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 ‘Great State’ of San Francisco
The public stock offering by Twitter reflects not only the current bubble in social media stocks, but also the continuing shift in both economic and political power away from Southern California to the San Francisco Bay Area, home to less than one in five state residents. Not since the late 19th century, when San Francisco and its environs dominated the state, has influence been so lopsidedly concentrated in just one region.
The implications of this shift are profound not only for the ascendant northerners, but also for the increasingly powerless, rudderless regions that are home to the vast majority of Californians. With some 16 million residents by far the state’s largest region, Southern California long dominated both state politics and the economy. Today it, along with virtually all interior parts of the state, is effectively ruled by the Bay Area’s admixture of venture capitalists, tech moguls, political and environmental activists.
Should L.A. Be California’s Capitol
One thing that unites Americans, pretty much wherever they are from, is the conviction that their own state is singularly corrupt. Most states, if not all, have their harrowing stories of arrested governors or legislators, and local political folklore is filled with hair-raising corruption scandals. Just in the past few weeks, in California, State Senator Ron Calderon got stripped of all his legislative assignments following reports that he may have taken $88,000 in bribes from an undercover federal agent. And in New York, the leader of an anti-corruption commission set up by Governor Andrew Cuomo earlier this year indicated to the press that its findings would include outright criminality.
But corruption is a common problem in most places, so your state probably isn’t as bad as you think. And if it is especially bad, odds are good that your state has a small capital city—one that is far away from your state’s biggest population centers. As it turns out, that’s not coincidental.
Calderon’s FBI Woes Hurt Other Politicians
With the ugly news coming from the FBI’s investigation into state Sen. Ron Calderon, you’ve got to feel sorry for California politicians.
Not for Calderon, mind you. Remembering Joel Fox’s words in this space Thursday that the Montebello legislator is innocent until proven guilty, Calderon’s well-known penchant for testing the ethical edge had left plenty of folks thinking it was only a matter of time before something like this popped up.
No, it’s all the other honest politicians, in Sacramento and elsewhere, who are paying their own price for Calderon’s troubles.
New Boeing Line in California? We Can Do It.
It may be a longshot – but it’s worth the shot.
The venerable Boeing aircraft assembly plant in Long Beach apparently is in the running to build the new generation 777X jetliner. Just the prospect of this development is astonishing, given that the plant had recently rolled off the line the final C-17 built for the US Air Force. The company had said the assembly line would be shuttered for good in 2015.
That could all change with the recent announcement that the Machinists Union in Washington had rejected a tentative labor agreement that would have brought the work to the Seattle area.
Prop 13’s High Profile in Assembly Special Election
Thirty-five years after it passed, property tax reform Proposition 13 has taken a central role in one candidate’s attempt to win an assembly seat in what many consider the birthplace of the measure, Los Angeles’ San Fernando Valley. Republican candidate Susan Shelley running in tomorrow’s special election for the 45th Assembly district is promoting herself on placards around the district as the protector of Prop 13.
Shelley is facing off against Democrat Matt Dababneh. Both candidates emerged from the first round election to replace Bob Blumenfield who moved to L.A. City Hall.
Californians’ Love-Hate Relationship with Direct Democracy
Californians have a love-hate relationship with direct democracy.
We love that we have the ability to set the politicians straight, either by getting a jump on them on the next big issue or reversing course when we think they’ve made a big mistake.
But we’re not wild about reading through all those damn initiatives that appear on the ballot every year, or sorting through the claims and counter claims of the interest groups that sponsor and oppose them. And we don’t like the way that big money pays to get most measures on the ballot and then underwrites the campaigns.