THE NEED FOR INITIATIVE VOLUNTEERS

CALIFORNIA FOCUS

FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 29, 2013, OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
    “THE NEED FOR INITIATIVE VOLUNTEERS”

          There is little doubt about the historical veracity of one statement in the text of a recently vetoed California law that would have required at least some signatures for ballot initiatives to be gathered by volunteers instead of paid workers:

          “The voters amended the California Constitution to reserve for themselves the power of the initiative because financially powerful interests, including railroad companies, exercised a corrupting influence over state politics.”

          In fact, the initiative process did work that way for quite awhile. The best example might have been the so-called Clean Environment Initiative of 1972, a measure that lost – but whose goals have almost all been achieved: a moratorium on new nuclear power plants in California, taking lead out of gasoline and many more provisions now taken for granted.

          That initiative, organized by the populist People’s Lobby group headed by the legendary (among initiative aficionados) Ed and Joyce Koupal, is considered the start of the modern initiative era because it opened up shopping malls to petition carriers.

          That came after San Bernardino County sheriff’s deputies kicked volunteers out of a mall, and a lawsuit ensued, upholding their right to be there.

          Soon after, then-Gov. Ronald Reagan ironically invited the Koupals to meet with him and explain the initiative process. Their meeting bore strong irony because Koupal once led a drive to recall Reagan. But Reagan listened, and soon qualified a tax-cutting initiative for a special election ballot in 1973. That one also lost, but its goal was realized five years later via the Proposition 13 property tax limits.

          Reagan’s ballot drive was the first to use significant numbers of paid petition carriers, with corporations, labor unions and big money interests of all types realizing they also could play the initiative game.

          Within just a few years, tobacco companies, oil companies, electronics companies, labor unions and many other types of organizations had small armies of petition carriers pushing many different types of causes.

          At first, paid carriers got about 25 cents per signature; more recently, some have been paid upwards of $5 per valid name. Initiative petition drives now often cost millions of dollars. It’s become a political truism that anyone with the money to run a petition campaign can qualify just about anything for the ballot, with virtually no need for popular ideas that can draw volunteers.

          So much for the original purpose of taking power away from “financially powerful interests.”

          Enter the vetoed bill, which passed the Legislature as AB 857. It demanded that least 10 percent of petition signatures be gathered by unpaid workers. That would have been a start toward ensuring that all future ballot measures enjoy at least a modicum of popular support before going to the voters.

          The problem Gov. Jerry Brown zeroed in on when vetoing it: labor union members working for an initiative would have been classified as volunteers. That, he felt, gave unions too much of an advantage over other interests.

          Some Republicans contended the definition would give a lasting advantage to labor. But there was also nothing to prevent groups on the right from sending their own members out to gather significant numbers of signatures. You can be sure the various Tea Party organizations would have taken heed.

          The bill summed up its goal this way: “Improving the measure of public support for a proposed initiative will increase the public confidence and protect the integrity of the initiative process…this is more consistent with the intent of the voters in reserving (to themselves) the power of the initiative.”

          This would not have been a panacea for ballot measures. Big money could still have had plenty of influence in the process. The need now is for sponsoring Assemblyman Paul Fong, a Concord Democrat, and others not to give up, but to make their definition of who is a volunteer a bit more pure. Then this needed improvement will probably pass muster with Brown and make a start toward returning initiatives to the populist purpose for which they were always intended.

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    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net

STATE GOP CONGRESSIONAL RECOVERY NOT LIKELY

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 2013 OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS

     “STATE GOP CONGRESSIONAL RECOVERY NOT LIKELY”

    Republicans have been talking big this fall, saying they expect to improve greatly on their current 15 seats in California’s delegation of 53 members on the House of Representatives.

          Don’t bet on it, despite the fact the GOP managed a victory in one recent special election for a Central Valley state Senate seat previously held by a Democrat.

          For one thing, turnout is generally much lower in special elections than in November votes with offices like governor and a full plate of controversial ballot initiatives at stake. That’s especially true among the Latino voters who have lately made California dependably Democratic, but did not turn out heavily in that special election.

          Republicans plan next year to target three Democrats who in 2012 took previously GOP congressional seats. But they may not do nearly as well as they expect.

          One Democrat who thought he would be a big beneficiary of the political demise of former San Diego Mayor Bob Filner is first-term Democratic Rep. Scott Peters, who ousted longtime Republican incumbent Brian Bilbray last year. The GOP anointed former City Councilman Carl DeMaio as Peters’ opponent, and he’s a major threat, having carried his San Diego-based district when he narrowly lost the mayoralty to Filner last year. Once Filner left office, DeMaio toyed with the idea of making another run for mayor, thus leaving Peters sitting pretty. But he eventually opted to go against Peters.

          But for their infighting, Republicans could also have a shot at two other newly Democratic seats. They will wage a spirited primary campaign among three significant candidates wanting to oust Sacramento area Rep. Ami Bera. Vying for the slot opposite Bera will be Igor Birman, an immigrant from the old Soviet Union who has been chief of staff to Rep. Tom McClintock, solidly entrenched in a neighboring district.

