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.
Proposition 65 at 30—Time for a Different Approach
This year is the 30th anniversary of California’s chemical warning law, Proposition 65. To mark the occasion, I published an article in the Journal of Business & Technology Law outlining the law’s biggest flaws—the lack of adequate information provided to consumers through Proposition 65 warnings and the abuse of the law by bounty hunters. My article offers alternative approaches to Proposition 65.
Since its overwhelming passage in 1986, it’s become nearly impossible in California to avoid seeing Proposition 65 warnings. Hotels, restaurants, ballparks, parking garages, office buildings, amusement parks, and pools, along with thousands of consumer products, warn Californians (and many outside California) of possible exposure to carcinogens or reproductive toxins. (more…)
Raising Property Taxes for Parks Raises Questions about Spending
The L.A. County Board of Supervisors would like voters to approve higher property taxes to pay for parks.
It’s the latest tax hike proposal to loom over the county of Los Angeles, joining a government wish-list that includes a half-cent increase in the sales tax for transit and an extra half-percent income tax on millionaires to pay for homeless services.
The proposed tax for parks is a parcel tax that would cost property owners 3 to 5 cents per developed square foot, which works out to $45 to 75 per year for a 1,500-square-foot house. The money is needed, the county supervisors say, because of the expiration of two temporary taxes passed in 1992 and 1996. (more…)
Scoring the Primary Results
Political insiders, like stock market traders, love to ascribe great meaning to events even when often times none exists.
Leading up to election day, it was being reported that California would experience an incredible increase in voter turnout, one of historic proportion, as young voters and voters of color surged to the polls in support of Bernie Sanders or as a response to the possibility of a Donald Trump presidency.
Given the way votes are cast and counted in this state, it will be a while longer before we can draw definitive conclusions about Tuesday’s results. That said, based on where the vote count stands now it appears that: (more…)
Labor’s Love Lost
Election campaigns contain a bit of Shakespearean drama as they deal with many aspects of human nature, but the fractured headline of this piece refers not to Shakespeare’s play but the question labor faces because of an unusual outcome in a Los Angeles County supervisorial race.
In the Fifth Supervisorial District overseen by Republican Michael Antonovich for 36 years, most political experts thought that Antonovich’s successor would be a Republican. Labor agreed and the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor and public employee unions stacked dollars behind their preferred Republican candidate, Kathryn Barger, Antonovich’s Chief of Staff. So much mail was sent out on behalf of Barger by the unions that she could direct her campaign cash to buying expensive Los Angeles television. (more…)
Thoughts on the Primary Results – the Local Edition
Yesterday, I touched on some initial thoughts on the June 7 California Primary. Caveats aside that there are still more VBM and provisional ballots yet to be counted, I’d like to examine some local election results. Local elections often don’t get the coverage they deserve, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t important.
Ballot Measures – Lots of Yes’s
Statewide ballot measures (thanks to well-funded Yes and No campaigns) get a lot of attention, but you’ll be lucky if you receive a mailer for the local measures. This is unfortunate. As with statewide measures, unless legislative bodies are given the authority within the measure’s language (very rare) they can only be amended or repealed via another ballot measure. This requires another expensive ballot measure campaign to fix poorly written measures or repeal just plain bad public policy. (more…)
Assessing the Top Two Primary
With the voting this week, California has now entered its third election cycle with a “top two” primary. This system marks a radical departure from the “semi-closed” approach in place from 2002 through 2010. Under that system, those voters registered with a party could vote only for candidates of that party. By contrast, the top two gives all voters the same ballot so they can vote for whomever they choose, regardless of party, and the two candidates with the most votes (again regardless of party) advance to the fall.
Among other goals, supporters of the top two hoped that the relatively open nature of the system would encourage more candidates to run and would lead to closer outcomes. There was also a general hope that it would give a leg up to candidates who were not favored by the Democratic and Republican Party establishments. How has the system performed and what do the results indicate? (more…)