California Plays "Block That Recovery"

The real tragedy of the proposed cuts in the state budget comes when you recognize that some of them would cancel out federal stimulus dollars. A perfect example would be the elimination of the welfare-to-work program Cal Works. In Los Angeles County, the stimulus funds a program through Cal Works that provides jobs. Without Cal Works, the program gets eliminated, and $200 million in federal dollars cease to flow to the state. And that's really just one example.

We see the same cross purposes when assessing social services programs for the elderly.

"Advocates for the elderly in California say recent budget cuts are dramatically affecting the ability of social service programs to keep up with demand" at a time when "the state's elderly population — and the incidents of elder abuse — are exploding," NPR reports. One example is Contra Costa County, where the Aging and Adult Services Program laid off two-thirds of the staff who "investigate abuse complaints of elderly and dependent adults." The county is now "turning over virtually all of its self-neglect cases to some other agency — often, the police." The Contra Costa situation is "so severe that the county grand jury recently concluded that Adult Protective Services no longer has the resources to carry out its legal mandate to investigate physical and financial abuse complaints." This comes at a time when complaints of elder abuse are on the rise. According to "national studies," only "1 in 5 elder abuse cases is reported" (Siler, 6/3).

Needless to say, this threatens the ability for Contra Costa county to qualify for stimulus funds to backfill those cuts, thanks to "maintenance of effort" rules. The Feds giveth, the state taketh away and taketh away what the Feds giveth. And that undermines the goals of the stimulus and damages economic recovery, given that we are the nation's largest state.

Some would say that the state's "runaway spending" brought this on, but Sen. Mark Leno argues persuasively against this, detailing the nature of the spending over the past decade and where that money has actually gone - tax cuts (the vehicle license fee), prisons, debt service, and the rapid cost growth in health care and fire protection. This is familiar to most of us but ought to be shared with those friends who don't know the facts. Same with this.

What truly brought this on is a dysfunctional process that requires serious structural reform.

SB810, Single-Payer Healthcare for All Californians, Reintroduced

Single-payer healthcare reform has a new bill number and a new sponsor. With my former State Senator Sheila Kuehl termed out, Mark Leno has stepped up to carry SB810, which in the past was known as SB840. The bill would, in the words of the press release, "guarantee comprehensive health care benefits to every California resident and streamline claims and reimbursements, which will save billions of dollars in health care administrative costs." Here's Sen. Leno:

“As a nation, we spend twice as much per person on health care as other wealthy countries, with the hope that our families will be protected from illnesses, yet most insured Americans still worry about how they will afford critical care if they become sick,” said Senator Leno. “In California, 7 million people do not have health insurance. Wasteful health care spending is crushing our economy and forcing families to forego basic medical care. With the money we spend today on health care, California can have a modern, universal health care system that provides high quality care for everyone,” he said.

A version of this bill has basically already passed the California Legislature, only to be vetoed by the Governor. So it shouldn't be a surprise that 43 lawmakers, including both leaders in the Assembly and Senate, have already signed on as co-sponsors.

Given the conservative veto and the 2/3 rule for revenue, SB810 lacks a funding source, so even if it were signed at some point - and realistically, Governor Schwarzenegger won't be the one to sign it - supporters wold have to go to the ballot to raise the necessary revenue to fund the bill.

There is no question that our health care delivery system is grossly inefficient, and insurance company profit and overhead is a pool of money that does little to provide quality care. As a nation we spend an extreme amount on health care - $2.4 trillion dollars in 2008, closing in on 20% of GDP - without a proportional increase in health care outcomes over the rest of the industrialized world. In fact, we pay more for care while ranking below dozens of nations in quality. Single-payer care, while varied in different nations across the world, has generally been proven to offer the best quality at the most reduced cost.

