California Propositions
Yes on Prop 19 This is the most important issue on the California ballot. Unlike even the other high-profile races, this one carries profound national implications: a "Yes" vote would represent an unprecedented departure from 60 years of the War on Drugs. The fact that the "No" campaign has basically resorted to the lazy "This law is poorly written!" defense demonstrates how few arguments they really have to make against the common-sense Proposition. None of the suggested problems with the bill's structure make much sense at all (when they're anything more than vague complaints of sloppiness, which is rare), and at any rate they're not nearly substantial enough to offset the number of people we'll keep out of jail, the money we'll make and the money we'll save by passing 19.
No on Prop 20 I was initially in favor of this one, since I think the more redistricting is taken out of the hands of politicians, the better. However, after doing a bit more research, it appears that the Redistricting Commission may not be any less partisan or more representative, but it would be more unaccountable. If that's the case, then this deserves a "No".
No on Prop 21 I'd ordinarily be all for this type of revenue-raising initiative, but California has to stop budgeting by ballot box. The root cause for lack of money to spend on things like state parks is the ridiculous budgetary system California has in place, and it's time to end that rather than continue to rely on passing initiatives to raise taxes that Sacramento isn't able to.
Yes on Prop 22 I'm very skeptical of measures that restrict the scope of what the Legislature can do to balance the budget. When bad times hit, all options need to be on the table, or else really bad decisions have to be taken. But this Proposition essentially seems to prevent the Legislature from being able to enact a really bad idea anyway (namely, raiding local government revenues rather than raising State revenue), and I'm all for making it harder to do bad things.
No on Prop 23 This is an outrageously bad idea. The hidden goal of this Proposition (although it's not very well hidden) is to repeal the state's tremendous environmental protection laws. But since the Proponents know that California wouldn't hesitate to reject that idea, they're disguising it in a naked appeal to people's rough financial circumstances. I believe Californians are smarter than the Proponents believe, and we have no choice but to reject this measure.
No on Prop 24 I completely support the goals of this Proposition, but this is something that the Legislature simply has to do. Ending the practice of budgeting by Proposition is too important to be hypocritical about. This is the third budget-related Proposition so far on this ballot, and we're not even done! It has to end.
Yes on Prop 25 If Prop 19 is the most important Proposition on the California ballot because of its nationwide impact, then 25 is the most important for its impact on California's future. The two-thirds rule is a huge part of the reason that California has a $20 billion budget deficit, and this Proposition is necessary for it to end. As an Initiative Constitutional Amendment, only it can begin to roll back the decades of havoc Prop 13 wrought across the California landscape.
No on Prop 26 Just stop it. Just stop. An awful idea (requires that certain state and local fees pass by two-thirds). You're making my brain hurt. How many times do I have to rephrase "end budgeting by ballot box"?!
Yes on Prop 27 I earlier was leaning towards "No" on this one, under the belief that disinterested third parties should be in charge of drawing district lines, instead of politicians. I stand by that. But the Redistricting Commission appears to be anything but a "disinterested third party", and that coupled with its lack of accountability means it might as well go away for good.
California Elected Officials
Barbara Boxer for US Senate Carly Fiorina ran HP into the ground, left millions of dollars richer and now wants to be a Senator because...? Boxer is a solid liberal vote in a Senate that needs as many as it can get.
Jerry Brown for Governor Meg Whitman is trying to buy her way into office, spending over $100 million on her campaign. But she can't spare a couple bucks for her illegal immigrant housekeeper's overtime? She can go to hell, but not the Governor's Mansion.
Gavin Newsom for Lieutenant Governor Because why not?
Debra Bowen for Secretary of State All else being equal, pick the Democrat.
John Chiang for Controller Democrat.
Bill Lockyer for Treasurer Democrat.
Kamala Harris for Attorney General Democrat. Joel needs to work for an Attorney General in all 50 states!
Dave Jones for Insurance Commissioner Democrat.
Betty Yee for State Board of Equalization, 1st District Democrat.
East Bay Elected Officials
Barbara Lee for US Congress Democrat.
Nancy Skinner for State Assembly Democrat.
Tom Torlakson for State Superintendent of Public Instruction His list of endorsements is impressive: the CA Democratic Party, the CA Federation of Teachers, the CA Teachers Association, the CA School Employees Association, the CA Labor Federation, the CA National Organization for Women PAC, Equality CA, the CA SEIU State Council and the CA Young Democrats.
Dave Blake, Asa Dodsworth, Kathy Harr, Lisa Stephens, Jesse Townley, Pam Webster for Berkeley Rent Board This is the Progressive Tenant Slate, so why not?
Josh Daniels, Leah Wilson, and Karen Hemphill for Berkeley School Board Endorsed by Cal Dems, good enough for me.
Joel Young for AC Transit At-Large District Director AC Transit is a pretty great transit system, and Young's the incumbent, so he gets my vote.
Andy Katz for EBMUD Director, Ward 4 Unopposed.
Ann-Marie Hogan for Berkeley City Auditor Unopposed.
