My Political Issue

Coffee or Tea?

2010-03-14T19:45:00.000-07:00

Everyone, meet Annabel Park:

So what is this Coffee Party really about? To start, it’s about civility. One of the first things you see on their website (which, by the way, is here: http://www.coffeepartyusa.com/) is the following pledge: “As a member or supporter of the Coffee Party, I pledge to conduct myself in a way that is civil, honest, and respectful toward people with whom I disagree. I value people from different cultures, I value people with different ideas, and I value and cherish the democratic process.” Wow, an actual conversation? Sounds like something I could get behind.

Although the media has already begun to try to pit the coffee party against the tea party, the two movements actually have a lot in common. First of all, everyone’s angry. Both sides are afraid for the financial stability of the country and are sick of politicians who seem painfully out of touch with ordinary Americans. Both movements are planning to elect their own people, normal citizens, to office, although the Coffee Party might be a little late to the party to get into the 2010 election.

If you’d like to find out more about them, here’s a good Washington Post article: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/25/AR2010022505517.html

If you’d like to follow them on Facebook, go here: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?#!/coffeeparty?ref=search&sid=35802366.3302691802..1

At the end of the day, whichever movement you identify most with… enjoy your caffeinated beverage!

Reconcile Yourself to Reconciliation

2010-03-10T21:30:00.000-08:00

The word of the day is reconcile:

1. to cause (a person) to accept or be resigned to something not desired: He was reconciled to his fate.
2. to win over to friendliness; cause to become amicable: to reconcile hostile persons.
3. to compose or settle (a quarrel, dispute, etc.).
4. to bring into agreement or harmony; make compatible or consistent: to reconcile differing statements; to reconcile accounts.

As the time for the reconciliation vote on the healthcare bill approaches, all four of those definitions seem rather appropriate depending on the side of the aisle you’re on. The GOP is laughing at the Dems for passing a hotly debated piece of legislation in what appears to be a shady underhanded way. Yup, thanks for handing them the election next fall. Oh, but wait! Hypocrisy abounds!

As Senator Orin Hatch put it in the Washington Post last week, reconciliation would be, “unprecedented in scope. And the havoc wrought would threaten our system of checks and balances, corrode the legislative process, [and] degrade our system of government.”
Oh, puuuuh-leeze! I wonder if he felt that way when he voted for the 2003 Bush tax cuts under reconciliation rules (by the way, V.P. Dick Cheney had to come in and cast his vote to break a 50-50 tie in that vote). In fact, of the 22 bills passed under reconciliation through 2008, 16 were passed under a Republican controlled Senate.

You know what else came about thanks to a reconciliation vote? The Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act, more fondly known as COBRA.

At the end of the day though, here is what’s most likely going to happen:

If you’ll remember, the Senate has already passed a healthcare bill. Remember the Night Before Christmas? Unfortunately, the House doesn’t like certain parts of the Senate bill and are likely to tweak it, undoing certain compromises that were made to pass the bill with 60 votes. In order to re-pass the bill through the Senate with those tweaks in place, they will probably have to use reconciliation rules. Ironically, this happens all the time. The difference here is that those tweaks will happen very quickly, in a matter of days rather than years.

But in reality, legislation is constantly being tweaked. A bill that you hear has passed one chamber of congress will, most likely, not be the bill that is ultimately enacted into law.

So What Are You Doing on Friday?

2010-02-28T18:18:00.000-08:00

After the now infamous demon sheep ad, the Republican candidates for U.S. Senate have agreed to a debate. Carly Fiorina, Tom Campbell, and Assemblyman Chuck DeVore are all running in the GOP primary to ultimately challenge Senator Barbara Boxer for her Senate seat. If Boxer wins in November, she will serve her fourth term (wow, at six year terms, a fourth term is… well... you can do the math).

The debate will be hosted by Eric Hogue of Sacramento’s KTKZ radio station. In Mr. Hogue’s blog (http://erichogue.townhall.com/blog) he discusses all three of the candidates. I have two favorites though. The first is his most recent blog entry “Campbell Sympathetic Toward Terrorists?” Apparently, in another move by Carly Fiorina to demonize (bah bah black sheep) Tom Campbell, her campaign manager commented that Campbell is clearly anti-Israel and insinuated that he is, in fact, a terrorist sympathizer.

As a former California Representative in the U.S. House, he voted several times to redirect money away from Israel and is accused of having personal relationships with two convicted Palestinian terrorist sympathizers. Yikes.

My other favorite blog entry of Eric’s sheds some light on why exactly Campbell switched races from being a Gubernatorial candidate to the Senate GOP primary race. In a word: abortion. As the only clearly pro-choice Republican candidate, many moderates believe that he is the only candidate with a chance against Boxer in November.

So if you have a chance, Friday at noon you should tune in and learn a little bit about these people who might very well be your next Senator. http://www.ktkz.com/

The Healthcare Summit - Be There or Be Republican

2010-02-24T19:57:00.000-08:00

Tomorrow President Obama is hosting the televised bipartisan summit on healthcare! You remember, the one that the Republicans were so nervous about?

Although on the eve of the summit (why do they call everything a “summit” these days, I mean this seems like more of a meeting and less of an overdramatic “summit”) it’s not the Republicans who are feeling uneasy. Basically, it would be a shame for the Democrats to come up empty handed on an issue that has taken up so much of our national conversation in the last year, especially in an election year. But the Dems aren’t even sure they can get enough votes on their own side of the aisle.

Obviously, if you’ve been paying attention at all in the last year, bipartisan solutions are… umm… unlikely seems like it might very well be the understatement of my life. Republicans are demanding that the work done thus far on healthcare be scrapped and that reform should start over from the beginning. (So that we can watch this all happen again until the Republicans are back in the majority in the Senate? I’m exhausted just thinking about it.)

Since the Dems clearly won’t be able to pass a healthcare bill under the traditional method where they need 60 votes to avoid a filibuster, they are considering passing the bill under the reconciliation process. I know, what the heck is the reconciliation process?! Apparently, there is an entirely different process for passing budget related bills which only requires a majority vote to pass a bill. It looks something like this: “The House and Senate pass the budget resolution in the spring of each year. It is a budget blueprint which Congress imposes on itself, and which establishes the rules that limit how much various committees can spend in the legislation they produce. A budget resolution can contain one (or in rare cases, up to three) reconciliation instruction(s). Reconciliation instructions create reconciliation bills.” I’m not sure who this guy is, but he gives a great and complete definition at http://keithhennessey.com/2009/08/05/what-is-reconciliation/.

So, for this reconciliation bill to pass at all the healthcare bill would first have to become a reconciliation bill. Then, the House Democrats would have to approve the Senate version of the bill. And then there’s the minor detail of the underlying shadiness of the whole thing. All I can say is that if the Dems want to go down that road in an election year, they better do a fantastic job of communicating what the heck they’re doing to the public and why it has to be that way.

If you’d like to watch the six hour summit it will be streaming live from http://www.foxnews.com/ and will re-air on CSPAN and CSPAN-2 after the House and Senate adjourn for the day.

The Conservative Political Action Conference Lives Again!

2010-02-21T20:12:00.000-08:00

This last weekend saw the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (more commonly known as CPAC) come and go. And boy was it exciting! Put on by the American Conservative Union, the conference hosts approximately 10,000 attendees and boasts speakers such as John Ashcroft, Newt Gingrich, Rep Ron Paul, John Bolton, Gov Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney, George Will, Ann Coulter, Liz Cheney, Tucker Carlson, and this year’s keynote speaker: Glenn Beck.
The mission of the conference? Well, after perusing the website, I’m not too sure, but if you can figure it out by all means please let me know: http://www.cpac.org/

Some of it sounds pretty scary, some of it sounds downright infuriating, but mostly it sounds like celebrities playing to the crowd. Listen to some of the speeches for yourself and let me know what you think (If you can handle a whole speech, I will be very impressed. I can only make it through about 45 seconds at a time.). Enjoy! (Or at least, please don’t cry.)

Glenn Beck - Part 1 of 6:

Ann Coulter:

Liz & Dick Cheney - Part 1 of 2:

Newt Gingrich - Part 1 of 3:

Ron Paul:

OOoooohh! Drah-mah in the Courtroom!

2010-02-17T18:53:00.000-08:00

And the Proposition 8 drama continues! A little over a week ago, two San Francisco Chronicle writers did the (almost) unthinkable. They outed Judge Vaughn Walker, the U.S. District Judge who is currently hearing arguments in the Proposition 8 case. (To read the original article, go here: http://articles.sfgate.com/2010-02-07/bay-area/17848482_1_same-sex-marriage-sexual-orientation-judge-walker)

Now, I don’t know if you’re thinking what I’m thinking, but the phrase “conflict of interest” somehow leaps to mind. On the other hand, Judge Walker was appointed to his current position by President Bush Sr, implying that he is, by nature, conservative leaning. But again, if you’ll recall from my blog last month (because I know you hang on every word I’ve ever written!) gay marriage could actually be a conservative issue. Man, that sounds like a double whammy.

So with the news that’s new to all of us, will the judge remove himself from hearing the case? HA! Not surprisingly, anti-prop 8-ers claim that this is a non-issue and many cite a case he took as a private attorney on behalf of the U.S. Olympic Committee to keep San Francisco’s Gay Olympics from using the name. The U.S. Olympic Committee won the case and consequently, Judge Walker, “pissed off a lot of gay people” (http://sfist.com/2010/02/08/prop_8_trial_judge_is_gay_should_th.php)

As you might imagine, the other side of the courtroom has a lot to say about it:

''Walker's entire course of conduct has only one sensible explanation: that Walker is hellbent to use the case to advance the cause of same-sex marriage.'' - Ed Whelan, National Review’s The Corner

''At every turn he's displayed extreme bias in favor of his similarly situated homosexual activist plaintiffs.'' And ''This is no different than having an avid gun collector preside over a Second Amendment case.'' – Matt Barber, The Liberty Counsel (By the way, avid gun collectors DO occasionally preside over Second Amendment cases without any violation of the rules of judicial conduct.)

Walker is ''far more akin to an activist than a neutral referee.'' – Brian Brown, National Organization for Marriage.

I have to admit that I don’t know much about the rules of judicial conduct, but I do know that if I was for Proposition 8 and it was struck down by a gay judge, you better believe it would be the first (and maybe only) thing I would point to on appeal. And I would really hate to see a ruling as important as this one overturned by a higher court because of a technicality.

Colorado Loves California, How Sweet (not really)

2010-02-13T15:16:00.000-08:00

Everyone I talk to seems to be at least mildly aware that California is not the most business-friendly of states. And I’m not surprised, given our current state of budget imbalance, constant bickering, and general partisanship, that everyone knows this is a bad time to be a business in this state.

Other states, if they were smart, would definitely make a move to steal some of those businesses right out from under us. Well, last week Colorado finally got smart. Governor Bill Ritter declared last Friday to be, “Colorado loves California day!” Cute Bill, very cute. The announcement though was actually driven by the Metro Denver Economic Development Corp (MDEDC), and you can check out their Colorado loves California website right here: http://www.colovesca.com/

In an effort to take their message to the streets, 20 Colorado-ians dressed up as Cupid invaded downtown Los Angeles on Friday (wings and all) and handed out chocolates. (They call them “love ambassadors” at the MDEDC.) Here are some of the “auditions” (can we say so staged?) to become a cupid:

On a more serious note though, should California be seriously worried that business is going to start migrating elsewhere? Quite possibly. Joining Colorado’s campaign are several other states including Nevada and Arizona who claim that businesses have already reached out to them with questions about tax rates and other expenses.

Tina Sumner, an economic-development director from the city of Clovis even commented on meeting another economic-development official from Phoenix in a Sacramento Bee article last year, “One of the things that struck me was how enthusiastic he was about how easy the pickings were, for taking businesses from California and bringing them over to Arizona. He was kind of almost giddy.” (http://www.sacbee.com/business/story/1994615.html?mi_rss=Business) Yikes.

In fact, to make matters worse, non-profit organization The Tax Foundation ranked California in the bottom 5 (yea, we’re 47 out of 50) in their 2010 State Business Tax Climate Index (SBTCI). The index is based on five factors: corporate income tax rates, individual income tax rates, sales tax rates, property tax rates, and unemployment insurance tax rates (this last one is the one that really hit California where it hurts). To read more about the SBTCI check out their site: http://www.taxfoundation.org/news/show/25212.html.

Resources and Re-education

2010-02-10T20:46:00.000-08:00

Today I am giving you the opportunity to stop reading my blog. (Wow, did I really just say that?! I didn't mean it! I love that you read my blog!) What I'm really doing is giving you the opportunity to find out more about what you want to find out about.

http://www.opencongress.org/

Everything you need to know about the United States Congress in one place. As a joint project between two non-profit foundations, the site combines official government data (you know, all that legal mumbo-jumbo that only those crazy lawyers understand) with relevant Google news articles, and campaign contribution information from OpenSecrets. Which leads me to the next site you should definitely take a look at:

http://www.opensecrets.org/index.php

Their mission at OpenSecrets? "Inform, Empower & Advocate!" Let's face it, I'm all about empowerment so next time I need (or am just wildly curious for) information about campaign contributions or lobbying data, I'm definitely going there.

http://www.followthemoney.org/

Show me the money!! Need I say more? (But seriously, for the more graphically inclined this site is pretty neat.)

http://maplight.org/

Last, but certainly not least (drumroll please) maplight.org! The data compiled by this website actually lets you see the timeline of contributions (including who's doing the contributing) and votes for each bill, and will actually show when the legislator received large donations before or after the vote. Yes, that's right, you can actually see that shady business right up in your face!

Happy researching!

Demonizing Political Ads

2010-02-07T20:02:00.000-08:00

Ok, so you’ve probably already seen it, but it’s so funny that it bears repeating (or replaying). Check out my new favorite political ad of all time:

What on earth were they thinking?! Well, according to Allan Hoffenblum, “I thought the spot was right on as far as its message.” Hmmm… I wonder what the message was supposed to be exactly. I didn’t learn much from it except that Carly Fiorina thinks that Tom Campbell is a FCINO/wolf with glowing red eyes dressed up like a sheep! (And perhaps that everyone in Fiorina’s campaign camp is on the same psychedelic pills.)

Coming through with an amazingly cheesy retort was Campbell himself, saying, "Carly Fiorina's campaign is in full Mutton Meltdown mode.” Ah geez!

So who exactly is responsible for my new favorite ad? Republican consultant Fred Davis III who is the former Chief Creative Consultant to 2008 Presidential Candidate John McCain. Ok, he has a much longer resume than that. You can check it out for yourself at his website: http://www.strategicperceptioninc.com/samples.php

I confess, I am surprised that someone who seems so legit would come up with something so extremely nuts. Although, to him, “if nobody sees it and nobody talks about it, you have wasted your money.” In that respect, since the official version hit over 450,000 views on Friday, the ad is a smashing success. Way to go Fred Davis III. In fact, the ad is so popular that there are already T-shirts. No joke, they are completely fantastic! http://www.zazzle.com/demonsheep_2010_tshirt-235821840421345343

I know, I’ll go away so you can watch it again. Enjoy!

Revisiting Campaign Finance Reform

2010-02-03T21:41:00.000-08:00

After the Supreme Court decision on January 21st (see January 21st rant), Congress is in a tizzy! Ok, not all of Congress, more like the Democrats on the Senate Rules Committee (Dick Durbin, Russ Feingold, Chuck Schumer and John Kerry to be exact) are in a tizzy.

The plan? To attempt to limit election spending by government contractors (who have a direct monetary interest in who gets elected) and U.S. subsidiaries of foreign companies (I don’t really have to explain that one do I?). Under the old rules, U.S. subsidiaries could form Political Action Committees as long as they were funded solely by donations from U.S. employees and foreign nationals are not the ones deciding how to spend the money. The trick here, for all you accounting nerds out there, is what percentage a company must be foreign owned before regulations kick in?

Possibly the most interesting facet of the whole issue is Senator John McCain’s reaction to the Supreme Court’s ruling. McCain, who broke ranks with Republicans in 2002 to cosponsor the McCain-Feingold act (part of which was overturned in the Supreme Court ruling), will not back efforts to address the court’s ruling. Most fascinating.

Also fascinating is the fact that the media is already saying that the Senate Democrats will probably need 60 votes to get the legislation (that isn’t even written yet) passed. The only reason 60 votes would be necessary would be to avoid a Republican filibuster. After Scott Brown is sworn in tomorrow (dang that was fast), the Democrats will officially “control” (as if the Democrats could actually keep anything really under control) 59 seats.

And the Healthcare Debate is On... In California?

2010-01-31T17:01:00.000-08:00

In the midst of the national debate on healthcare, the California State Senate passed Senate Bill 810 this week in the hopes of creating a single-payer healthcare system for California residents. The bill would basically allow for a public option while also allowing those with private insurance to continue that coverage.

If you’d like to read the bill in its entirety, knock yourself out: http://info.sen.ca.gov/pub/09-10/bill/sen/sb_0801-0850/sb_810_bill_20100113_amended_sen_v97.pdf

Not surprisingly, the vote went almost exactly down party lines with one Democrat from Santa Ana (the reddest part of the state) voting no on the bill. Ultimately though, even if the bill makes it through the state assembly and through the Governor’s desk (which is extremely unlikely given that he has vetoed similar legislation twice already), the citizens of California will have to vote it into law in an election.

I know what you’re thinking, if this is already being done at the national level why are we putting an extra burden on ourselves? Glad you asked! After last week’s special election in Massachusetts, supporters of healthcare reform don’t believe that any meaningful reform will come out of Washington and it is now up to the states to take up the cause. (Fun fact of the day: newly elected Scott Brown of Massachusetts actually voted FOR the universal health care bill in Massachusetts when he was in the state senate. Oh and by the way, so did then-Governor, now- Republican Senator Mitt Romney.)

California is certainly not the only state to take up the cause. We’re in good company with Massachusetts, Vermont, New Mexico, Maine, and Connecticut. (http://www.newrules.org/equity/rules/singlepayer-and-universal-health-care)

Alright Schwarzy, so what’s the big problem? Well, there is the small issue of the $200 billion price tag at a time when we can’t even get a balanced budget passed. On the other hand, according to the bill’s author, Mark Leno (D-San Francisco), we’re already spending $200 billion on healthcare and this bill is, “the same $200 billion used in a more efficient, cost-effective fashion."

I don’t have a hard time believing that we’re already spending that much on healthcare, but the fact that the bill includes $1 million to set up a commission to decide how to pay for the new system does not make me feel warm and fuzzy inside.

The one thing that everyone (except Republicans) seems to agree on: even if we don’t pass this legislation, it’s at least good that we’re having a debate and getting the information about healthcare (and its ginormous issues) out there.

And The Gloves Can Come Off!

2010-01-24T14:03:00.000-08:00

The California Governor’s race has gotten a shake up in the last few weeks as Tom Campbell dropped out, to make a run instead for Barbara Boxer’s Senate seat.

Folks, things are about to get ugly! (Isn’t it exciting?!)

As noted in a San Jose Mercury News article this week, “Before, Whitman and Poizner would have had to keep a lid on nastiness for fear the famously genteel Campbell would ‘slip through the middle’ as the public became repulsed by multimillion-dollar mudslinging.” (http://www.mercurynews.com/ci_14251951?source=most_viewed&nclick_check=1)

Now why does that scenario sound familiar? Not that long ago, in the 1998 race for the Governor’s seat, when we elected none other than recently ousted Former Governor Gray Davis. The poor man in the race, Davis eked by while airline mogul Al Checchi and Rep. Jane Harman from Southern California spent massive amounts of their personal wealth attacking each other.

Afraid of a historical repeat, Whitman and Poizner have, thus far, run a cordial race. However, with Campbell out of the running, the mitts can come off.

Whitman, worth an estimated $1.3 billion, has already donated $29 million to her own war chest while Poizner, who is refraining from disclosing his personal net worth, has only given himself $15 million. Not surprisingly, since he (or she) with the most money wins, Whitman is currently leading the Republican primary race 45 percent to Poizner’s 17 percent. I know, I can do math, 38 percent of voters are still undecided.

