The New York Times

Nate Silver Projects An Extremely Close Governor's Race

September 3, 2010 by Calitics

Nate Silver, who's moved his 538 blog to the New York Times, is out with his gubernatorial projections. He's got Whitman narrowly beating Brown by a 0.4 point margin, 49.2% to 48.8%. He also gives Whitman a 53% chance to win the seat and Brown 47% chance of winning.

Much of this is due to the way he weights his polling data - a recent Rasmussen poll (Whitman 51, Brown 43) and SurveyUSA poll (Whitman 47, Brown 40) are largely responsible for this. The SUSA poll gives a 6 point swing to Whitman between August 11 and August 31.

For the Senate, Silver projects Boxer over Fiorina 49.3% to 47.7%, with Boxer having a 58.7% chance of winning.

The takeaway here is that this race is extremely close, as is the Senate race. It will come down not to persuasion, but to turnout. Every vote counts in November. I know people have been complaining about this or that aspect of the Brown campaign, but the time for that is over. Californians, progressives especially, have to decide whether they want a radical, destructive, elitist right-winger governing them or whether they want to have a chance at making a more progressive California with Brown.

Why Orange County Is Getting Bluer

August 30, 2010 by Calitics

Having been born and raised in Orange County, one of my lifetime goals is to see it become a bastion of progressive politics. So I'm glad to see that today the New York Times is finally noticing Orange County is indeed becoming less right-wing and more Democratic:

SANTA ANA, Calif. - Orange County has been a national symbol of conservatism for more than 50 years: birthplace of President Richard M. Nixon and home to John Wayne, a bastion for the John Birch Society, a land of orange groves and affluence, the region of California where Republican presidential candidates could always count on a friendly audience.

But this iconic county of 3.1 million people passed something of a milestone in June. The percentage of registered Republican voters dropped to 43 percent, the lowest level in 70 years.

Adam Nagourney attributes the political shift away from the right-wing and from Republicans to demographic changes, primarily immigration:

At the end of 2009, nearly 45 percent of the county's residents spoke a language other than English at home, according to county officials. Whites now make up only 45 percent of the population; this county is teeming with Hispanics, as well as Vietnamese, Korean and Chinese families.

Guest Blog: PR Strategy Can Trump Grassroots GOTV Action

August 28, 2010 by Democracy for N...

This is a guest blog by Stuart Heady, a freelance writer and political activist who lives in Albuquerque.

Reviewing the history of the United Fruit Company overthrow (through the Eisenhower Administration) of the democratically elected government of Jacobo Arbenz in Guatemala in 1953, I was struck anew by the role of Edward Bernays, the father of modern public relations.

This is a very under appreciated episode in modern history, and a highly important precedent for the way political debate is now conducted in America.

Edward Bernays’ uncle was Sigmund Freud and he grew up around figures like Carl Jung and Wilhelm Reich and other originators of the science of psychology. Reich’s best contribution was the concept that entire societies had a psychology. He had to run from Germany in the ‘30s for trying to warn the world about the growing mass madness there.

Assembly Spikes The Concept of Rehabilitating Children

August 24, 2010 by Calitics

In jurisdictions across the world, we are gradually seeing the rolling back of the harshest prisons against minors under the age of 18.  Not in California, as the Assembly killed SB 399 that would have allowed courts to review the sentences of minors 15 years after the crime.

Today, the State of California failed to join the rest of the world in ending life sentences for juvenile offenders.  On a 34-36 vote, the State Assembly killed Senate Bill 399 - The Fair Sentencing for Youth Act authored by Senator Leland Yee (D-San Francisco).

While SB 399 would not have prohibited life without parole (LWOP) sentences for juveniles, the bill would have allowed courts to review cases of juveniles sentenced to life without parole after 15 years, potentially allowing some individuals to receive a new sentence of 25 years to life.  The bill required the offender to express remorse and be working towards rehabilitation in order to submit a petition for consideration of the new sentence.

This was hardly revolutionary or radical. It was a modest measure that would have allowed judges to use a bit of discretion.  But as we know, discretion is dead in the California justice system, where everything is on auto-pilot.

The Terrible Public Pension Threat

August 20, 2010 by Calitics

It's time for a class war over public union pensions. So says Ron Lieber, writing in the New York Times. Okay, let's rumble. What's the score, so far?