Commission on Thursday.(SDUT)
Anybody who drops more than $100K on signature gathering, which won't really get you too far these days, must now report.
On another front, political committees that send out emails must now identify themselves. It seems shocking that this wasn't the case before, but apparently a few tricksters sent out an email last cycle signed only as "The Hardy Boys" and "Nancy Drew". Cute.
There is still much work to be done on initiative reform. For most folks who sign the form, the last thing they are going to think to do is look at Cal-Access to see who is paying the gatherers. But, baby steps forward are better than no steps.
"People see that so many people are leaving the state, and they think 'oh, it's because California business is bad,' " said Bill Schooling, chief of demographics research for the state Department of Finance. "It's more that California, particularly with counties like L.A., is a huge gateway state." ...
Schooling noted that much of the state's population growth was concentrated in coastal counties, where people tend to be younger and more mobile. Economists also said that job growth has been much stronger along the coast, particularly with growth in foreign trade, technology and tourism.
Ironic, isn't it? The Coast subsidizes the rest of the state, and votes in favor of a more sustainable government. Yet the Coast is where the economy, and the growth, is strongest. Did California suffer right along with the nation during the Great Recession? Yes, of course. However, we're also leading the nation forward.
Over the last few days, you may have read a few breathless stories about how Californians are moving out of the state. We're having a mass exodus apparently!
Exodus: California, once a magnet for the enterprising and ambitious, is losing residents. There's not so much a giant sucking sound coming from the Golden State as there is the hiss of a balloon losing its air.
The Census Bureau says that California had a net loss of 100,000 people last year. Many headed for Texas (58,992), while Arizona (49,635), Nevada (40,114), Washington (38,421) and Oregon (34,214) all took in fleeing Californians. (Investors Business Daily)
So, what's the deal you ask, we lost residents in California? Well, no. We did not lose residents in California. What happened is that who Californians are has changed. The IBD article goes on to blame everything on the awful Californians and their terrible, terrible taxes. And then they close with this:
Maybe they'll catch on when they look around in a few years and find there are no longer enough productive citizens left to support everyone else. So far, though, they haven't shown much of a capacity for learning.
But, earlier I said that we haven't lost residents, so what gives you ask? Well, the number that the IBD chose not to include was the fact that over a quarter of a million people moved here from outside of the United States. California is the new America. We are the new Ellis Island. The new melting pot where creativity still booms brightest.
Despite IBD and other right-wing publications protests, California is still the home of the new economy. We still create the jobs of the future. In the first quarter of 2012, California accounted for nearly half of all venture capital deals. People come here from across the globe to be a a part of this new, exciting future.
They come here for our resources, our people, and yeah, they'd like to see a decent education system for their kids too. We're learning all right, we're learning about the future of America. Perhaps some folks from IBD should come on down and see it for themselves.
Progressive conference brings together activists from across the country
by Brian Leubitz
If you are reading this website, you are probably either a political nerd, a progressive activist, or both. But either way, you're going to enjoy Netroots Nation in California for the first time.
(Or perhaps you're just trying to figure out progressive Californians, in which case: Welcome, open book here!)
If you've never been, it is a well-run conference with a bit of a twist in that the program is created by the folks that are participating. Topics are submitted by the community, and ultimately chosen by a great panel of activists themeselves.
But even more than the programs, the highlight is getting to meet up with thousands of other progressive activists from across the country. It's a nerd's paradise. And now you can get a discount on admission. Sign up for Netroots Nation 2013 by tomorrow, and you'll get the great rate of $245. It's a smoking hot deal, as the "escalating rate" throughout the year will be getting ever more expensive.
The fossil fuel industry is eyeing a new Gold Rush in the Golden State: the Monterey Shale, a natural gas play stretching from Monterey County south to Bakersfield, Santa Barbara, and the Baldwin Hills area of Los Angeles County. It's said to hold more barrels than North Dakota's Bakken Formation. "several oil companies, including Venoco and Occidental, have reported they are experimenting in California's shale formations."
Today in Sacramento, the federal Bureau of Land Management is holding its first auction of 18,000 acres in Fresno, San Benito, and Monterey counties. A protest is being organized, complete with hazmat suits - you can RSVP here. If you can't make it to Sacramento, here's an online petition to tell the BLM - Don't frack California.