To see whether or not the candidate’s have any actual differences in their platforms, check out this cute little chart: http://www.mercurynews.com/portlet/article/html/imageDisplay.jsp?contentItemRelationshipId=2832973

Citizens United v. FEC - an update

2010-01-21T19:09:00.000-08:00

If you’ll recall (way back when, i.e. September) we talked about an interesting Supreme Court case Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. Well, the highest court in the land finally came to a decision, and not one that I am particularly fond of. I know, I’m not usually that blunt in my blog, but I have to admit, my hackles are up.

As a blogger, I like to think that I help to inform the electorate! Now, I have no illusions that my effect on the electorate is… well… itty bitty… and that’s if it actually exists at all. But this is my soap box, and I like that I have one (when I’m old I hope to have a real soap box and be crazy enough to actually stand on it on a street corner and yell at people – and not just about politics, but about anything… “Hey you, stop picking your nose! That’s disgusting!”).

Today though, my effect on the electorate (who, in reality, are my family and friends – thanks for reading my blog by the way!) went directly to zero. And it definitely did not pass go or collect $200.

The Supreme Court’s decision today overturned a decades old rule limiting direct spending of corporations on elections. Heard of political action committees (PACs)? Well, after today, they basically no longer exist. Previously, PACs acted as a middleman between corporations and candidates. Corporations had to set up a PAC, register it, solicit donations, and file separately with the IRS. Now, that accounting firewall and limits to how much a corporation can raise are out the window. Now, a corporation can dip into its own cash, and give it to whomever it wants or independently advertise on behalf of (or against) a candidate.

To summarize, corporations can spend unlimited amounts of money to influence the electorate, and I have my blog. As proud as I am of my blog, somehow that just seems way unfair. And while I’m not saying that my first amendment rights don’t still exist, clearly I still have the right to say whatever I want, clearly I can’t say anything as loudly or as often as a multi-million dollar corporation. So, to that end, I feel that I have to say, shame on you Supreme Court! How dare you make me, as a United States citizen, feel like I have less of a voice today than I had yesterday.

The Masses in Massachusetts

2010-01-20T15:01:00.000-08:00

Last night in a special election to fill the late Ted Kennedy’s Massachusetts Senate seat, the voters elected Republican candidate Scott Brown. I know, I know, you’re like, who cares? They’re all the way across the country from me!

Oh, but you care. Believe me.

First the good news: Gone is the Democrats “supermajority”. Personally, I don’t think any party or any person should have a “supermajority”. Maybe that the balanced Libra in me, but I’m all about balance of power even within one of the branches of government.

Now the bad news: The Democrats actually needed that supermajority to bring the health care bill to a straight up and down vote on the Senate floor! I don’t care what party you’re from, you have to admit that it would be a shame for Congress to have spent so much time and effort on a health care reform bill only to have it filibustered (which I personally consider cheating) by the Republicans.

So what’s going to happen to health care now? Within hours of the election results, Democrats laid out a new approach that would still include major provisions such as 1. No longer allowing insurance companies to deny people coverage based on preexisting conditions, 2. Allowing young adults to stay on their parents insurance for a longer period, 3. Helping small businesses and low-income people pay premiums, and 4. Changing Medicare to encourage quality care rather than simply more care.

Clearly, as the president said in an interview with ABC, “We know that we have to have some form of cost containment because if we don't then our budgets are going to blow up.” (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_health_care_overhaul;_ylt=AlJcU4LrjA7SQ1dkWs3gYLKs0NUE;_ylu=X3oDMTNuaWM5dWQ4BGFzc2V0A2FwLzIwMTAwMTIwL3VzX2hlYWx0aF9jYXJlX292ZXJoYXVsBGNjb2RlA21vc3Rwb3B1bGFyBGNwb3MDMQRwb3MDMwRwdANob21lX2Nva2UEc2VjA3luX3RvcF9zdG9yeQRzbGsDZnVsbG5ic3BzdG9y)

Just in Fiscal Year 2010, the Federal Government will spend more on Health Care than any other individual line item including education and defense. And, more importantly, health care costs are expected to increase by $0.1 Trillion every year for the next four years. http://www.usgovernmentspending.com/breakdown?year=2010

Granted, I don’t have the answers, but I can see that there’s a problem and I really hope that the Senate can find it within themselves (I’m not sure if their hearts have turned to stone yet) to actually come to a compromise and pass some sort of health care plan that will contain costs. Good luck!

Proposition 8 Goes to Court!

2010-01-17T16:21:00.000-08:00

This week was an exciting week for gay and lesbian couples throughout California (although, let’s face it, it’s been an exciting last two years really). This week, a federal court judge in California started hearing arguments for and against upholding Proposition 8, passed by California voters in 2008.

The attorneys bringing suit, Ted Olson and David Boies, make a strange pair since after the 2000 election the two were on opposite sides of the aisle in Bush v. Gore, deciding who would run the United States for the next four years. But, as Olson (the conservative one of the group) reminds us, and as we all were reminded by Newsweek’s cover this week, (http://www.newsweek.com/id/229957) there is a very strong conservative case for gay marriage. I highly recommend reading the whole article, but if you don’t have time here’s the gist:

1. Marriage is a fundamental right of all Americans

2. Depriving gay and lesbian couples the right to marry causes serious emotional and mental harm

3. There’s no societal benefit to depriving gay and lesbian couples the right to marry

Sounds pretty solid to me. In fact, the way I understand conservative values, big government is a big, fat no-no. Most conservatives I know don’t want the government involved in their personal lives, especially not in their bedrooms. So it makes sense that the case against Proposition 8 would ultimately be a conservative argument. Strange, considering the Republican party’s stance on gay marriage (for their official stance go to their website: http://www.gop.com/2008Platform/Values.htm). I confess, I sincerely hope that the irony of “Ensuring Equal Treatment for All” listed only four bullet points above “Preserving Traditional Marriage” is not lost on anyone.

Unfortunately, the judge ruled against showing the trial on television so there are no YouTube clips available (otherwise you would be inundated with them right about now), but there is plenty of information out there if you’d like to find out more about the case. At last count there were over 5,000 articles for your perusal. Happy reading!

A Sad State of the State

2010-01-10T16:21:00.000-08:00

Last Friday in Gov Schwarzenegger’s annual State of the State address, he unveiled his budget plan for the upcoming fiscal year. If you’d like to watch it, check it out here: http://gov.ca.gov/ And let me tell you, you’re in for a laugh!

In a bold (and honestly not-too-bright) move on his part, Schwarzenegger has written additional federal funding (that we can’t and shouldn’t count on) into the 2010-11 budget. How much would the plug be for? Oh, only about $6.9 billion. In an interview this morning with David Gregory on Meet the Press, Gov Schwarzenegger stated that for every dollar that California sends to Washington DC, we only get about $0.78 back. This would be grim indeed, if it were an updated figure. However, since California is receiving so much more than other states under the Federal Stimulus packages, the current amount is closer to $1.45.

Don’t get me wrong, the state of California certainly has some unfair disadvantages compared to the rest of the country. For example, immigration. We only received about $96 million from the Federal government to incarcerate illegal immigrants convicted of felonies (these prisoners account for approximately 10% of inmates and cost around $973 million every year).

But, I think our current Governator might be going about this the wrong way. In his interview with Gregory, Schwarzenegger said, “We also will inspire and push extra hard the California congressional delegation, the bipartisan delegation, because they’re not …. representing us really well in this case.” If he thought that writing extra Federal funds into the budget was going to be “inspiring”, well… here are some of the actual comments that his statement inspired:

“[Schwarzenegger] sounds like he’s trying to avoid responsibility. He’s the governor. We’re not. There has been a financial storm brewing in California for years. They haven’t dealt with it." - Rep. Zoe Lofgren of San Jose, head of the California Democratic delegation in Congress.

“What I don’t think is helpful is it’s the federal government against the state government. We’re representing the same people here.” - Sen. Barbara Boxer.

“The federal government is not responsible for the state of California's budget, and we look forward to hearing a sustainable plan for the state to get its house in order.” - Drew Hammill, spokesman for Rep. Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco, Speaker of the House.

Hmm, good luck with getting the dough from those guys Schwarzenegger.

At the end of the day though, all the finger pointing is pretty useless (although it is what makes for entertaining politics!) since the chances that the California legislature will actually pass this particular budget are slim to zero. So never fear everyone, there is plenty more budget madness to go around!

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/09/AR2010010902207.html?wprss=rss_politics

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/nov05election/detail?blogid=14&entry_id=54968

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2010/01/governor-says-california-doesnt-get-its-fair-share-of-federal-money.html

Midterm Elections Wreaking Havoc Already

2010-01-06T14:08:00.000-08:00

2010 is officially in full swing and already full of midterm election drama! With two democratic Senators announcing today that they would not be seeking reelection in the fall, the pundits are out in full force attempting to predict which party will lose seats and which party will gain.
Please don’t be confused by all the hypotheses, let me tell you right now: the Democrats will lose more seats than the Republicans. Why am I so confident?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1738236/posts

Historically speaking, every single President since Lincoln (with four notable exceptions – the Roosevelts, Clinton, and Bush 43 after 9/11) has lost seats in the midterm election. Don’t think that the Democrats losing seats is some sort of mandate for someone or that it should give Congress a bigger message. It’s simply probability.

What will be interesting to see is exactly how many seats the Democrats lose. Voters hate overspending, so the question is: How much spending in the last two years will voters think really mattered? (Oh, and hopefully they can get their timing straight too with the bailouts that passed in the 11th hour of 2008 BEFORE this Congress took over.)

The chances that the Democrats will lose control of either Congressional house is slim. Republicans would have to pick up 40 seats in the House and 11 seats in the Senate to reclaim control. I know that doesn’t sound like a lot, but current projections (from those pesky pundits I just warned you about) show that in a regular midterm election Democrats would lose between 10-15 seats total because of the way voter turnout falls in midterm elections. Of course, throw in the “great recession” and the numbers jump to between 20-30 seats total. Now I’m no math whiz (ok, that’s a lie, I actually kind of <3 math), but I’m pretty sure that’s not enough to regain control over both branches of Congress! Oh, and in case you were wondering, the historical average loss of seats for the President’s party is 3 Senate seats and 34 seats in the House.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0110/31209.html

So who were these two Senators announcing their lack of reelection plans? Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT), and Senator Byron Dorgan (D-ND). Way to cause some serious commotion guys. No candidates have officially come forward yet in either state to run for the newly vacant seat, but no to worry, I’ll keep you posted!

A New Year and New Laws

2010-01-03T17:19:00.000-08:00

Happy 2010 everyone! To usher in the New Year and celebrate the 696 bills signed into California law last year (fewer than any year in recent history, but still an outrageous amount) here are some of the laws that went into effect on January 1, 2010 (in alphabetical order).

Air safety: Allows airports to kill birds that pose a danger to aircraft without violating state fish and game laws.

Blueberries: Creates a California Blueberry Commission, to be funded by an industry fee of up to $0.025 per pound of berries sold.

Burial fees: Allows state-owned cemeteries to waive the fees for interment of the spouses and children of honorably discharged veterans if they determine the families cannot pay the costs.

Charter schools: Allows such schools access to about $900 million in voter-approved bond money for construction. A separate law gives districts more incentive to approve them by cutting red tape.

College violence: Allows universities to obtain restraining orders on behalf of students against a person who has threatened them with violence.

Cow tails: Bans the dairy-industry practice of shortening cows' tails unless necessary to protect the health of the animals. Some argue that tail-docking is inhumane.

Delta restoration: Creates a new Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Conservancy to oversee restoration of the failing delta ecosystem. Sets goals of "providing a more reliable water supply for California and protecting, restoring, and enhancing the delta ecosystem." Part of the larger water package.

Dog fights: Raises the maximum penalties against those convicted of being spectators at dogfights, subjecting them to as much as a year in jail and a $5,000 fine.

Drunk driving: Creates a test program in four counties, including Los Angeles County, in which judges can require that first-time drunk-driving offenders install a breath-testing device on every vehicle they own and pass a test on it before the vehicle will start.

Education: Allows school and student performance data to be used to judge the quality of instruction. The change will allow California to compete for federal Race to the Top education grants.

Fat in food: Requires restaurants to use oils, margarine and shortening with less than half a gram of trans fat per serving of regular foods. The standard will apply to deep-fried bakery goods next year. Trans fat has been linked to heart disease.

Football stadium: Exempts a professional football stadium proposed in the City of Industry from state environmental laws, so it can proceed despite a lawsuit filed by opponents.

Fire prevention: Requires government officials to improve guidelines for protecting property from wildfires, including larger brush-clearance zones and better access roads in regions vulnerable to such fires.

Fire safety: In response to evacuation problems during a 2008 wildfire that destroyed dozens of mobile homes in the San Fernando Valley, a new law requires owners of mobile home parks to adopt and post notice of an emergency preparedness plan.

Gangs: Allows tougher penalties, including a fine of up to $1,000 and up to a year in jail, for gang members who return to school campuses within 72 hours of being asked to leave.

Gasoline: Increases the underground storage fee paid by gas retailers to help fund grants and loans to those who need to meet tank cleanup rules and install devices that capture more vapor from gas nozzles.

Gay marriage: Recognizes same-sex marriages performed in other states before California voters banned gay marriage in 2008 by approving Proposition 8.

Hanging nooses: Makes it a misdemeanor to hang a noose, "knowing it to be a symbol representing a threat to life," in order to terrorize a person who lives, works or attends school at the property where the noose is hung. The law is in response to a series of incidents at California colleges.

Harvey Milk: Proclaims gay-rights activist Harvey Milk's May 22 birthday as a day of recognition and encourages schools to consider commemorating his life.

High-speed rail: Requires the state's High-Speed Rail Authority to prepare, publish and adopt a business plan by Jan. 1, 2012, and every two years thereafter, so the public knows how its money is being spent.

Hospital fee: Imposes a new fee on hospitals to make them eligible for $2 billion in federal funds. The funds are subsidies for Medi-Cal, the state's health insurance program for the poor.

Human trafficking: Quadruples the fine, to $20,000, for those convicted of human-trafficking crimes and allows law enforcement officers to seize traffickers' assets.

Inhalants: Makes it a misdemeanor for a person to sell or furnish products containing nitrous oxide to a minor.

Jail guards: Allows jail guards and custodial assistants to have the blood of people taken into custody tested for specified communicable diseases when exposed to the suspect's bodily fluids.

Liquor ads: Waives rules prohibiting indoor alcohol advertisements in one club that sells the featured products: Club Nokia, a downtown Los Angeles venue owned by billionaire Philip Anschutz.

Mammogram safety: Requires facilities that operate mammogram machines to post any notices of "serious violations" they may receive in an area visible to patients. Serious violations are those posing a significant threat to public health.

Mortgage crimes: Creates a new offense, "mortgage fraud," punishable by up to a year in prison. Such crimes are defined as those in which someone makes "any misstatement, misrepresentation or omission during the mortgage lending process with the intention that it be relied on by a mortgage lender, borrower, or any other party to the mortgage lending process."

Office bets: Changes the penalty for participation in a non-commercial or office "sports betting pool" from a misdemeanor, punishable by fines up to $1,000, to an infraction, punishable by a fine not to exceed $250.

Paparazzi penalties: Allows celebrities and others to sue for up to $50,000 when someone takes and sells their pictures without permission while they are engaging in "personal or familial activity," such as taking their children to school.

Plastic surgery: Enacts the Donda West law, named after the deceased mother of rapper Kanye West, that prohibits elective cosmetic surgery unless the patient is first cleared by a physical examination.

Political spouses: Prohibits political candidates from paying their spouses or domestic partners to work on their campaigns to enrich their own households.

Prostitution arrests: Allows local government agencies to impound vehicles used in the commission of prostitution-related crimes.

Rental cars: Allows car-rental companies to recover from customers an increase made last year in the vehicle license fee from 0.65% to 1.15%.

School books: Expands the use of digital textbooks in public schools by allowing districts to use textbook money to buy electronic viewing devices.

School buses: Extends to school buses the $300 penalty already applicable to commercial vehicles that idle too long. Existing clean-air regulations prohibit school buses from idling for more than five minutes within 100 feet of a school, but the fine has been $100.

School safety: Makes it a misdemeanor to possess a razor blade or box cutter on school grounds.

Talent agents: Prohibits talent representatives from charging advance fees.

Teen voting: Permits a California resident who is 17 to pre-register to vote.

Snake food: Requires pet stores to use specific, "humane" methods for killing rodents before they are used as food for another animal.

Toll roads: Allows toll road operators to use license-plate-reading technology to bill motorists who use their roads.

Used car sales: Bars car dealers from selling a used vehicle until action is taken to cover any previous loan or lease obligations held by a previous owner. Also boosts by $25 fees for dealers' state business licenses.

Vietnam veterans: Establishes an annual Welcome Home Vietnam Veterans Day on March 30.

Water management: To better manage California's water supplies, creates a statewide monitoring program to track groundwater levels.

Water softeners: Allows local governments to ban residential water softeners if regulators find that salts discharged into municipal sewer lines pose a pollution problem.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-new-laws1-2010jan01,0,3437892,full.story

To sum it up, 1/1/10 was a good day to be a dog and a cow, but a bad day to be a bird near an airport. Even though gay marriage remains illegal under the California constitution, those previously married in same-sex ceremonies will continue to be recognized as legally married under the law and May 22nd is now considered a holiday in recognition of Harvey Milk. It was a good day to be Jennifer Aniston and Kayne West, but a bad day to be a talent agent. For the rest of us, don’t text while you’re driving and don’t be surprised if fast food doesn’t taste quite the same. Happy New Year!

2009 A Year in Review

2009-12-30T18:20:00.000-08:00

As this is my last blog of 2009, I’m doing it. I’m the first! The very first 2009: year in review! It has been an exciting one hasn’t it? We started with a brand new president, full of hope, 2009 was going to be a great year! Well, I don’t know if it was great, so much as just completely crazy.

2009 has seen some big issues come our way, from California’s budget crisis (parts one and two), to national healthcare, to possibly dismantling the Federal Reserve.

So let’s recap:

- We have a new President ladies and gents! Someone who people either find hopeful or horrific, no one can accuse Obama as being lazy as he’s packed some big issues into his first year in office.

- The economy goes from bad to bad. Ok, let’s face it, the economy hasn’t really gone anywhere in the last year. We’ve been assured that without the billions in bailout money it would’ve been a whole lot worse, but it isn’t exactly a whole lot better either.

- Among several other states, California finds itself in a budget crisis because of the economy. The legislature throws some band-aids on it to stop the hemorrhaging, but is back in the red only a few months later.

- To protect consumers, Congress starts discussing several different angles on financial regulations. None are particularly helpful and appear to just increase the crazy bureaucracy. Except for the possibility of getting rid of the Federal Reserve, which would put the power of the purse back in Congress’s hands where the founders intended it. But, given how we all feel about Congress, are we really comfortable with that?

- Senator Al Franken is elected giving the Democrats 60 votes in the Senate, a so-called “supermajority”. Except that for some reason they still can’t get anything passed. (To hear my full rant on this particular issue, feel free to email me!)

- California’s Gubernatorial election is in full swing! It appears that the conservative candidates will be Steve Poizner, Tom Campbell, and Meg Whitman vs. democratic candidate Jerry Brown.

- This year saw the outing of a power religious group: “The Family”. While the particular political dealings of this group are still veiled, I highly recommend the book for some totally scandalous (but completely true) reading: http://www.harpercollins.com/books/9780060559793/The_Family/index.aspx

- Two propositions are submitted to California’s Secretary of State giving the people the opportunity to scrap the current California constitution and start all over.

- Healthcare. Need I say more?

It’s been quite the year. Publicly and personally, it’s been a year full of change. At times it’s been scary, and at other times it’s been nothing short of amazing. I hope your 2009 brought you health and happiness and that 2010 brings you everything you hope for. Happy New Year everyone!

'Twas the Night Before Voting

2009-12-23T21:33:00.000-08:00

'Twas the night before voting, when all through the Senate, All creatures were stirring, discussing their tenets

The healthcare debate must come to a close, the Senate will vote while the West coast will doze

The Senators nestled all snug in their seats, In hopes that the bill will not meet defeat

Hopefully hoping to go home at last, They’d been working much harder than holiday’s past

But out from the floor there arose such a clatter, we all sprang from our couches to see what was the matter!

