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.
Infrastructure Report Card: The Continued Importance of Conventional Fuels
The American Society of Civil Engineers recognized oil as an element of “infrastructure” in California in its 2016 Infrastructure Report Card. That report card clearly documents the fact that there are no easy answers to our complex energy and transportation challenges for the future.
Fossil fuel permeates every aspect of our daily lives. It has driven an exponential increase in human numbers and civilizations from the horse-and-buggy days. It enables us to easily get to work, school and medical facilities as well as the freedom to travel for family and recreational purposes. It supports the quality of life Californians take for granted. We need more – not less – fossil fuels to develop economies and basic infrastructures for the people of developing and third world countries. (more…)
ACLU Joins Unions to Attack California Charter Schools
About 6.2 million students attend California’s K-12 public schools. Of those, over 570,000 are enrolled in public charter schools. Most of these charter schools operate with a degree of management autonomy and teacher accountability that goes well beyond what is permitted by the union work rules that govern traditional public schools. These charter schools themselves are accountable – if they don’t deliver better academic outcomes cost-effectively, they are closed down. They are a laboratory for excellence in education and administration, and they’re working. And their success is a tremendous threat to teachers unions.
Enter the ACLU. In a study released earlier this week, the ACLU said it had identified 253 schools with “exclusionary policies,” and noted “this is just the tip of the iceberg.” The exclusionary policies were (1) exclusion based on academic performance, (2) discrimination against English learners, (3) pre-enrollment essays or interviews, (4) illegal parent/guardian volunteer requirements, (5) requirements that discourage undocumented students. (more…)
The Lesson of Trump: Don’t Mix Religion and Politics
A truism of American politics is that if you play around with race or religion you will get burned. Donald Trump has played both the race and religion card, and if current polling is to be believed; opinion has hardened against him in the past two weeks and he is headed for a thumping defeat.
Playing the religion card has long had dire consequences, especially for Republicans. There is the famous case of a Protestant minister arguing that the Democrats were the party of Rum, Romanism and Rebellion, an ethnic slur that sunk GOP presidential candidate James G. Blaine in the election of 1884. Catholics took great exception to the notion they were not good Americans and voted for Democrat Grover Cleveland in such huge numbers that he beat the favored Blaine. (more…)
Prop. 56: Tax ’Em If You Got ’Em
You’re probably something like me: a professional who doesn’t smoke tobacco. Although in my case, I puff an occasional stogie, maybe once every two months. So if Proposition 56 passes in November, increasing tobacco taxes $2 a pack, it’s one of the few taxes that wouldn’t phase my personal bank account. And it wouldn’t affect anti-tobacco fanatic Tom Steyer, the hedge-fund billionaire backing the initiative, who’s obsessed with making everyone else in the state miserable.
But I know poor people who will be devastated. Prop. 56 will inhale “in the range of $1.1 billion to $1.6 billion annually by 2017-18,” according to the Attorney General’s summary. Poor friends of mine smoke a pack a day, so that’s $730 a year more pilfered from them. (more…)
The Walls Are Too High in the Kingdom of Ventura
Ventura County is the most glorious and verdant of California kingdoms.
Just ask its princes and princesses—those fortunate enough to be able to afford to live and vote there. The nearly 900,000 residents can pretend that they live in the country, with parks or farmland always nearby. The Kingdom of Ventura’s cities remains a series of separate and distinct developments on the landscape—they haven’t sprawled and melted into each other, like cities do elsewhere in Southern California.
Their secret? “No other county in the United States has more effective protections against urban sprawl,” says the web site of SOAR, aka Save Open Space and Agricultural Resources, a family of growth-controlling ballot measures. (more…)
Climate Change and Partisanship
Ten years ago, California led the nation in climate change policy when it passed the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006, landmark legislation that required the state to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. While passed largely along partisan lines, Assembly Bill (AB) 32 was signed into law by Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Notably, the law enjoyed the support of a strong majority of Californians—including two in three adults across parties—in our July 2006 Statewide Survey.
Today, the state is prepared to meet the reduction targets set forth in AB 32. As policymakers debate how to further reduce emissions, a strong majority of Californians continue to favor these targets. But now there is a wide partisan divide. An overwhelming majority of Democrats (80%) are in favor, compared to a majority of independents (56%) and fewer than half of Republicans (44%). (more…)