SB 51: the California politics thread

iow, sarahell otm

Everything decided by ballot measure is a bad thing to let the population decide, and it’s particularly bad when you remember decisions made by ballot measure can only be overturned by another ballot measure. But yeah, triple negatives in wording and insanely technical issues very few people have direct experience of are the worse offenders.

the population shouldn't get to decide anything??? ... like that logic seems suspect and what lead to things like the electoral college and the fact that we have the same number of Senators as North Dakota.

Ballot measures are a nice idea in theory but the past 100 years have shown that they are an unbelievably bad way of running a government, and they are getting worse.

yeah I don't think the fact that the founders wanted to entrench a slave-owning minority discredits the whole idea of representative democracy

Yeah the US senate is not the alternative. Getting rid of ballot measures s the alternative.

Ballot measures are a nice idea in theory but the past 100 years have shown that they are an unbelievably bad way of running a government, and they are getting worse.

I could argue that our federal government, sans ballot measures, is also run quite badly, and has definitely gotten worse! ... Like "worse than what" is my question to you.

there are/have been ballot measures that have been effective in terms of pressuring legislators to actually respond to what people want ... idk ... remind me how long you've lived in California, caek?

Just get rid of ballot measures! Keep everything else the in the CA constitution same. It works all over the world.

(and stop forgetting the rest of the world exists and has things to teach us. why are the only options the status quo or the ... federal constitution?!?)

the rest of the world works so so so so well. geez ... you have this unrealistic view of "the rest of the world"

Apparently not long enough because my first thought isn’t “we can keep doing what we’re doing or we can ... South Dakota”

Looking by forward to tons of prop 22s, ie tech companies paying for laws that literally cannot be overturned.

I don't understand your problem with ballot measures. It appears that you want elected officials to have to decide everything through the legislative process, which you know, concentrates power more in the hands of the elected officials ... the direct democracy of ballot measures, if done well, is actually a nice form of checks & balances to that. But maybe, we both are coming from this place of idealism, where we are being a bit too hand-wavey about the fact the reality of the systems we are advocating for, is actually mediocre.

xp as opposed to tech companies buying candidates?

Yes because a law passed by a corrupt politician can be overturned but a ballot measure cannot unless you have more money than the people that passed it!!!!!

I’m not saying representative democracy is perfect. I’m saying ballot measures are a greater concentration of power among the very rich than no ballot measures.

I’ll do some googling another time for details but I just want to say for now that the view that ballot measures result in bad government wherever they’re tried is an extremely conventional and mainstream idea that is empirically pretty obviously true.

it’s also very easy to see how the problems with ballot measures (kakistocracy) are worse in states that suffer from extreme concentration of wealth, which is e.g. California. And that concentration is getting worse here very fast. We need to get rid of them ASAP.

i disagree -- i think having a mix of representative and direct democracy is good -- and maybe some of this is my age + remembered history of CA politics that I've lived through and my parents and grandparents and great-grandparents lived through, but I don't see how it's more difficult for the very rich to buy politicians as opposed to buying individual voters. They have been very successful at this in the past! I feel like things are less grotesquely corrupt in Sacramento than they were in the 80s and 90s ... and maybe that's a big difference in our perception here. But, you do strike me as way more authoritarian than I am.

Thought experiment to prove ballot measures are bad: imagine we had them at the federal level. Think what would be this year’s prop 22, ie a well resourced group buying a law that cannot be repealed other than by a group with more money.

removing Trump from office?

Prosecuting cops that kill black people?

Thought experiment to prove ballot measures are good: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposition_103

(only it wasn't a thought experiment, 103 saved folks a lot of money and at least somewhat deflected the insurance industry's power in the state)

That’s a good law that happens to have been passed by a ballot measure. We have some good laws that were not passed by ballot measure too.

removing Trump from office?

I can see the argument for ballot measures in a state where the government is hugely corrupt and no party is interested in doing the boring governance bit well, which I suppose is one reason they are more popular in the US than elsewhere haha.

But if that’s the problem, and extremely wealthy people/corporations having the sole power to submit ideas directly to the people is the solution, then why even have a representative legislature at all. Since representative legislatures are “authoritarian” apparently.

Somewhat related: for a long time, California government had a two-thirds supermajority rule which effectively gridlocked the state from doing much of anything except fund-raise and create fiefdoms among themselves. Ballot measures were the last resort for a lot of folks.

Ironically they passed a ballot measure to require a supermajority in the legislature to raise revenue ten years ago

https://ballotpedia.org/California_Proposition_26,_Supermajority_Vote_to_Pass_New_Taxes_and_Fees_(2010)

That link again

feels like that dialysis proposition is an example of what is bad about california state propositions. how are we supposed to figure out what it is about and vote accordingly? I voted no because I couldn't understand it

And then there are abominations like Prop 8

on the other hand, there are propositions that I can easily vote for, including most local bonds to improve infrastructure/schools/parks (that are always placed first on the ballot)

But if that’s the problem, and extremely wealthy people/corporations having the sole power to submit ideas directly to the people is the solution,

we could have a system where grassroots organizations can do this too? The ballot measure system allows for this. Just like, the representative democracy allows for elected officials to conscientiously consider the needs of their constituents and legislate accordingly. Neither of these things are impossible. I see, in my idealistic mind, a system, where these work as checks and balances of one another -- the ballot measure as safety valve for when elected officials don't serve the public. ... Where I live, wealthy corporations are funding opponents to progressive candidates for local office (I doubt our city is unique in this) ... it isn't that ballot measures are the evil thing here, it's wealthy people/corporations' influence