Away to the news stations we flew like a flash, to cable, to internet and other such trash

The flashing of cameras at great shelves of books, giving the semblance of smartness to people with looks

When, what to my inquiring eyes should appear, but former Governor Sarah Palin! And her politics of fear!

With a lively old interviewer, just nice as heck, I knew it a moment it must be Glenn Beck

Knowing without doubt that his rivals were lame, he yelled and he shouted and he called them by name;

“Now Nancy, now Stewart, now Hoyer and Kerry! On Colbert, on Schumer, on Obama and Harry!

To the top of the ratings! To the top of them all! Now watch me, now watch me, now watch me,” he called.

As the Senate’s debating drew near to an end, with a bill full of provisions and a nation to mend

The protestors they came, to the capital they flew, with a bag full of signs and some firearms too

But then, in a twinkling, I read it online, they have all the votes to pass it on time

As I took off my glasses and was turning around, from my laptop there came an unmistakable sound

She was dressed in a skirt suit, her lipstick dark red, And her blouse neatly pressed, hair perfect on her head

In her hand she held over 2,000 pages, And all she can say is “it’s one for the ages”

Her eyes—how they twinkled! Her dimples so merry! Between you and me, she’s been into the sherry.

Not that I blame her with a nation so torn, though there’s not much to do but regard them with scorn

Who would like a Congress that does everything wrong? And is a big part of why this year’s been so long.

But don’t worry good people, 2010’s a new year, we’ll vote them all out and change will be near

For now though adieu as I must take flight, Happy Christmas to all and to all a Good Night

You'd Have to be So High...

2009-12-20T13:05:00.000-08:00

To continue with last week’s theme of ballot initiatives in California’s November 2010 election, this week we’re going to talk about everyone’s favorite topic! Legalizing marijuana! (Don’t forget your towel.)

To hear a national overview of the different views, check out this clip from This Week with George Stephanopoulos: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zizS76elpiU

To hear it straight from the mouths (ok, website) of the official “Regulate, Control, and Tax Cannabis Act of 2010” check out their About Us page: http://www.taxcannabis.org/index.php/pages/about

The general idea is that, rather than continuing a seventy-year war on marijuana, which we seem to be losing both in terms of actual dollars flowing back to the Mexican drug cartels and actual dollars that we spend locking up drug offenders who are caught with non-medical marijuana, we should legalize it, regulate it, and tax it.

California has always been on the forefront of decriminalizing the use of marijuana starting in 1996 when we became the first state to legalize marijuana for medical use. In July of this year, Oakland became the first city to assess a sales tax on marijuana. The initiative has already gathered the signatures it needs to be presented on the general election ballot in 2010. (And here I thought pot-heads were lazy and had no motivation! I am appropriately impressed.)

According to The Sentencing Project http://www.sentencingproject.org/template/index.cfm) drug arrests have more than tripled in the last 25 years leading to 1.8 million drug arrests in 2005 alone. The majority of these arrests are for simple possession of marijuana and most people in prison for drug offenses have no history of violence.

Between the reduced prison costs of legalizing marijuana and the possible revenue from taxation, it kind of sounds like a deal. So what IS the big deal anyway? (Got your towel?) Well, there is still a pretty big list of questions that have not yet been answered: “Who is going to determine or regulate how marijuana is produced and distributed? Who will it be distributed by? How is the state going to collect the taxes? Will it really have an impact on the illicit trafficking and production of marijuana? Will this lead to proposals to legalize other drugs?”

All right all my business friends out there, ready for your next big business idea? Producing and distributing (selling) pot! Who knew that you too could grow up to be a drug dealer? You can drive around town in your fancy BMW and wear lots of bling. Next thing you know, you could be Snoop Dog’s best friend.

In other news, the Senate has finally passed a health care bill. Help us all. More about that on Wednesday!

Jobs, Jobs, Jobs, for your Bills, Bills, Bills

2009-12-16T15:49:00.000-08:00

Today we’re going to revisit the Job Bill. Almost a month later after my first Job Bill blog, the House is still working to pass a version of the bill lovingly dubbed by Democrats as the “Jobs for Main Street” bill. Currently, the tab is up to $174 billion, but it includes:

$36 billion for highways and mass transit.
$20 billion to keep Highway Trust Fund solvent for existing obligations.
$23 billion to pay teacher salaries in an attempt to save or create about 250,000 education jobs.
$2 billion for job training, summer jobs for teenagers and for AmeriCorps.
$500 million to retain or hire firefighters.
$1.2 billion to put 5,500 law enforcement officials on the beat.
$2.3 billion to extend the $1,000-per-child tax credit to 16 million poor families.
$24 billion to states for Medicaid for the poor and disabled.
$41 billion to extend emergency unemployment benefits for six months.
$12.3 billion for health insurance subsidies for long-term jobless workers.
$600 million for improvements to airports and seaports.
$2.8 billion for water projects.
$2 billion for housing renovations.

Sometime this week the House will officially vote on the bill as well as voting on a temporary, two-month increase in the national debt of $1.2 trillion. About half of the jobs bill will be financed by the left over or repaid money from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP – the Treasury Department’s bank bailout).

House Appropriations Committee Chairman David Obey had some harsh words for critics of the bill who say the price tag is too high, “We make no apology whatsoever for trying to give the same amount of attention to Main Street needs as was given earlier to Wall Street needs.” (Oh! Zing!)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20091215/pl_bloomberg/ahqzpf24e2eg
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20091216/pl_nm/us_usa_congress_jobs

Reforming, Rewriting, and Repairing

2009-12-13T18:43:00.000-08:00

Let’s start off today with some trivia! Who once said, “whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.”?

It has been argued recently, both in the press and amongst my family and friends, that California’s government has become overly large, complex, and destructive. California’s constitution is the third largest in the world. Not only amongst states, but amongst any governing entity with a constitution (states, countries, etc.). We have diluted our constitution with over 500 amendments since its ratification in 1879. As a result, our education system is practically on the brink of collapse, our elections produce legislators with ideological extremes who cannot pass a decent budget to save their (or our) lives, and our water will likely dry up completely before anyone does anything about that looming crisis.

At this point to “effect” Californians’ safety and happiness, it seems that the next logical step is to “alter or abolish” the government. Ok, take a deep breath, I’m not saying that we should take up arms and storm Sacramento (although that would be really exciting), our founders actually gave us the tools to fix the underlying problem in a non-violent way (way to be on top of that founding fathers).

Through a constitutional convention, California can completely scrap the constitution as it stands now and start all over! Sounds like a pretty good idea right? Unfortunately, as of now there is only one way that we can make this convention happen: our legislators can authorize a convention with a two-thirds vote (HA! The very idea that two-thirds of our legislators would agree to do this totally cracks me up.).

Enter Repair California (www.repaircalifornia.org). A non-profit organization started by the Bay Area Council (http://www.bayareacouncil.org/bay_area_council.php), Repair California’s mission is to give Californians the opportunity to take part in a Constitutional Convention to completely rewrite our current, overblown and diluted constitution. On October 28, 2009 Repair California presented the Attorney General with the language for two Propositions which will appear on the November 2010 ballot and which you will know as Proposition 1 and Proposition 2.

Proposition 1 amends the current constitution to allow the citizens of the state the opportunity to call for a constitutional convention with a majority vote on a ballot initiative.
Proposition 2 is the ballot initiative calling for a citizens constitutional convention.

I highly recommend reading both initiatives. Proposition 1 is only two pages long and Proposition 2 is only slightly longer at 16 pages. The text can be found here: http://www.repaircalifornia.org/Docs/repair_california_prop_1.pdf and here http://www.repaircalifornia.org/Docs/repair_california_prop_2.pdf.

There are still lots of hurdles to clear before the citizens constitutional convention can become a reality. Both measures have to get 1.4 million signatures before the attorney general can even allow them on the ballot. Then, both initiatives have to be passed by the people, clearly one is no good without the other. Once the convention is held and the delegate’s reform package is written, is must again be voted on by the citizens in 2012 to become legally binding. I realize this sounds incredibly overwhelming and a little scary. But really, I think sticking with our current constitution is far more terrifying.

To calm your fears a little, here’s an interesting statistic: since 1950, five states have undergone constitutional conventions to completely rewrite their constitutions. They are Montana, Hawaii, Illinois, Michigan and Connecticut.

Now for the answer to trivia! In 1776 Thomas Jefferson wrote, “whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness” in the Declaration of Independence.

Big Bank Bohemoths & My Economic Solution

2009-12-09T08:15:00.000-08:00

Today in the wake of Obama’s jobs summit and the plethora of speeches on the economy, we’re going to have a small history lesson.

One of the problems that I hear over and over again (in that plethora of speeches) is how the government gave all that money to the banks to bail them out so they could start lending again. But, now, (shocker) they’re not lending. Now I have a theory. Sure, lots of people are defaulting on mortgages because of variable or resetting interest rates resulting in crazy huge bills that they can’t pay because they’re unemployed. But how the heck are they supposed to go out and start their own small businesses if they can’t get a loan? (No, of course I am not talking about myself! Wink, wink!) Face it though, banks have lots and lots of other ways to make money. For example, investing!

For a complete list of where Citigroup Inc makes their money for example, check out their most recent 10-Q. http://yahoo.brand.edgar-online.com/displayfilinginfo.aspx?FilingID=6877451-1106-1291714&type=sect&dcn=0001047469-09-009754 By the way, if you can read it, can you let me know what it says? I’m five minutes away from being a CPA and I pretty much barely understand it.

Back to my last point though, banks can invest in lots of things to make their money these days. Like hedge funds or derivatives. Both are totally safe investments, of course, so when they take your hard earned money that you put into your savings account to get a whole 1.5% interest and they put it into a derivative investment and either make lots and lots of money or lose everything, I’m sure we can all feel good about it.

Anyway, I believe I promised you a history lesson. Way back in the day (when people were partying like it was 1999, because it WAS 1999), three senators wrote a bill formally named The Financial Services Modernization Act of 1999. (Informally the bill is called The Gramm Leach Bliley Act or GLBA – go ahead, I give you permission to laugh!) The first section of the bill repeals Section 20 of the Glass-Steagall Act to now allow mergers between securities and banking companies and also repeals Section 32 of the Banking Act of 1933 to permit officers and directors to serve in those capacities for both securities and banking companies. To read the Senate Banking Committee’s Summary of the Bill check this out: http://banking.senate.gov/docs/reports/s900sum.htm.

To give you an idea of how popular the bill has been since its passage, economists Robert Ekelund and Mark Thornton have stated that the bill, “amounts to corporate welfare for financial institutions and a moral hazard that will make taxpayers pay dearly.” Economist Paul Krugman called Senator Gramm, “the father of the financial crisis” because of his sponsorship of the bill. Yikes.

Here are my thoughts: bring back Section 20 of the Glass-Steagall Act and Section 32 of the Banking Act of 1933. As if the banks weren’t already too big before this crisis, now there’s only five large banking institutions left. What’s going to happen when they mess up again? Do you think maybe they’d start lending again if we took away their securities? It’s time to break up the behemoth party. And if I’m not convincing as an economist, check out economist Robert Reich’s personal blog: http://robertreich.blogspot.com/2009/10/too-big-to-fail-why-big-banks-should-be.html. (I love that I use the same blogger as Robert Reich! It gives me goose bumps!)

Oh California's Education System, Why Are You So Terrible?

2009-12-06T18:43:00.000-08:00

Ok, I admit it, today I am picking on an easy target: California’s education system. As we all know, it sucks. Big time. Let’s go over some of the statistics:

* Only 36.3% of California’s high school graduates go on to college, compared to 40% nationally.
* We rank 18th out of the 20 largest states in the percentage of 12th graders who go directly to college and 17th in the amount who ever go to college at all.
* We are 30th in spending per pupil
* 49th in student to teacher ratios, and
* UC fees have increased 300% in the last 10 years

Yikes. In this blog though, I would like to concentrate on bullet #3! Only twenty states spend less per pupil than California. And what exactly are we spending that money on? Before school started this year, my sister (who teaches 1st grade – damned those kids are cute) confessed that the budget crisis is creating a borderline hostile atmosphere at her school as the various grade levels duke it out for whatever money they can get their hands on. In the same breath, she told me that she wasn’t sure she would even have the budget money to provide her five and six year olds (who go through erasers like no other) with enough pencils for the school year. Tragic.

As it that wasn’t bad enough in and of itself though, let’s talk about earmarks! As school budgets are created by those higher ups somewhere out there, money gets set aside for certain activities or expenses and once those budgets are passed it becomes illegal to spend that money on anything else. For example, at my sister’s school thousands of dollars has been tied up to buy new PE equipment. Now, that’s very nice and everything, but the school can’t afford to hire a PE teacher so there is no PE program to buy new equipment for! And in the meantime my sister is worried about pencils.

In a really great example of misused funds, remember Swine Flu? On Friday, state schools chief Jack O’Connell announced that the state has purchased 23 million masks and gloves to prevent the spread of Swine Flu. Yup, even if those suckers only cost 50 cents apiece, we’re talking over $11 million. (If you’d like your own Swine Flu mask now that flu season is almost over, there’s a pretty good assortment here: http://www.google.com/products?q=swine+flu+mask&rlz=1I7DLUS_en&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=ie7&um=1&ie=UTF-8&ei=yOcaS-1RjbCzA8Xr6PwE&sa=X&oi=product_result_group&ct=title&resnum=6&ved=0CDgQrQQwBQ)

The supplies were paid for by a federal grant which was given for the sole purpose of purchasing the masks and gloves.

http://www.cde.ca.gov/nr/ne/yr09/yr09rel160.asp
http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-rutten5-2009dec05,0,2869973.column
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,579367,00.html

Afghanistan: How much sleep are you losing over it?

2009-12-02T11:40:00.000-08:00

Last night President Obama gave a much anticipated speech on the future of American involvement in Afghanistan. So what’s the verdict? (drumroll please) We need a surge! What else is new? It’s like our new favorite war term.

About 30,000 more lucky winners get to head off to the hot, dusty Middle East bringing the grand total of military personnel (does anyone else wonder what exactly the term “military personnel” means? I mean, are they troops or what?) to about 100,000.

Of course, what’s everyone’s new favorite question? How are we going to pay for this? Funny, you would have thought we would wonder that eight years ago when we actually went to war. It appears that we have two (ugly) choices: one, raise taxes or two, issue war bonds.

First, let me ask, how often do you think about the fact that we are actually at war? That we are in fact involved in two wars?? I’m going to guess that you don’t think about it all that often. So let’s take a look back into the history books shall we?

World War II: The American public was actually put under strict rationing. From food and gas to clothing, Americans consumption was limited so that our resources could be directed to our troops. Recycling was actually born during World War II to help reuse materials that could be useful in war. War bonds were issued and training sessions were held to teach women how to shop wisely to help conserve food. Can you imagine how we would all react if our government put us on rationing today? (Can we say communism?)

Vietnam (speaking of communism): I only have two words for you, the draft.

So I have to ask, given our history, why does asking Americans to sacrifice just a little, for a war that we all wanted to fight so badly, scare our Representatives so much? I, for one, want to know why we think we have to make a choice between raising taxes or issuing war bonds? Heck, let’s do both! Remember when the troops in Iraq didn’t have enough bullet-proof vests?? I certainly do, and I say, by all means, raise my taxes to make sure that my friends overseas (who are fighting my battles) are a little bit safer.

California has the Budget Blues... Again

2009-11-29T09:12:00.000-08:00

Ah, to think California almost made it five whole months before diving back into the depths of a budget crisis. Yup, it’s true. Cleverly though, the Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) released their report over the long weekend (or maybe just before, it’s not entirely clear from where I’m sitting) so… you know… maybe nobody will see that we’re $20.7 billion in the hole through 2011. Yea, I’m sure nobody will notice. In fact, according to said report, we’re likely to continue to see tens of billions of dollars in deficits until 2014 when revenues are projected to rebound (I think I’ll still keep my fingers crossed on this one, you know, just in case!). Read the LAO’s report here: http://www.lao.ca.gov/laoapp/PubDetails.aspx?id=2143.

So where is the money going to come from this time? Nobody knows for sure, but likely sources are health and human services, education (oi), and corrections. The only possible silver lining to this hurricane of a disaster is the possibility of a lessening of regulations on small businesses (I’m giving that a preemptive “yay”!).

The scary thing (at least for me) about this upcoming budget crisis is that, “Legislators have expressed concerns that approving a balanced state budget will be harder this time around, as some of the easier cuts have already been made.” (http://www.vvdailypress.com/news/billion-15872-california-deficit.html) Um, excuse me, did you say “easier cuts”? Am I the only one who recalls how long it took to resolve the last budget crisis? When we made those “easier cuts”? When people were getting I.O.U.s instead of cash for the tax refunds? Anyone? Anyone?

Why is it that the only people who seem to understand the problem and offer real, realistic solutions are not our elected officials? A letter to the editor published in the Ventura County Star gives some great ideas, check them out at this link: http://www.vcstar.com/news/2009/nov/26/ob9budgetletts27/?partner=yahoo_feeds.

When will the legislature start to work on closing the new budget gap? Well, your guess is pretty much as good as mine, but if you want to follow what the legislature is up to, check out their website: http://www.legislature.ca.gov/.

Since we haven't talked about healthcare in almost a whole month...

2009-11-25T10:57:00.000-08:00

The healthcare monster is officially open for debate on the Senate floor. With barely enough votes to even get to the debate part of the process (the motion to debate passed 60-39, with 60 being the minimum amount of votes to pass), the Democrats are in for what could turn into unrestrained debate next month. Did I mention that not a single Republican voted to begin debate and more than likely will not vote for any healthcare reform bill?

The latest argument over the bill: the cost. The U.S. currently has the largest debt we’ve ever had. If we don’t raise the current legal debt ceiling, we will actually default on some of our debt. The healthcare bill as it stands now will cost approximately $979 billion over 10 years. It will also reduce the deficit over the same 10 years, i.e. the bill will NOT add to our current debt. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091122/ap_on_go_co/us_health_care_overhaul) Supposedly the bill will save 3.5 million jobs and $800 billion over the next 20 years. Republicans however, don’t buy it and are saying things like, “I don't want to fix the problems in our health care system in a way that creates more of an economic crisis.” (Joe Lieberman, I-CT). Kit Bond (R-MI) even called the whole bill a, “scam”. (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091122/ap_on_go_co/us_health_care_democrats)

To find out who exactly is full of it, I went straight to the source: The Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the entity in charge of estimating the fiscal impact of bills introduced by congress. Per a CBO report published on November 20th, the federal budget deficit will have a net reduction of approximately $138 billion. ($979 billion cost over 10 years less the $800 billion in savings over 10 years… not exactly $138 billion in net savings, but close enough for our purposes here.) If you’d like to read the whole report, click on the link: http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/107xx/doc10741/hr3962Revised.pdf.

For those of us who are skeptical of the CBO (or any governmental entity), here are the facts:

1. The director is jointly appointed for a four year term by the Speaker of the House and the President Pro Tempore of the Senate.
2. Director and Deputy Director compensation is set by law
3. Approximately 70% of the professional staff hold advanced degrees in either economics or public policy.

For more info in the CBO: http://www.cbo.gov/

Former Director Robert Reischauer, who served from 1989-1995, recently noted, “CBO is there to score savings for which we have a high degree of confidence that they will materialize… There are many promising approaches [in these reform ideas] but you...can't deposit them in the bank.” Hmm, I think I might be sold on this whole billions of dollars in net savings thing…

For an extremely in-depth well-written article on the specifics of the healthcare bill, check this out: http://politics.theatlantic.com/2009/11/a_milestone_in_the_health_care_journey.php

U.C. Tuition Increase.. Because of COURSE students should pay for our budget crisis!

2009-11-22T13:45:00.000-08:00

In the midst of the great California budget crisis, at a time when all Californians young and old are feeling the squeeze, last Thursday the University of California regents voted to raise tuition by 32%. DANG! Starting in January, half the hike will kick in, raising tuition to $8,373. The rest of the increase will take effect next fall and will raise tuition to $10,302. To give you an idea of the obscenity of the hike, the average annual tuition increase nation-wide is 6.5%.

