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Here you can see who I voted for in past elections.
Well, I like libertarian stuff in general, but in particular, in this interview Michael seems like an intelligent guy who is more direct than democratic and republican candidates:
http://politics.slashdot.org/politics/04/09/20/1423219.shtml?tid=11&tid=219
I liked his NPAT answers. Boxer is okay, but she semi-evaded the NPAT by not checking any of the mulitple choice answers, and writing in responses, so I couldn't really be sure what she meant.
Well, Susan Davis is okay, but, looking at her NPAT (http://www.vote-smart.org/bio.php?can_id=BS026406) she wants to raise spending on most things. Also, she doesn't support public financing of elections or instant run-off voting, big issues for me. She does, however, use one of her write-in statements to speak about the need to make sure anti-terrorist stuff doesn't intrude on civil rights, another big issue for me. She's okay, but let's see if anyone else is better.
I next turned to the Libertarian guy. He didn't even submit an NPAT. Forget it!
Then I looked at the Republican and the Green party guy (Lawrence P. Rockwood). The Green guy was closest to my interests. I'm not into big government, but he agrees with me on the big issues of public financing and IRV, and he has the right idea about lots of international issues and the civil rights stuff, it seems. So I'm for him.
This is a tough one. Both Murphy and Kehoe filled out an NPAT, and Stirling didn't, so he's out. Kehoe is into big government, and her legislative priorities (last entry on NPAT) reflect that. But she is for campaign finance reform. Murphy is a libertarian, but he seems to be in the extreme-republican camp of libertarianism; he wants to slash govm't, which is good, but he feels like a social conservative, too, and I don't think he'd be anti-monopoly; I want fiscal conservative, social liberal, but with the govm't still regulating big big business (i.e. reduce all concentrations of power as much as possible).
Well, I can't find any polls online, but I get the idea that Stirling may be in the race b/c I've gotten ads from both her and Christine. So I'll vote for Christine to block Stirling (who didn't fill out an NPAT).
She's the only one who filled out the NPAT. And she supports some campaign finance reform (but not public financing of elections). That was easy.
I am indifferent b/t the two candidates.
I am indifferent b/t the two candidates. They both seem good. Schwandt has more endorsements, though.
The challenger, Kate Kelly, wants to make Professional Job Seeking Skills (which she teaches) a req'd course?!? No way!
And, Block has lots of great endorsements.
See reasoning from my decision to vote for her from last march. Also, in the interim I had a short email exchange with Reff, and she seems cool (also, since she found me via this webpage, that means that either she or someone she knows had the presence of mind to search on Goodle for her name after the election; this is mucmore technological competance than most 50-yr old moms I know have or have access to). Go Reff!
I don't know much about this race, and both candidates seem good.
I should probably abstain since I don't know muych about this race, but Whitehurst-Payne has a phD in education administration and a BA in math!
She's been big on transparency in government measures. And she seems to have been trying to prevent the pension underfunding scandal.
I still like her statement; use her office to do her job, not to set policy; beware of decisions behind closed doors.
Good endorsements. For open space.
Yes, transparency in govm't is one of my big issues.
The only argument against is that it doesn't go far enough. Fine, but it's better than nothing, right?
Anyway, not one person in the legislature is against!
Well, in general I hate to empower political parties, but in my ideal world, they would be a check/balance against abuse and/or demagogery (sp). It does make sense that at least one of their candidates appears on the ballot; after all, each party is something that lots of people care about, so they should at least have a chance "to be heard".
Also, most of the legislature is for it, and there's no phDs against it (but there is one for it), it seems...
In general, I like things that pay off bonds or stop the issue of new bonds. I hate to be spending money on interest.
Even the opponents say it can't hurt, but just doesn't go far enough, so let's do it.
I'm against bond issues for almost everything except primary school education. I hate spending money on interest. If we need to do this, let's just raise taxes.
This sounded appealing to me at first, but Common Cause is against it; they're big on transparency of government, electoral reform, etc. They've thought about this a lot more than me, and I trust them.
Also, As Prop 60 points out, I do think that the system is better if the political parties at least have a chance to pick a candidate and present them in the general election. Come to think of it, yes, prop 65 would make for a situation in which voters essentially choose between everyone who is running in any political party primary.
I dunno though, sfgate and the latimes are for it. Not that I trust them... I wish Common Cause had more to say about it..
This one's pretty technical, so it's hard to judge. Is there really a problem with "shakedown lawsuits" which is most obviously fixed by fixing this law? Is this law really useful for people to fight corporate injustice?
My bias is "no", because I tend to favor decreasing corporate power. But this also involves another one of my pet issues, tort reform.