Like, in my example of a federal ballot measure about prosecution for racist cops that murder black people -- which I noticed you just conveniently ignored. Black Lives Matter (and related orgs) could sponsor a ballot measure on this subject. This could affect more equal change statewide, as opposed to just acting at the local level, where the results depend on the politics of elected officials in those localities, as well as the varying structures related to oversight of law enforcement. In other words, you will likely get more justice in Berkeley than in Bakersfield. ... which sucks for black people (and those who care about them) who happen to end up at the wrong end of a cop's gun in Bakersfield.

how do you have a ballot measure to (1) prosecute crimes (2) murder is already illegal (3) prosecute crimes against one race
sorry i don't know why i clicked this thread, i've never even been to CA, but ballot measures are the worst and putting any criminal law on the ballot is a recipe for disaster. anti-minority by definition. do they even allow criminal laws to be enacted by ballot measure?

ballot measures lead to vibrant civic engagement, as this crucial text proved

https://i.imgur.com/7h2Ie1O.jpg

we could have a system where grassroots organizations can do this too? The ballot measure system allows for this.

in a legalistic sense yes, and i think i agree that ballot measuress would be good in an ideal world. but in a practical sense, no it doesn't allow for this. it costs an average of $5m to gather signatures and for anything remotely contentious it costs several times (5, 10, 20?) more than that to actually get the votes to pass. see https://ballotpedia.org/Ballot_measure_signature_costs,_2020 and the tweet upthread about how much is being spent on each measure and where the money is coming from.

e.g. the only reason rent control is on the ballot (again, after failing in 2018) is a single incredibly wealthy person in LA (michael weinstein). there's thousands of organizations advocating for rent control, but they do not have access to the ballot measure system as a practical matter.

I see, in my idealistic mind, a system, where these work as checks and balances of one another -- the ballot measure as safety valve for when elected officials don't serve the public. ... Where I live, wealthy corporations are funding opponents to progressive candidates for local office (I doubt our city is unique in this) ... it isn't that ballot measures are the evil thing here, it's wealthy people/corporations' influence

i agree with this. my point is that the nature of the ballot measure system (huge up front costs, and if they pass they are impossible for the legislature to undo, and almost impossible for another ballot measure to undo) make the problem of money worse in ballot measures in 2020 than it is in representative democracy.

also it's not checks and balances if the legislature can't undo a ballot measure. it's just a system by which people with enough money can override the legislature.

Like, in my example of a federal ballot measure about prosecution for racist cops that murder black people -- which I noticed you just conveniently ignored

i ignored it because as harbl said it would get refused by the state attorney. it's not a law. it's like something on https://twitter.com/rejectpetitions.

This could affect more equal change statewide, as opposed to just acting at the local level, where the results depend on the politics of elected officials in those localities, as well as the varying structures related to oversight of law enforcement.

this is an argument for passing good laws at the state or federal level by any method, or for amending the state or federal constitution. i don't understand how it's an argument for ballot measures in particular.

do they even allow criminal laws to be enacted by ballot measure?

there's a ballot measure this year to recategorize a bunch of misdemeanors as felonies. cool system.

As long as special interests have their undue influence in politics, every one of these rotten ballot measures is antidemocratic. Fuck em all and fuck prop 22 especially.

Tsk.

Coming down to the wire: New poll on Prop 22 in California, 46% yes, 42% no.

It’s the most expensive ballot measure campaign in California history, with 90% of the funding comes by from gig companies trying to rewrite labor law. https://t.co/JZHtydpSE3

— Matt Pearce 🦅 (@mattdpearce) October 26, 2020

haha

really feel like we haven’t talked enough about this absolutely hilarious Realtors flyer pic.twitter.com/gPcHRTxgU6

— fry votes yes on 15 & 21, no 22 (@anniefryman) October 23, 2020

there is apparently another in this series with a white man in a fancy suit holding up two bags of "money" standing in front of a large house. It's partly hilarious because "bags of money" and also because he is holding them in the way you see people holding fish they caught, with the same triumphant expression

That one is on the back of the mailer.

https://i.ibb.co/54d2CLV/079-FA6-AF-7-C93-4035-AC46-AF76-E90-ED8-FE.jpg

Ha!

doesn't that look like a "person holding fish" pose??

w..ow

.@GavinNewsom also DECLINED to take a #Prop22 position today, signaling his continued desire for an #AB5 deal w gig tech companies:

"I want to position ourselves as it relates to this issue in a position where we can accommodate if there is a need and desire to see compromise"

— Jeremy B. White (@JeremyBWhite) October 29, 2020

hahahah oh Gavin, you are still the same person who all the good leftists loathed when you first ran for Mayor of SF against the dreamy Matt Gonzales ...

w..ow

― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Thursday, October 29, 2020

OTM

informal poll... am I a weirdo outlier in really disliking both #AB5 and #prop22?

uhhh in your opinion, what should be the "employment" relationship of gig workers and other freelancers that more and more have been mis-characterized as independent contractors?

what is the polling on 22? is it likely to lose?

last I saw, it was close?

Ab5’s heart is in the right place but I think the consensus is it’s a badly written law with a lot of unintended consequences (most of which have been fixed?)

Prop 22 sucks.

yeah - a bunch of things in AB5 got fixed re the arts and cultural workers ...