I am glad to say that the students are not just rolling over and taking the news lying down. Students at Cal took over an English building, which led to three arrests. Over 2,000 students protested at U.C.L.A., and at least 50 students and one professor were arrested following protests at U.C. Davis. And we certainly can’t leave out those crazy U.C. Santa Cruz kids (you know who you are!) who took over Kerr Hall and demanded, not only the repeal of the tuition increase, but the impeachment of Mark Yudof, President of the University System and the altogether elimination of the regents. We could all take a few good negotiation lessons from those crazy U.C.S.C. kids: First, aim high in negotiating so you can always compromise down, but second, you need to have something to negotiate with in order to get anything you want. Taking over a building will only get you arrested. Unless you can get everyone (and I mean everyone… like on the planet) to agree to stop going to school (i.e. stop paying tuition), you have very little bargaining power.

In case that wasn’t depressing enough for you, here are some interesting statistics: Even though California can’t find the money to fund its education system, we still find the money to maintain all those prisons, check out this chart: http://www.good.is/post/prison-and-college-californias-ridiculous-priorities/. In my article perusing of this topic it seems that California is either #1 or #5 in spending on our prison system (which I think we can all agree is… well… up there), while we are a dim #48 in spending on education. Yikes.

Ever wonder who these so-called “regents” are? Well, I’m glad you asked. Of the 26 board members, 18 are appointed by the Governor to serve 12 year terms, 1 is a student appointed by the Regents to serve a 1 year term (you know, in case they get too uppity), and 7 are ex officio members including the Governor, Lieutenant Governor and several other political cronies. (See their official website here: http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/regents/) While regents themselves do not earn a salary for their position, they are in charge of setting compensation for all UC executives, administrators, and faculty. Check out some of the (rather disgusting if I may say so) increases in executive and administrative salaries at UC’s this year: http://www.upte.org/about/press/2009-07-23.pdf.

The only regent to vote against the increase was the student regent. I’m shocked.

A Second Stimulus?

2009-11-18T11:39:00.000-08:00

This week in the House of Representatives (it’s a soap opera, not unlike As the World Turns), Democrats started discussing a possible jobs bill. Now that the U.S. unemployment rate is officially greater than 10% clearly something must be done (before it was obviously under control, but now that we’ve reached the magical 10%, Congress must act to save us all).

Of course, let’s be clear, this will not be a second stimulus bill (or at least we definitely wouldn’t want to call it that because the public probably wouldn’t like it), the bill will be clearly focused (because Congress is great on focusing) on jobs. So will Congress just throw more money at the problem? Supposedly the main focuses of the bill will be:

* A transportation bill that could cost up to $500 billion
* A tax credit for businesses that create jobs
* Assistance to state governments, which otherwise would lay off teachers, police and other employees as they cope with plunging tax revenues and rising social spending
* Low-interest loans for small businesses
* Another extension of unemployment benefits, which otherwise could run out for millions of jobless workers
* An extension of health-insurance subsidies for the jobless
* A transaction tax on over-the-counter trades in unregulated "dark markets"

On the one hand, our deficit is already over $1 trillion, and this bill certainly won’t be paying for itself in the short run. As House Republican leader John Boehner (heh heh) put it, “Americans are asking, 'Where are the jobs?' But all they are getting from out-of-touch Washington Democrats is more spending and more debt piled on our kids and grandkids. Instead of doubling down with more spending and borrowing, the American people want fiscally responsible solutions to get the economy back on track.” http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091118/ap_on_go_co/us_congress_jobs_bill

On the other hand though, how else are we going to create jobs if we don’t spend any money? According to economist Robert Reich, “The Administration's biggest economic mistake so far was to badly underestimate last January how bad the employment situation would become by Fall. As a result, it low-balled the stimulus -- settling for a plan that, while avoiding even worse job losses, didn't go nearly far enough.” http://www.robertreich.blogspot.com/

Congress Cares! Right?

2009-11-11T09:26:00.000-08:00

Yesterday as I perused the headlines to see what the big Congressional news of the week was, here are some of the headlines I saw:

“Bill Clinton spurs US Senate Democrats on health care” (Really? We have to bring back Bill Clinton to get the Democrats to actually do anything useful?)

“Abortion foe seeks curbs in Senate health bill” (Ah yes, apparently abortion is now the big health care bill issue. We don’t want the government to dictate what procedures we can and cannot get – can we say the ‘death panels’ scare – but NO ABORTIONS ALLOWED!)

“US seeks climate framework, not legal pact: experts” (Because when we want our government or businesses to do something, all we have to do is ‘suggest’ it and they’ll get right on it – HA! Hello people, Windows 7 was not really your idea.)

“House passes historic health care bill, with one GOP vote” (Therefore it’s ‘bipartisan’! Boy am I proud.)

“Opponents say they have votes to block U.S. tourism to Cuba” (Two things, one: of all the things happening in this country, we’re concerned about lifting the ban on tourism to Cuba? But two: why are there so many people blocking the lifting of the ban on tourism to Cuba?! Are we still that concerned about Fidel Castro and Communism? Seriously?? I mean, first of all, if I was the U.S., Cuba would be my pinky finger! Secondly, maybe if we opened up Cuba to tourism, the actual people of Cuba wouldn’t be quite so poor, and they would stop trying to invade Florida.)

Ugh, that was all so uplifting that I had to laugh when I saw this headline: “AP-GfK poll: Country in a funk” http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091110/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_obama_ap_poll

Yes! I am in a funk! Thanks for noticing AP-GfK! The article cites lots of interesting statistics including the fact that only one third of the country approves of how Congress is doing. I’m not surprised, those guys clearly can’t get their act together. Then, I went and looked at the original poll which includes congresses approval rating over time. http://surveys.ap.org/data/GfK/AP-GfK%20Poll%20Final%20November%20Topline%20111009_political.pdf

Ok, so Congress’s approval rating was about 30% in November 2009, but it was 21% in November 2008! Now I’m surprised. You’re telling me that Congress’s approval rating has actually improved by nine percentage points in the last year?! Ok, forget surprised, I’m downright shocked! Or at least I was until I revisited what Congress was doing last year around this time: http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2008/index.asp Enter the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 and the Auto Industry Financing and Restructuring Act. Ah, mystery solved.

In fact, looking back on last year at about this time, between the multitude of bailouts, the Dow Jones diving to under 8,000, and the hundreds of thousands of jobs lost, things were looking pretty bleak. At least now, Congress is doing something to try and help me instead of just throwing money at corporate America. Thanks for at least pretending to care Congress! Things are looking up already!

California's U.S. Senate Race: Carly Fiorina Makes it Official!

2009-11-08T13:26:00.000-08:00

This week, former HP CEO Carly Fiorina announced her candidacy for one of California’s U.S. Senate seats. Sen. Barbara Boxer is up for reelection in November 2010 and the Republican primary will be held in June.

In the primaries, Fiorina will run against Chuck DeVore, a California State Assemblyman from Orange County a position he has held since 2004. Mr. DeVore has clearly had his feet firmly planted in the political arena since age 19 when he began actively volunteering for the Republican Party. Since then he has been a Reagan White House appointee to the Pentagon, been an aide to former Congressman Christopher Cox, was the City Commissioner for the City of Irvine and has been elected to the Orange County Republican Party Central Committee four times. To read where Mr. DeVore stands on the issues, visit his Chuckdevore.com for U.S. Senate website at http://www.chuckdevore.com/issues/

Given Chucks long political record, compared to the fact that Fiorina has voted in six of the fourteen elections held in California since 2000 and did not vote once in the ten years she lived in New Jersey prior to moving to California, I am surprised that she is already spending her time attacking Sen. Boxer, rather than her primary opponent that she will have to defeat in June.
In fact, I found the video of her campaign announcement absolutely fascinating! Take a look: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DIYREAUpkeM

I agree, job creation should definitely be a top priority for Washington. What about those 28,000 HP jobs that went away when you were CEO Carly? What about all those jobs that went overseas?

Fiorina cut her political teeth as top economic advisor to the McCain Presidential Campaign in 2008 (and we all saw how well that went). Although it went particularly badly for Carly, after saying that none of the candidates were qualified to run a major corporation like HP, she was more or less blackballed from the campaign. http://features.csmonitor.com/politics/2008/09/16/is-fiorina-finished-two-big-mistakes-get-carly-in-trouble/

Ok, maybe I’m being a little harsh here, but it seems like she hasn’t done much of anything that anyone has liked. First, she was ousted from HP, then she was ousted from the McCain campaign. What exactly does she think she can bring to the party this time??

Job creation! (I think this should be the new definition of “creationism”.) Focusing on small businesses and entrepreneurs is the way to go. Make it easier to start a new business, she says! But how? The systems are so different depending on which state you’re in (clearly since Delaware is THE state to incorporate your business in while incorporating in California would subject you to expensive laws, regulations, and other terrible things). Maybe she and Meg Whitman should switch races…

Oh, and as a recent breast cancer survivor you better believe that the woman has some serious opinions on healthcare. Although, her problems seem to be more centered on leaving decisions in the hands of the patients and their doctors, ensuring better communication throughout the system, and lowering costs. Not that I have a problem with that, I think all of those things are important. However, lowering costs is never going to happen until you get the uninsured out of emergency rooms, and make preventative care more available. I also have a small problem with someone who received a $21 million severance package from HP telling me that she just had a typical experience in the healthcare system. Money may not be able to buy happiness, but it can certainly buy a better healthcare experience.
For more Carly info, check out her website: http://carlyforcalifornia.com/

Election 2009: Did We Really Care?

2009-11-04T09:18:00.000-08:00

I never know how to feel the day after an election. Nothing ever completely goes your way, something will go exactly how you wanted it to, but something else can just wipe that smile right off your face. The two most important races in yesterday’s election were: Proposition 1 in Maine and the Congressional seat in New York’s 23rd district.

Maine voters decided to reject a gay marriage bill signed into law only six months ago, once again outlawing same-sex marriage in yet another state. Gay marriage activists are officially 0 for 30 in these types of votes. http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1934432,00.html?xid=rss-topstories

In better news, New York’s 23rd district is officially out of the woods. (For now.) For me what makes New York’s 23rd district election interesting are two things:

1. A brand new party called “The Conservative Party of New York State” decided to insert their own candidate into the election even though The Republican Party already had a candidate Dede Scozzafava on the ballot. And,

2. The Conservative Party candidate Doug Hoffman took so much of Scozzafava’s base away from her that she actually dropped out of the race three days before the election (drama!!)!

So who is this “Conservative Party of New York State” (CPNYS) anyway? http://www.cpnys.org/ Not to be confused with the American Conservative Party http://www.theamericanconservatives.org/cms/ (Yup, I just figured that out the long way.) To make a long story short, the CPNYS wants to:
* Do away with most taxes
* “Reform” of Medicaid so it looks more like a private health insurance plan
* Have more charter schools
* Restore the death penalty in New York State
* Ban stem cell research
* Constitutionally define marriage as between one man and one woman
* Oppose any government mandate on health care
* Opposes casino gambling (how boring for them)
* And the public property that New York transferred to the United Nations? They would like that property back… please.

All this among other things, of course. Apparently, the problem with the Republican Party candidate, chosen by the Republican Party, was that she just wasn’t conservative enough. In fact, the American Conservative party called her, “an embarrassing, self-serving, union-supporting liberal… She is of questionable fitness to hold a seat in the House of Representatives, and definitely unfit to hold the line against government growth, spending, and abuse of power.” Actually the Conservative Party secretary Charlie Domino (was he a mob boss in his last life?) said that about her. Interesting since he worked for City of Houston Public Works department for twenty years and now has a rather nice pension (provided by the government) that many of us will never even get to dream of having. If you’re interested in how much his pension might be, Houston has a really nifty pension benefits calculator that you can play with here: https://login.hmeps.org/WebBenefitCalc/

Who else was proud to stump for the new Conservative Party candidate, Doug Hoffman? The likes of Sarah Palin, former Presidential Primary Candidate Fred Thompson, and Glenn Beck who Hoffman actually referred to as his “mentor” on Beck’s Fox News show. (Does anyone else find that terrifying?)

But I digress, yesterday the Conservative Party of New York found out if they have a leg to stand on. Can they actually compete with the Grand Old Party? So far it appears to be so. The Conservative Party candidate officially conceded to the Democratic Party candidate Bill Owens with 88% of precincts reporting, however Owens had 49% of the vote, Hoffman had 46% (still a respectable amount), and Scozzafava (who, yes you recalled correctly, isn’t even technically in the race anymore) had 6%. Sounds to me like even though they lost this one, the Conservative Party has a fighting chance, and given how they seem very excited about the right to bear arms, I won’t be surprised if they come out a fightin’ again.

Gavin Newsom: Over and Out

2009-11-01T13:03:00.000-08:00

Less than a month after an endorsement from former President Bill Clinton, Gavin Newsom officially dropped out of the California Governor's race on Friday. Mr. Newsom became a father (awww!) last month at age 42, and has cited his young family as well as his responsibilities at city hall as reasons he will not continue in the election. Forget the fact that Newsom had $1.2 million in his election fund at the end of the last reporting period to opponent Jerry Brown's $7.4 million, and I'm sure the twenty percent lead Brown had over him did not help either.

If you're uber curious to read his full statement: http://www.gavinnewsom.com/releases/statement_by_mayor_gavin_newsom, knock yourself out.

So who does that leave the Democrats to vote for in the primary? Jerry Brown or.... nobody. Sounds like June 8th is going to be a super exciting day to be a Democrat.

Although really, with all the problems facing California, I'm not really surprised that people seem to be shying away from running in the upcoming election. I mean, no sooner did we fix (hmmm... maybe "band aid" is a more appropriate term) the budget deficit, than we had another shortfall. That's right folks, only three months later we are already billions of dollars in the hole. By the time the fiscal year ends on June 30th, the new budget deficit for the current year will be approximately $7 billion. State Treasurer Bill Lockyer recently called the budget, "a train wreck" (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/01/us/01calif.html), a phrase that I personally believe should be reserved for anything that Michael Scott does.

Oh, but don't worry, there is a plan for shoring up at least part of the budget shortfall. The state is getting an interest free loan! I know what you're thinking: Who on earth would give a state who's bond rating is in the tank an interest free loan? Obama? Nope, we are! The California taxpayer! Darn, that's awfully nice of us. Funny how I don't remember anyone asking if that was ok with me though. Starting today, anyone who has taxes withheld from their paycheck (presumably anyone who gets a paycheck) is going to find that their net pay is just a little bit smaller. Starting this week, the withholding tax rate is increased to ten percent. http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-state-tax31-2009oct31,0,2028140.story?track=rss But don't worry, it's not technically an income tax increase, it's just a loan, so you'll get your money back after you file your taxes. That is, unless we have no cash again, in which case good luck with that I.O.U.

With issues like this, I'm not surprised that we seem to be lacking candidates for Governor of California, I'm actually surprised that anyone is running at all.

Healthcare: One Step Forward, Three Steps Back?

2009-10-28T08:21:00.000-07:00

The heathcare debate continues! As if it will ever end! To start, here is a link that everyone who is confused about the healthcare debate should read:
http://www.time.com/time/healthcaredebate

The final Senate bill was completed on Monday and is currently being analyzed by the CBO
(Congressional Budget Office) to determine the ultimate costs of the bill.

The completed bill, which is a combination of the Senate Finance Committee bill and the Senate Health Committee bill currently includes a public option with a provision that allows states to opt-out in case they want to continue to contribute to the incredibly disheartening budget deficit. Why on earth they would choose to opt-out, when nobody would be forced into the plan is anyone’s guess. This appears to be a move by Senator Harry Reid (Democratic Majority Leader in the Senate) to appease the moderates and conservatives who are vehemently against a public option. Of course, as noted in a Time article this week, fewer than 5% of Americans are expected to sign up for the public option. http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20091027/us_time/08599193239700

So the fight is on. Moderate Democrats are suggesting that perhaps a public option should only be available to states where only one or two insurers control the market and “premiums are high” (whatever that means), so the state would have to invite the federal government’s plan in, rather than opting out.

Meanwhile, the GOP has actually threatened to filibuster the bill on the Senate floor and will do so for any bill that contains a public option. (This could be political suicide considering the most recent polls: http://www.upi.com/Health_News/2009/10/27/Poll-Majority-favors-public-option/UPI-55041256619076/.) Independent Senator Joe Lieberman said yesterday that he would back a Republican filibuster of Reid’s healthcare bill.

And just when you thought it couldn’t get uglier, “anti-abortion activist Randall Terry is calling on people to burn effigies of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid this Halloween, as part of a ‘Burn in Hell’ video contest to protest the health care legislation in Congress.” http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091027/ap_on_go_co/us_health_overhaul_burn_in_hell. Wow. Do they not realize that abortions are covered by many private insurance companies? I mean, think about it, one procedure is a whole lot cheaper for an insurance company than pre-natal appointment after pre-natal appointment followed by the actual visit to the hospital to give birth. (Yes, I realize that was way harsh, but really people, we’re talking about Fortune 500 companies which had billions of dollars in profits in 2008, and they didn’t get there by not thinking about things like that.) Perhaps these people should be burning an effigy of Leonard Schaeffer (CEO of Wellpoint Health Networks, formerly Blue Cross/Blue Shield) as well?

Have a happy and safe Halloween everyone!

Proposition 8: One Year Later

2009-10-25T15:21:00.000-07:00

Almost a year after the passage of California’s Proposition 8, which outlawed same-sex marriage, the same fight is emerging for the Nov 3rd election in Maine. The election there is almost an exact replica of what happened in California last year.

Remember the cute couple who were worried about what their son was learning in school after gay marriage was legalized in Massachusetts? Well, after they moved from Massachusetts to California (only to discover that someone had given gays rights here too), they moved again to Maine! Now they’re running into the same gosh darn problem of those same-sex marriages. Maybe they should move to Alaska if they’re so worried about it. Oh, what’s that you say? They never moved out of Massachusetts!? Then why are they sticking their nose into my business?

Schubert Flint Public Affairs, the public relations firm hired to run the pro-Proposition 8 campaign has also been hired to run the campaign in Maine.

Meanwhile, has California forgotten about Proposition 8 already? Oh no, don’t worry, we have certainly not heard the last of this issue. Liberal advocacy group Courage Campaign is currently collecting signatures (and money) to put an initiative on the 2010 ballot to repeal Proposition 8. However, the major player on the anti-Proposition 8 side, Equality California, has announced that it will wait until 2012 to bring an initiative to California to legalize gay marriage and will spend the next three years on an extensive outreach campaign to educate Californians about the issue.

I’m oddly ok with the delay only because I am so tired of seeing ads (for and against the healthcare bill, for and against your favorite politicians, or for or against same-sex marriage) that make me want to break my TV. (It’s nice, it’s big, and I paid a lot of money for it so frankly, I prefer it remain intact.) So really, since 2012 is an election year anyway, and you can only imagine how ugly that’s going to get, you might as well throw in something else that gets everyone all worked up.

In a small win for same-sex marriage proponents, Governor Schwarzenegger recently signed a bill recognizing same-sex marriages performed in other states. Although the couples will not be considered technically “married” under the law, "the same legal protections available to couples that enter into civil unions or domestic partnerships in other states," Schwarzenegger wrote in his signing message. "In short, this measure honors the will of the people in enacting Proposition 8 while providing important protections to those unions legally entered into in other states." http://www.sacbee.com/capitolandcalifornia/story/2248216.html

In a small win for opponents of same-sex marriages, President Obama’s administration went to court to defend the federal Defense of Marriage Act just last month even though the President has stated that he personally opposes the statute and would support a repeal. The act (commonly referred to as DOMA) bars federal agencies (including the IRS) from recognizing same-sex marriages.

If you’d like to be able to follow this issue from afar, NPR has a very cool map showing all 50 states and their current laws related to gay marriage. It’s also interesting to see the issue from this perspective. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=112448663

Financial Regulation: It's What I Want!

2009-10-21T09:12:00.000-07:00

Let’s talk about money: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=insVgcOVVDQ&feature=related

Amid the highest unemployment rate since the great depression, an expected additional 11% drop in housing prices, and a 6.5% increase in tuition at public colleges, you have to wonder who’s looking out for Joe the Plumber (who we heard so darn much about during the election) these days?

