Pensions and Taxes
In January 2015, the Manhattan Institute’s Steve Malanga, writing in the Wall Street Journal about public pension costs gulping down tax raises, quoted me saying that no matter what local politicians tell voters, when you see tax increases, think pensions. To paraphrase Ronald Reagan: Here I go again! Recent accounts indicated that the California Public Employees’ […]
Why It’s So Hard to Speak Silicon Valley
You can’t talk to people in Silicon Valley anymore. They don’t even speak our language. By that, I’m not referencing Mark Zuckerberg’s mediocre Mandarin or the software code underlying so many Valley’s endeavors. I’m talking, literally, about the words Valley denizens use when they speak, in sentences like: “Yeah, that startup has some cool gamification, […]
California Energy Plans Must Consider Geopolitics
The political actions of energy producing states such as Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iran, and the United States (US) impact energy prices. And no state seems to affect the nation, and it could be argued the world, more than California. California and its landmark global warming law affect how energy is consumed, produced and the impact […]
Sex, Drugs and a Controversial AIDS Activist
As an AIDS activist 30 years ago, Michael Weinstein helped defeat an inflammatory ballot measure that could have quarantined Californians with the disease. Today, Weinstein has turned to the ballot to advance his own controversial vision for public health. President of the Los Angeles-based AIDS Healthcare Foundation, which has clinics around the world, Weinstein is […]