So I went to the supporters and opposition websites and looked at the organizations for and against. The organizations for seem to be all corporations! I didn't see many (any?) nonprofits that I had heard of (there was a handful of "community groups" that I had never heard of, but this could be astroturfing) (and, the corporations didn't include the one corporation whose politics I respect, Google). By contrast, the organizations against included lots of nonprofits, two of whom I respect; the ACLU (I'm a card-carrying member!) and Sierra Club.
So, seems like most actual human beings seem to be against this, whereas corporate structures (who often make decisons which are not what most of the humans making them up would choose) seem to be for it. I side with the humans, thank you.
Anyhow, if it's undecided, I vote "No" (see prop 65 for reasoning on that).
p.s. the editorial claims the "shakedown lawsuits" under this law aren't a big problem: http://www.mylocalnews.com/nws/index.php?/main/content/prop_64_campaign_is_deceptive/
hmmm... both the pros and the cons say that spending money to provide mental health care is a good investment, but the question is if this is the way to do it.
in general, i am wary of any "millionaire tax". it just seems kind of unfair (i.e. an infringement of the majority on the rights of a minority); sure let them pay for all our stuff, they can afford it. I'm all for taxing the richer people more and not taxing the poor as much, but let's tax the upper-middle class, too. (hmm.. i wonder if there should be a constitutional prohibition of taxes which affect less than a certain proportion of the people?)
and maybe the opponents are right that there is insufficient oversight (i.e. requirement to continue current levels of funding)
You might think I'd abstain given this, but I think I'll end up voting no: if you can't decide, let the legislature decide! Forcing the legislature's hand is a No by default; it's only when something is truly "constitutional"/structural that you shouldn't start with a "no" default.
Yes, three strikes is a dumb idea in the first place, anything that weakens it is good. Judges should have discretion in sentencing; keep a human in the system, don't try to make everything into a machine. Even if I were for three strikes, I don't want nonviolent offenders (such as drug offenders) taking up jail space (and turned into more hardened criminals)
Here's a tough one; emergency room care should be paid for, because few people can (even if they were allowed to) walk away from a medical emergency when they can help, and it's cruel to make the responders pay the burden. The moral argument is less clear when it's a corporation (a hospital) paying the burden, but by analogy I suppose it works.
But I'm not qualified to judge if there is sufficient oversight. Shouldn't the legislature be doing something like this? Also, I don't like telephone taxes, as they're regessive. But, better compensation for people who can't pay in emergency rooms will probably ultimately increase the quality of their care, helping the poor. So, it's tough.
So I'm close to undecided, so I'll vote "No" (see argument in prop 65)
Smells like a special-interest deal to me. I'd be for allowing gambling outside of indian lands, but for everybody, not just a "lucky" few businesses specified in (who probably wrote) the initiative.
As for charging tons of money to the indians, I dunno. I'm generally in support of things that help the indians, since we did steal the whole country from them, but who knows if the money from casinos in any way supports anything that the indians of 200 years ago would have liked to see.
Anyhow, this measure seems to be supported by some casinos and opposed by everyone else.
Yeah, let's take the DNA of anyone suspected of a serious crime and put it in a government database, whether or not they are convicted. I'm sure this information will never be misused or misinterpreted or stolen. Great idea. Not.
We need to be thinking 500 years ahead, here. We need to defend against a government's natural tendency to become authoritarian.
I support the general idea of letting tribes have as much gambling as they want. But this seems a little strong and irrevocable (99 year renewable compact). I'm undecided. Leave it up to the legislature and governor.
I think spending a lot of money on stem cell research would be a good investment in the long run.
However, I don't want to pay 50% of the money on interest on a bond. Just raise taxes. As I said above, I'm generally against all bonds except for primary school education.
In addition, it's not very nice to force people who are religously opposed to this research to support it with their tax money. Whenever possible (and it's certainly possible here), controversial issues should be supported only on a voluntary basis.
Hmm... I'm all for providing more health-care, but why require employers to provide it? Seems like it would disproportionately hurt mid-size businesses, which is bad. And I'm very worried about the state-run pool; governments can't handle stuff like that, and businesses with highest-risk employees would dump them into the pool. On the other hand, it seems like the current mode of society is indeed for employers to provide health care, so maybe the most practical ay to expand health care is to require them to provide it to everyone. On the other hand, many businesses then couldn't afford to hire as many people here, and wouldn't we rather have more jobs with crummy health care than a few good jobs with good healthcare, but high unemployment? I.e. this is like increasing the minimum wage.
And Wal-Mart opposes it; Wal-Mart is a jerk, and I guess their opposition tears up my idea that 72 would hurt small businesses.
