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.

Giving a Voice to All Asian Americans in California Classrooms

U.S. Democratic presidential candidates Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders put education reform at the center of their political agenda. Here in California, the recent hearings conducted by the Instructional Quality Commission (IQC), an advisory body to the California State Board of Education, will have profound implications on the education system here in California.

At the recent California State Board of Education hearings, over 200 members of the local community spoke about the inclusion of the Armenian genocide, the use of “South Asia” in our history books, stories about Korean “comfort women” and discrimination against Sikhs in the United States. Sadly, the IQC hearings did not fully acknowledge the thousands of Vietnamese women who were victims of systemic sexual assault at the hands of South Korean troops during the Vietnam war. (more…)

Unconventional Wisdom Philadelphia

* The Democratic convention offered quite a valedictory for both President Obama and Vice-president Biden. Their boffo speeches left a high bar Hillary to clear. Did she? She is not an orator in a league with Barack Obama or Bill Clinton, but she was comfortable in the spotlight and got her points across. She can’t seem to help herself from playing to the room rather than to the country watching television. The TV cameras did occasionally pan to Bernie Sanders–who looked like he had eaten some bad fish. Chelsea Clinton played the Trump kids to a draw. Bill Clinton looked like the cat who swallowed the canary.

*   Bill Clinton hasn’t lost his touch. He still has the ability to lure cable pundits into bursts of psycho-babble. His 2016 speech wasn’t nearly as effective as his 2012 stem-winder for Obama, but this year, his was a very different task.   And he gave a good “First Spouse” speech, managing to convey lots of positive information about Hillary and to display her human side. Probably, the greatest relief for the Hillary campaign was that the Sanders folks didn’t loudly boo or disrupt the former President’s speech. There is no telling how “prickly Bill” would have reacted. (more…)

With Trump, Some Hysteria Is In Order

Tony Quinn bemoans in this space that the possibility of Donald Trump winning the presidency “has set off high decibels of hysteria among the political establishment, and no more so than in blue California.”

He takes newspapers to task for publishing opinion pieces defending Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s criticism of Trump, and the LA Times in particular for publishing a piece from a left-wing writer suggesting a military coup if Trump won.

Quinn is right to point to these excesses, but he’s wrong when he argues that the papers are more extreme than Trump. “That two of California’s leading newspapers would entertain the idea that these bedrocks of our democracy should be jettisoned to stop Trump shows what is really extreme in this polarized political year,” he writes. (more…)

A Topsy-Turvey Political World

Listening to political speeches and talking heads around the national party conventions I get the feeling I have fallen through to DC Comics  Bizarro World where everything is weirdly opposite of what one would expect. The conventions and their fallout have presented topsy-turvy politics.

It is Trump now, not Obama as before, who is basically calling for a “reset” of the relationship with Russia. It is the Democrats, not the Republicans, who are speaking of American exceptionalism, that America is a great country. It is the Democrats speaking about a strong international defense, keeping durable ties with NATO. Not so Trump. (more…)

Why Are State Lawmakers Kicking Online Education Students to the Curb?

Imagine enjoying your summer holiday vacation only to learn that special interest lawmakers beholden to the California Teachers Association are voting to close down your child’s school.  As a parent, you’ve never received any school closure information or a single news report.

Sound far-fetched?  Actually, it’s not.  When the State Legislature reconvenes on August 1, lawmakers will have the opportunity to close down a handful of online public charter schools.  It’s a sneaky effort to catch parents off-guard.  Over 20,000 California students are at risk of being displaced – literally kicked to the curb. (more…)

Making State Government More User Friendly for Business 

(Editor’s Note: The following is a release from the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development, Go-Biz)

Building on the Administration’s efforts to make state government more efficient, the Governor’s Office of Business and Economic Development (GO-Biz) today awarded 23 state officials across various agencies and departments certificates of completion for the Lean 6-Sigma training program administered by GO-Biz which helps streamline permitting and make state government more business friendly. The complete list of graduates and information on the projects is available here. (more…)