The jury is out on whether natural gas, which is mostly methane, is actually as clean burning as it's made out to be. California state regulators have lost track of whether California is being fracked; when they do re-regulate, they probably won't track methane emissions at all. California agricultural interests are concerned about fracking our food supply. An earthquake inducing, water intensive process doesn't seem like a good idea in an earthquake-prone, water-scarce state. The original Gold Rush pioneers didn't worry about environmental degradation as they chased shiny yellow riches. The frackers will likewise heedlessly harm our air and water. Unless we speak up.
I'm organizing folk concerned about fracking in California - if interested, respond in comments with your email address, or tweet me @RL_Miller.
In a sign that progressive push-back against Los Angeles Mayor Villariagosa's membership in the right-wing "Fix The Debt" lobbying group isn't abating, activists from MoveOn.org and the Progressive Change Campaign Committee delivered over 21,000 signatures to LA City Hall this afternoon demanding Villariagosa resign from the group's steering committee.
"They call themselves bipartisan because they're able to buy members of both parties," said Richard Eskow, a blogger for the Campaign for America's Future.
"The primary agenda for these folks is to lower taxes for millionaires, billionaires and corporations," he said.
In a scathing Huffington Post article about the Campaign To Fix the Debt's agenda, Eskow was even more blunt, "Let's be clear: This crowd doesn't really care about deficits. It never has. It's an anti-tax group which pursues its goals by fighting to downsize government programs and "reform" the Internal Revenue code. Its natural allies are the Republican Party, the nation's mega-corporations, and billionaires."
"The so-called 'Campaign to Fix the Debt' is nothing more than a front group to protect tax cuts for the wealthy while balancing the budget on the backs of the poor and elderly," said founder Rick Jacobs. "The fact that Mayor Villaragosa, or any other Democrat that claims to want to protect Medicare, Social Security and Medicaid, would join this effort is nothing short of shameful....Mayor Villaragosa should resign immediately."
Last week, Villaraigosa defended his decision to join fix the debt. "I am a Democrat and a progressive, but you know what? The country is evenly divided. They won too," Villaraigosa told CNN, referring to Republican lawmakers.
Angela Garcia Combs, a native Angeleno and former volunteer for the Mayor who started the petition, said she decided to deliver the signatures today after staff from Villaraigosa's office told her it would take at least three months to schedule an appointment.
She promised today's action wouldn't be the end of it. "Any Politician that calls themselves a Democrat, Progressive, Centrist,Bipartisan, we are putting you on notice too. We are coming after you if you join this group," said Combs.
"Joining the Steering committee of Fix the Debt is like saying I'm joining the steering committee of the Titanic to help all those poor people in the water."
"Let me be very clear: I oppose the privatization of Social Security. I oppose turning Medicare into voucher care," said Villaraigosa. "I oppose dismantling Medicaid. I support letting the Bush tax cuts expire for the top 2%."
However, a spokesman for the Mayor's office told KPCC Villaraigosa was open to raising the retirement age for Social Security and other federal benefits.
How do we work to address overpopulation at jails and prisons?
by Brian Leubitz
Sometimes you'll see some unlikely collaborations, and just kind of look askance at the written words. Sometimes you do a true double take, and that is exactly what happened upon reading this op-ed by Tim Silard, President of the Rosenberg Foundation, and Mike Jimenez, president of the California Correctional Peace Officers Association (CCPOA).
Counties also are tasked with dealing with California's recidivism rate, one of the highest in the nation, and local law enforcement must ensure that the state's revolving prison door problem does not become a county jail problem. A job is one of the best tools for reducing recidivism, and one solution is for the state and local officials to join forces to create multi-county re-entry facilities, again at less cost. Inmates nearing the end of their sentences can be trained and eased back into society, and given the job and life skills they need when they leave jail. (SacBee)
I've have enormous respect for Tim Silard, and his work on criminal justice reform. CCPOA, on the other hand, is known to be all over the map on prison reform. A collaboration with a foundation that focuses on civil rights, and has a history with prison reform, isn't really all that expected. But there it is.