Tough call. I guess I'm against it; as I said, better many jobs with bad healthcare than a few with good healthcare. And I'm worried about that state pool.
But since I doubt, and I want to heed the legislature's advice, I'll abstain.
Huh? I didn't know the state could raid local tax revenues. That stinks. Yeah, stop it. Anyhow, a large majority of the legislature is behind it, and I'm sure they've thought about it.
Even the supporters of 65 now say to vote for 1A instead. So I will
The "argument against prop A" in the official voter guide sounds persuasive (i.e. that there isn't sufficient independent oversight to guard against special interest influence on the committee, and that this plan will make it easier for developers to avoid traffic restrictions by local government), and it (the rebuttal) is backed by the surfrider foundation and the sierra club.
On the plus side, why should we exempt this site from the usual guidelines?
On the minus side, the site still meets state guidelines, and it seems like a waste to throw away 10 years of planning
No one's against it!
Anyway, transparency in government is one of my big issues.
Yes; same as Propo D.
haven't decided yet. there's a lot of famous cities with "strong mayors" who are corrupt political boss jerks, but who's to say if that's the norm... anyway, it sounds to me like this would reduce corruption, by preventing other members of the city council from having backroom influence over the hiring and firing of city employees.
however, after reading a little more, i realize that the council form of governance is a regional representative government, whereas strong mayor aggregates the votes of everyone in san diego. i like the regional-ness here. so i'm against strong mayor.
I buy Diann Shipione's argument against that the this doesn't go far enough, given the recent problems, but it seems to be better than nothing. I am a little disturbed about the part about allowing underfunding as part of a court-approved settlement. But hey, the Pension Reform Committee's behind it, and I guess they know better than me.
Once again, I buy the arguments against that this doesn't go far enough, but it doesn't seem to hurt. And again, I'll trust the Pension Reform Committee.
Nah, we don't need more taxes. Anyway, a 10% tax on tourism seems a bit high already -- it's good for people to travel about and see other parts of America , right?
seems to me like a sneaky way to evade the court order. just relocate the darn cross, like the Memorial Association (which built and maintained the cross) wants to do!
I like to devote as much money to education as possible. This is the only cause important enough to me to borrow money to do.
This proposition would make you able to increase taxes by a majority of 1/2 instead of by the current 2/3s. This will lead to bigger government.
I don't want to borrow as a short-term sop to the state's finances. Just cut stuff already and get it over with. Without paying interest.
Good act in general, but it suspends the state's constitutional balanced-budget's provisions for the case of prop. 57!!
Still, I guess what I'd most like is for this one to pass and for #57 to not pass. So I'll vote that way. Even though this act doesn't take effect unles prop. 57 passes. if there is a strong vote for this one and against that one, it will at least show the popular will. The cost is that if that one definitely passes and this one barely does, then I will have wasted "my chance" to kill the bond measure. But I bet this one will get a stronger showing than the bond one anyway.
None; I took a nonpartisan ballot.
The other guy was all I'm-all-tough. I want logical social policy, not "tough on crime". Also, McMillan? was a physicist!!
This was a tough one; I also liked Sullivan, and I think I also liked Peckham.
He was a math guy! And his other criteria seemed good; I was going to go for him even before I saw the math.
This was a tough one. At first glance, Mitz seemed like more of a "parent", but actually Miyo has had two kids go through San Diego public schools too. Miyo seems to have more experience and qualifications in management positions.
I voted for the incumbent. I don't know much about the state of things, but I like the way San Diego is managed in general so I guess he's doing all right :) More importantly, since I don't know about him, the Sierra club supports him. And he seems to have lots of management qualifications.
This was kind of a tough one. Devaney said she thought the city attorney should be a dispassionate advisor who executes the laws, not makes them. I thought that sounded good. Also, she had had a lot of experience in that position already, and since it's a management position, that counts (many of the other candidates were just attorneys).
Michael J. Aguirre was my second choice. I liked how he was into protecting the public's right to meet and comment on city matters, and he seemed like a progressive fellow. But I like Devaney better for the reasons above.
The main thing going for him was Phil Thalheimer's attack ads against him! Also, all these eco organizations supported him.
This one seemed pretty straightforward; the rebuttals didn't mention any down sides except your usual zoning stuff. I sort of dislike zoning, but I think we really need to go all out to preserve rural lands. Ah, well...
Seemed like this would relax bureacratic government rules and make things cheaper. The guys writing the opposition statement were all unions of San Diego contractors, which seemed fishy to me. Also, the financial statement thought it would save money.
First, I thought it was not being nice to our guests. I feel kind of bad about passing the buck to these people just because they can't vote against it. Also, the more people travel, the better for our national culture. In addition to that, the opposition statement said there was some sneaky stuff going on.
