Death Penalty Trumps Environment in AG Race
In the race for Attorney General, Kamala Harris emphasizing she will be a tough enforcer of law protecting the environment won’t be enough to blunt Steve Cooley’s attack that Harris is soft on the death penalty.
In the debate between Los Angeles D.A. Steve Cooley and San Francisco D.A. Kamala Harris at UC Davis yesterday, Cooley went right for the death penalty issue with his opening comment. Harris emphasized environmental issues in an attempt to connect with voters and to avoid her controversial stand on the death penalty.
Cooley spoke of Harris’s refusal to pursue the death penalty for the killer of San Francisco Police Officer Isaac Espinoza. Cooley was quick to point out his endorsement from the Espinoza family, who earlier this week issued a tough press release stating in part: "Kamala Harris’ arrogant contempt for the sacrifice of law enforcement officers, for the rule of law and for the will of the people has disqualified her from being California’s chief law enforcement officer. She is simply not worthy."
Prop 27, The Big Lie Ballot Measure
Deceptive ballot measures are nothing new in California, but it is rare when an initiative is entirely a lie. That is the case with Proposition 27, a big lie ballot measure to eliminate the voter-approved Citizens Redistricting Commission and return this vital function to self serving incumbent legislators.
Fed up with the dysfunctional legislature whose approval rating is now just 10 percent, voters in 2008 passed Proposition 11 to take the drawing of legislative districts away from politicians and give it to a 14-member Citizens Commission. Voters said it is time to end the practice of incumbents drawing districts for themselves.
The reform the people passed in 2008 has gone spectacularly well; more than 30,000 citizens applied for the Commission, and the 60 finalists include Democrats, Republicans, Green Party members, political independents, whites, Latinos, blacks, Asians and Native Americans. The Commission will reflect the diversity of the state, and will draw the new districts in 2011 according to specific and transparent criteria.
Employment Gains Expected if Prop 23 Passes
The California electorate next month will vote on Proposition 23,
which would suspend the implementation of the state’s global warming
(i.e., energy taxation) law ("AB32?) until the unemployment rate
reaches 5.5 percent for four consecutive quarters. My new paper on the
employment effects of this initiative can be found here.
In a nutshell: Based upon official estimates of the reduction in
state energy use attendant upon implementation of AB32, Proposition 23
would increase California employment by over half a million in 2012,
and over 1.3 million in 2020. (Total employment in 2009 was about 16.2
million.)
Brown’s Judges
Rarely do you read a devastatingly funny yet as serious a
political book as Gov. Jerry Brown’s Destruction of the California
Judiciary.
While the title seems like a reach, by the time
you’ve read about judges who grow pot in their home, chauffeured
murderers, violated court orders and voted to overturn every murder
conviction that came before them, you will ask yourself where Governor
Brown found so many of these fruitcakes. The book anticipates and
answers that question and includes the perspectives of Democrats like
Senator Alfred Alquist that Brown "seems to have gone out of his way to
appoint people who are extremely controversial."
It’s easy to
see why former Governor Pete Wilson, past California District
Attorneys’ Association President Ed Jagels, Senator Tony Strickland,
and Assemblyman Jim Nielsen all praise the book.