We Fight Low Information
by Frank D. Russo – For the past several years here in California about this time we begin to learn through leaks or otherwise what our dear Governor’s theme is for the upcoming year. Like the teasers you see sitting in the theater before the main show for a blockbuster movie about to be released, [...]
The California Field Poll showing Proposition 8 behind with 44% support and 49% opposition that was released earlier today is making the headlines of the state’s newspapers—and in fact is national news. These results are remarkably similar to a poll released last week by the Public Policy Institute of California that showed it with the [...]
The California Field Poll released today shows Barack Obama has widened his lead to a 55% to 33% margin over John McCain with 4% voting for other candidates and 8% undecided amongst likely voters. If this holds up, it will be the largest margin any candidate has won in California since World War II.
It is happening across the country, and California is no exception. Democratic voter registration is up, a record turnout of voters is expected, and polls show independent voters trending Democratic and districts once thought safely in the hands of Republicans from the State Assembly to the Congress are up for grabs. This last happened in [...]
An iconic figure in California politics, the Progressive Republican Governor almost a hundred years ago, Hiram Johnson, coined the phrase, “The first casualty of war is the truth.” Well, in reigniting the cultural wars of the 1960’s and taking a page from the disgraced Spiro Agnew who resigned from the Vice-Presidency in disgrace and indictment, [...]
The latest numbers are just in from the United States Census Bureau. According to analyses from the California Budget Project (CBP) they show that for low and middle income Californians there has been a decline in the real (inflation adjusted) household income. A separate analysis by Health Access California shows that more Californians are uninsured [...]
I was at the Governor’s press conference yesterday afternoon to see and hear directly his announcement that he would veto any bills sent to him before a state budget is passed. You can read his remarks in their entirety as dutifully transcribed by the Governor’s press office and published on these pages yesterday.
Over 8,500 service workers represented by AFSCME Local 3299 began striking at ten UC campuses and five medical centers yesterday. They have been negotiating for almost a year for a fair contract, but have remained deadlocked for months. An overwhelming 97.5 percent of the workers authorized a strike in May. These workers do everything from [...]
Some astute political observers are seeing a parallel between this year’s general election in California and the elections of 1976 when the Republican Party cratered in the aftermath of Watergate. I remember 1976 very well. It was the year I graduated from law school, passed the bar, became an attorney, and began working for an [...]
Legislation that would reform the foreclosure process in California for the benefit of homeowners trying to hold on to their homes passed the Assembly today on a 55 to 18 vote, just one vote above the two-thirds majority it required. Ten Republican Assemblymembers joined 45 of the 48 Democrats in voting for the bill, while [...]
The Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) has released a massive survey today that shows just how important the internet has become to most Californians’ lives and has major implications as to how Californians are getting their information about their communities, news in general and political news, variable access to the internet by different demographic [...]
As we celebrate graduations from high schools all across California, the Public Policy Institute of California (PPIC) has released a sobering study, “Predicting Success, Preventing Failure: An Investigation of the California High School Exit Exam,” that shows that by the 4th grade those students who will pass or fail the California High School Exit Exam [...]
Charles Hayes: What 42 makes crystal clear is how shallow and superficial the strain of contempt is that enables and sustains racism as prejudice is handed down from one generation to the next.
Walter Moss: What unites us, as it did the early Progressives, is resistance to–in John Muir’s memorable phrase–“trying to make everything dollarable.”
Gary Corseri: Jeffers gaze was not so much bitter as it was unflinching, steady, resolute and sui generis. “The cold passion for truth,” he wrote, “hunts in no pack.”
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