Judicial Elections
I can't seem to find any list of endorsements online. I assume they'll be forthcoming from local bar associations, but for now I'll just vote yes for all of them.
Victoria Kolakowski for Superior Court Judge, Office #9 This is the only one I know anything about, and all I know is that a) it seems like Kolakowski is the good liberal choice here, and perhaps in part that's because b) she'll be the first transgender person at this level of the California judiciary, is my understanding.
East Bay Propositions
Yes on Alameda County Measure F For whatever reason, I don't have the same problem with ballot-box budgeting at the local level. Probably because Alameda County strikes me as being in a far less bad predicament than the State, and so a little populist tax-raising doesn't strike me as so dangerous.
Yes on Berkeley USD Measure H I have no problem passing whatever measure raises more money for schools, locally. See Measure F for discussion of obvious hypocrisy.
Yes on Berkeley USD Bond Measure I I have no problem passing whatever measure raises more money for schools, locally. See Measure F for discussion of obvious hypocrisy.
Yes on Berkeley Measure R The Downtown Area Plan seems pretty impressive, and has the support of people I trust, such as Robert Reich and Loni Hancock.
Yes on Berkeley Measure S Let's pass 19 and legalize cannabis, and then let's tax the hell out of it and hopefully the money coming in will convince critics of the benefits to ending prohibition. No argument against this Measure was even submitted.
Yes on Berkeley Measure T This Measure begins the regulatory absorption of the marijuana business, which I am all for. None of the "No" arguments are particularly compelling, and when in doubt, I vote to make at least some progress.
What a "No" vote on the above Propositions means: It's hard to say for sure. In the near term, it almost certainly means that the budget crisis in California will get worse. But accepting these Props will be at best a temporary solution, at the cost of a number of essential social programs. That might be ok if the tradeoff were a more sound fiscal situation in the future. But it's not - California as currently structured is ungovernable, and until something fundamental changes, we'll have to keep settling for these bad deals forever.
Right now, in order to raise taxes, 2/3 of the Legislature needs to approve, and since California Republicans are so marginalized, mustering 1/3 of the Legislature to oppose tax hikes is about all they can accomplish. Tax hikes are always unpopular, so a supermajority requirement for them will always mean that it'll be too hard to raise enough money to keep the state going at an acceptable level of funding. That requirement needs to be removed, and a Governor more amenable to raising taxes probably needs to be elected. If fiscal disaster in the short term is the way to make that happen, then so be it - the alternatives presented by these Propositions don't avert disaster anyway, they just put more of it onto the backs of the poor and the mentally ill.
President
Barack Obama. You probably didn't need me to tell you that.
California Stuff
Yes on Prop 1A. Because a high-speed rail trip between SF and LA in 2 hours and 40 minutes is awesome. Seriously, America's rail infrastructure is pathetic, and in particular the SF-LA corridor ought to be far better served than it is. CF the Acela corridor on the east coast - it spurs all kinds of economic development, and is a particularly good idea during a recession like we're in now.
Yes on Prop 2. Because doing everything we can to treat animals as justly as possible is simply the right thing to do. It would lead to some food cost increases, and could hurt farming in California, but American agriculture is far too coddled already for that to be a reason to vote against this.
Yes on Prop 3. Because American healthcare suffers from, among other things, a lack of adequate infrastructure, and that type of spending is an excellent idea during a recession. And because what kind of heartless bastard are you if you vote against money for children's hospitals? I mean, come on.
No on Prop 4. Because requiring "parental notification" before allowing a minor to have an abortion is yet another back-door attempt to make as many abortions illegal as possible. Criminalizing doctors for acting in the best interest of their minor patients, during the most urgent hour of need in those minors' lives, is f'ing wrong. Because passing a law to force families to communicate better is stupid. Because making it harder for teens to get abortions only means that many of them will get dangerous, illegal ones, which is an atrocity. And because most parental-notification systems put in place by various states where this is already the law simply don't work very well, and very often the process isn't resolved until after the delivery, at which point it's obviously too late.
Yes on Prop 5. Because drug addiction isn't a crime, it's a medical condition, and should be treated as such. Because we as a country spend far too much money imprisoning and arresting drug offenders for no good reason. Because the war on drugs clearly isn't working, so why not try something else? And because the best way to make drug offenders into future unemployable, violent criminals who will represent a threat to society is to put them in jail, where the only thing they'll learn is how to be better criminals.
No on Prop 6. Prop 6 would force 14-year-olds to be tried as adults if convicted of a "gang-related" felony. It would force public housing residents to get annual criminal background checks, and lose their housing if convicted of a crime. It would allow the use of hearsay in criminal cases, eliminate bail for illegal aliens charged with certain crimes, and murder your puppies (well, not so much the last one, but almost.)
No on Prop 7. This is a tough one, but ultimately it's one of a handful of "stealth" ballot measures this year: it looks great, but the fine print is awful. In this case, look beyond the stated goals of the Proposition (which are very laudable ones, like requiring all electric utilities to provide half their power via renewable sources by 2025.) The first clue that this is a dangerous proposition are the opponents: the California Democratic, Republican and Green parties; the Sierra Club of California; the California League of Conservation Voters; the Natural Resources Defense Council; and the Union of Concerned Scientists, to name just a few. This is because this proposition will make it harder for small renewable utilities to exist (which currently provide nearly 60% of renewable power in the state); it will lock consumers into paying 10% above market rates (by not accounting for future drops in the price of renewable power, and by decreasing competition among producers.) And it will stifle development of new renewable power in California.
