CA: 13 ballot measures could be bad luck - Bond, tax initiatives dicey for candidates

San Diego Union - Tribune ^ | 7/9/06 | John Marelius

[FairOpinion]

What about parental notification before a teenager has an abortion?

This is a big issue for conservatives -- funny, how you have to think about this and "read the fine print", before you support it, and yet you are proclaiming how conservative you are.

And if you are so interested in these, how come you took the trouble to read the fine print on the other propositions, but not these ones?

Sounds mighty peculiar to me -- for a conservative, I mean.

[calcowgirl]

What is 'not conservative' about wanting to read a new law before voting for it? I voted for Parental Notification last time (Prop 73) and will vote for it again, assuming there is nothing problematic in the fine print. Do you have some problem with that approach?

What I will NOT do is rely on the highly misleading Ballot Summaries, many of which were written by our leftist legislators (Perata, Nunez, et al), as the only basis for judging the initiatives.

California has a long history of misleading ballot measures. Look only to Prop 76 that purported to cap spending while actually authorizing more bonds and borrowing. Or Prop 111 that obliterated the Gann Spending Limit under the title "Traffic Congestion Relief and Spending Limitation Act." Given some of the bond measures, this election is no different.

[calcowgirl]

You are too much!

What a load of $%*#!

[Paloma_55]

And do you think ANGELIDES is just the guy to put CA on the "right track"?

FO: The "moderates" (people who claim to be moderate, but are social liberals) in the Republican Party use this argument all the time to advance their "moderate" Republican candidates.

OK..fine, advance him. But don't expect "real" Republicans to help you. I guarantee you, the "moderates" would not lift a finger to help a "real" Republican get elected. We have seen it before.

In fact, during the recall, when it looked like Tom McClintock was going to be the next governor, someone made a phone call to Arnold and pushed him to run. "Someone" was a "moderate" Republican. I don't know if you recall the story, but Arnold was going on the Tonight Show to announce that he was *not* going to run, he received a phone call, and he came out and announced his candidacy. Even his campaign coordinator was surprised.

The left wing of the Republican Party is a bunch of libertarians who were smart enough to realize they would never get elected under the L or D, so they moved in to the Republican party.

The "Borrow and Spend" reputation being given the Republicans is not coming from the conservative side of the house, it is from the liberal side. They know it will be all-out-war with the conservatives if they raise taxes, so they put up 70B bond measures instead.

[Paloma_55]

BOND MEASURES you will NOT see...

a) Limit Legislature to two 30 day sessions per year
b) Require all lobbyist meetings be public noticed and the content of all meetings recorded and made public.
c) Limit spending increases to rate of infl + rate of pop growth
d) Eliminate Unions for public employees
e) Improve safety, water quality, energy with 4B "Auburn Dam Bond"
f) Demand verificaton of citizenship for all government funded programs

Just a few... I am sure there could be more

[Czar]

Any ballot measure which spends or borrows will be getting 8 automatic NO votes from this family.

[calcowgirl]

I can see it now.

"A NO vote on Proposition X is a vote for Angelides!"

It's gonna be a long three months until November!

One of these days, the GOP might come up with something other than:

"Better than (insert name of hated leftist here)!"

[goldstategop]

I'd vote to borrow and spend money for infrastructure projects just like we borrow money and spend it for home improvement projects. But I still recommend a NO vote on the bonds on the November ballot because I don't trust Sacramento to actually put the money where its supposed to go or they would have done it already. They're spending more than they take in and before putting these bonds on the ballot, the State Legislature could have voted to spend less on education and more on building new roads, freeways, dams and reservoirs in this state. Its called seting priorities. They won't do that so they want us to borrow and spend more to make up for their fecklessness. Here's where we can send them a message. Get our state's fiscal house in order, cut spending and just maybe try putting existing revenue to fixing infrastructure! There, that's not so hard now, is it? Do that first and if we still need to borrow, then go ahead and submit a bond to the voters for them to consider if its needed.

(The Palestinian terrorist regime is the crisis and Israel's fist is the answer.)

[calcowgirl]

And if you are so interested in these, how come you took the trouble to read the fine print on the other propositions, but not these ones?

If you hadn't noticed, fiscal issues are my primary interest and concern. I I followed the progress and read the language of the Infrastructure bonds as they were making their way through the legislature. I haven't read the text of Prop 83 yet because, frankly, it is very, very long--30 pages. That takes a few cups of coffee and some time to dedicate which I haven't had. See text of initiative

[Paloma_55]

I remember when the GOP convention was meeting in Sacto to elect the new party chairman. A long-time, dyed in the wool conservative Bill Back was running and a much younger, Bay Area liberal Republican Duf Sundheim was running against him.

I met Duf in the lobby of the Hyatt, shook hands and while shaking hands asked him "So what is your position on abortion" and I tried really hard not to telegraph my position as he searched my eyes for a clue.

He pulled me close and said "personally, I am against it but I can't take that position in public". He must have figured only a pro-life person would ask the question and therefore he tried to take both sides.

I voted for Bill.

[calcowgirl]

He must have figured only a pro-life person would ask the question and therefore he tried to take both sides.

Dufus is smarter than I gave him credit for.

I believe his legacy will be the complete neutering of the CA Republican party as it was known in any traditional sense.
I'm sure he is proud.

[newzjunkey]

Looks like a good start to me.

[Czar]

"But I still recommend a NO vote on the bonds on the November ballot because I don't trust Sacramento..."

I don't trust Sacramento and I don't trust the Austrian. So it will be NO on all bonds and I will be no-voting the Austrian.

[SierraWasp]

BRING BACK BILL BACK!!!

[b9]

Tom McClintock supported prop 76, too.

[calcowgirl]

McClintock voted against the pork-filled Transportation Bond.

Will you be supporting it, like FO?

[b9]

I want to see what McClintock recommends.

[calcowgirl]

Ah... after the arm twisting and extortion occurs. How very partisan of you.

I'm still waiting for the CA GOP to release some funds to Tom for his campaign.

How's that 'joint ticket' thing coming along?
I see a lot of Arnold on the campaign trail--but no Tom.

[b9]

Tom's supporting Arnold.

I'll take his judgement any day over yours, thanks.

[calcowgirl]

Give me a break. You'll use Tom just like Arnold is.

You all trashed him in 2003 and had absolutely no respect for his judgement then.

The only thing that has changed is now the CRP holds more of the purse strings
and can silence the opposition to the big spending bonanza via extortion.