Fox and Hounds Daily Says Goodbye
With this article, we end publication of Fox and Hounds Daily. It has been a satisfying 12½ year run. When we opened in May 2008, our site was designed to offer an opportunity to those who wished to engage in public debate on many issues, especially in politics and business, but found it difficult to get placed in newspaper op-ed pages.
Co-publishers Tom Ross, Bryan Merica and I have kept F&H going over this time investing our own time, funding, and staff help. Last year at this time we considered closing the site, however with an election on the horizon we decided to keep F&H going through the election year. With the election come and gone, and with no sense of additional resources, we have decided to close the site down.
Fox and Hounds will live on, at least, with my articles collected in the California State Library.
On a personal note, I have spent over 40 years in California policy and politics. There have been some incredible high moments and some difficult low points. It pains me that politics too often is a blood sport, frequently demonizing the motives of opponents and using the legal system as a weapon in public discourse. At Fox & Hounds, we tried to adhere to the practice of giving all a voice in the debate, yet keep the commentaries civil and avoided personal attacks.
F&H offered the opportunity to publish different perspectives (even ones that criticized my writings!). We had success as indicated by the Washington Post twice citing Fox and Hounds Daily one of the best California political websites and many other positive affirmations and comments received over the years.
Tom, Bryan and I want to thank our many readers and writers for being part of our journey. The publishers of Fox and Hounds Daily believe that we added value to California and its people. We hope you agree.
Gov. Lorena Gonzalez?
Not many politicians have risen as fast as Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez, D-San Diego. She just scored the 35th spot on Politco Magazine’s annual list of the Top 50 politicians in America, its “guide to the thinkers, doers and visionaries transforming American politics in 2016.” She’s listed as “The progressive ideas lab.”
“If states are the laboratories of democracy, then Lorena Gonzalez might be the nation’s most ambitious progressive scientist,” Politico enthuses. “After decades of lurching from crisis to crisis, California has emerged as a test case in how progressive government can work. And since 2013, Gonzalez, an assemblywoman who represents the state’s southernmost district, has become the brain trust for California’s most ambitious policy ideas – in the process, mobilizing liberals across the country too. (more…)
Initiative Process Only Obstacle to Democrats Total Power—for Now
Partisan dissatisfaction with the initiative process seems to be a little skewered from reality in the new Public Policy Institute of California poll given that the power in today’s state politics is nearly exclusively in the hands of Democrats. With such a situation, Republicans should embrace the initiative process as a way to leaven Democratic power. Instead, according to the poll, by a 36% to 23% margin Republicans are more likely to be dissatisfied with the process than Democrats.
Perhaps, this result is understandable because Republicans by a 69% to 54% margin believe special interests are in control of initiatives “by a lot.” In a time when heralds of public doom declare that corporate control and big money command legislative action, Republicans must see the dominance of the public employee unions and progressive groups driving the agenda on ballot measures. Certainly, with high profile ballot measures such as a tobacco tax increase, income tax extension, gun controls, marijuana legalization and the elimination of the death penalty, they have a right to think that way. (more…)
Political Spending by California Personal Injury Lawyers Tops $22 Million
Just as surely as the the sun will rise in the east and set in the west, personal injury lawyers in California will spend big in an attempt to influence lawmakers, elections, and regulators.
California’s personal injury lawyers spent more than $22 million on political contributions and lobbying lawmakers in Sacramento between January 2013 and June 2016, according to a newly-released statewide report from California Citizens Against Lawsuit Abuse (CALA).
The report shows why California is caught in an seemingly endless cycle of lawsuit abuse, earning it the dubious distinction of being ranked the number one “Judicial Hellhole” in the country. This didn’t happen overnight. Over numerous years and election seasons, these trial lawyers have contributed money toward ballot measures, political candidates, and lobbying efforts. Spreading money wide and deep, they’ve infected California’s policy-making process at every level. (more…)
Fighting Fire with Diversity
Californians like to brag about our diversity, how our mix of people of all races, ethnicities and origins produces a vital culture and economy. But we rarely talk about the other less glamorous role diversity plays in our state—as protection against disasters, both natural and manmade.
California is a disaster-prone state, and when calamity strikes, diversity—of all kinds—keeps bad times from becoming even worse.
The central insight into diversity as protection is biological: a diverse eco-system is more resilient. Why? Because when you have different kinds of living things in an eco-system, it has a much broader variety of ways to respond to stress and calamity. This insight applies not only in your local forest also but in your neighborhood or state government or your industry. (more…)
Tsunami of Local Taxes Headed for State’s Taxpayers
Taxpayers beware: A tax tsunami is headed your way. According to a report compiled by the California Taxpayers Association, a record number 421 local taxes and bonds (paid by increased property taxes) will hit the state’s many local jurisdictions in November. In addition to the up to $10-plus billion a year in taxes on the state ballot, 228 local taxes could add $3 billion a year in taxes and 193 bonds an additional nearly $32 billion.
The timing of the tax explosion has to do with politics. Conventional wisdom is that voter turnout this presidential election will see more likely supporters of tax increases come out to vote. Democratic voters and younger voters, who often vote in smaller percentages, are expected to cast ballots in greater numbers during this presidential election. (more…)
Labor Tries to Make Ballot Access Costlier
There is disingenuous, there is deceptive and then there is the labor-backed legislation that purports to reform the ballot initiative process.
That bill, SB 1094, would impose a requirement that 5 percent of all signatures submitted to qualify statewide initiatives and referenda be gathered by volunteers.
In a Sacramento Bee oped that was almost Trumpian in its lack of connection with reality, state labor chief Art Pulaski argued that this bill was based on good intentions. The people would get a voice in the process, he wrote. The bill would somehow respond to voter confusion at long ballots, like this November’s ballot of 17 statewide measures (and many more local ones), and protect the initiative process from fraud and deceit in signature gathering. He even invoked Gov. Hiram Johnson’s supposed original intention for a noble process (This is historical hokum—Johnson created and used a nasty, conflict-ridden expensive process very much like the one we have today–though you can’t blame Pulaski when media people keep repeating this nonsense). (more…)