Here are a few pieces of legislation that are en route to the floor of the congress:

- House Majority leader Rep Steny Hoyer (D-MD) plans to introduce legislation that would attack the controversial Wall Street practice of short selling. Short selling, the practice of borrowing a security and selling it with the expectation the price will go down, allows the borrower to go back into the market and buy it back at a lower price before returning the security to the owner thus making a profit. Short selling was banned briefly after the stock market tumble. While this doesn’t sound so terrible, what you may not be aware of is that brokerage houses can use their customers’ shares in short selling without their knowledge. Hoyer wants to ensure that brokers are disclosing when they are using customers’ shares for short selling, and that the customers are appropriately compensated. http://news.yahoo.com/s/cq/20091020/pl_cq_politics/politics3226440

- Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) is currently listening to arguments both for and against his bill, which would allow people forced into bankruptcy from medical bills to waive certain credit counseling requirements, would help them protect their homes from creditors, and give them the option of paying attorney fees at a later time. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091020/ap_on_go_co/us_bankruptcy_medical_bill

- Today, the House Financial Services Committee will vote on whether to establish the proposed Consumer Financial Protection Agency, and whether or not the agency will share regulatory power with individual states. The vote could potentially give states new authority to protect consumers through additional credit card and mortgage regulation. On the other hand, the bill also contains a provision through which banks could obtain exemptions from specific state laws if granted by federal regulators. (I’d love to know who will be granting those.) http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091020/ap_on_go_co/us_financial_overhaul

- Congress is looking to extend a new homebuyer tax credit past November, the original expiration date. According to the National Association of Realtors, “The housing market would not have moved without this tax credit.” So why on earth wouldn’t we want to extend it!? Since the initiation of the program back in February, the IRS has 107,000 questionable claims cases related to the tax credit and has uncovered 167 criminal schemes. Damned. http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091020/ap_on_go_co/us_tax_credit_problems

Well, I suppose all of those things are all well and good (or have the potential to be all well and good), but they feel like drops in a big, wide ocean of financial regulation mumbo-jumbo that don’t make much sense. I consider myself fairly well educated in the ways of the almighty dollar, but I have my doubts about whether or not I’ll be able to understand my mortgage even after all these fine laws are passed. Of course, that’s if I can even ever afford a mortgage at all. As always, thanks for your help Congress!

Know Your Future Governator: Gavin Newsom

2009-10-18T13:31:00.000-07:00

This week in Know Your Future Governator, meet Gavin Newsom!

As Mr. Newsom is the current Mayor of San Francisco and I have several pending job applications with the city and county of San Francisco, I am not considering myself to be independent and am thus providing you with an anti-blog. However, I certainly do not want to leave you in the dark about Mr. Newsom so here are a few links to get you started.

Official Website:
http://www.gavinnewsom.com/

Bill Clinton endorses Newsom:
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/lanow/2009/09/bill-clinton-supports-gavin-newsom-for-california-governor.html

Gavin’s Facebook Page:
http://www.facebook.com/GavinNewsom

Gavin Newsom T-Shirts:
http://www.gavinnewsomtshirts.com/

And lastly… is Mr. Newsom dropping out of the race???
http://www.queerty.com/is-gavin-newsom-already-dead-in-the-governors-water-20091007/

Happy reading!

Coming Back to Healthcare

2009-10-14T09:13:00.000-07:00

The big news in Congress this week? Healthcare! Glad I didn’t miss anything in the three weeks I was gone.

Yesterday, in a 14-9 vote, the Senate Finance Committee voted to approve the healthcare bill proposed by Senator Max Baucus. By far the most conservative of the bills passed by the various senate committees, the Finance Committee version does not contain a proposal for a public option and would impose fines on people who do not obtain health insurance.

Senator Harry Reid (D-NV), the Senate majority leader (who you can usually see putting the moves on Nancy Pelosi during their joint press conferences), plans to combine the Finance Committee bill with the more liberal Health Committee bill and the final version will come before the full senate (tentatively) the week of October 26th.

With the vote yesterday, healthcare reform is officially the farthest it’s ever been in the U.S. Government. Since FDR first proposed reform almost an entire century ago, the fact that there is about to be a real debate on the floor of the full Senate is practically a miracle.

On the other hand, if you thought it was ugly before, this is just the beginning. The Democratic leadership on the Finance Committee has pledged that a public option will be part of the combined bill, which as you might imagine, is going to send insurance companies and their lobbyists spinning.

Plan to see scary articles about how much your insurance costs will go up if a public option goes into play. Including the letter to the editor in the San Jose Mercury News last Sunday, entitled “Public option would merely shift costs”:
http://www.mercurynews.com/opinion/ci_13528549?nclick_check=1

Notice that the author of the letter is the CEO of the National Association of Health Underwriters Arlington, VA, the people who ultimately decide whether or not you are worthy of health insurance.

Oh, and don’t forget the study done by PricewaterhouseCoopers (sounds legit right?), paid for by health insurance companies which concludes that the costs to the average consumer for healthcare will skyrocket based on certain provisions in the Finance Committee bill. As it turns out, the study only looked at the four most costly provisions and did not include any analysis of the impact of new subsidies on insurance costs to households.
http://www.politico.com/livepulse/1009/PWC_statement__Not_so_helpful_for_AHIP.html

Expect to see a backlash from the other side also. Almost thirty unions are already running ads in your newspaper letting everyone know they are opposed to the Senate Finance Committee healthcare reform bill. Citing the lack of a public option and the tax on expensive policies, labor leaders plan to use the tag line “real health care reform and nothing less.”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091013/ap_on_go_co/us_health_overhaul_union_ad

Ringside Seats to Citizens United v. FEC

2009-09-16T11:27:00.000-07:00

We don’t hear much about the Supreme Court unless there’s a vacancy. Traditionally, the court usually chooses to not hear arguments for cases that truly contentious unless they absolutely have to. Or unless they feel like choosing the next president of the United States. Arguably the most powerful of the three branches of government, the buck does not stop with the President, but with the nine Supreme Court Justices who may strike down all those unconstitutional laws that Congress and State Legislatures seem so fond of passing.

Last week, in a rare special session, the Supreme Court heard more arguments in Citizens United v. FEC (Federal Election Commission). The case was initially heard last March, but apparently has been unable to reach a decision. Citizens United brought suit against the FEC when the FEC and a federal court blocked the airing of Hillary: The Movie during the 2008 election season. You should check out the trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BOYcM1z5fTs, it is pretty heinous.

The FEC believes that it had the right to block the airing of the politically charged movie because of language included in campaign finance reform laws passed in 2002 (popularly known as the McCain-Feingold law). In an attempt to prevent unions or corporations from having more of a voice in elections than the rest of us, the law stipulates that any biased election message, about a candidate, financed by a union or corporation, may not be broadcast within 30 days of a primary election or 60 days of a general election.

Seems fair, I guess. I mean, I certainly couldn’t finance the production of a 90 minute documentary about Hillary Clinton, or any other major politician for that matter so the producers, arguably, have more sway over the general public than I do. But is this stifling of freedom of speech?

Can I get a refresher on the 1st Amendment please? “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.” http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/bill_of_rights_transcript.html

Let’s do it again for good measure, “Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech.” I don’t believe it reads, “Congress shall make no law… abridging the freedom of speech unless you’re a union or a corporation.” Unless you’re going to argue that unions and corporations are not people, and the Constitution and the freedoms afforded therein only apply to individuals (While I’m sure there is a boatload of case law backing up that argument I, for one, am not going to go look for it otherwise I’d be here all week.)

For more fun reading on this issue, check out these articles:

http://www.economist.com/world/unitedstates/displayStory.cfm?story_id=14416613

http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/09/04/mears.election.laws.1/

Know Your Future Governator: Jerry Brown

2009-09-13T13:58:00.000-07:00

This week in Know Your Future Governator, meet Jerry Brown (although this guy, you probably already know)!

Mr. Brown has a rather interesting history, if I may say so myself. Born in San Francisco, he graduated from St. Ignatius High School, spent a year at Santa Clara University before answering God’s call to become a Jesuit Priest. Four years later, he went back to school at UC Berkeley and afterwards attended Yale Law. His political career looks something like this:

1969: Elected to Los Angeles Community College Board of Trustees
1970: Elected to be California’s Secretary of State
1974: Elected to be California’s Governor (Reelected in 1978.)
1982: Ran for U.S. Senate and lost to Pete Wilson, so he went to India to work with Mother Teresa
1989: Became Chairman of the State Democratic Party
1992: Ran for U.S. President against Bill Clinton in the Democratic primaries and won Maine, Colorado, Vermont, Connecticut, Utah and Nevada
1998: Elected to be Mayor of Oakland (Although I’m not sure he ever lived there before becoming Mayor. He was reelected in 2002.)
2006: Elected to be California State Attorney General

This is quite the record I have to admit. I know what you’re all thinking: What did he do as Governor of California in the 1970s? Most sources cite him as having a strong environmental record, including the creation of the California Conservation Corps by the former Governor and making the California Coastal Protection Act permanent law. He also takes credit on his campaign site (http://www.jerrybrown.org/about) for California producing 25% of the nation’s new jobs during his tenure. However, since that was the very beginning of the technology boom, I’m not sure I feel comfortable giving him all the kudos for that.

What I find the MOST interesting about Jerry Brown and his website, is the lack of information about the issues! If you check out his website, you’ll notice that it has more than you could ever possibly want to know about his political career and who Jerry Brown is, but zero information about his views on California’s budget crisis, the economy, the drought, or education.

Granted it is extremely early in election season, but what I find the most disturbing about this are the preliminary polls. You can find these on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_gubernatorial_election,_2010. Even with his lack of a plan, Mr. Brown appears to be the favorite in every single poll. I’m certainly not saying that he doesn’t have the potential to do great things, if you check out his “Fighting for You” tab on his Facebook page, http://www.facebook.com/jerrybrown#/jerrybrown?v=wall&viewas=0, it’s clear that he is all about reform. It would just be nice to know exactly what reforms we can look forward to (exactly what reforms we are in for), before we go to vote.

This Week in Health Care

2009-09-09T09:09:00.000-07:00

Now that Congress is back in session (yup, as of yesterday, we are all screwed), the only thing anyone is talking about is health care. So guess what we’re talking about today?

The general theme is the same, but the tune is wildly different depending on who you talk to. So here are all the things you should know about the health care debate right now:

* The plan emerging from the Senate Finance Committee would create nonprofit cooperatives to compete with insurance companies instead of a government-run insurance plan (We’re going to call this the Baucus plan after the Chairman of the committee Senator Max Baucus, Democrat from Montana. More on this plan in a few bullet points.) http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20090908/ts_nm/us_usa_healthcare

* Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), has declared that a public option health insurance plan is pretty much essential to the passage of the health care bill in the House of Representatives.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20090908/pl_afp/uspoliticshealthcareobamacongress

* The overview of the Baucus plan: The plan would cost approximately $900 billion over 10 years, paid for by Fees on insurance companies, drug makers, medical device manufacturers and insurers. Tax of 35 percent on insurance plans costing above $8,000 for individuals and $21,000 for families, applied to premium amounts over the threshold. Cuts to Medicare and Medicaid. A fee on employers whose workers receive government subsidies to help them pay premiums. Fines on those who fail to get coverage, up to $950 for individuals, $3,800 for families. Oh, and everyone HAS to get coverage otherwise you have to pay those fines. As an example, $950 fine for me would be cheaper than one year of premiums, so do I really have a strong incentive to get health care? Of course not, so in the end we'll still likely end up with large amounts of people uninsured.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090908/ap_on_go_co/us_health_care_glance

If you’re interested in what the president has to say (although after the whole speech to schoolchildren debacle I’m starting to think most people aren’t… how sad when people will no longer show any respect at all to the nation’s highest office), President Obama will be addressing the country tonight and afterwards, “the country will know exactly what he thinks is the solution to controlling spiraling health care costs.” http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090908/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_obama_health_care_speech

Also, for an interesting article from The Economist comparing the state of health care in the U.S. to that of health care in Britain, check this out: http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=14258877.

Know Your Future Governator: Tom Campbell

2009-09-06T14:37:00.000-07:00

This week in Know Your Future Governator, meet Tom Campbell!

Currently a visiting professor at the Chapman University (Hey I went there!) School of Law, Campbell has a long history in politics, serving five terms as a Representative in the United States Congress and spent one year as the Director of Finance for the state of California from 2004-2005, the last year that the state balanced the budget without additional taxes, borrowing or dipping into reserves.

Campbell has a PhD in Economics (something that gives me a warm fuzzy feeling) from the University of Chicago and his JD from Harvard (ok, we get it, you’re a smart dude). He served as a clerk to Supreme Court Justice Byron White and was mentored by Milton Friedman. Campbell taught law at Stanford University for five years, and was also Dean of the UC Berkeley Haas School of Business for five years.

Ok, with a record like that how is this guy not 105 years old? Clearly, I think we can all agree that he is well qualified. If you’re not appropriately impressed by the short list that I have presented here, feel free to check out the full list at his website:
http://www.campbell.org/meet-tom/campbell-record

Now for the important stuff!

While Tom lists out several of his platforms individually, I am going to lump a few of them together because otherwise, 1) this will get extremely convoluted and repetitive and 2) I will be late for a barbeque and I’m getting hungry.

On the budget & tax reform: First, CA should be able to pass a budget with a simple majority (YES PLEASE!) provided expenditures have not increased more than inflation and population growth from the prior year. A greater increase should require 2/3 of the votes. Also, if the budget deadline passes and no budget has been agreed upon, we need a provision to continue the previous year’s budget so state citizens do not go without necessary services. Don’t forget the old Republican mantra: no new taxes. In fact, Campbell wants to lower taxes by constraining spending. How does he plan to do that? The infamous line-item veto. I have to say, I do not feel comfortable that a Governor can go through a budget passed by my state representative and cut out certain things that HE (and maybe not anyone else) thinks are unnecessary. Last, but certainly not least, Tom wants to completely overhaul our income tax system and make the state income tax a straight percentage of whatever you pay in federal income taxes. Hmmmm…..

On growing the CA economy, innovation and competitiveness: Campbell believes that it should be written into state law that mortgage writers and lenders in CA have to offer the best terms available to the purchaser, rather than the most lucrative. (Good luck convincing all the legislators’ bank buddies to go along with that.) To preserve California’s innovation and competitive edge, Tom is strongly against cutting any more into education, including K-12, community college, and the UC and state school. (I think I love this guy.)

On education: See above! He also suggests programs to increase parental involvement and mentorship such as one that is currently implemented between the Haas School of Business and the city of Oakland. He also cites a Pleasanton program which embeds character education into the curriculum as a way to keep public school’s safe. To attract and retain good teachers, he suggests relaxing the certification standards so professionals with masters or doctorate degrees could also be eligible to teach elementary or secondary schools. Also, he wants to increase bonuses for good teachers and reduce class sizes even further.

On immigration: Besides imposing severe sanctions on employers who hire illegal immigrants, Campbell wants to implement an e-verify system to make it easier for employers to ensure that their employees are legal. With the system, an employer can simply log in and make sure that the employee’s name matches the social security number he or she gave.

On water: Clearly, we need more storage water to buffer California when we are in serious drought (like right now). He does not claim to have all the answers on this issue, but believes that we can solve this problem by possibly raising dams, developing on-stream storage, and recharging aquifers. He also suggests desalination, which is currently too expensive because of the high amounts of energy needed. Campbell believes that California should lead the way in designing innovative solutions to solve this problem using alternative energy sources as well as finding new ways to desalinate ocean water without harming the environment.

I confess, I never thought these words would come out of me when discussing a political candidate, but this guy really seems to have a plan. I strongly suggest checking out his website www.campbell.org, if you’re even remotely interested because I only skimmed the surface here. He goes into great detail on all the issues including exactly what he sees as the problem and what he thinks could be a possible solutions. Happy reading!

The Tenthers

2009-09-02T09:19:00.000-07:00

I don’t know about you, but I am sick of health care. I’m tired of hearing about it; I’m tired of arguing about it. I don’t see why we’re making such a big, hairy deal out of having a public option. Keyword: option, it’s not a takeover. All I can say is that when a mother can’t get health insurance for her 15 month old baby because he’s needed two heart surgeries since he was born and will likely need another one, and we’re actually arguing over whether or not we need a public option in this country, we have clearly lost all of our compassion and humanity.

So instead of talking about health care, which is the only thing congress is talking about this week, we’re going to talk about a small movement that some liberals have fondly nicknamed the “tenthers” (like the birthers, I know, sad attempt at political humor).

To make a long story short, tenthers basically believe that President FDR illegally expanded the federal government’s power to unconstitutional levels by instituting programs such as Social Security. According to tenthers Social Security and other programs, like Medicare, Medicaid, federal education funding, the Veterans Affairs health system and the G.I. bill are all illegal under the 10th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution.

What exactly does the 10th Amendment say you ask? Boy, I’m glad you did (happy to facilitate a U.S History 101 course). The 10th Amendment states, “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.” Now, I know what you’re thinking: What the hell does that mean?

Basically, (in my own non-legal terms) the 10th Amendment is to ensure that the states retain their sovereignty, autonomy, and basic rights and that the federal government only retains control over powers specifically mentioned in the constitution. Tenthers argue that since the constitution does not specifically mention health care, Medicare, Medicaid and the possible public option, are all illegal. However, the Commerce Clause of the constitution gives congress the power to regulate interstate commerce and is broadly interpreted to give Congress the power to implement all these programs.

Historically, the Supreme Court rarely finds laws unconstitutional for violating the 10th Amendment, and the opinions tend to be only cases when the federal government has attempted to force participation of the state.

Now, do I think that these tenthers have a point? Well, no, not really. But, I do think that our federal government is out of control big. I’m not going to lie, I don’t have a solution, but I actually agree that we could probably stand to do away with a federal program or two and let the states handle it if they see fit. I just really wish these people could find a better (dare I say more thought out?) way to express that idea.

Know Your Future Governator: Steve Poizner

2009-08-30T06:51:00.000-07:00

This week in Know Your Future Governator, meet Steve Poizner!

Currently Mr. Poizner is our elected Insurance Commissioner and, as such, oversees everything insurance in our great state of California from car insurance to health insurance (yipes, I see this getting ugly). Mr. Poizner is also a very successful businessman and entrepreneur. His latest company SnapTrack established the great idea of putting GPS receivers into cell phones so you won’t get lost as long as you have your phone.

Now for the juicy stuff, the issues! Steve’s pet issues include economic growth, education, government reform, water and fiscal accountability.

Straight from the Steve Poizner for Governor website: http://stevepoizner.com/

On economic growth: Mr. Poizner believes we must overhaul our tax and regulatory structure. Currently, California is ranked as one of the worst states to do business in.

On education: Apparently Mr. Poizner spent a year teaching at a public school so he considers himself an expert on the subject. (Wow, a whole year! Don’t hurt yourself!) He believes that we should shift control of the classroom, facilities and budget back to the local level to improve accountability as well as grade-level proficiency.

On government reform: It appears that Steve wants to completely dismantle the current structure in Sacramento (with its 300 boards and commissions, 11 agencies, and 79 departments) and rebuild it to be more efficient. His most specific suggestion for reform: a part time legislature. Rather than having full time assembly-people and representatives, make them part time. Giving them less time to pass laws will focus their efforts on what’s truly important and giving them less money will give them incentive to have other, “real world” jobs so they can actually appreciate their constituents’ issues.

On water: I’m glad Steve brought this up; I think this is one of the more important, but least discussed issues facing our state today. His long term policy solutions of empowering local agencies to innovate or build new infrastructure and increasing surface and groundwater storage to provide stability during droughts are all well and good. But, I’m not going to lie, two of his short term solutions make me cringe. 1) Calling for the “flexible” application of the endangered species act during times of drought. I’m still not sure how that would actually help our water problem. 2) Utilizing the governor’s executive power to get water where it needs to go. Personally, I am highly suspicious of any policy that gives one person all the power.

On fiscal accountability: The only thing I actually got out of this section was that, well, we need it. Thank you Captain Obvious. The other interesting statistic he cites is that the CA legislature approved a tax increase for 95% of Californians. While this sounds terrible, I’m pretty sure he’s talking about the temporary 1% sales tax increase passed in the original budget for the year (back in Feb/March of 2009) which is scheduled to expire on July 1, 2011. But I do generally agree, yay for fiscal accountability.

