Free Republic

SAN FRANCISCO -- California Republican and Democratic Party leaders, always at war, finally agree on a common enemy: the open primary. A proposed constitutional amendment would go before voters in June 2010 instituting a "top-two" primary system, which would effectively eliminate party primary ballots, erase candidate party labels in primary elections and allow voters to choose the two candidates - of whatever party - who would compete in the general election. An open primary would dissolve the current political primary system, and has the potential to seriously erode party power and change the entire landscape of state politics.The measure...

Why You Should Vote No on Prop 62 and Yes on Prop 60The California Pro Life Council's voter's guide for the November 2 election gives information on candidates' support for legal protection of unborn children, opposition to use of taxpayers' funds to pay for abortions, and opposition to physician assisted suicide. (The guide is available at www.californiaprolife.org). Tricia Hunter, running as a Republican in the 76th assembly district in central San Diego County, rates a no, no, and a "position unclear" on these three issues respectively. It's a stance more typical of Democratic Party candidates. Hunter has also merited an...

Does Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger think that democracy is for girlie men, or does he have more pragmatic reasons for supporting Proposition 62, the so-called open primary initiative? If passed next Tuesday, it would eliminate party primaries, except at the presidential level, with California voters supporting a candidate of any party in a preliminary election, and the top two vote-getters appearing on the ballot in the general election. Both the state Democratic and Republican parties oppose the measure, but Schwarzenegger supports it, saying, "I didn't come to Sacramento to make political parties happy." No, he came to Sacramento to make his...

Schwarzenegger just endorsed Prop. 62, the open primary initiative. But he also took a much more important step for the long run. He offered a full-throated endorsement for reforming the way legislators draw district lines, and taking that power out of the hands of elected officials. He says he will be challenging the Legislature to put a reform initiative on the ballot. He doesn't say when, but I hope he means next year, in a special election. It's silly to let legislators pick their voters, when it should be the other way around. If Schwarzenegger can change that, he will...

When Arnold Schwarzenegger overwhelming won the race for governor last year, he vowed to break the hold that special interests and fringe groups have in Sacramento. But Schwarzenegger found that promise hard to keep, in large part due to something he has no control over - the Legislature. The system under which California elects its legislators is engineered to elevate candidates who hold extremist views on the left and the right. Moderate, centrist candidates stand little chance because Democrats and Republicans conspired together to gerrymander legislative districts. The gerrymandering is so bad that one party or the other is virtually...