But of course, that is on a national level. And even though with 38 million people we have as many citizens as several other nations which have implemented single-payer, universal health care, what we lack is a printing press to coin our own money. Given the constraints of a balanced budget, given the far more onerous constraints of the conservative veto, and given that states have little control over the boom and bust cycles of the national economy, universal health plans have largely come ashore and beached when they are done at the state level. There are certainly reforms that can take place here, but we need the structural reform to set the table for them, and even with that, I am highly dubious (though willing to be convinced) that any state can manage UHC on their own without the tool of deficit spending that would occasionally be needed. And history bears this out.

Yacht Party Throws Cogdill Into The Ocean

There's some overnight craziness going on in Sacramento. The Yacht Party staged a putsch, deposing their leader in the middle of the night.

Around 11 p.m., a group of GOP senators, unhappy with the higher taxes that Senate leader Dave Cogdill of Modesto agreed to as part of a deal with the governor and Democrats, voted to replace him in a private caucus meeting in Cogdill's office. Shortly before midnight, it was still unclear who would replace him.

Cogdill's ouster could be a major setback to budget negotiations. Cogdill was a lead negotiator on the budget package and had committed to voting for it. If he were removed from his leadership post, a new Senate minority leader would likely try to renegotiate the deal, which lawmakers spent three months forging [...]

Sen. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco), noting that Cogdill helped negotiate the budget and pledged to vote for it, said the Republican's caucus mates should join him -- or replace him.

"You ought to follow your leader or choose a new one," Leno said.

They took Leno's advice.

We've been following this at Calitics all night. Apparently Cogdill, Maldonado, Cox and Asburn abstained from the leadership vote, which was unclear for a while until the rump Yacht Party chose as their leader Dennis Hollingsworth, who's 12 shades of crazy but with the Yacht Party it's all a matter of degree. Everybody knew Cogdill was a goner (including Cogdill, he offered his resignation over the weekend), but what's crucial here is if the negotiations are already over. The big question is this - would Dems have to re-negotiate with a new Senate Minority Leader on this, or are there three votes locked up?

John Myers asked Hollingsworth if he would ask for the budget to be re-opened, and he simply said "a majority of Republicans oppose tax increases." That's a no, to me.

Steinberg's on the floor right now congratulating Hollingsworth and saying "We're tired of waiting." Hollingsworth, in his speech, says "I honestly don't know how the vote is going to turn out." And now voting has begun on the $14.4 billion dollar tax package.

...which failed. All the necessary GOP votes abstained.

A Wedding Guest

I haven't done too much writing about Prop. 8 compared to my friends at my other blogosphere haunts. Over at Calitics we've devoted a substantial amount of time and resources to it, and we've raised over $50,000 at the Calitics ActBlue Page for Equality for All. I've been praiseworthy of the campaign at times, critical at others - I think their ads fail to put a face on who the discrimination would actually harm, and as such come off as vague and allow the theocons to distract and distort the issue ("they'll teach your kids how to be gay!!!") and drive the narrative. I've been happy that much of the progressive movement has come together to defend this attack on civil rights, and that even establishment figures like Maria Shriver and Dianne Feinstein have gone public for the cause (Barack Obama has allowed the campaign to use him in Web advertising, but there's an argument to be made that he could do more).

But instead of an analytical post (the short answer is that every single volunteer is vital because this will be an extremely close vote), I'd like to get a little personal. Today is Write To Marry Day, where hundreds of bloggers are posting about Prop. 8 and their thoughts about gay marriage and civil rights. I'd like to add my own by talking about the wedding I attended a few months ago.

It was unusual only for the fact that it was extremely casual. There was morning coffee and some pastries and other food and drinks set up on picnic benches at a park in the hills behind Berkeley, and a large field where the wedding was held. When the announcement was given for the ceremony to begin, everybody kind of meandered over to the field and stood around in a circle. The "aisle" for the couple to walk down had to be created impromptu. Eventually that got sorted out. Other than that, the event had what you might expect - two people who loved one another making a commitment to spend their lives together. It was entirely unremarkable and indistinguishable from any other wedding where I've been invited. Except for one thing.

