Political Reform: All Articles and Books

Arnold vs. Arnold

Ron Tang — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 10:00:00 -0400

Education cuts and reform campaigns can be the drinking and driving of California politics. Each carries certain risks when pursued separately. Combined, they can be deadly.

This is a truth that Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger has found hard to accept. Three years ago, just as he launched his breakneck drive to win voter approval of budget and political reforms, he decided to withhold part of a mandated increase in education funding from his 2005-06 budget proposal. The delay in Proposition 98 funding soon consumed the public attention that Schwarzenegger wanted directed toward his reform proposals. His favorability rating dropped more than 20… more

A Way Out Of the Nader Dilemma

Ron Tang — Thu, 06 Mar 2008 00:00:00 -0500

With Ralph Nader in the race, Democrats are fuming and no doubt preparing to use the same legal tricks they used in 2004 to keep Nader off the ballot in many states. Republicans are cackling with glee.

But Republicans shouldn't cackle too loudly. They've also been hurt by the spoiler dilemma.

In fact, the GOP lost control of the U.S. Senate due to Libertarian Party candidates in Montana, Washington, Missouri, Nevada and South Dakota spoiling things for Republicans. And many observers believe that Bill Clinton beat George H.W. Bush in 1992 only because Ross Perot drained away enough votes from Bush.

The… more

Our Senate Problem

Ron Tang — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0500

"The most troublesome task of a reform President," wrote Henry Adams, is "bringing the Senate back to decency." Adams was writing about the presidency of Ulysses S. Grant, which began with an Obamaesque promise of national reconciliation and reform but was dragged into scandal by the senatorial kleptocrats of the day.

The Senate has changed since then -- its members are elected now, though no less likely to be millionaires -- but it's still true that the Senate is where ambitious presidencies die. Dozens of subtle explanations are offered for the early failures of the Clinton administration -- from the early… more

Why Tuesday Won't be So Super

Ron Tang — Sat, 02 Feb 2008 00:00:00 -0500

With Super Duper Tuesday looming on Feb. 5, the presidential horse race is about to move into its mid-game. At the end of this process, we may end up with the first president in history who is a woman, or an African American, or a former prisoner of war, or a Mormon or an ordained Southern Baptist minister.

Beyond the headlines and election results, when you lift up the hood of our nation's nominating process, you see a pretty gnarly sight. There's nothing simple or easy to understand about it, in fact it has evolved into a complex, chaotic snarl… more

How to Make Primaries Balanced, More Relevant

Ron Tang — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0500

In the aftermath of Iowa and New Hampshire, many Americans have begun to question the nominating process itself. Are two tiny rural states really the place to kick off an all-important national selection process? According to a survey conducted for the Associated Press and Yahoo News, fewer than 1 in 5 voters favors Iowa and New Hampshire's "favored state" status, and nearly 80 percent would rather see other states get their chance at the front of the line. Officials in those other states fear that if they hold their presidential primary too late in the season, the nominations… more

The Trans-Atlantic Clash over Political Economy and Fulcrum Institutions

Ron Tang — Tue, 01 Jan 2008 00:00:00 -0500

While the United States and Europe share much in common, they also exhibit basic differences, an "American Way" and a "European Way," that are diverging and had been leading to frequent clashes even before the U.N. rift over Iraq. In a globalized capitalist world, where all nations are seeking models of development that allow "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" for its people, this clash within the West is every bit as elemental as the clash with Arab-Islam because it is multidimensional -- economic, political, social, and international in scope. Few in the world wish to emulate the… more

Republican Power Grab Returns to California

adminn — Sun, 11 Nov 2007 10:34:00 -0500

It's ba-aaaaack! Like the hockey masked assailant in the Friday the 13th movies that refuses to die, the GOP ballot measure designed to ensure that their presidential candidate wins nearly half of California's electoral votes has been revived. And it's got Democratic leaders nervous.

GOP operatives have found a new sugar daddy to bankroll their proposition that would award one electoral vote for each congressional district won by a presidential candidate, instead of giving 100 percent of electoral votes to the candidate that wins the statewide popular vote.