Again, what does this sound like?

“I will not fail you. I will not disappoint you. And I will not let you down. For two months, I've been speaking out about the needs of bringing back fiscal responsibility to this state, bringing back the positive business atmosphere, bringing back businesses, bringing back jobs, and bringing back our education.” -Governor Schwarzenegger in his 2003 victory speech.

So Mr. Poizner, let’s talk…

HOW will you overhaul our tax and regulatory structure. I agree it needs to be done, but what exactly will you be changing?

HOW are we going to shift back control of our classrooms to the local level and still ensure that poor and underprivileged areas get the resources they need to give those kids the education they deserve? (I’m assuming that when you shift control back to the local level you shift the funding back to the local level also.)

WHAT makes you think that by calling legislators “part-time” will make them run out and get another, regular part time job? As of 2007, CA legislators make the most money of any state legislature (followed by Michigan, the only state which seems to be doing worse than California). http://www.empirecenter.org/html/legislative_salaries.cfm Even if you halved their salaries (which I doubt they would be too keen on and I’m pretty sure they would have a vote in the approval process), they would still be making over $55,000 a year. For something really nifty, check this out: http://www.capitolweekly.net/salaries/index.php?_c=y8cnuzmg4kh5nt

HOW do you plan to convince the rest of Sacramento to go along with your government reforms?

Reappointing Ben Bernanke

2009-08-26T09:25:00.000-07:00

It is a basic rule of economics that the markets abhor uncertainties. In ambiguous times, the markets will do wild and unpredictable things, swinging one way and then another. In fact, you could even argue that, when it comes to economic markets, uncertainty begets uncertainty. And then it all just gets crazy out of control!

In a show of certain certainty and unambiguous un-ambiguity, President Obama nominated Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke to a second term at the Federal Reserve yesterday.

The markets, of course, love it. Or they at least don’t hate it. And why would they? We’re talking about a Fed Chairman who threw billions of dollars at failing institutions like AIG and Bank of America, leading to announcements of $1.8 billion in quarterly profits at AIG only a few weeks ago, and $4 billion in profits for 2008 at Bank of America. Sure, sounds absolutely ducky for Wall Street. Back here at the corner of Main Street and Taking-It-Up-The-Ass-Between-Bank-Fees-And-Healthcare Street, national unemployment is still at an almost all time high of 9.4% for July 2009, we’ve lost almost 2.9 million jobs in the last six months alone, and GDP has declined in all three of the preceding quarters.

Do I agree that it appears as if the “Great Recession” (totally lame name if you ask me) is drawing to a close and the economy may even turn around sometime soon? Sure, it looks like that could possibly be the case. (I am feeling awfully optimistic today though. Try me again in a few days and I may have changed my mind.) Am I going to give Chairman Bernanke credit for steering us out of this mess and keeping us out of another Great Depression like everyone else seems to be doing? God no. (I said I was feeling optimistic, not that I was feeing nice.)

What prevented a run on the banks this time around? Don’t get me wrong, we came close, but the public still had confidence (see paragraph #1) in a very important institution: the FDIC. No matter how bad it got, we always believed that we could get our money back. So do I think that Chairman Bernanke prevented the failure of so many banks and kept the economy from totally tanking? No, I think that credit should go to the consumer and its confidence in the FDIC. Thank you FDR and the 73rd congress.

For these very reasons, as it turns out, some people in Congress are less than thrilled by his reappointment also. However, the senate will, more than likely, reconfirm Chairman Bernanke for the standard reasons:

You don’t change horses in midstream.
Better safe than sorry.
Don’t rock the boat.
Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t.

Should we look forward to four more years of Bernanke? Or should we take the Senator Ron Paul (L-TX) approach who said about the reappointment, “Chairman Bernanke’s reappointment is rather irrelevant. Our current monetary system is unmanageable, and changing the individual in control will not change the long-term outcome.”

To read a more scandalous (scathing) article on the Federal Reserve, check this out: http://www.minyanville.com/articles/fed-bernanke-bubble/index/a/24208

Know Your Future Governator: Meg Whitman

2009-08-23T17:28:00.000-07:00

Welcome to the Know Your Future Governator series. The five part series (for now) will cover the five candidates who have more or less thrown their hats into the ring for the California Governor’s race of 2010.

So far the candidates are:

For the Dems: Gavin Newsom and Jerry Brown
For the Reps: Meg Whitman, Steve Poizner, and Tom Campbell

This week in Know Your Future Governator, meet Meg Whitman!

Most well-known as the former CEO of eBay, Ms. Whitman took the company from a 30 person start up to a major internet corporation with over 15,000 employees. Since her resignation in November 2007, she has been actively involved in the political arena.

As a former consultant of Bain & Company, Whitman supported former Bain & Company CEO Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign in 2008 and was on his “National Finance Team”. After Romney left the race and endorsed Senator John McCain, Whitman followed suit and joined the McCain presidential campaign as a national co-chair, even giving a speech at the 2008 Republican National Convention.

Check out her speech on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWuL_SgdQww

So where is Meg on the issues? Her three major platforms appear to be jobs, spending and education (I’d like to give her an air-five for at least making education a priority before I even start tearing anything apart).

Straight from the Meg Whitman for Governor website: http://www.megwhitman.com/index.php

On jobs: Ms. Whitman says that she will 1) Streamline the permitting and approval processes to make it easier for businesses to expand or locate in California 2) Eliminate inefficient and unnecessary regulations that increase business costs, decrease competitiveness and threaten California jobs and 3) Lower taxes to give businesses the incentive to invest, innovate, hire more workers and prosper

On spending: she promises to 1) Commit to at least $15 billion in savings and efficiencies within 4 years 2) End runaway spending by implementing a sustained government spending freeze 3) Reduce the size of government while making it more responsive and productive

On education: Meg claims that she can 1) Give students and parents more choice and control by expanding charter schools 2) Reward success by giving more pay to high-performing teachers 3) Make California’s schools the nation’s leaders in Math, Science and the other bedrock skills needed to succeed in the 21st century economy

This is all very well and good and everything, but sounds like politics as usual. Take a look back to Arnold’s victory speech when he won the special election against Gray Davis in 2003:

“I will not fail you. I will not disappoint you. And I will not let you down. For two months, I've been speaking out about the needs of bringing back fiscal responsibility to this state, bringing back the positive business atmosphere, bringing back businesses, bringing back jobs, and bringing back our education.”

And how has that worked out for us?

On the other hand, Meg Whitman has something the current governator was seriously lacking when he first took the job: managerial experience. She did amazing things for eBay and I have no doubt that Ms. Whitman could run our state government just as well as the next guy (or gal).

For now though, while there’s still some competition out there, I ask that she get specific.

HOW are you going to streamline the permitting and approval processes to make it easier for businesses to expand or locate in California? Which regulations will get cut to eliminate inefficient and unnecessary regulations that increase business costs, decrease competitiveness and threaten California jobs?

HOW will you reduce the size of government while making it more responsive and productive?

HOW will “success” be measured in order to reward teachers and increase their pay?

HOW can we make California’s schools the nation’s leaders in Math, Science and the other bedrock skills needed to succeed in the 21st century economy?

The Christian Mafia - Sending us to Swim with the Fishes?

2009-08-19T10:35:00.000-07:00

And today, something more than just a little creepy.

After the extramarital affairs of Senator John Ensign (R – NV), Former Congressman Chip Pickering (R – MS), and Former Senator (current Governor) Mark Sanford (R – SC) came to light, people have become more curious about the link between them all – C Street House.

So what is this place anyway? A house run by, and lived in by members of a Christian Conservative organization that calls itself “The Family” (or sometimes "The Christian Mafia"). The members historically include at least a dozen Congressmen at any one time. Currently, Joe Pitts (R-Penn.), Frank Wolf (R-Va.), Zach Wamp (R-Tenn.), Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), Ander Crenshaw (R-Fla.), Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), Jo Ann Emerson (R-Mo.), and John R. Carter (R-Texas) are all residents of the C Street House.

According to Jeff Sharlet, author of The Family, “[The Family is] the oldest Christian Conservative organization in Washington and it goes back seventy years to when the founder believed that God gave him a new revelation saying that Christianity had gotten it wrong for 2,000 years. And that what most people think of as Christianity as being about helping the weak and the poor and the meek and the down and out, he believes that God came to him one night in April 1935 and said what Christianity should really be about is building more power for the already powerful. And that these powerful men, who are chosen by God, can then, if they want to, dispense lessons to the rest of us through kind of trickle down fundamentalism.”

To see more of the disturbing interview, go here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iGWu-kBLDu8

The Family also organizes the National Prayer Breakfast held on the first Thursday in February each year under the name “The Fellowship Foundation”. The National Prayer Breakfast is widely attended by most members of Congress, the President (who is also usually a speaker), and many foreign diplomats. Read more about Abraham Vereide who initiated the prayer breakfast idea, and is the founder of International Christian Leadership, The Family, and The Fellowship Foundation (technically all the same organization) here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Vereide.

Let’s also not forget that the C Street House is actually owned by yet another organization, Youth With a Mission, who aren’t actually youth as far as I can tell. The group, who charges far less than market value for rent on the C Street House (seriously, these guys are paying even less than half of what I pay for rent on my apartment), has recently gone public with plans for Christian world control. Oh, how I wish I were kidding. The Youth With a Mission founder, Loren Cunningham, explains the 7 mountains of culture and how Christians must reclaim all 7 mountains in this video: http://www.reclaim7mountains.com/.

So you tell me, is fostering members of The Family within their own enclave part of reclaiming one of the mountains of culture? Because that’s certainly what it looks like from where I’m sitting.

And The Race Is On!

2009-08-16T17:29:00.000-07:00

Well folks, it’s about that time. The California gubernatorial election will soon be upon us, and candidates have begun to throw their hats into the ring. (Yay! Elections and mudslinging! Can’t you just not wait!?) Primary elections for both of the major parties will be held on June 8, 2010 and the general election will take place on November 2, 2010.

Now keep in mind that the nomination papers that a candidate has to file to run in the primary elections are not due until March 12 of next year, and for independents to run in the general election nomination papers are not due until August 6 of next year, so the following list has the potential to change dramatically. However, as it stands now, the major players in the gubernatorial election are:

For the Democrats:
Gavin Newsom – Mayor of San Francisco
Jerry Brown – Attorney General and former Governor of CA (1975-1983)

For the Republicans:
Meg Whitman – former CEO of eBay has formally announced her candidacy
Steve Poizner – Insurance Commissioner has formed an exploratory committee
Tom Campbell – former Congressman has formed an exploratory committee

Over the next few (five, give or take candidates entering and leaving the race) Sundays, I’ll be posting blogs about each of the candidates to help you learn about their political platforms and issues, as well as any important history.

Speaking of history… an interesting side note and FYI: the CA Governor is prohibited from serving more than two terms, but Jerry Brown is exempt from the rule because the term-limit rule only applies to terms served after 1990. Way to sneak in under the wire Mr. Brown!

Please feel free to comment and let me know what issues are important to you in this election, but here are my top five:

1. The Budget. Duh. Somebody needs to get this thing under control already. Be it through amending the constitution to do something about Proposition 13 (1978) (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/California_Proposition_13_(1978)), or fixing that whole 2/3 vote needed to pass the budget or increase taxes, or some other fancy-shmancy thing that I haven’t thought of. The California budget is a problem, and it will continue to be a problem until somebody makes some fundamental changes to the system. Let’s do it!

2. Education. According to http://www.statemaster.com/state/CA-california/edu-education we rank 49th in percentage of students above a basic reading level in 4th and 8th grades (they wouldn’t be able to read and understand this blog), are 46th on the best educated index, and are 46th in the total number of teachers per capita. We spend more actual dollars and have more students enrolled in public schools than other state in the union and we are currently doing them a huge disservice because we don’t seem to be actually educating them.

3. It’s the economy, stupid! With the state unemployment rate pushing 12%, we are in some dire straits. Do I think the state government should be employing all those people? Oh hell no! (As if our budget problem wasn’t bad enough? I’m sure employing all those people would help a lot!) But, the government can help the private sector create jobs here through tax incentives, making it easier to incorporate or start a business here, and (as much as I heart the environment) getting rid of some of the ridiculous regulations that make it incredibly expensive to do business in California. Check this out to see what I mean: http://www.calchamber.com/GovernmentRelations/BusinessIssues/Pages/Environmental.aspx.
4. The Prison System. The current budget for the CA Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation is approximately $11 billion even while the CA state prisons are operating at 200% of their capacity. How should we fix this one? Shit, I have no idea. Maybe if we did a better job educating our population (see #2) or giving them something to do (see #3), we wouldn’t all become criminals? Just a thought.

5. Immigration. I know, the dreaded “I” word that nobody ever wants to talk about. But let’s be real for a minute, I’m going to go out on a limb and say that most, if not all, of the above issues would be a little bit better (not fixed, mind you, but better) if we could get our immigration issue under control. According to http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/immigrationnaturalizatio/a/caillegals.htm, in 2004 illegal immigration costs California approximately $10.5 billion per year. Yikes. Again, do I have any idea how to fix the problem? Not really. I don’t think that an extra tall fence or vigilante justice are the answer, but neither is complete amnesty for those already here.

Can anyone out there help us? Find out over the next five weeks!

Healthcare Gets Personal

2009-08-11T22:55:00.000-07:00

This week, for me, healthcare got personal. Really, really personal.

As I am currently self-employed (or unemployed as the naysayers choose to call me), I am now in charge of obtaining my own individual health insurance. Let me walk you through the circus that was applying for health insurance:

June 26th: My last day at Deloitte. Thanks again to everyone who came to my party; that was a good time!

June 30th: My employer sponsored healthcare expires. I’m busy writing my book (John’s Symphony, coming soon) so I ignore it for now.

July 16th: Oh crap, I need to get on that whole healthcare thing. I spend four hours filling out an application for PacifiCare, the individual health insurance company under the United Health Group umbrella. I had been very happy with my United Healthcare insurance that I had through Deloitte, so I think this is a safe bet.

July 21st: I get a phone call from the mysterious underwriters of the insurance I am applying for. They have some questions about my application. We go through their questions, which are the exact same questions that I answered on the application (so underwriters can’t read?). At the end of the conversation, I ask when I can expect to hear back from them. They say they have to request my medical records from my doctor.

July 27th: I’ve heard nothing and have been uninsured for almost a month. I call the number on the PacifiCare website, and am shuffled around to no less than five different customer service representatives until finally, someone tells me that they’re still waiting on my medical records. I call my doctor to see what the holdup is. Turns out it takes them about two weeks to process those requests. Yikes.

August 10th: It’s been more than two weeks and I’m wondering what the heck is going on. My eligibility to apply for Cobra expires on the 29th, which is coming up soon. I check my mailbox and have a letter waiting for me from PacifiCare letting me know that I have been denied insurance for the following reasons:

Asthma, Elevated Cholesterol.

Imagine my surprise at being denied health insurance for two medical issues that I’m not even being treated for currently because my doctor doesn’t think they’re a problem. As I told the underwriters, I’ve never had an asthma attack and never been hospitalized. Ever. In fact, I ran a half-marathon not six months ago. Yet for some reason, even though I share similar conditions with 20 million Americans who are asthmatic and with 47.7% of American women who have total cholesterol levels over 200 mg/dL, I am somehow a high enough insurance risk that they won’t even cover me?! Do they cover anyone!?

See http://www.aafa.org/display.cfm?id=8&sub=42 for asthma statistics and http://www.americanheart.org/presenter.jhtml?identifier=4506 for cholesterol statistics.

Do they have the right to deny me? As a private sector company, absolutely. Ironically though, if I end up on Cobra the same umbrella company is still insuring me. Either way I am, apparently, still a risk to them. So what is going on here?!

I have a theory, and by all means, please let me know what you think.

Under the PacifiCare individual plan, my premiums would be $86 (not adjusted for premium increases for preexisting conditions). Under Cobra, my premiums would be $353 (which, as a person with $0 in income, I totally cannot afford). Either way those dollars eventually end up at the same company, United Healthcare. Which plan do you think they would prefer me to be on?

Still think our healthcare system isn't broken?

Viva Las Vegas!

2009-08-09T17:39:00.000-07:00

Last weekend I went to Las Vegas. I had a fantastic time. Being an adult and with a group of people who have respectable incomes lends itself to having fun in Vegas. While I was in sin city, it occurred to me (on a slightly inebriated elevator ride) that being in Vegas is an awful lot like being in politics.

For example, when you first show up in Vegas it’s bright and shiny and exciting. Much like politics where, at first, everything is new and different and you really believe that you can make a difference. After a few days, you come to realize that, during the day, Vegas is literally hell on earth at a dry, dusty, miserable scorching 104 degrees. Politics also can be a hell on earth, with endless meetings, presentations, lobbyists, caucuses, committee meetings, people who want favors, people you already owe favors to, press conferences, and did I mention meetings? It is no wonder that most politicians not only don’t write their own bills (clearly that work is done by their highly underpaid staffers), but they don’t usually read the whole 1,000-2,000 page bills that they vote on.

Also, in Las Vegas, as I just discovered last weekend, you have the potential to win big or go home a big, fat loser. My good friend taught me how to play and bet on blackjack, and by the end of the weekend I came home with extra money in my pocket! It was amazing! It’s exactly the same in politics. When a politician is first elected, they (theoretically) have the political capital to win big. Of course, if the bill or program that they propose goes down in flames or ends up being an economic drain then they too can go home angry and defeated, maybe even losing their reelection.

Don’t forget that Vegas (and politics) costs money to get there! Plane tickets to Vegas are among the only flights whose prices have not gone down during the current recession and forget about how much it costs to stay in a hotel on the actual Vegas strip. You also must factor in the fact that us girls have to take cabs to get anywhere (we definitely aren’t walking in our four inch stiletto heels), drinks will cost you an arm and a leg (or your first born whichever you’re more willing to part with), and if you’re going to gamble then you should pretty much be prepared to kiss all that money good-bye. This is just like running for office! McCain and Obama spent outrageous amounts of money in the last election: $333 million and $730 million, respectively. It’s not as if they can use that money for anything other than gambling on themselves in the presidential election. Historically speaking, he (or she) who spends the most money wins and gets to keep playing. (www.opensecrets.org)

Just like someone in Las Vegas, politicians must maintain their composure at all times. Girls: you must look great at all times, and wearing dresses that short means you can’t get too drunk otherwise you may flash everyone at the party on accident. Guys: never, ever run out of cash or you too may get caught unable to buy your girlfriend of the evening a drink (or a cab ride back to the hotel), also, don’t freak out when you lose all your money gambling. We expect our politicians to keep it together constantly. You think you’re getting away with that extramarital affair? HA! Our presidents must be tough on terrorism, but compassionate on human rights issues; politicians must not be seen as flip-floppers, but are forced into compromise by the very nature of their positions; they must be good to their families, but should spent almost all of their time working for their constituents.

So, like I was saying, being in politics is a bit like going to Las Vegas. Exciting and glamorous (and expensive) at first, but after a little while you become jaded, calloused, and are totally broke.

I Love a Good Protest

2009-08-05T15:13:00.000-07:00

Each August, Congress takes a month long recess. Most years, congressmen take this opportunity to go on vacation or simply hang out back at home. This year, President Obama has asked Congress to take the health care issue to the people. Many congressmen are finding out how people feel about the problem in the form of town hall events.

Many of these town halls, which have been held already in Florida, New York, Georgia, Texas, Wisconsin, and Ohio, are being disrupted by angry protestors.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sEH9M0Wgvzc&NR=1&feature=fvwp

Don’t get me wrong, I’m all about a good old fashioned protest when it has the potential to be productive. However, these protests appear to be designed to not let supporters of the health care bill have a voice or just to scare the crap out of their elected officials.

http://www.miamiherald.com/news/breaking-news/story/1172648.html

http://news.yahoo.com/s/bloomberg/20090805/pl_bloomberg/a8lefaompeb0_1

We’ve actually resorted to hanging effigies of our Representatives? Wow.