With realignment, counties will now be expected to take up a lot more of the slack. However, they need the tools and the resources for the state. With a 2/3 majority, Democrats need to move past any fears of "Willie Horton" ads. We simply cannot continue spending billions upon billions on warehousing inmates.
But there is a win-win opportunity here with programs like job training. They help reduce recidivism, saving us money, and also making our communities safer.
Reposted from my Sunday feature at Daily Kos. Since it's mainly California content, I think it deserves a place here too.
California right-wing radio shock jocks John and Ken. Diversity!
Immediately after the November election, I wrote about the overwhelming victory Democrats enjoyed in California, where Governor Brown's tax measure was passed, the union-busting Proposition 32 was soundly defeated, and Democrats claimed a supermajority in both chambers that will allow them, if they so choose, to pass budgets and submit initiatives for voter approval without a single Republican vote.
Since the time of that writing, things have gotten even worse for Republicans in the legislature, as Democrats picked up two additional seats in vote canvassing in races which their candidates were trailing on election day: Assemblymember Cathleen Galgiani came back to beat her colleague Tom Berryhill for a hotly contested State Senate race to pad Senate Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg's margin. And lastly, in perhaps the shocker of elections in California, Democratic candidate Steve Fox completed a comeback on the very last day of canvassing when the Los Angeles County Registrar counted the last 1,601 votes in Assembly District 36. Fox gained 463 votes from that final update, giving him a 145-vote win in a traditionally Republican area and padding Speaker John Perez' majority to a 55-25 count in the 80-seat chamber.
Republicans have held minority status in Sacramento ever since the turn of the millennium, but it's only now that panic is really starting to set in. Because of Proposition 13 in 1978, which began California's so-called "tax revolt," it takes a two-thirds vote of the legislature to pass tax increases or put referendums on the ballot; while still a minority, Republicans had always held at least one-third of one of the two chambers, which allowed them to effectively control the terms of the debate for budgetary issues and continue to extract major cuts and concessions every single election cycle. But as the extremist Republican agenda of decimating the public sector and social services continued to cripple the state, cracks started to show. During the red wave of 2010, California Democrats not only held all their seats; they actually expanded their legislative majorities. Meanwhile, team blue also swept every single statewide office that year, despite the millions of dollars that failed CEO's Meg Whitman and Carly Fiorina spent trying to buy a governorship and Senate seat, respectively.
In 2012, the dam burst. A variety of factors combined to create a Democratic wave in California: nonpartisan redistricting created a series of competitive districts; the creation of online voter registration led to a surge of turnout by young and minority voters; and voters who had had enough of budget cuts began to believe in a different vision for the state. It all adds up to one reality: when the rounds of special elections are over and all the vacancies are filled, Democrats will be able to do what they want in Sacramento without a single Republican vote, provided that they can keep their caucus unified.
The shocking results are leading California Republicans to engage in the same refrain being used by their Washington counterparts. It's not the policies, they claim, but rather the message:
California Republicans in the Assembly looking to revive their party have a new team on their side.
Assembly Republican leader Connie Conway on Thursday announced a new "Diversity Outreach Team" made up of government staff members. A news release says the group will focus on "helping strengthen Republican ties with women, ethnic communities and young people."
"We know that most Californians share our common-sense ideas, but we need to do a better job communicating that message," Conway said in a statement. "To become the majority party again, we must not only talk to diverse communities but also listen and that's what our Diversity Outreach Team is all about."
It takes a special brand of chutzpah to claim that most of a state's voters agree with you when you hold no statewide offices and less than a third of the seats in both houses of that state's legislature. But it also takes a special brand of either arrogance or blindness to believe that having your party be rendered entirely irrelevant in the most populous state in the nation is simply a messaging problem that can be fixed by token figures to head up a "diversity outreach" program aimed at all the various groups of voters who simply cannot stand what you represent.
It was the unified opposition of the Republican Party, after all, that thwarted Speaker Perez' best efforts to eliminate a corporate tax break for multi-state businesses and use the money to cut the cost of higher education. Republican legislators and governors have consistently opposed efforts to make life easier for immigrants and their children. Republicans are the ones who have consistently worked to hold California's budget hostage to painful budget cuts to social services and health care programs for the poor. And no amount of "outreach" to women will help undo the damage done at the national level by Rush Limbaugh and the constant efforts to strip away reproductive rights.
