California

Grannies, potholes, sunshine, and healthcare. We sure do get to vote on a lot of interesting things in California.

Prop 5 changes the way property taxes are calculated for certain classes of (mostly wealthy) people. Prop 6 amounts to a Republican temper tantrum. Prop 7 wants to settle some timely questions. And Prop 8 is a more-complicated-than-it-seems battle of the Titans.

Proposition 5 – Another Trickle Down Scheme

This is about the first four of California’s 2018 Ballot Propositions for the general election.

What the first four ballot offerings have in common are requests to use taxpayer money for things proponents would like us to believe are for the common good.

By Stephen Cooper

Above the din of disturbing news – that discordant banging you’re hearing, steadily getting louder and louder, that you can no longer ignore – that’s the drumbeat of the unfree.

Dehumanized by the labels “prisoner,” “inmate,” and “convict,” even reduced to serial numbers like Victor Hugo’s Jean Valjean in “Les Misérables,” these men and women are, just like you and me, or any mortal – irrespective of flaws, frailties, even felonious acts and misdemeanors – endowed with the right to be treated with dignity, decency, and respect

There are eleven ballot measures for voter consideration on the 2018 general election ballot in California. Three were placed on the ballot by the legislature, the rest via signature gatherers (mostly) paid for groups with an interest in shaping the legal and political landscape.

Four propositions (1-4) ask voter approval for bond measures to borrow money to build things. In the case of General Obligation Bonds, payments are made through the state treasury from tax dollars collected on Californians. In the case of Revenue Bonds, an existing or newly dedicated source of funding is used to make payments. Voters have approved 79.49% of bonds submitted in statewide elections over the past 25 years.

By Huiying B Chan / Daily Kos

Wildfires continue to ravage California. Instead of hiring firefighters to put out the fires, the government is turning to incarcerated people for labor. More than 3,400 prisoners risk their lives every day to tackle the wildfires. While the average California firefighter earns $74,000 plus benefits annually, imprisoned people are paid as little as $2 a day. By relying on prison labor, California avoids spending $80 to $100 million a year.

By Laura Sisk-Hackworth / SanDiego350

A landmark bill in the California legislature, SB 964, defines climate-related financial risk in law for the first time and requires the boards of the two largest public pension funds in the nation to report on this risk every three years.

The importance of this bill is that it gives the public a way to respond to the boards’ consideration of climate risk and its investments in key industries. It also protects state employees and our economy from potentially devastating financial losses that could result from climate change.

By Daniel Bacher

SACRAMENTO – California Governor Jerry Brown yesterday condemned the Trump Administration’s proposal to weaken the nation’s clean vehicle emissions standard at the same time that California regulators have approved an expansion of offshore and onshore drilling in California.

“For Trump to now destroy a law first enacted at the request of Ronald Reagan five decades ago is a betrayal and an assault on the health of Americans everywhere,” said Brown in a statement.

One hundred seventeen years ago, direct democracy came to California with the adoption of the initiative, referendum and recall processes by way of a special election called by a newly empowered progressive wing of the Republican Party (yes, there was such a thing back then).

The push for direct democracy was a reaction to the excesses of the gilded age when millionaires and their corporate entities became powerful politically. In California, the entire state government was under the control of the Southern Pacific Railroad. Bribery was the accepted method of doing business in the state capitol.

Today – Primary Day in California – is a good day to vote against the self-proclaimed emperor, Donald Trump.

Yesterday, June 4, Trump tweeted, “I have the absolute right to PARDON myself, …” This is akin to what a monarch, a king believes – the view of a dictator, an emperor.

“In this view the president is like kings and emperors of ages past. By definition, he cannot violate the law. It’s not that he is above the law. As president, the argument goes, he is the law.”

That’s not of the OB Rag – that’s from the Los Angeles Times editorial in today’s paper.

Please join the Ocean Beach Town Council at their next meeting, Wednesday, May 23, where they will be discussing the OB Parrots and ways in which the community can support these beautiful and unique residents of Ocean Beach.

In particular the discussion will examine the City’s springtime tree-trimming policy, which often endangers parrot nests.

Getting bored yet with all the glossy Anthony Villaraigosa commercials touting the utopia that will be California if only the former mayor of Los Angeles rises from the basement in the polls and becomes our next governor? Just a few weeks ago, Villaraigosa was languishing at 9% in the polls, having fallen behind the no-name Republicans in the race to see who would compete against Gavin Newsom in November. Now the airwaves in the Golden State are awash in all things Antonio all the time.

What gives?