The saddest part of this issue, for me, is that the whole point of a town hall meeting is to hear all sides of the story. If you disagree with how your representative is voting, then go, present your argument, and we can have an honest debate about the issue. Yelling and screaming over someone who actually has something to say or an important question is rude, childish, and, as far as I can tell, is disrupting someone’s right to freedom of speech. (Read the constitution recently? I’m pretty sure the First Amendment is still in effect.)

One representative, Rep. Tim Bishop (D-NY), has even suspended town hall meetings after residents called the Suffolk County Police to escort him back to his car through a large crowd of rowdy protestors.

The group that appears to be behind many of the disruptions is known as the Tea Party Patriots. If you happen to be all about interrupting town hall meetings and want more information here’s the website: http://teapartypatriots.org/HC.aspx

On a completely different note, if you’ve heard that by signing up for the Cash for Clunkers program the federal government will be granted access to your computer and files, it is absolutely not true.

But just for grins, here’s a link to the original story (which does sound pretty terrifying when you first watch it): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bWs12ccbOiE

Here’s a link to the myth debunking website Snopes: http://www.snopes.com/computer/internet/clunkers.asp

What's Up With This Health Care Thing Anyway?

2009-07-29T10:09:00.000-07:00

Health care.

I feel like this must be the single-most confusing issue in politics today. First of all, what does “universal health care” actually mean? It sounds like everyone has to be covered since it’s universal. Secondly, what would this universal health care system actually cover? As someone in the process of applying for independent health insurance (which is no walk in the park let me tell you), I can barely figure out what’s going to be covered under the plan I just applied for! With terms like “high-deductible”, “coinsurance percentage”, “copay”, “professional fees”, “lifetime maximum”, and “outpatient lab fees” is it any surprise that a well-educated, fairly smart (okay, maybe I’m flattering myself with that one) person can’t even figure out how much she’ll have to pay when she goes to the doctor?

To shed a very small amount of light on the issue, here are some Wikipedia definitions for you:

Universal health care: Health care coverage for all eligible residents of a political region and often covers medical, dental and mental health care. These programs vary in their structure and funding mechanisms. Typically, most costs are met via a single-payer health care system or national health insurance, or else by compulsory regulated pluralist insurance (public, private or mutual) meeting certain regulated standards. Universal health care is implemented in all but one of the wealthy, industrialized countries, with the one exception being the United States. It is also provided in many developing countries and is the trend worldwide.

Single-payer health care system: Is a term used in the United States to describe the payment of doctors, hospitals, and other health care providers from a single fund. It differs from typical private health insurance where, through pricing and other measures taken by the insurer, the level of risks carried by multiple insurance pools as well as the coverage can vary and the pricing has to be varied according to the contribution of risk added to the pool.

Now, I may be going out on a limb here, but I don’t think anyone would argue that having a public option would be a bad thing. It’s just another option in the big pool of competition out there. Last time I checked, most Americans were down with the free market economy. If the government wants to play too, let them. Heck, if they could make as much money off of us as most insurance companies do (during their last fiscal year United Health Group showed Net Income of $3 billion, Aetna Inc. had Net Income of $1.4 billion, eHealth Inc. showed Net Income of $14.2 million, and Humana Inc. with Net Income of $647.2 million) we definitely wouldn’t be quite so in debt to China. At the very least, you have to admit that those net income numbers really don’t make it look like we’re in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

But I digress. There’s competition and plenty of money to be made in the health insurance industry which is something that it seems all Americans can get behind, since we’re already behind it, in the system we have.

The real problem is that the government wants to provide an affordable option (heaven forbid), and nobody can agree on how to pay for it. One solution is to tax the highest wage earners. Don’t quote me on this, but I believe this is people/couples who make over $350,000 a year. Frankly, and I know a few of you will have a heart attack at me for saying so, but I certainly feel like they can afford it. Another proposed solution is to tax health benefits that Americans receive from their employers. This one made me cringe at first too, but I’m not sure it’s actually as bad as it sounds.

In theory, because health care isn’t taxed, it’s effectively on sale and because of that people will tend to buy more than what they need. Because of the excess of money spent on health insurance, no effort is made on the part of the insurance companies to control costs or root out inefficiencies or waste. Oddly enough, it seems that liberals and conservatives all agree that this option would be the most effective to pay for a government health care option. But, you better believe that it’ll be a whole lot harder to be re-elected with a tax hike on health care on their record.

John Kerry (we all remember him, right?), the Democratic Senator from Massachusetts has proposed a health care tax that puts the burden directly on the insurance companies. While it’s questionable that the proposal would actual cover the cost of the plan, I kind of like the idea of sticking it to the insurers. http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/29/business/economy/29leonhardt.html

Of course, let’s not forget that although many ideas, proposals and even bills are floating around both the House and the Senate, nothing has formally passed either part of Congress, and saying that you are either for or against the universal health care plan is a little premature since there technically isn't one quite yet.

California Has a Budget! But Only For Now...

2009-07-26T15:24:00.000-07:00

On Friday, July 24, pigs learned to fly. Not really, but the California state legislature finally passed a budget, which seems like pretty much the same thing.

The winners:

* People who were being paid in IOUs. As you might’ve read in my previous blog, this was mainly small business owners with large state contracts. Although they may still have to wait to redeem their IOUs, they will be receiving cash from now on.

* The California state legislators. After almost 20 hours worth of hearings on the 30 (maybe 31 depending on the source) bills in the budget package, the budget is approved, has Schwarzenegger’s approval (but not signature), and they can go home. Way to work about as hard as an auditor from the Big 4 on a deadline (although the state legislature clearly missed theirs)! At least they haven’t been getting paid in IOUs.

* The Santa Barbara coast. One idea to raise additional funds for California: open up a small area for oil drilling off the Santa Barbara coastline. Legislators rejected this proposal in the budget package, and the California coast is safe once again.

* The Governor. After the budget passed he said, “I know that college students will pay now higher tuitions, I know that teachers will be laid off, and I know state workers will get less money. But we have to do that. It's the only way to solve the problem and to save our great state.” (http://www.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/07/24/california.budget/index.html?section=cnn_latest) I guess you got what you wanted, even if almost nobody else did.

The losers:

* College students. Students who attend California universities, including UC Berkeley, UCLA, and SJSU, to name a few of my favorites, have seen a 30% tuition increase since May. They will also likely see an increase in class sizes, due to a never before seen drop in state funding to California State Universities. Cuts to higher education totaled approximately $3 billion.

* Teachers and public schools. Teachers will be laid off and class sizes will increase. The teachers laid off won’t be those who have the lowest ratings or that are the least effective. Because of union rules, the teachers who lose their jobs will be the ones with the least experience. The ones who will have the hardest time finding a new job. Good luck in a state where unemployment has reached about 11.6%. As for increasing class sizes, districts will no longer be able to maintain a 20:1 ratio, and all I can say is I challenge anyone to manage a class of more than 20 screaming 6 year olds. Seriously, Mr. Schwarzenegger, most elementary school classrooms do not equal the set of Kindergarten Cop. Cuts to public schools totaled approximately $6 billion.

*Health and welfare programs. This includes cuts for in-home care of the state’s Medicare recipients, which will force many of those people who still manage to live at home, into nursing homes. Not that they’ll be able to sell those homes to pay for the nursing home care. Oh, and don’t forget that there will also be a huge loss in health care for children. Cuts to health and social services programs totaled approximately $3 billion.

* The prison system. “Lawmakers passed $1.2 billion in cuts to the state prison system. But they put off deciding how to make the reductions because the issue was too heated.” (http://freeinternetpress.com/story.php?sid=22292) Wow. Leave it to the state legislature to pass a budget without an actual solution.

* Your friendly, local city council. About $3.1 billion in state “revenue” will come from money that is supposed to go to city governments for parks, law enforcement, and transportation systems. Is this legal? I seriously doubt it. Will they sue? More than likely.

* State government workers. Workers employed by the state will still be forced to take three furlough days a month, equating to about a 15% cut in pay. Representatives of state workers say they may strike, and unions of state workers have said they will certainly challenge the budget package in court.

* The state legislators. I know, I know, they were winners a minute ago. Unfortunately, the budget, which passed on Friday, is based on estimated state revenues. Since the year is hardly over, and the economy may continue to decline, the estimated revenues may be grossly overstated. If that is the case, we have another budget deficit, and another budget crisis before the year is out. Of course, there is also the fact that part of the budget crisis was solved by certain accounting maneuvers, including pushing some payroll expenses into the next accounting period. Will that be a problem in the next fiscal year? Duh.

* Everyone else. Okay, I admit, that is probably a bit of an exaggeration. But, in all fairness to me, the budget passed with a $1.1 billion shortfall which really is everyone’s problem. Especially when the governor’s solution is to make up for it with cuts that his office has the authority to make on its own. I can’t help but wonder what exactly those are.

Energy: Who Got It & Who Wants It!

2009-07-22T13:07:00.000-07:00

Up until now, I’ve been avoiding the big issues that are currently being tackled by Congress: Health Care, Energy, and the Economy. I prefer to work with issues that are funny by nature, and of course, none of those issues are particularly humorous. In fact, they’re just darn right big, ugly, and complicated. However, since Congress will be taking a month long recess in August, but I’m not planning on recessing from blogging, I’m saving the really funny (disturbing) stuff for when congress goes on vacation.

So, this week, let’s talk about H.R. 2454, popularly known as the Cap and Trade Energy Bill. The bill already passed the House of Representatives in a 219-212 vote (yikes, that was a close one!), and is now under consideration by the Senate. If the bill does pass the Senate, you better believe that it won’t be the same Cap and Trade Bill passed by the House. The Senate will add its own amendments and take out language included in the House bill that they don’t like. If that version of the bill passes, a group of congressional staffers (I’ve never been really clear on who these people are) get together and reconcile the two versions of the bill.

As it stands now, the bill would impose a nationwide cap on greenhouse gases and require public utilities to produce at least 12% (according to http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090721/ap_on_go_co/us_climate_governors), although it’s 20% according to http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/D?d111:1:./temp/~bdo5ad:@@@L&summ2=m&/bss/111search.html, by 2020. The bill also sets up a trading market for business to buy and sell permits to pollute. Companies that need fewer permits can sell them to companies that need more.

Wow, that sounds like not such a bad idea, Congress! It almost sounds like, by treating pollution as a tangible good, Congress is going to let the free market solve the problem. So why so many votes against it?

The U.S. agriculture industry will go down in flames! Just kidding! Actually, according to the USDA, although the projected loss to farmers overall is between 1 and 7.2 percent, the money that they’ll earn under the program doing things like capturing methane gas from manure ponds, planting trees, or practicing no-till farming will earn them $75-$100 million per year starting in 2012 to $15-$20 billion per year in 2040.

It’ll be terrible for the economy! Unless you live in Washington, New Jersey or Colorado where measures already adopted to reduce greenhouse gases and standards requiring a certain amount of energy from renewable resources have already created new industries and more jobs in those states. In Washington, almost 50,000 new jobs have been created in the last two years as a result (including architects who design energy-efficient buildings, venture capitalists investing in new technology, and farmers growing the next generation of biofuels).

At the same Senate hearing where the Governors from Washington, New Jersey, and Colorado praised the bill, the Governor from North Dakota, a Representative from Arkansas, and a Senator from Oklahoma disagreed. Why? Oil. Duh. Now, I’m not going to argue, the bill could conceivably cause job losses in the oil industry, but I don’t see any reason why those job losses couldn’t turn into new, green jobs. It’s not like people can’t learn to do new things. Also, I must point out that our friend, the Rep from Arkansas, John Lowery (D-AR) owns his own oil company, Lowery Oil Co. Seriously? Can we say, conflict of interest? (Am I the only one who has a problem with the fact that the owner of an oil company, or any company, is allowed to be a representative in Congress?)

Of course, let’s not let the rest of Congress off the hook quite so easily either. Heaven forbid, the House pass a bill without shooting themselves in the foot. A last minute addition to the Cap and Trade Bill included a tariff provision which will levy a tax on all goods imported from countries that do not limit greenhouse gases (which includes almost every country on the planet, and you better believe they’ll more than likely tax our exports right back).

Yeesh.

If you want to learn more about this crazy legislative process and the big, bad filibuster, come out to Campbell’s Sundown Cinema this Friday, July 24th for Mr. Smith Goes to Washington! http://www.downtowncampbell.com/sundowncinema

Totally unrelated, check out the best, and most random, mash-up of two songs I’ve ever seen at http://acollectionofwords.blogspot.com!

Solving the California Budget Crisis

2009-07-19T14:41:00.000-07:00

Breaking news! Tonight, four top legislative officials will meet with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to finishing closing the $26.3 billion budget deficit. Lawmakers hope to bring the budget to a vote next week.

Woah, I just had a crazy case of déjà vu right there. Hopefully, they actually will pass the budget and I will be forced to eat my words. Mmmm, that sentence looks awfully tasty.

At this point, if you don’t know what the problem is with the California state budget, or why it’s a crisis, please refer to previous blog posts. Frankly, the whole thing, especially the way we treat education, just makes me mad, so this week I’ve decided to, instead, focus on some of the more bizarre and occasionally hilarious solutions that have been offered.

1. Back in May 2009, Gov. Schwarzenegger suggested that the state sell the Orange County fairgrounds. Not a bad idea. If the county would buy it and continue to use the grounds for the fair, I say go for it. Random, but not a bad idea.

2. Legalize pot and tax it! With the potential to bring in $1.4 billion in revenue to the state, marijuana would be taxed similar to alcohol. Potential problems: a) are we going to tax medical marijuana too? I don’t think taxing medication is a good path to start down. b) people suing the state and turning it into a federal issue where we’re at the mercy of the Supreme Court. I definitely wouldn’t count on that $1.4 billion then. In the meantime though, I’m betting that California would pretty much be the happiest place on earth.

3. The closure of 220 state parks. I won’t list them all here, but believe me, some of these are really great parks. I’m curious to know how exactly one goes about closing a state park? Will it just not be attended by a park ranger? But we can still go there right?

4. Drilling off the coast of Santa Barbara. See my previous blog for more discussion on this and the oil spill of 1969. This one is still part of the budget debate.

5. A gigantic used car sale! The state plans to sell off 15% of its approximately 40,000 used cars in an auction. If you’re in the market, the sale will be held on August 28th and August 29th in Sacramento. Officials estimate this will generate $24.1 million in revenue for the state.

Of course, I’d like to offer a suggestion of my own, if you’ll humor me…

It recently came to my attention that the beautiful town I live in, Campbell, has had a balanced budget for the last 20 years. For the last few weeks I’ve been wondering why, if Campbell can do it, why can’t California, just on a larger scale?

Yesterday, the city of Campbell held its second annual Big Bands & BBQ event (a completely watered down version of the more-popular Oktoberfest), and as my sister and I went to pay two tickets ($2) for a bottle of water she mentioned that even if it’s a little pricey, she’s happy to support Campbell.

Then it hit me. California needs to have a crazy, state-wide, gigantic Oktoberfest! If street fair activities plus overpriced booze equals lots of money in Campbell, I’m guessing it would work pretty much everywhere else in the state too. Or, if you prefer, the state could throw a gigantic rave and charge $5 for water. Either way, budget problem solved!

Norma McCorvey, You So Crazy

2009-07-15T11:22:00.000-07:00

Every time a U.S. Supreme Court judge retires, the question is always the same: will the new appointee uphold Roe v. Wade? The same is true today as the Senate Judiciary Committee questions nominee Sonia Sotomayor, who, if confirmed, will replace Justice David Souter.

On, Monday, July 13th, the first day of the Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings for Sotomayor, four protestors were arrested during the hearings for unlawful conduct – disruption of congress. One protestor, Norma McCorvey began yelling during Senator Al Franken’s (D-MN) opening remarks that Sotomayor was “wrong” about abortion. (Check it out on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJj0OMdZT4w about two minutes in.)

McCorvey, as it turns out, is better known as Jane Roe, the plaintiff in possibly the most famous and well-known Supreme Court case ever. Now, if you’ll hearken back to the days when you had time to watch Law & Order, the plaintiff is the person doing the suing. They are the person who is unhappy and wants something changed. In the case of Roe v. Wade, Roe was unhappy that her state, Texas, didn’t allow its citizens the freedom of abortion. The decision in Roe v. Wade, overturned that law, taking the decision away from the states, and legalizing abortion on a federal level. She wins, yay her.

So why is she screaming at Supreme Court nominee Sotomayor that abortion is wrong?

In the 1980s McCorvey revealed herself to be Roe, and in 1994 wrote an autobiography I Am Roe (what a creative title). At a book signing that same year, she was befriended by a pro-life activist and within a year converted to Christianity. McCorvey was baptized in 1995 in a backyard, swimming pool event that was filmed for national TV and announced shortly after (two days to be exact) that she had become an advocate for the pro-life movement.

Two years before the book was published, McCorvey split from her longtime partner. Partner, as in, yes, she’s a lesbian. I’m sorry, she was a lesbian until 1998 when she joined the Catholic Church. Not that those two things have anything to do with each other (Ha!).

In the case she claimed that her pregnancy was the result of rape, which she now says is not true.

Since all the ruckus, McCorvey has been a busy girl. So far this year, McCorvey has been arrested twice, once for disrupting Sotomayor’s confirmation hearings and once during the protest of President Obama’s commencement speech at the University of Notre Dame.

Check this out for more info on Norma McCorvey: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norma_McCorvey

And check this out for a picture of McCorvey and her painted on eyebrows: http://www.advocate.com/news_detail_ektid98017.asp

I'll Bring the Tar, You Bring the Feathers.

2009-07-12T23:22:00.000-07:00

The California budget crisis continues.

When last we looked at the California budget, legislators were trying to make the tough choices. Cut prison funding, or schools? In-home care for the elderly and disabled, or raise taxes? Oh wait, Governor Schwarzenegger and the California GOP refuse to pass a budget that raises taxes, so let’s wipe that last option off the table. Yes, let’s limit our choices, how free market of us.

You probably haven’t been personally affected by the budget crisis, so let’s see who is shall we? They keep calling it a crisis, so someone must be getting screwed somewhere. The state government has been sending out IOUs since they (almost) ran out of cash at the beginning of the month. Specifically, 101,930 IOUs have been sent out, as of Friday morning, equaling more than $389 million in payments. (http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2009/07/california-iou-update_11.html) The state plans to mail out more than $3 billion in IOUs by the end of the month.

Granted, the IOUs have a 3.75% annual interest rate, which is way better than anything I’m getting in my regular savings account at the moment, but most major banks stopped accepting the IOUs on Friday, maybe Saturday depending on which newspaper you read. On October 2nd the state plans to redeem the IOUs for the small percentage of people and businesses who can afford to hang on to them that long. Woah, woah, woah, back up for a second. October 2nd? Oh, even better, the October 2nd deadline is “Assuming there is adequate cash in the Treasury” according to http://www.sco.ca.gov/5935.html. You’re saying this really might not be resolved before October 2nd?

Who’s getting these IOUs anyway? People who are just now receiving their personal income tax refunds, local governments, and small business vendors top the IOU list (along with the disabled, no joke, California is officially picking on the small groups of people who can barely defend themselves). Who isn’t getting an IOU? Legislative employees, appointees, and legislators are getting paid in cash. For an incomplete but interesting list of “Haves and Have-Nots” check this out: http://blogs.reuters.com/felix-salmon/2009/07/01/california-the-haves-and-have-nots/.

The true tragedy of the whole budget crisis really lies with the small business owner. According to the state’s department of general services, California has annual contracts with at least 14,000 small companies (most based in California) for $2.7 billion. About $140 million of the $3 billion in IOUs expected to be issued in July will likely be issued to those small businesses. Given the current state of the economy, this is exactly the group that can’t afford to wait until October 2nd to cash in their IOUs. For more specifics, and a couple really sad stories that will really make you want to run out and start your own business, read this article: http://money.cnn.com/2009/07/12/smallbusiness/california_small_vendors_ious.smb/index.htm?section=money_latest.

In yet another effort to float some more cash for the month, the state controller delayed $4 billion in payments, which were scheduled to go out on Friday, July 10th, to California public schools. I’ve asked before, and I’ll ask it again: Why do we hate education so much in this state??