It's not that California Republicans haven't done a good enough job explaining their values. Quite the opposite: They've done too good a job. As a matter of fact, they even have their own equivalent of Rush Limbaugh in the form of John and Ken, archconservative radio shock jocks who enforce discipline against any Republican even contemplating lenience on tax issues or undocumented immigrants and who make a habit of crude insults against the very groups Republicans are now appointing a diversity team to reach.
If Republicans want to know what future they have to look forward to, all they have to do is see what has happened to them in California. The only thing saving Republicans nationwide is simply that the country as a whole doesn't quite resemble the demographics of California. Yet.
Supreme Court takes on marriage equality, Prop 8 and DOMA
by Brian Leubitz
Mark your calendars for June 2013. That's the close of the current Supreme Court session, and by that time we should have a decision on marriage equality. On Friday, the Court announced that it would hear cases on both Prop 8 and the so-called "Defense of Marriage" Act. But there is a caveat in the Supreme Court's order:
About two decades after the campaign to win the right to marry for same-sex couples began, the Supreme Court on Friday afternoon agreed to consider - but not necessarily to decide - some of the most important constitutional issues at the heart of that national controversy. Each side gained the opportunity to make sweeping arguments, for or against such marriages. But the Court left itself the option, at least during the current Term, of not giving real answers, perhaps because it lacks the authority to do so. (ScotuBlog)
With respect to that open question of whether the Court has standing, it is a question that was at the center of much speculation before the 9th Circuit's decision. Ultimately, the Ninth Circuit determined that the proponents of the law, ProtectMarriage.com, had standing to defend it. If the Court decides that it doesn't have standing, Judge Walker's original decision will hold and marriages will resume in California.
Now, as a matter of scheduling, we should have oral argument for both cases early next year. The cases will likely be scheduled for the same day, but that is not definite at this point.
Turning to the merits, well, you can find many reasonable predictions. But the Dean of UC-Irvine Law is both esteemed and usually pretty accurate at this game. His take:
"I believe the court will find that Prop. 8 and (the Defense Of Marriage Act) are unconstitutional," Chemerinsky said. "The court decision will be 5-4 and I predict Justice Kennedy will write it. The court will say that the government has no legitimate interest in denying gays and lesbians the right to marry. ...
"Justice Kennedy wants to write the next Brown v. Board of Education, not the next Plessy v. Ferguson," Chemerinsky said.
Kennedy has actually been pretty good on LGBT rights issues, having written Lawrence v Texas and Romer v Evans, two of the most noteworthy gay rights cases.
There's good news and bad news in yesterday's PPIC poll. The bad news first, Prop 13, or at least that branding, is still popular. When asked if they felt whether Prop 13 has mostly been a good thing or a bad thing for California, a strong majority said "good thing." 60% of Californians generally, and even 55% of Democrats say that Prop 13 has been good for the state.
Yet, that doesn't really tell the whole story. When it comes to the particulars of our messed up taxation system, Californians are very amenable to change. Take the 2/3 vote that is required by voters on local special taxes. When asked whether they would support the threshold going back to 55%, 54% of Californians said they would support it.
Fortunately for us, we at least have a start on that.
Today we officially introduced SCA 3, which would remove roadblocks to local approval of school parcel taxes. twitter.com/MarkLeno/statu...
So, this doesn't even go so far as the PPIC poll tells us that voters are willing to go. It is a modest reform that would allow community colleges and K12 school districts put parcel taxes on the local ballot with only a 55% threshold. That would simply put taxes at parity with bonds, as voters already made that change in the early part of the last decade.
With the pending supermajority, we will have the opportunity to put many measures on the ballot. Perhaps we should be thinking bigger, about totally overhauling our the taxation system. Surely we can't be giving the voters measure after measure with tweaks.
But Prop 30 bought us a bit of time. We have five years to come up with a sustainable revenue system. A system that can see us through the booms and the busts. Whatever that may be, starting with a simple change in 2014 seems a good place to start. And if we can't pass Senator Leno's measure, we have to question what use the supermajority is at all. So, let's get SCA 3 passed quickly and move on from there.
