Don’t Damage the Initiative Process Out of Anger
From the contemptible (“Sodomite Suppression Act”) to the retaliatory to make a point (“Intolerant Jackass Act”) to the corny (“The President of California Act”), California’s initiative process seemed to have gone off the deep end recently prompting some legislators to propose initiative reform measures. Let’s not react in haste. Most initiatives don’t qualify for the […]
Stop the Federal Water Wasters
If you came across somebody gasping with thirst, you wouldn’t give him one of those prank drinking cups that would trickle water down his shirt. By the same token, in drought-parched California, we can’t afford to have federal environmental bureaucrats drilling holes in our dams. Yet that’s what they’ve been doing, figuratively, by imposing Endangered […]
Getting the People’s Business Done — In Memory of Bill Campbell
California lost one of its great statesmen last Sunday, when veteran lawmaker, Senator Bill Campbell, passed away at the age of 79. Famous for his legendary humor as well as his legislative accomplishments, Bill served in the California Assembly and Senate for nearly four decades. Prior to his retirement in 1998, he served as President […]
Let’s Toast China’s President, California’s Savior
Dear President Xi Jinping, This is a thank you note from California. Thank you, first off, for sustaining our neighborhoods through these last difficult years. Thank you for keeping wealthy Chinese so nervous about your purges of political opponents—I’m sorry, I mean your anti-corruption campaigns—that they are buying up real estate all over California. More […]
Housing: How the California Dream Became a Nightmare
Important attention has been drawn to the shameful condition of middle income housing affordability in California. The state that had earlier earned its own “California Dream” label now limits the dream of homeownership principally to people either fortunate enough to have purchased their homes years ago and to the more affluent. Many middle income residents […]