The ceremony was conducted by Assemblymember (soon to be State Senator) Mark Leno. He is notable for having authored the marriage equality law that passed through the California legislature - twice - only to be vetoed by Governor Schwarzenegger. (Just remember that the next time someone tells you he's "practically a liberal." He's opposing Prop. 8, supposedly, but has gone completely silent on the issue.)

In brief remarks, Leno talked about how the issue was not made clear to him until the Massachusetts Supreme Court rendered their decision on the law. He quoted the text of the decision at length, particularly this portion:

The SJC ruling held that the Massachusetts constitution "forbids the creation of second-class citizens." The state Attorney General's office, which argued to the court that state law doesn't allow gay couples to marry, "has failed to identify any constitutionally adequate reason for denying civil marraige to same-sex couples," Marshall wrote.

The creation of second-class citizens is really the nub of this, said Leno. By defining marriage in such a way, those who would seek to ban gay marriage tell those who wish to love one another how they can do it. But this is part of the common experience of the human condition - the desire to love another man or woman and profess a commitment to them. What is perverse - indeed, irrational and against human nature - is to defy that love and that commitment. The right to marry is a right to share in the common experience of man. It has served the nation and the world with tangible societal benefits and promotion of the family. It is a profoundly conservative virtue.

And this was a very (small-c) conservative, simple wedding, just two people - two men - and their friends and family, coming together to express their love and joy. This is what those who would pass Prop. 8 would snuff out. Indeed they are the radicals - the kind of people who would express that equality is not an American value. They have to rewrite the Declaration of Independence to fit their worldview:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal…

It's really as simple as that. I was thinking while attending this wedding that I would maybe write something about the feelings it engendered, the wonderful picture of basic civil rights being expressed. But it was totally unremarkable, which is why I waited so long. It was banal, even. It was just two people that love one another among the hundreds of millions and even billions on this planet. There was nothing that special about it.

Which is why it should not be singled out and rejected.

If you can, volunteer for No on 8 or donate to their cause. It's the best investment in normalcy that you'll ever make.

The California Report

• As I noted at Calitics, Dennis Morris, a resident in San Luis Obispo County, got his ballot, saw that no Democrat was running in the 15th Senate District, and did something about it:

And so today he is mounting a last-minute write-in campaign to get his name on the November Ballot. From the SLO County Dems:

"The San Luis Obispo County Democratic Party endorsed Dennis Morris on May 14th in his write-in bid to run against Republican Abel Maldonado for the 15th Senatorial District which includes all of San Luis Obispo County as well as parts of several neighboring counties. The Party is urging all Democrats in San Luis Obispo County and elsewhere in the 15th Senatorial District to WRITE-IN "Dennis Morris" for that office on their JUNE 3rd BALLOT" [...]

This is crucially important. With the possible demise of the Denham recall and an unopposed Maldonado seat, Democrats were missing out on two of their best opportunities to achieve a 2/3 majority in the State Senate. Morris' bid at least provides the opportunity for a real race in one of them. Don Perata allegedly prevented top local Dems from running in this race. But this is a people-powered action that could actually be more impactful.

• So Arnold wanted to have a yacht party yesterday - at a time when his budget dropped the closure of the loophole that lets yacht owners avoid sales tax. So after his appearance got some publicity, the coward skipped out:

I waited, and waited, and waited, but Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger didn’t show today at the St. Francis Yacht Club in San Francisco’s Marina District for an event unveiling a hybrid pleasure-boat engine [...]

But although Frauscher’s public relations firm had insisted Wednesday, Thursday and through much of this morning that Schwarzenegger had been confirmed to attend — and that the event had been moved from Thursday to Friday to accommodate his schedule — there was no governor. He was in San Francisco, apparently meeting with a certain newspaper’s editorial board, but he didn’t make the yacht event (though many reporters did, with most splitting as soon as it appeared he wouldn’t show).

• San Francisco is leading at the forefront of the electric car movement, investing heavily in charging infrastructure. Mayor Newsom actually had an E-car back when he was on the Board of Supervisors IIRC.