    There will also be Elizabeth Emken, the GOP’s failed 2012 candidate against Democratic U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, who moved her residence from the East San Francisco Bay area city of Danville to make this run, and former Rep. Doug Ose.

          Says Allan Hoffenblum, a former Republican consultant who now edits the California Target Book rundown on the state’s political races, “Republicans in this district love to fight over who’s a real Republican; they’re not as good at beating Democrats.”

          The GOP may have its best chance in the Coachella Valley area around Palm Springs, where it seeks to upset first-termer Raul Ruiz, who ousted longtime Rep. Mary Bono Mack last year. Likely to face Ruiz is soon-to-be termed out Assemblyman Brian Nestande, whose father Bruce was a longtime state legislator and later an Orange County supervisor.

          Republicans will also try to regain a Ventura County-based seat they lost last year when Rep. Julia Brownley narrowly defeated former GOP state Sen. Tony Strickland. Yet, Brownley appears more entrenched by the day.

          Even if the GOP picks off a Democrat or two next year, the embattled party is just as likely to lose one or two seats it now holds. Most endangered in the GOP is longtime Rep. Gary Miller, in the 31^st district, taking in most of southern and central San Bernardino County. Miller lucked out last year, as Democrats splintered their party’s vote in the “top two” primary, leaving Miller to run against a fellow Republican.

          This time, no other significant Republican seems likely to run, while Democrat Pete Aguilar, the party’s leading vote-getter last time, faces former Democratic Congressman Joe Baca and activist Eloise Reyes, endorsed by the fund-raising group EMILY’s List. So Miller will almost certainly get a Democratic opponent in this district with a large Democratic majority among registered voters, an area that twice voted for President Obama.

          Another possibly endangered Republican is Jeff Denham, from the Merced-Modesto area. His district is strongly Latino, one reason Denham bucked his party’s leadership to endorse immigration changes including a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants. He is likely to be opposed by beekeeper and farmer Michael Eggman, whose sister is a Democratic assemblywoman.

          The bottom line, though, is that the GOP will be lucky to hang onto its current puny total of 15 California congressional seats. That’s mainly because the party has made no significant inroads into the solidly Democratic loyalties of the state’s Latino voters and will continue paying heavily for it.

          

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       Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net.

RECALL MOVES LOOK LIKE PUBLICITY STUNT

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 2013 OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS

    “RECALL MOVES LOOK LIKE PUBLICITY STUNT”

          There is little doubt that of the two active Republican candidates wanting to oppose Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown’s reelection next year, former Lt. Gov. Abel Maldonado is far better known than Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, who represents a largely rural district including vast stretches of desolate desert.

          So what’s Donnelly to do in this era of the top two, open primary, when he needs to attract some Democratic and independent votes along with many conservative Republicans in order to get into a runoff with Brown?

          How about a publicity stunt, and even better, how about one that will linger for months?

          That’s what it seems to some Donnelly is now doing as he helps prepare attempts to recall the Democratic speaker of the state Assembly and several other fellow legislators. Donnelly, once active in the Minutemen anti-illegal immigration group and best known for getting arrested while trying to carry a Colt pistol onto an airliner in 2012, early on targeted only lawmakers with Spanish surnames who voted for California’s latest gun-control laws, although his strategist says there may be additions and/or subtractions from the initial list.

          The strategist is Jennifer Kerns, a former spokeswoman both for the state Republican Party and for the campaign to pass the Proposition 8 gay marriage ban and a onetime Arnold Schwarzenegger press aide. More recently she helped run the successful early-autumn recall campaigns against two Colorado legislators who voted for gun controls. It’s fair to wonder whether it was coincidence that the recall notion surfaced about the time Kerns signed on with Donnelly.

          Donnelly’s Minutemen connection and the choice at first to target only Hispanic legislators raise the question of whether the putative recalls might be racially motivated.

          But other facts argue that this is more about publicity than anti-Latino bias or even gun control.

          It’s not just the timing – why run a recall effort against people who will, for the most part, be up for reelection anyway within mere months of any possible recall vote? (Kerns’ answer: “This is different because it involves people feeling a Constitutional amendment has been usurped and that strikes a nerve with people.” She doesn’t say why this couldn’t just as well be the topic of a normal election campaign.)

     And why does a nominal fiscal conservative want to spend millions of taxpayer dollars (any special election costs between $1 and $2.5 million) to hold votes so close to a regularly-scheduled election?

          Publicity for Donnelly appears to be the most likely explanation. Especially since a successful recall appears possible against no more than one of the named targets. The Kerns response: “Tim Donnelly came to one of our recall meetings on his own before we ever joined with him.”