In 2004 John Kerry won all 55 of California's electoral votes, but under this proposal he would… more

How to Revive Redistricting Reform

Articles — Thu, 18 Oct 2007 08:40:00 -0400

In the movie Groundhog Day, the Bill Murray character, a weatherman who is doomed to repeat the same day over and over, asks a question that haunts redistricting reformers in California: "What would you do if you were stuck in one place and everyday was exactly the same, and nothing that you did mattered?"

With the recent failure of the Legislature to place redistricting reform on the ballot -- for the second year in a row -- reformers are scrambling for a way forward. One way would be to spend millions of dollars to gather signatures on a voter initiative. But… more

Election Security That Works

Articles — Wed, 03 Oct 2007 14:03:00 -0400

These are anxious times for election security and voting equipment. The system is truly broken, starting at the federal level with a lack of national standards, a chaotic testing regimen, untrustworthy vendors, a revolving door between the industry and government regulators, and a decentralized hodgepodge of election administration from coast to coast.

Into that abyss has stepped Debra Bowen, California’s secretary of state. Many of us have supported her call to make elections more secure, and Bowen came into office with the best of intentions. Yet her staff’s inexperience and misreading of the bigger picture have caused more chaos than necessary… more

New Politics Gets Newer

Articles — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 09:15:00 -0400

Who would have predicted that the defining difference in the Democratic presidential campaign would involve not Iraq but reform of the political process, particularly the role of lobbyists? At the candidates’ joint appearance at the YearlyKos convention of netroots activists in August, the question of taking money from lobbyists earned Barack Obama and John Edwards -- who don’t -- their biggest cheers, and Hillary Clinton -- who does -- her biggest boos. Since then, the fight has only escalated.

Most Democratic strategists tell their clients that reform of the political process is a marginal issue, of interest to a few NPR… more

Building a Better Presidential Election

Articles — Sat, 08 Sep 2007 08:42:00 -0400

California is used to power grabs, as are other states of electoral significance, like Ohio and Florida. All three states have seen partisan attempts at redistricting reform, which treated them as pawns on the national political chessboard.

Now in California comes the latest power grab, an attempt to manipulate the Electoral College vote to help Republican candidates for president. GOP operatives are seeking to pass a ballot proposition that will award one electoral vote for each congressional district won by presidential candidates, instead of giving 100 percent of electoral votes to the candidate that wins the statewide popular vote.

In… more

How Ed Jew Got Elected

Articles — Sun, 24 Jun 2007 08:33:00 -0400

With all the controversy swirling around embattled San Francisco Supervisor Ed Jew regarding FBI investigations and his in-district residency, some have asked the question: How did this guy ever get elected?

Ironically the answer reveals a new dynamic in San Francisco elections that may diminish the nastiness of mudslinging campaigns, to the relief of all. San Francisco has seen its share of vicious political races. Campaign mailers showing Nazi swastikas, cockroaches and pornography, along with accusations of anti-Semitism, slum landlordism and more, have defiled our mailboxes and doorsteps. While negative campaigning will never go away, it may be possible to… more

Whose Big Government?

Articles — Fri, 01 Jun 2007 11:47:00 -0400

The most confusing political phenomenon of recent times is "big-government conservatism." The lines on every graph show the same pattern: Government -- whether measured by spending, the deficit, the number of employees, or earmarked appropriations -- expanded through the Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and Bush Senior administrations; declined steadily under Clinton; then shot rapidly northward after Republicans took control of the White House in 2001.

For conservatives, the story of big-government conservatism has become a chapter in their own self-satisfied mythology. It is the story of moral corruption, of the dreams of libertarian paradise hijacked by the grasping Washington interest groups.… more

Downsides of our Presidential System

Articles — Wed, 30 May 2007 11:01:00 -0400

The Bush administration seems to be reeling from policy failure to scandal.