• It looks like Mark Leno is cruising to victory in his challenge of Carole Migden in SD-03. Mark's a really good guy and a transformative progressive; this is good news.

• Lost amid the budget wrangling is the fact that college fees are going up again for Cal State students, with UC likely to follow. California used to have the best education system in the world. Remember those times?

• As our warehousing of human beings continues, a California man who was shipped off to Mississippi has died in prison, reportedly of "asthma," which is, you know, often treatable. What a shame.

Liveblogging Convention Sunday

OK, so apparently the two battles for endorsements will happen first, before anything else. Mark Leno is greeting members at the door as they walk into the hall. You're going to have a low-information electorate here doing the voting on these endorsements: I don't know if someone in Fresno has ever heard of Mark Leno or Carole Migden. So the speeches they'll give should be interesting. The same with AD 40 (Blumenfield-Waldman-Healey). Bill Clinton's speech will apparently take place after the endorsement fight. I'll update....

My sense of what's happening on the floor is that people are very turned off by this endorsement process as a whole and will be voting against endorsing Democrats over other Democrats. We'll see if the Progressive caucus has enough juice to pull off that message, along with the Leno supporters on the floor, versus the establishment.

Regarding the Clinton speech, the first several rows of the convention floor are all superdelegates, you if you want to read the tea leaves, look to them. I expect Clinton to be well-received, but he's had foot-in-mouth disease on the campaign trail, so we'll see...

According to hekebolos Ted Kennedy might be making a surprise appearance in support of Barack Obama. I cannot speak to its truth.

...the Hillary visibility extras are massing on the floor. Incidentally, I heard that Phil Donahue's movie, which screened here last night, is uncompromising on Hillary's war vote, and during the time when she talks about it in the film she was booed. The reaction from the audience here to the Big Dog should be interesting.

Right now the volunteers of the year for all the various regions are being announced. And now we have the credentials report. There are 2,018 registered for the convention, which could be important for quorum purposes.

...Christine Pelosi is talking about the party platform. Marriage equality is in there, which is awesome, as well as the party's commitment to a safe and orderly withdrawal from Iraq and single payer healthcare. That's a good platform. And it passed without any incident. Fantastic.

...Inola Henry on the Resolutions Committee reports that the party endorses a no vote on 98 and yes on 99 for the June election, and endorses the recall of Jeff Denham in SD-12. That's great. Prop. 98 would end rent control throughout the state, and it must be stopped. Art Torres says "that's the easiest resolutions report we've ever had."

...SF DA Kamala Harris is about to speak on behalf of Sen. Obama. There's a good amount of Obama visibility. Harris is talking about how her speech up against Bill Clinton is "what this campaign has been about... the audacity of what seems impossible." She continues, "As we celebrate the fact that we are the most diverse, most vibrant and most inclusive party in America, we know that this November we will elect a Democrat as the next President of the United States." DA Harris talks about her family's history in the civil rights movement and how "this is a place that offers us a chance to rise again," and her improbable rise in public service as the first female black district attorney in the state of California. Now she goes into a version of Obama's stump speech. "The next President must be more than simply an improvement on the incumbent... we'll need more than plans... we'll need what former President John Quincy Adams called 'leadership.'" Apparently John Quincy Adams is the only American who's ever used the word "leadership."

...Harris mentions how Obama will appoint judges that will bring balance back to our courts and protect a woman's right to choose. That doesn't usually show up in stump speeches, but it should. Now she's on to talking about ending a culture of fear. She's doing well in the room... also talking about being smart on crime. "We will no longer have to accept the false choice between being tough on crime and vigilant in the protection of justice."

...Harris "Change has only ever come out of crisis." Interesting finishing thought. A lot of Obama supporters are here. There's an Obama chant happening now. Could this be a hostile audience for Bill Clinton?