          Donnelly’s most prominent potential whipping boy is Speaker John Perez. He will be termed out at the end of 2014.  In 2012, Perez won reelection to the Assembly by an 83-17 percent margin in his Los Angeles County district. It’s unlikely his support there will simply vanish.

  

    Similarly, San Diego Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez won office in a special election last spring with 71 percent of the vote in a district where Democrats took 97 percent of all votes. She doesn’t look vulnerable.

    The only likely victim listed is Assemblywoman Sharon Quirk-Silva of Fullerton, who eked out a very narrow win last November. But a recall campaign against just one lawmaker would not draw much attention, so if you want to increase Donnelly’s notoriety, you might go after several.

          Donnelly and Kerns plainly hope few analysts will look at the actual vote counts from the most recent elections won by their named targets. The publicity motive is visible to anyone who does.

          Donnelly says this effort is purely about gun control and the Second Amendment. But no California district involved looks remotely like the ones where recalls succeeded in Colorado.

          Still, if the National Rifle Assn. and other conservative groups can be persuaded to spend as heavily in California as they did in Colorado, Donnelly could get a lot of free exposure.

          But even if that happens and Donnelly can somehow parlay it into a runoff slot opposite Brown, he’d still have virtually no chance of winning next fall against the well-funded, currently popular governor.

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    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, visit www.californiafocus.net

COMPREHENSIVE QUAKE INFO AN ABSOLUTE MUST

CALIFORNIA FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 19, 2013, OR THEREAFTER

BY THOMAS D. ELIAS

    “COMPREHENSIVE QUAKE INFO AN ABSOLUTE MUST”

          Anyone who has seen the epicenter of a major earthquake within days of its hitting knows that California’s legal and scientific priorities have lately been seriously skewed.

          Now put these recent events together: First, the state Legislature passes and Gov. Jerry Brown signs a new law to require development of a comprehensive statewide earthquake early warning system. Estimated initial cost will be $80 million.

          Next comes a report detailing how the state’s effort to map all its significant earthquake faults has slowed almost to a stop. This began just after the 1971 Sylmar temblor, which destroyed a veterans hospital, among other things. That quake occurred on a fault no one previously knew existed and for 20 years mapping was a priority, with 534 maps published detailing active faults.

           

          But since 1991, reports the Los Angeles Times, just 23 more maps have been drawn, none between 2004 and 2011 because of budget cuts. About 300 more faults must be mapped.

          Then word arrives that a multi-campus team of University of California scientists funded by the National Science Foundation has identified about 1,500 of the most apparently quake-vulnerable buildings in Los Angeles, using public records and a walking survey.

          Trouble is, the academics won’t give their list to the mayor so he can start doing something about it. Since they can’t be sure all buildings on their list are really at risk, the scientists fear they could face lawsuits from building owners if they finger structures that are actually sound – something only an on-site assessment can determine.

          The question arising from these three almost simultaneous autumn developments: How do you create a comprehensive warning system if you don’t know where all the faults lie? And how do you warn the people most at risk if you don’t know what buildings they’re in?

          The warning system legislative sponsor, Democratic state Sen. Alex Padilla of Los Angeles, insists that while mapping precise locations of all faults is “very important,” it’s still not crucial to early warnings. “Once energy starts to emanate from the epicenter, waves go out,” the MIT mechanical engineering graduate says. “Energy moves faster than the actual shaking, so depending on how far you are from the epicenter, you might get between 15 and 60 seconds warning, as they do in Japan. That can be crucial if you’re a surgeon in an operation or a train engineer or in a car going over a bridge.”

          Padilla agrees that fixing buildings to cut casualties is critical. The first step in getting information needed to do that must be to immunize the scientists who have pinpointed dangerous buildings. If Los Angeles and other cities are to undertake a retrofitting campaign as thorough as one now authorized in San Francisco, they need that information. Nothing should be withheld for fear of lawsuits.

          So it’s necessary to free seismologists and structural engineers from the danger of lawsuits. That can be done with special acts of the Legislature and Congress if earthquake safety is a true priority.

          If lawmakers don’t do that, their priorities are fouled up. As usual, some might say.

          It’s hard for anyone who hasn’t seen the sheer power of a major earthquake up close to understand how urgent this problem is. California has seen no big quakes in major population areas in almost 20 years, creating a false sense of security.

          But action is needed. The comprehensive warning system should be online within two years. Padilla is correct when he says it can operate even without some key information. But adding that information can help prevent many casualties and a lot of damage. So we need to know where quakes might strike and who is most at risk.

          Yes, the maps drawn since 1971 give far more information than anyone had before then. But the biggest quakes of the last 40 years have come in unanticipated places, generally along unmapped faults. So even with an early warning all information on possibly unsafe buildings must be checked out, no matter what legislative manipulation it takes.

          That's because without adequate information, the good done by warnings could be minimized. Warnings should be targeted as precisely as possible and that can be done if lawmakers both state and federal forget partisanship and concentrate on saving lives.

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    Email Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough: The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias columns, go to www.californiafocus.net