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.
The Controversial Legacy of Henry Waxman
Rep. Henry Waxman is retiring from Congress, in part, he says, because of the “extremism of the Tea Party Republicans. I am embarrassed that the greatest legislative body in the world too often operates in a partisan intellectual vacuum.” Yet the fact is that few members have contributed more to the partisanship, extremism and dysfunction of Congress than Henry Waxman in his four decades of service.
Over those years his attitude toward his political opponents has been not only that they were wrong, but that they are deserving of no respect whatsoever. That was not how Congress worked when Waxman first arrived, but in no small part thanks to him, it is the norm for Congress today.
Attorney General’s Inaccurate Pension Initiative Ballot Summary Must be Corrected
Yesterday, my fellow proponents and I announced that we will be filing a legal challenge to correct the inaccurate and misleading ballot summary that the Office of Attorney General Kamala Harris issued for our statewide pension reform initiative.
The ballot summary is just plain wrong. It provides an inaccurate description of our initiative and misleads the voters as to what the measure does. The Attorney General’s Office has failed to meet its legal duty to give voters a ‘true and impartial’ summary of our initiative.
In particular, the lead sentence in the ballot summary incorrectly states that the initiative eliminates constitutional protections for employee pension and retiree healthcare benefits.
Polling Shows Californians Like School-Choice Tax Credits
This week is National School Choice Week and recent polling data shows that Californians support school choice, especially proposals creating tax credits that empower parents to choose the type of education that best meets their children’s needs.
Historically, Californians have had a favorable view of particular school-choice options. For example, charter schools, which are deregulated public schools independent of local school districts, have been seen as providing better quality education than regular district public schools. In a 2011 Los Angeles Times/University of Southern California state poll, twice as many respondents said that charter schools provided a higher quality of education than those who said that regular public schools provided the better education. While charter schools have been around in California the 1990s, other school-choice options are piquing the public’s interest.
The Thin Veneer of Civilization
“The thin veneer of civilization,” Edgar Rice Burroughs, describing man’s inner savage, The Return of Tarzan (2d in the Tarzan series) (1912).
Recent major storms and their after-effects – NY and NJ after Sandy; Joplin, MO after tornados; Katrina in New Orleans; the Philippines recent mega-typhoon Haiyan; Atlanta, GA this past week, after only a 2 inch snowfall – remind us of how little it takes to penetrate the thin veneer of civilization, revealing the utter chaos of human affairs beneath.
Living, as we do, in a state crisscrossed by fault lines, the potential collapse of civilization after a disaster event is far more than an academic hypothetical. For us in California, it is like asking about hard drive failures on your computer – it is a question of ‘when,’ and not ‘if.’ We are told that we are past the point where the San Andreas Fault should have seriously ruptured again, producing the dreaded “Big One,” as it did last in 1906, destroying a good part of San Francisco.
To Spend or Not To Spend – Voters Say, “Let’s Do Both!”
The Public Policy Institute took the temperature of the California electorate on a myriad of issues and once again voters have demonstrated an inconsistency in their approach to government. When it comes to the question if government should spend more or limit spending the voters seem to be telling the pollsters: “Let’s do both!”
When poll respondents were asked if they wanted to increase spending on four of the state’s major budget items, on the whole they were for more spending – overwhelmingly. K-12 public education received 81% support for increased spending; higher education spending increases garnered 75% agreement; while increased spending for health and human services was supported by 66%. Only prison spending didn’t receive sympathy from those polled with only 23% saying to spend more.
Oil Severance Tax Would Hurt Economy and the Middle Class
San Francisco Chronicle writer Joe Garofoli recently wrote that California appears to be taking the lead in President Obama’s agenda to address “economic inequality.” But this is bad news for California’s middle class families because, in actually, such a foolish pursuit will put a greater burden on their pocketbooks and stunt economic recovery.
This November, California’s ballot could be crowded with anti-business initiatives, from raising the minimum wage, to capping hospital executives’ pay to possibly imposing an oil severance tax. While Californians may find the left’s rhetoric sympathetic, they also understand the consequences of raising taxes on our economy and how it will harm business because they have seen it firsthand. The notion of making the rich pay their “fair share” is spreading like wildfire, yet the implications would be detrimental to our economy.