Even more disturbing, as of Sunday afternoon the apparent elephant in the room in the California legislature debate (according to http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/07/12/BA4L18NC36.DTL) is whether or not to suspend Prop 98, a constitutional amendment guaranteeing a minimum level of funding for schools. The proposition, passed in 1988, commits the state to spending at least 40% of the general fund on schools. Although it’s a favorite target for legislators looking to blame the budget crisis on something other than themselves, I’d like to know how they feel about the tax cuts that have cost the general fund $100 billion since 1993. Who thought it would be a good idea to need 2/3 legislative approval to raise taxes, but only 1/2 to approve a tax cut? Of course we have no money!

And, of course our legislators don’t have the cajones to pick on someone their own size, instead going after those with no time (small business owners), no capacity (the mentally and physically handicapped), and no idea (kids). I’m so proud.

Habeas Corpus? Psht, don't you know this is America!?

2009-07-08T10:15:00.000-07:00

On January 22, 2009, President Obama signed an executive order suspending Guantanamo Military Commission activities for 120 days and to shut down the detention center within a year. Of course, does Congress agree? Heavens no! The first regular spending bill for 2010 passed by Congress in June (almost six months after the initial order was signed) contained a stipulation that $0 of the $100 billion war spending bill can be used to close Guantanamo. (http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/48560027.html)

Not so easily deterred, the Obama administration has already transferred one suspect to be tried in New York and another nine to other countries, probably not to stand trial (let’s hear it for habeas corpus and due process).

Now, everyone is still arguing about what to do with the 229 remaining detainees. Not surprisingly, we’re having a hard time getting other countries to take our prisoners. As the rest of the world is taking a if-you-don’t-want-them-neither-do-we approach to detainees held at Guantanamo, I find it strange that while we can’t find a place for four Muslim men to be held and stand trial in the U.S., Bermuda is willing to take them!? (That can’t possibly be good for tourism.)

As Cynthia Tucker of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution put it, “The United States imprisons a larger share of its population than any other country in the world, but we can’t imprison the remaining dangerous detainees in maximum-security facilities on continental soil?” (http://www.yobserver.com/opinions/10016807.html)

That could actually be the best solution for everyone, given that there is at least one detainee who doesn’t even want to go home (not that he really wants to stay here either). (http://www.miamiherald.com/news/americas/guantanamo/story/1131895.html)

Not to mention, we have the facilities in place already. The Mayor of Marion, IL is now backing the idea to move several detainees to the local federal penitentiary. The prison, built in 1963 was the new Alcatraz at the time and held some of America’s most infamous criminals, including John Gotti. Granted, the neighbors aren’t thrilled, but if you’re moving to an area for its “security” are you really going to move within 10 miles of a prison? I’m not saying terrorists aren’t scary, I’m just saying that our prisoners can be pretty damned scary too. If you don’t know who John Gotti is, read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Gotti

So will Guantanamo really be closed by the end of the year? Will this, rather embarrassing, chapter of our country’s history finally be over? Doubtful. The Justice Department is currently conducting a review of its options on what to do with the rest of the detainees, which was supposed to be completed by July 21. More than likely the deadline will be extended (until who knows when) since the review probably won’t be finished. (Surprise, surprise.) (http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090707/ap_on_go_co/us_guantanamo_detainees)

SIDENOTE: In my 7/1 blog on Al Franken and the Scary Supermajority I recommended the movie “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington”. I am re-recommending the movie now and also giving you the chance to watch it free in downtown Campbell.
Where: The parking lot behind Orchard Valley Coffee (across from Katie Bloom’s)
When: 7/24/09 at sundown (approximately 8:30pm)
http://www.artsopolis.com/event/detail/51837

Drill, Baby, Drill?

2009-07-05T19:38:00.000-07:00

We all remember the infamous chant, “Drill, Baby, Drill”, the McCain-Palin solution to the energy crisis. Now, California is considering that same motto to solve another problem: the budget crisis (Yes, we’re still in it. I know, nobody’s really surprised.). One source of income that has been suggested as a way to close the California budget gap, is to start drilling for oil off the California coast.

Why aren’t we doing that already, you ask? I’m not going to lie, this gets complicated and downright fishy in some areas, so here’s the gist:

· July 14, 2008: President Bush lifts a presidential ban on offshore drilling originally implemented by (any guesses?) President Bush Sr.

· Originally, offshore drilling was opposed by our dear Gov. Schwarzenegger. Originally as in, last year after the ban was lifted. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=a362RHmsy71s&refer=worldwide

· Federal drilling, which begins 3 miles offshore, (3 miles within the shoreline belongs to California) could be opened up for exploration as early as 2010, if Congress doesn’t vote to renew its own ban, and oil drilling platforms could be constructed by 2012.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/12/28/MN4G14QMVE.DTL

· California law, however, still blocks new oil drilling in that area controlled by the state (that 3 miles I mentioned above).
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/06/07/MN251808DH.DTL&type=printable

In a nutshell: 3 miles within the coast drilling is not allowed, beyond that check back in 2012 for great views of those oil rigs that you can see off in the distance from your beachfront property.

Obviously, with a $24.3 billion budget deficit, anyone could have a change of heart, even dear old Gov. Schwarzenegger and as luck would have it, there’s a cute little loophole in the law. It’s called Tranquillon Ridge. Just off the coast of Santa Barbara County, the oil from a field in state waters is seeping into a federally controlled field, allowing the state to drill in that one spot.

Hooray! The budget is saved!

Hardly. The project, which would yield about $100 million a year in state revenues barely puts a dent in the deficit. Not to mention that the drilling would occur off the Santa Barbara coast, where an oil rig platform accident in 1969 spilled 3 million gallons of crude oil along the beaches. Needless to say, dead wildlife and black sand are not so good for tourism.

Senator Al Franken and the Scary Supermajority

2009-07-01T12:25:00.000-07:00

Does anyone else find it a wee bit disturbing how many of our elected officials end up in office because a court somewhere says that they won? Clearly, as we all discovered in the post 2000 election madness where finally the Supreme Court intervened to declare a winner, not every vote really does get counted. If your chad is hanging the wrong way or has a bad attitude, he definitely won’t be included in the final tally.

In another show of not every vote was counted so let’s take it to the courts, the Minnesota Supreme Court decided yesterday (6/30/09) that Democrat Al Franken won the Senate Election in Minnesota which actually took place eight months ago. Not exactly a quick turn-around in terms of election results. Not to mention that the Senate convened the 2009 session on January 6, meaning that Senator Franken has now missed out on six months of fun with the Senate.

So what’s with all the hubbub? Why do all the other 49 states give a hoot about what’s happening in Minnesota? Now, with the election of Franken, the Democrats have a supermajority in the Senate! (Does that mean all the Senate Democrats have to wear capes now?) The so-called “supermajority” gives the Democrats the power (60 votes) to block a filibuster as Senate rules call for 60 votes to end debate and move for a vote (otherwise known as cloture). (http://www.stltoday.com/stltoday/news/stories.nsf/nation/story/924E6F5D066C9BBE862575E600114957?OpenDocument)

On paper, yes, that sounds very scary. Should any party really have that much power? Until you consider the fact that there’s not really 60 Democrats in the Senate. Only 58 Senators are actually members of the Democratic Party. The other two, Sen. Barry Sanders (Ind-VT) and Sen. Joe Lieberman, (Ind-CT) are both independents who caucus (“meeting of members of a political party or subgroup to coordinate members’ actions, choose group policy, or nominate candidates for various offices.” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caucus.) with the Democrats. Of course, we also can’t forget Sen. Robert Byrd (D-WV) and Sen. Ed Kennedy (D-MA) who have both been in and out of the hospital and generally haven’t been able to spend much time in the Senate. Getting the 60 votes, or just getting all 60 Senators to be present could still be quite the challenge.

On the other hand, are filibusters even really that useful? A filibuster allows a senator to speak for however long he or she wants (or can in some cases if you don’t have a friend to hand off your filibuster to) on whatever topic he or she chooses. It’s not like it has to be related to the topic at hand. (If you haven’t seen “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” I recommend you drop whatever you’re doing right now and watch it.)

Filibusters have always been part of the process and through the 1960s every Senate term averaged less than seven, the most famous filibuster of the 1960s was when the Southern Democrats filibustered for 75 hours to block the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Since then, you could say that the Senate has become filibuster-happy, with the record for most votes to end a filibuster hitting 112 votes by the 110th congress at the end of 2008. Call me crazy, but 112 filibusters seems like overkill, and like maybe the Senate could do something more productive with its time. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filibuster_(legislative_tactic))

Are you blameshifting!?!

2009-06-28T12:40:00.000-07:00

Let’s start with a bit of trivia. Who said this quote and when: “Our elected officials in Sacramento are facing a budget crisis unseen in this state since the Great Depression, and it was entirely avoidable. Teachers are getting pink slips, cops are getting laid off and the taxpayers are facing an increase in taxes and California's future is in danger.” Answer at the end.

Is this budget crisis over yet? Hardly, but according to State Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, a Democrat from Sacramento, it will be done by June 30. In two days, this will all be over. The great budget crisis of 2009 will be finished. Completed. Fin. So we must have made a lot of progress in the last week.

Here are some of my favorite headlines from the last few days:

“Some Reasons Why California Is Ungovernable” by Jerry Roberts and Phil Trounstine (http://www.theday.com/re.aspx?re=f8123aa9-7ae8-4ce7-8993-fb2c81c23343.)

“California forced to confront roots of current fiscal mess” by Carla Marinucci and Matthew Yi (http://www.deseretnews.com/article/705313414/California-forced-to-confront-roots-of-current-fiscal-mess.html?pg=3.)

“California's Fiscal Crisis: The Legacy of Proposition 13” by Kevin O’Leary (http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1904938,00.html?xid=rss-topstories.)

“Washington to California: Drop dead” by Victoria McGrane (http://news.yahoo.com/s/politico/20090628/pl_politico/24266_1.)

Yup, those all sound very upbeat. In fact, the whole situation seems to have turned into one, big “blamestorming” session (much like this commercial http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50ovKaEI_4Y&feature=related, poor Eileen). Some of the possible culprits:

· The Federal government won’t give CA a bailout. (Because even though one out of every eight Americans live in CA, we have the eighth largest economy in the world, and 55 electoral votes, CA is apparently NOT too big to fail.)

· Proposition 13

· Lobbyists (this is my personal favorite, I would blame my bad hair days on lobbyists if I thought I could get away with it)

· Partisanship and term limits which don’t encourage legislators to work together (or just “legislators” if you prefer the short version), and;

· Diversity (I know, you think I’m kidding, but I’m not: http://www.hutchnews.com/Columns/patbfifs)

Clearly, there’s no lack of places or people to point the finger at (which finger you’re pointing is entirely up to you). Will this be resolved by the 30th? Doubtful. In the meantime, government workers are taking more and more furloughs, CA will begin to pay its bills with IOUs (does that include government workers? It’s pretty difficult to buy groceries with IOUs last time I checked), and the business-oriented Bay Area Council is pushing initiatives for a state constitutional convention, the first since 1879, to wipe the slate clean and build a new rational structure for state government. Not a bad idea.

The answer to the trivia question above: Arnold Schwarzenegger in 2003 when running for Governor of California in the gubernatorial recall election that resulted in the replacement of then Governor Gray Davis.

Who's Afraid of the Big, Bad Regulation?

2009-06-24T19:53:00.000-07:00

The United States has always had a history of strong financial regulation.

I would now like to challenge you to say that last sentence with a straight face.

That is not to say that the U.S. is lacking in regulatory agencies and bodies, we are absolutely not. In fact, we lead the rest of the world with eight financial regulatory authorities (second place is Canada with three). For a complete listing, go here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_financial_regulatory_authorities_by_country. Clearly, I don’t want to have to type them all out.

As the reactionary country we tend to be (or maybe it’s just Congress that freaks out over everything and the rest of us are perfectly rational), when things are going badly we regulate. Take the Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002: a classic case of someone (named Congress) overreacting to the shock and scandal that was Enron, and lots and lots of people losing their pensions. On the other hand, when things are going fine and dandy we (again Congress) have a tendency to deregulate.

Anybody remember the ‘90s, and how great they were? So just when they thought nobody was looking (because we weren’t, we were too busy spending money while we had it), Congress passed the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gramm-Leach-Bliley_Act ) sometimes known as GLBA. Yes, you read that correctly. To make a long story short GLBA made it ok for Citibank to merge with Travelers Group, which previously would have been illegal, to become Citigroup. Now if you don’t know what happened to Citigroup, I suggest you move out from under your rock.

Of course in the wake of the credit crisis, what do we come full circle back to? More regulation! Let’s add another agency to the list shall we? Let’s call this one the Consumer Financial Protection Agency. The name certain does make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside.

The legislation to form the new agency will be reviewed by the House Financial Services Committee in July and will take “many of the consumer protection powers over mortgages and credit cards that now are spread across as many as 10 federal regulators.” (http://news.yahoo.com/s/mcclatchy/20090624/pl_mcclatchy/3259529.) Wait, 10? I thought we only had eight. Does anybody actually know how many we have?

Also included in the upcoming legislation: the possibility of giving the Federal Reserve the responsibility of oversight over any institution that is deemed “too big to fail.” Yes folks, this is the same Federal Reserve that either, 1. Somehow didn’t see this whole thing coming, or 2. Just decided to not do anything about it.

Gosh, I feel so much better now.

The California Fudget Crisis Continues

2009-06-21T14:44:00.000-07:00

The Still Non-Existent California Budget:

Since last week, the California Legislature has done, well, not much. And I (fortunately or unfortunately depending on whose side you’re on) still don’t have an ocean view.

The good news: there appears to be an active debate in the legislature. Some of the items considered to be “on the chopping block” include the California Exit Exam (http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=913216de8b1c6f9033bc480c137978e3&from=rss), and the 30,000 teachers and school administrators who have already received pink slips (http://www.sfexaminer.com/local/48728472.html.) Do we really hate education that much?

Most California senators have also agreed to take a 5% pay cut this year starting on July 1. (http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-mew-state-paycut20-2009jun20,0,3127468.story?track=rss) That’s very big of them, to cut into their own $116,208 salary when, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, the median household income for California in 2007 was $59,928. Way to not even pretend to be average Senators.

The better news: there is a plan. On Wednesday, July 17, California legislators revealed their best version of a new budget. Great! Let’s vote on it, get it in action, pay our July bills and call it a day.

The tragic news: Governor Schwarzenegger says, “I will, without any doubt, veto it.” The legislature still plans to put the plan up to a vote next week, but the Governator reminded them that he is, “very, very much against any tax increase whatsoever.” (http://www.mercurynews.com/politics/ci_12611429?source=rss.)

Don’t get me wrong, I admire a guy (or girl) who sticks to his guns. Good for him for not wavering. Except that he’s holding up the whole process and dragging California down with him. Stop being retarded and pass something already. We can’t pay our July bills until we have a budget. Oh, and did I mention that S&P and Moody’s have both publicly noted that, “The state of California is facing a multinotch downgrade of its debt if it fails to resolve its enormous budget woes.” (http://dealbook.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/06/19/moodys-joins-sp-in-warning-on-california-debt/) We’ll have no cash and nobody will want to lend us money. That sounds like a great situation to be in.

Again, don’t get me wrong, I don’t want to pay more taxes either. But the scary truth is that we have a $24.3 billion budget gap and if the best alternative we have is to lay off more teachers and extend government worker furloughs, sure, I can stand to pay a little extra for a tax increase on gasoline, tobacco, and my car registration.

My advice to Governor Schwarzenegger: Stop making like an ostrich and get your head out of the sand already. Sure, you’ll probably face some reelection troubles if you go along with some new taxes, but good luck getting reelected if you’re the Governor who let California go completely broke.

Congress Strikes Out

2009-06-17T22:23:00.000-07:00

This week in Congress…

Former major league baseball player and 1998 hitting legend Sammy Sosa announced his retirement from professional sports two weeks ago, on June 3, 2009, after not actually playing for any major league team since the 2007 season.

If you actually care about Sammy Sosa and the several records he broke throughout his career, check this out: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sammy_Sosa#Final_years_.282007-2009.29.

For those of us that care to hearken back to 2005, the year of Terry Schiavo, Sandra Day O’Connor’s retirement, William Rehnquist’s death (if you don’t know who either of the previous individuals are, I would appreciate it if you would stop reading this blog right now), Lewis “Scooter” Libby’s indictment, and Hurricanes Rita and Katrina, Congress decided that 2005 was a great time in history to hold hearings about steroid use in professional baseball.

And we wonder why New Orleans never totally recovered.

Yes, in 2005 Congress had nothing better to do than to call on the likes of Roger Clemens, Mark McGwire, Rafael Palmeiro, Sammy Sosa, and others to testify about steroids. I’m sorry, not steroids, “performance enhancing drugs”.

On a total side-note, why are we picking on baseball players? Clearly, if anyone is using “performance enhancing drugs” it’s those guys who play football!

Back to the topic at hand: hearings were held, a conclusion was presumably reached (not that anyone heard it, or cared about it at all), and the U.S. Congress continued on its merry way of completely ignoring actual issues.

Four years later, and a mere two weeks after Sammy Sosa’s retirement, on June 16, 2009, it comes to light that two years before his testimony he tested positive for “performance enhancing drugs” and yet told congress that he would never take stuff like that! (For actual quotation and 6/16/09 NY Times article by Michael Schmidt go to http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/17/sports/baseball/17doping.html?fta=y.) GASP! I know, you’re shocked. I certainly was, at least for the five seconds that I cared.

Congress, on the other hand, can they let it go? Can they let bygones be bygones and focus on, oh I don’t know, the worst economic crisis to hit the U.S. in my lifetime? How about the war in Iraq that we are still fighting for some reason? What about this health care reform thing that I keep hearing about?

Instead, “The Oversight and Government Reform Committee always takes seriously suggestions that a witness misled the committee while testifying under oath,” Edolphus Towns, the chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said in a statement. “Investigators will begin a review of this matter and, upon learning the results, I will determine appropriate next steps.” (from 6/17/09 NY Times article by the expert, Michael Schmidt, http://www.nytimes.com/2009/06/18/sports/baseball/18doping.html?_r=1&ref=sports)

Will someone please tell me why The Oversight and Government Reform Committee is trying to reform baseball instead of the Government?

California - Did We Budget For This?

2009-06-14T14:58:00.000-07:00

And Now For: Your California Legislature

That can’t pass a budget. California, home to the Steve’s (Wozniak and Jobs), birthplace of Google, Stanford, UCLA and UC Berkeley, can’t pass a budget. We have Hollywood, Napa, at least part of Tahoe, Silicon Valley and a really nifty bridge in San Francisco, but we can’t pass the budget.

California, arguably the best state in the union (especially for those of us born and raised here), has, also arguably, the worst legislature in history. It’s a budget guys, it’s not rocket science. Most of us learned how to do this when we moved out of our parent’s house. Hopefully not all of our representatives still live at home with mommy and daddy.

Sure they need a 2/3 vote to pass the budget, but how long does it take to get 2/3 of your friends to agree on what to do on a Friday night? An hour of playing phone tag? 20 minutes in person? Sure, 1/3 of your friends might not come out, but the rest of us all know that doing something is better than doing nothing, even if it doesn’t work out quite as planned. (And really, does anything ever work out quite as planned? Have you seen The Hangover? http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1119646/ )

We don’t expect you to be perfect, but we do expect you to do something, like your job perhaps. So suck it up California legislature and pass the budget already! Or amend the constitution to get rid of that pesky 2/3 vote if it’s such a problem!

So what happens if the budget doesn’t pass by tomorrow (June 15th, due date for passage according to the state constitution http://www.leginfo.ca.gov/.const/.article_4)? Clearly, the state won’t drop off into the ocean. Although, if California became an island, the amount of beachfront property would double and maybe I could finally have the ocean view I always wanted, with the Vegas lights off in the distance. Perhaps we could have each of our state representatives and state senators turn to their colleagues on their left and give them the old, “You’re fired!” Whoever does the best Trump impression gets to keep their job, of course. Unless those old tricksters already extended the deadline when I wasn’t looking… Did they?

I don’t know when they would have had time as the San Francisco Chronicle so kindly pointed out; they’re busy up there in Sacramento. Doing things like, you know, making sure that juice sold under the name “Pomegranate” is really 100% pomegranate. Check out the hilariously tragic article by Juliet Williams “Debate for Calif lawmakers: Budget or blueberries?”