No on Prop 8. This one's pretty simple: if you think it's fair for straight people to be able to get married, but not for anyone else, then vote against it. If you think it's a good idea for the California Constitution to explicitly deny people certain rights based on their sexual preferences, then I guess you should vote for it, but please do so on November 5th (you'll avoid the long lines that way.)
No on Prop 9. Prop 9 is another "feel-good" amendment (like 7 and 10) that doesn't really solve any existing problem, while causing more problems in the future. In this case, all the positive-sounding benefits (like enhanced victim rights) of the amendment are already enshrined in California law, so the amendment itself is largely unnecessary. However, according to the nonpartisan California Legislative Analyst's Office (the state agency that provides fiscal-impact analysis for ballot measures and the State Legislature), the measure would probably cost a few hundred million dollars above the status quo.
No on Prop 10. This is basically the "enrich T. Boone Pickens" proposition, which is why corporations he controls have spent almost $8 million supporting the amendment. The amendment would cost California $10 billion over 30 years to subsidize natural-gas-fueled cars, which are rather unnecessary, not especially clean and for which there is currently no real market. The proposition is opposed by the Sierra Club, Union of Concerned Scientists, California League of Conservation Voters, LA Times and SF Chronicle.
Yes on Prop 11. Prop 11 moves redistricting authority from elected officials to a bipartisan 14-member commission, 9 members of whom (3 Rs, 3 Ds and 3 independents) must approve district boundary changes before they go into effect. This sounds arcane and technical, but redistricting (and its alter-ego, gerrymandering) is probably the most important contributor to the shitty state of American democracy today. Because, in most states, district lines are drawn by elected officials who have a stake in preserving their seats, we see a Congress whose members get re-elected over 90% of the time, despite having a nationwide approval rating of around 20%. Anything would be better than the current system, quite literally - so even if this method is bizarre and wacky (and it is), it's an improvement that we need to make. (Note: this specific proposition doesn't affect Congressional boundary-drawing, unfortunately, but the same problems apply at the state level as well as the national one.)
Yes on Prop 12. This basically extends the Cal-Vet program, which issues bonds to help veterans buy homes. It should affect a large number of veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan. The only real objection I've heard to this program, besides "we can't afford it" (note: we can afford it), is that it should be open to non-veterans as well. That's compelling, but the reality is that veterans do come back from combat with a variety of mental and physical injuries that make their lives much harder over the long-term. There's nothing whatsoever wrong, in my mind, with giving vets a bit of assistance with things like buying a house. Particularly when 1 in 3 homeless men is a veteran, and 400,000 veterans will go homeless at some point this year. (Maybe more, since these statistics were generated before the current housing collapse.)
East Bay Stuff
Barbara Lee for Congress. She's the Democrat.
Loni Hancock for the State Senate. She's the Democrat.
Nancy Skinner for the State Assembly. Unopposed.
Dennis Hayashi for Superior Court Judge. Endorsed by Alameda County Dems and the SF Sierra Club.
Chris Peeples for AC Transit District Director. Endorsed by Alameda County Dems.
Lynette Sweet for BART Director. Endorsed by Alameda County Dems.
Norman La Force for East Bay Regional Park District Director. Endorsed by the SF Sierra Club.
Yes on Prop VV. Raising property taxes to pay for mass transit? More please!
Yes on Prop WW. More money/land for the East Bay Regional Park District? More please!
Berkeley Stuff
Tom Bates for Mayor. Endorsed by Alameda County Dems and the SF Sierra Club.
Max Anderson for City Council. Unopposed.
Nicole Drake, Judy Shelton and Igor Tregub for Rent Stabilization Board Commissioners. Endorsed by Alameda County Dems.
John Selawsky and Beatriz Leyva-Cutler for School Directors. Endorsed by the SF Sierra Club and Alameda County Dems, respectively.
Yes on Prop FF. It's...probably a good idea to make the libraries earthquake-proof.
Yes on Prop GG. It's also probably a good idea to pay for the fire department, and this tax is relatively small.
Yes on Prop HH. California has some wacky laws relating to how cities can pay for what they need. I wish they didn't, but they do, so we gotta approve stuff like this.
Yes on Prop II. I believe this measure is unopposed. At any rate, I can't fathom what such an objection would look like.
Yes on Prop JJ. Um...hell yes? Don't get me started. Also, it's unopposed.
No on Prop KK. This is another stealth proposition. Any measure that requires a new type of [SOMETHING] to be voted on separately is really just a way of preventing some number of those [SOMETHING]s from passing. It's never about "democracy".
Yes on Prop LL. I like architecture, and there're some nice buildings in Berkeley, so it's a good idea to give the Berkeley Landmarks Preservation Commission some real authority.
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