I really should put this up before the election in the future so that I can hype my favorites to you.
Official information on the CA elections is at http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/elections_viguide.htm , including the candidates' statements and the summaries of and arguments for and against the ballot initiatives. Nonpartisan views on who supports what for my district is at http://www.vote-smart.org/vote-smart/ziplookup.phtml?zip5=94305&zip4=7546 .
Legislature sponsored initiative with a strong majority. Issue bonds to pay for housing subsidies for the poor. I can't decide if I like the idea behind it (I think there should be more money spent on these things, but I don't think it is the government's job), so I'd be willing to defer to the legislature on that. But I don't like bond issues. Just raise taxes upfront and avoid the interest payments.
Legislature sponsored initiative with a very strong majority. Issues bonds to pay for capital construction of schools. I hate bonds but we need good education so badly that I'll go for education spending. There was an argument against it that spending would be concentrated in LA, but I think that's where it's needed, so fine.
Legislature sponsored consittutional amendment. Unanimous. Removes language in the state constitution allowing for municipal courts, which no longer exist here. I agreed with the argument against this one (that it removes flexiblity if we ever want the municipal courts again), but I deferred to the unanimous advice of the legislature here.
These are all voter inititives (not suggested by the legislature) that restrict how the legislature can spend money. I think adding this sort of inflexibility to the system is dumb unless you are absolutely sure that your proposal is right, and I am not qualified for most of these, nor were they top spending priorities of mine. I generally vote down such things.
I think the election system works now, and what's more, I think this proposal is a dumb idea. This proposal lets people walk into an election on election day, unregistered, and just vote (they do have to present identification). I think this makes it easy to cheat.
Iris Adams (Natural Law Party). The natural law platform sounds kooky (government based on discoveries in Quantum Physics?!?) but Iris's NPAT indicates more agreement with me on many issues than the other candidates. I would have liked to vote libertarian, but the libertarian's responses to the NPAT seemed a little bit too off the cuff -- he didn't check any of the boxes, and he wrote weird things like "did you guys ever hear of the FREE MARKET?". I think he was ignoring the NPAT, which I don't like.
Eshoo (the incumbent). This is the only incumbent I voted for. I email Eshoo a lot with my various suggestions, and I usually get back a form email with her position on the subject. Usually it turns out she agrees with me (not always, though). And once I actually got a specific response to my email, which I liked. She is way too Big Government for my tastes, but at the bottom of her NPAT she says one of her priorities is alternative energy, which I like. In addition, she seems to take the right stand on technology issues, something I can't say for our two senators.
Raymond Bell (Libertarian). He didn't fill out an NPAT, so I couldn't decide whether to vote against him just for that. But only one of the three candidates did fill out an NPAT (the republican), and Bell is a Libertarian AND an engineer. So I voted Bell.
Pat Wright (Libertarian). See http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/bp_ge02/ltgov.pdf for official statements. Although he had a sense of humor and I liked that (he listed his occupation on the ballot as "ferret coordinator" or something), I can't say I agree with his owning a ferret; we gotta manage our ecology and things that reproduce are a threat to everyone. But the other candidates were worse. The Independence Party guy is anything but (he's anti-secular), the Natural Law chick is interventionist rather than laissez-faire (sp?). I liked the Green Party chick; but I was turned off by "California...can afford to give its citizens affordable energy, ... "living wage" jobs"; government is an inefficient way to distribute goods and services. The Democratic candidate, btw, emphasized how he likes to sue people, which I thought was bad.
Larry Shoup (Green Party). See http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/bp_ge02/sos.pdf . He mentioned Instant Runoff voting and public financing of elections, both of which I strongly support. End of story.
Aguirre (Natural Law). See http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/bp_ge02/controller.pdf . He was the only one who wanted to rein in government spending.
Rosenmeier (Green). See http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/bp_ge02/treasurer.pdf . The only one who mentioned Instant Runoff Voting, which I strongly support.
Ed Kuwatch (Libertarian). See http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/bp_ge02/ag.pdf . The three candidates who mentioned ending the War on Drugs in some form were him, the Green one, and the American Independent on ("restitution and rehabilitation as alternatives to long-term incarceration"). I liked that the American Independent one has practiced law, but I don't trust her party. Out of the Green and the Libertarian, I chose Kuwatch because I like the Libertarian platform better.
Ogden (Libertarian). See http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/bp_ge02/ic.pdf . This guy will cut the size of government and he has 28 years of experience in insurance! And he's a libertarian! What a bargain!
O'Connell. See http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/bp_ge02/spi.pdf . His opponent was big on forcing "appropriate attire" on students and teachers. Anything to prevent one of those bozos from getting into office!