I close with a passage from Federalist 58 on the subject of thresholds:
As connected with the objection against the number of representatives, may properly be here noticed, that which has been suggested against the number made competent for legislative business. It has been said that more than a majority ought to have been required for a quorum; and in particular cases, if not in all, more than a majority of a quorum for a decision. That some advantages might have resulted from such a precaution, cannot be denied. It might have been an additional shield to some particular interests, and another obstacle generally to hasty and partial measures. But these considerations are outweighed by the inconveniences in the opposite scale. In all cases where justice or the general good might require new laws to be passed, or active measures to be pursued, the fundamental principle of free government would be reversed. It would be no longer the majority that would rule: the power would be transferred to the minority. Were the defensive privilege limited to particular cases, an interested minority might take advantage of it to screen themselves from equitable sacrifices to the general weal, or, in particular emergencies, to extort unreasonable indulgences. Lastly, it would facilitate and foster the baneful practice of secessions; a practice which has shown itself even in States where a majority only is required; a practice subversive of all the principles of order and regular government; a practice which leads more directly to public convulsions, and the ruin of popular governments, than any other which has yet been displayed among us.
I want to vote for a comprehensive bipartisan plan to address the fiscal cliff. I'm willing to take a tough vote. I'm willing to make sacrifices. I'm willing to feel the heat. But I'm not willing to solve the fiscal cliff by throwing seniors over the cliff. I draw the line at cutting benefits in Medicare and Social Security.
This week, House Republicans unveiled their fiscal cliff counterproposal. While they continue to call for an extension of the Bush tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires, they propose offsetting this cost by gutting Medicare benefits, including raising the age of Medicare eligibility to 67. I won't go there. As California's Insurance Commissioner for eight years, I know this would be horrible policy, throwing millions of seniors into the rapacious hands of an insurance industry interested only in profits for its shareholders.
Medicare is a promise we made to seniors more than four decades ago. When President Johnson signed Medicare into law, one in three seniors lived in poverty. Half of seniors had no health coverage at all. Today, less than one in ten seniors live in poverty and almost all have guaranteed access to affordable coverage. With medical expenses as high as they are, that's a remarkable improvement, and we have Medicare and Social Security principally to thank for it.
The seniors being kicked off Medicare under the GOP plan will face uncertainty, delayed treatments, and more expensive care - if they can even afford health care at all. Do we really want our emergency rooms clogged with seniors who couldn't afford their heart medication and suffer a preventable heart attack? Is it really in anyone's interest to see grandmothers and grandfathers sent to an early grave because they were forced to choose between having a roof over their head or paying out of pocket for lifesaving diabetes medication? This is, to borrow a phrase from Mitt Romney, severe conservatism, and it's the opposite of a reasonable bipartisan fact-based compromise.
If the House Republican plan to increase the age of Medicare eligibility to 67 moves forward, health care delivery in America would become more expensive for everyone. Seniors remaining on Medicare would see a substantial increase in their premiums because seniors ages 65 and 66, in the aggregate, are a lot healthier than seniors 67 and above. By moving 65 and 66 year olds into the expensive private market, states, local governments, employers, and the general public would pick up the multi-billion dollar tab. For example, businesses who provide health insurance and have older workers would bear the full cost of health insurance - effectively shifting the cost to these employers and their employees.
If the goal is to keep the Medicare system running as efficiently as possible, we should be looking into ways to lower the age of Medicare eligibility, not ways to increase it. The Republican plan chips away at Medicare affordability - one of its greatest strengths - seemingly by design. I'm willing to compromise, but I'm not willing to compromise the health and economic security of seniors and everyone who hopes to become a senior.
I approach this from the perspective of someone who regulated the insurance industry for eight years. I know how they operate, and I know how health care delivery operates in America. I know changes need to be made to Medicare to make it more solvent in the years and decades to come, and I know we can make those changes without harming benefits. For example, we can empower Medicare to directly negotiate drug prices or we can import drugs from Canada and other countries with robust safety standards. We can improve electronic records and crack down further on Medicare fraud. We can ramp up the prevention and early treatment provisions in current law. Each of these ideas has support among most Democrats and many Republicans. Let's make these ideas the starting point in extending the solvency of Medicare (beyond the eight additional years from the Affordable Care Act) and in preventing our national debt from becoming unmanageable in the long-term (as was done under President Clinton).