Key administration officials have resigned, President Bush’s approval ratings are in the high 20s, with support dwindling even among Republicans and high-ranking military officers. Ed Rollins, a Republican strategist who ran Ronald Reagan’s 1984 presidential campaign, has said, "The country doesn’t believe George W. Bush, it doesn’t trust him, and with 19 months to go it’s only going to get worse." The government of George W. Bush clearly has "fallen," in the classic parliamentary sense. President Bush is the lamest of ducks.

Yet our presidential system does not have a… more

No Way to Run an Election

Articles — Thu, 17 May 2007 10:46:00 -0400

The sound of hissing air leaking out of Los Angeles democracy is unmistakable. A check-in at one precinct by 2:00 p.m. on election day revealed that only two voters out of the 1,073 registered in that precinct had turned out to vote. By the close of the polls, it was up to four. This makes the 10% overall turnout in the March 6 elections -- already the lowest in decades -- look like a democratic flood.

Each of the 122,436 ballots cast Tuesday, out of nearly 2 million registered voters, cost taxpayers more than $40 -- an expensive ticket to a… more

Mismatching Funds

Articles — Sat, 31 Mar 2007 20:14:00 -0400

Ten years ago, the United States held its first billion-dollar election -- that was roughly the amount spent by all candidates for Congress and the presidency put together. The same year brought the first large-scale campaign finance scandal since Watergate, best remembered for the almost accurate metaphor of President Bill Clinton selling overnights in the Lincoln Bedroom in exchange for large contributions to the Democratic Party. And both took place at a time when Americans were deeply disconnected from politics; the 1996 election was the only presidential election since 1960 in which turnout of the voting-age population fell below 50… more

Pay to Play

Articles — Fri, 16 Mar 2007 19:48:00 -0400

"The billion-dollar election." Get used to that phrase, because you’ll be hearing it a lot over the next year and a half. That’s the total that all candidates for the presidency are expected to spend on their campaigns between now and 2008. It’s a staggering figure that critics will surely cite as evidence that money has thoroughly corrupted politics. Newt Gingrich shocked the bluenoses back in 1996, when he said that there was too little money in politics, not too much. The price tag this time around will be sure to give them apoplexy. Maybe, though, Gingrich had it right.… more

Real Democracy... Or Dystopia?

Articles — Fri, 16 Feb 2007 04:31:00 -0500

Imagine that it is Election Day 2016. Imagine yet another presidential election that boils down to the same two battleground states -- Ohio and Florida -- which is not unrealistic, given demographic trends.

Candidates will spend most of their time in these two states and perhaps a handful of other swing states, ignoring all others. Visits to our largest states like California, Texas and New York will be kept to fund-raising zip codes. Florida and Ohio electorates will be sliced and diced into bite-sized targets as TV viewers are bombarded with ads, most of them negative, making television virtually unwatchable for… more

Let's Give a Swift Kick to the Rumpocracy

Articles — Mon, 29 Jan 2007 01:17:00 -0500

Californians and their state government are drifting further apart.

A recent poll by the Public Policy Institute of California found only 20 percent of November voters believe our state will be a better place to live in 2025; 51 percent say it will be worse. Another poll by the New America Foundation found widespread dissatisfaction with the two major political parties, even Democratic and Republican voters indicating their weariness of voting for the "lesser of two evils."

For the first time in modern California history, a majority of adults are not registered with either of the two major parties and… more

Catching on to Instant Runoff Voting

Articles — Sun, 14 Jan 2007 07:29:00 -0500

Political reforms such as redistricting reform and campaign finance reform have foundered at the ballot box in recent years, rejected by voters in several states. But another political reform, instant runoff voting, has quietly racked up impressive victories.

Instant runoff voting (IRV), which allows voters to rank their candidates 1, 2, 3, made great strides forward during the November 7, 2006 elections.

Voters in four different jurisdictions overwhelmingly approved ballot measures for IRV. In California, voters in Oakland approved the idea with a landslide 69 percent of the vote, as did 56 percent of voters in Davis. In Minneapolis, a landslide 65… more