Day 2 quick thoughts

• I truly think that the governor's mansion is Jerry Brown's if he wants it. I always aprreciate a guy who's been marginalized and demonized by the right for so long, and just keeps going, shoving it right back in their faces. Brown's speech at the convention, delivered without a teleprompter, was great for red meat but also reflected an agile mind that has been right about so many issues for so long. I like a guy who takes "Governor Moonbeam" as a compliment. I really think that if he wants to be Governor again the seat is his. Outside of President I don't believe he's ever lost a political race. (Plus I still remember that Joe Trippi ran his campaign against Bill Clinton in 1992.)

• I don't have a connection to the Leno-Migden fight outside of what I read on Calitics and what I hear from my friends on the site. But I have to say that, looking at it from the outside, this is the biggest waste of resources I've ever seen in my life. What would happen if these hundreds of volunteers walked precincts in the district, instead of providing "visibility" while fighting for an endorsement in a high-information area that won't ultimately matter much? The battle is swamping the entire convention, and it's clearly become a giant pissing contest between the Assembly and the Senate, with each side taking up for their colleague. As you've read here, Migden is nuts, and I have pretty strong opinions about who should serve, and in particular the principle of the unbalanced endorsement process, where an incumbent needs a lower threshold to get the party endorsement than a challenger. That's ridiculous, and in fact Joye Swan of the Progressive Caucus is leading an effort for a bylaw change to address just that. But this is a waste.

• Relevant to that, I think Bill Clinton has NO IDEA what he's about to step into on Sunday. The Leno-Migden thing is sucking up most of the oxygen out of this convention. Clinton and San Francisco DA Kamala Harris are speaking for Hillary and Barack Obama tomorrow, but there's going to be less focus on that than he'd expect.

• We are doing several interviews with Congressional and legislative candidates. So far we had a good chat with Bill Durston, a candidate in the rapidly purpling area of CA-03. We have interviews with Charlie Brown (CA-04), Hannah-Beth Jackson (SD-19) and Russ Warner (CA-26) later on. We will be posting the audio as we get it in. We also had a nice chat between bloggers and Mayor Gavin Newsom. His effort to sue for restoration of Medi-Cal reimbursements is a very strong stand.

What's Next For Net Neutrality

Sorry to be so California-focused today. Expect it to continue.

As I mentioned, the CDP affirmed their support for net neutrality this weekend with a strong resolution that reflected the concerns of both labor interests and the progressive movement.  Brad Parker of PDA (Progressive Democrats of America) commended the process in the Sunday session as proof that the Progressive Caucus and the more institutional elements of the CDP can work together.  On that score alone, it's a win. 

The best part, by the way, was that Speed Matters (the CWA's astroturf campaign) spent major dollars creating a glossy brochure that they put on everybody's seat this morning, and it included what they thought would be the resolution.  Biggest waste of money I've ever seen.  Ha!

As for how to translate this into policy, since after all it is merely a nonbinding resolution, that's what I'd like to address.  These resolutions sit on some corner of the CDP website and collect e-dust.  They have no meaning unless they are publicized.  So here's what I propose.

Every Democratic member of Congress and the state legislature should be getting calls this week.  You should say, "Hello, I'm a constituent, the California Democratic Party just passed a resolution supporting the preservation of a free and open Internet.  I would like (the congresscritter) to abide by the wishes of his/her party and support any legislation codifying the principle of net neutrality.  If you would like to look at the text I can fax it to you."  Let's hold our representatives to the demands of the Party they represent, as well as their constituents. 

The preservation of a free and open Internet is critical to the continued innovation and entrepreneurship of this country, as well as the free flow of information needed for a well-informed citizenry and the rights to free speech and freedom of assembly.  We can move this forward in California.  We know that, at the state level, Mark Leno sought to introduce net neutrality legislation back in February.  That needs to return next year and we need to organize around it right now.

This can also work for other resolutions, especially the one on parole and sentencing reform that passed this weekend.  Really they are completely useless unless publicized in this manner.  Let's allow them to have some impact, otherwise the hard work crafting them and managing them on the Resolutions Committee goes to naught, and nobody wants that.

