Subscribe to Excerpts
Subscribe by Email
Republicans have told the Big Lie for 30 years, and are finding it hard now to say, “Sorry folks: just kidding.”
Archive for the ‘California Politics’ Category
November 18th, 2010
November 3rd, 2010
Category: California Politics, Campaign 2010, Energy and Environment, Handbasket, world going to hell in
The initial results in California last night make my state seem like a sane drop of blue in the country. Jerry Brown won for Governor; Barbara Boxer was re-elected; and Proposition 23, which would have reversed the state’s landmark climate change law, was resoundingly defeated. Voters also approved Proposition 25, which allows the state budget [...]
October 12th, 2010
In a long and thoughtful reflection on David Brooks’ bleat about public pensions, Jon admits that there is a public pension problem and maybe even a public employee salary issue. Here’s some more along those lines, too long for a comment. My main point is that the problem is structural: political arrangements, intentional and other, [...]
October 7th, 2010
Category: California Politics, Drug Policy
Rich people frequently get their way in politics, and will probably do so with Proposition 19. Another Croesus has written a big check to the pro-side, which has outspent the opposition by at least 10-to-1. As it becomes more likely that the Proposition will pass, increasing pressure is being put on Attorney General Holder to [...]
September 10th, 2010
Category: California Politics, Drug Policy
Proposition 19 calls for a legal marijuana industry and market regulated by California counties and cities. The California State Association of Counties just announced that they oppose Proposition 19 as did the League of California Cities a few months back. I tend to ignore most organizations’ stance (yeah or nay) on ballot propositions because they [...]
August 20th, 2010
The City of Maastricht is battling the European Union over whether it can prevent drug tourism by having “coffee shop” sales restricted to Dutch citizens. If the EU rules that Dutch coffee shops cannot deny cannabis sales to people from outside of the Netherlands, Maastricht may follow the lead of other Dutch border cities, which [...]
August 8th, 2010
The effects of the federal crack vs. powder cocaine sentencing disparity were well-documented at the federal level, but such assessments did not capture the damage inflicted in the states that adopted doppelganger legislation in the late 1980s. Collectively, the states imprison over six times as many people as does the federal government, making state-level reform [...]
August 7th, 2010
Category: California Politics, Gay marriage
Some people may wonder how Judge Vaughn R. Walker is holding up under the brutal, often homophobic tirades to which he is now being subjected for his recent ruling on gay marriage. At a Stanford drug policy forum about a decade ago, we were seated together at the closing dinner. The interaction that evening makes [...]
July 31st, 2010
Category: California Politics, Education policy, Policy Analysis, Prisons and penal policy, Taxation
…are about the same size and shape. It’s an iron law of sound household management, ignore it at your peril, and I know you will recognize its absolute unvarying truth, that you can put a baseball in your fruitbowl only if you’re willing to take one apple out of it. So what? Does any sane [...]