Compromise to address the fiscal cliff is not an end; it is a means to an end: preserving the health and well being of all Americans. We can fashion a bipartisan deal that keeps seniors' retirement security preserved. We can take a step back from the fiscal cliff without breaking our promise to seniors.
We can get this done and done right, but raising the age of Medicare eligibility to 67 is a nonstarter for me, and it's a nonstarter for many of my Democratic colleagues.
Rep. John Garamendi wrote this blog for Labor's Edge.
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa defended his decision to join The Campaign to Fix the Debt even as an online petition demanding he resign from its steering committee approached 11,000 signatures.
"As a progressive Democrat, I joined the Campaign to Fix the Debt because Democrats and Republicans need to come together to find a balanced approach to our fiscal future," Villaraigosa said in a statement to the LA Times." There are tough decisions ahead and the only way that we are going to find long-term solutions is by stepping out of our ideological boxes and reaching out to a broader coalition to get something done"
The Institute for Policy Studies has called Fix the Debt a 'Trojan Horse for massive corporate tax breaks'.Scott Klinger, who wrote the IPS report critical of the lobby group said, "They're simply taking advantage of the so-called 'fiscal cliff' to push the same old agenda of more corporate tax breaks while shifting costs onto the poor and elderly."
Founded by deficit hawks Erskine Bowles and Alan Simpson (co-chairs of Erksine/Bowles 2010 deficit-reduction commission) the Campaign to Fix the Debt claims to be a "bipartisan" interest group, yet touts the very Republican "core principles" of keeping tax rates low for the wealthy while slashing Social Security and Medicare.
Cut corporate tax rates and shifting to a "territorial tax system"
that would permanently exempt from U.S. taxes all offshore income earned
by U.S. corporations.
"Reforming" earned-benefit programs by raising the retirement age
and means-testing Medicaid, Medicare, and Social Security benefits.
In only 36 hours, 11,000 people have signed on to a petition begun by a former Villaraigosa campaign volunteer demanding he resign.
"As somebody who volunteered and knocked on doors to help elect for Mayor Villaraigosa, I feel disappointed and betrayed, " states Angela Garcia Combs in the petition. "As former chair of the Democratic National Convention, it is inappropriate that Villaraigosa use his position to help this corporate backed group gut Social Security and Medicare, which many of us will need someday."
The politically ambitious Villaraigosa is termed out of office in 2013, and has made noises he wants to run for Governor of California in 2014.
But by signing on as a progressive "beard" for corporate interests, he'll be on the wrong side of the "core principles" of another interest group. Namely the coalition of working Californians,public sector unions, and progressive organizations fighting for economic justice who've traditionally backed Villaraigosa.
Set aside for the moment the balls required for Villaraigosa to pretend to be a deficit hawk. His handling of L.A.'s municipal finances is a matter of record.
Let's instead look more closely at the "balanced approach" advocated by Fix the Debt, especially its "pro-growth" tax reform ideas. What counts as "pro-growth"? Well, any reform that "broadens the base, lowers rates, raises revenues, and reduces the deficit."
Wait wait wait, go back. Lowers rates? Is this a deficit-cutting plan or a tax-cutting plan? Let's turn it over to Paul Krugman
That last part makes no sense in terms of the group's ostensible mission, but makes perfect sense if you look at the array of big corporations, from Goldman Sachs to the UnitedHealth Group, that are involved in the effort and would benefit from tax cuts. Hey, sacrifice is for the little people.
In the same vein, Matt Yglesias argues at Slate that Fix the Debt is not really that concerned about fixing the debt: "What they believe in, instead, is the overwhelmingimportance of rate-cutting tax reform and reduced spending on retirement programs."
You'd think that Antonio Villaraigosa, an ostensible liberal, would want to pay attention to those voices. Evidently not.
Journalist with a keen insight on California politics moves on