Below, I've added the resolution text if you want to fax it to your legislators.  Please call Congress and the State Legislature today.

Support of Affordable High Speed Internet for America and Internet Neutrality (it’s actually Network Neutrality –ed.)

WHEREAS to secure the rights of assembly, and free speech online, which are guaranteed by the Constitution and encourage new innovative American businesses to flourish , Americans are entitled to and require open, equal and impartial Internet access; we need high speed internet for our homes, schools, hospitals and workplaces to grow jobs and our economy; enable innovations in telemedicine, education, public safety and government services; foster independence for people with disabilities and strengthen democratic discourse and civic participation and;

WHEREAS the United States – the country that invented the Internet – has fallen from first to sixteenth in internet adoption; US consumers pay more for slower speeds than people in other advanced nations; millions of Americans, especially in rural and low income areas do not have access to affordable, high speed broadband; then United States alone among the advanced nations has no national, Internet policy; the US definition of “high speed” at 200 kilobytes per second (kbps) is too slow and has not changed in nine years: the US and California collections of broadband data does not tell us what we need to know about broadband deployment, adoption, speeds and prices and consumer and worker protections must be safeguarded on high speed networks and;

WHEREAS the growth of a free and open Internet has provided historic advances in the realms of democracy, free speech, communications, research and economic development; California and US consumers are entitled to and require open, unfettered access to the lawful Internet content of their choice without interference by any entity, public or private; build out of universal, high speed, high capacity networks will promote an open Internet by eliminating bandwidth scarcity;

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that the California Democratic Party endorses national,  state and local policies to promote affordable, high speed broadband for all with strong protections for consumers and the workers who build, maintain and service those networks; and a national goal for universal access and deployment of network capable of delivering 10 megabytes per second downstream and 1 megabyte per second upstream by the year 2010 and the California Democratic Party supports federal and state initiatives to improve data collection on high speed broadband deployment, adoption, speed and prices as a necessary first step; upgrading the current definition of high speed to 2 megabytes per second downstream, 1 megabyte per second upstream and policies that promote public programs to stimulate build out of high speed networks to all home and businesses in the nation and;

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the California Democratic Party in order to promote vigorous free speech, a vibrant business community, and unfettered access to all information on the Internet, supports policies to preserve an open, neutral and interconnected Internet; protect against any degradation or blocking of access to any websites for content on the Internet and insure consumers have the right to free email; encourages build out of high speed networks to all homes and businesses so that everyone can go where they want and upload or download what they want on the Internet as a public utility maintained by union workers.

Submitted by the

Labor Caucus of the California Democratic Party

Progressive Caucus of the California Democratic Party

CA Clean Money: Perata Endorses

This is an absolutely enormous development. Clean Money got kind of lost in the shuffle at last weekend's CDP Convention, but Loni Hancock's AB 583 has been quietly making its way through the Assembly. It cleared the Assembly Elections Committee, and yesterday there was a hearing in the Assembly Appropriations Committee, which was favorable. And now, the Senate President pro Tem has signed on to be a co-author. Considering that the CDP wouldn't take a position on Clean Money just a year ago, this is historic news. Susan Lerner writes in an email to supporters:

I want you to be among the first to hear the exciting news: California Senate President pro Tem Don Perata just became a co-author of AB 583, the Clean Money bill!

The President pro Tem joins an ever-growing list of Legislators who are co-authors of AB 583, the California Clean Money and Fair Elections Act. Clean Money supporters in Senator Perata's Oakland district and throughout California should be proud because it was your calls, letters, and petitions that convinced him to sign on as a active Clean Money supporter.

As Mark Leno said in yesterday's Appropriation Committee hearing, "AB 583 is more than just a bill, it's a movement." Two years ago it was stopped in committee. Last year it cleared the Assembly. And this year, Perata's support will go a long way to helping it pass both houses and go on to the governor. This movement understands that the ability to wage fair and clean elections is vital to sustaining our democracy. You can join the movement working to clean up our political process here.