Its OK if politics isn’t overregulated. I get it about freedom. The problem is that the two parties abuse their freedoms to betray the public interest. Its time for someone to use their freedoms to abuse them. That’s just fair and balanced.

Depending on what happens between now and then, I could be inclined to shut down CMP and become active in AE.  My willingness to do that, however, will depend on a number of unanswered questions, so I’m very reluctant today to make such a decision.

I really wish they would put out a long-term vision.  And my use of the word “they” is exactly the problem.  They’re top-down.  We’re bottom-up.  At a time when people are looking for trust more than anything else, top-down is not the way to earn it.

Voters wanted an independent commission because they wanted less political self-interest in voting districts. If Republicans were told to stand down and actually did so, then that’s not political malpractice, its a rare example of a political party acquiescing to the will of the people. It is a rare example of political activists taking politics out of politics. It can be done if participants have the strength of character to reign in their massive egos and exert a modicum of discipline, transparency and honesty. It really isn’t all that hard, especially if the people involved have respect for (i) the rule of law and (ii) the will of the people.

Of course, that’s not easy for political activists and ideologues, most of whom consider themselves generally above respect for what the stupid voters want and the rule of law. I recall both parties fighting against open primaries and against independent redistricting. That contravined the public will and is evidence of the profound disrespect that both parties have for voters and what they want.

Unless I am mistaken, the rules of the game are to abide by what voters want and what the law is, not what behind the scenes, self-serving political insiders want. Those folks had their chance and they failed. Exactly two groups are responsible for the colossal mess California is in – the California Democratic party and the California Republican party. Democrats are arguably more responsible because they have had more legislative and maybe executive power for a longer time. However, parsing blame is an academic parlor game that’s beside the point. Its time for both parties to go into permament oblivion status but I would happily settle for one or the other permanently checking out.  

What California desperately needs now is an uncorrupted new political party focused on problem solving over ideology, transparency over opacity and honest service to the public interest over corrupt service to powerful special interests. Powerful corrupt special interests include the California Democratic and Republican parties.

Maybe what AE is doing will lead to unintended or bad consequences. You have respectfully articulated your concern, which is about the best you can do.

Ash, your point about needing to unite despite differences of opinion is true. You know how relatively like-minded folks at Rise of the Center often sharply and sometimes harshly differ. As far as I can tell, what you are trying to do here is exactly what is needed. Given the disquieting status quo, I am more than willing to see folks (AE, you and anyone else asking for better politics) try something different, even if it ultimately fails or needs to be fixed.

An example.
Boring moderate: An analysis of potential income streams suggests that upwardly adjusting the ratio of sales tax to income tax would tend to have a smoothing effect on year to year fluctuations in revenue flowing into California’s treasury. External factors may affect implementation of such proposed an adjustment, but the projected benefit of a more stable income stream would allow for modest increases in efficiency of state expenditures due to an enhanced capacity to project future revenues. The impact of propopsed changes on would vary among various sectors of California’s economy, with potential levels of private both public and sector support fluctuating accordingly.

Infotainment moderate: Once again, California politics shows itself to be hopelessly mired in gridlock grounded in bitter partisan differences and special interests defending their revenue streams. Republican partisans are ideologically opposed to proposed changes to in adjustments to sales and income tax revenue streams. Special interests in the service sector bitterly oppose increases in taxes on services and their lobbyists, backed by massive campaign contributions, have effectively shelved action by forcing the legislature to refer to the issue to a Blue Ribbon committee who will provide a final report on the matter in two years. Democrats remain generally clueless. In the meantime, California is screwed by partisan politics as usual and derailed (corrupted) by special interest lobby power and cash. California’s political moderates decry the partisan state of failure and point out that the proposed revenue changes would be a significant benefit to the state and its operations (link to economic analysis). Democrats and Republicans in the California legislature both dismiss moderate complaints as blither from nincompoops despite the obvious benefits that unbiased expert analyses say are there.

Which of those two is more fun – boring or infotainment? Why does a lot (but not all) of TV news sound more like infotainment? Being moderate doesn’t necessarily mean being dull. Maybe its largely a matter of how the content gets presented. At least, the infotainment approach may be worth a try. Check out George Lakeoff and his take on how politics is framed and what effects framing can have (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5f9R9MtkpqM&noredirect=1). Moderates can frame political issues without loss of much content and without deceiving the public, while being less boring.

How on Earth can committed, hard core liberal Democrats and committed, hard core conservative Republicans be coaxed into setting politics aside? For most hard core ideologues, facts, logic and reality do not get in the way of their ideology. They see and accept reality (truth, facts) fits their ideology and reject, distort or deny what doesn’t. For most of them, ideology is sacrosanct. For some, politics sometimes is literally a matter of sacred, infallible religion, e.g., in social issues like gay rights and abortion. This issue is a significant source of failure in California government but how to effectively deal with it is completely beyond me.
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I suspect that if partisans could be “converted” into pragmatists first and ideologues second, the huge differences in how the liberals and conservatives perceive reality would be reduced at least modestly. That ought to make it easier to get at least some people to accept reality for what it is without as much distortion from ideology as would otherwise be the case. In turn, that ought to make governing a bit easier. However, that doesn’t necessarily imply that smart governing always means compromise between the right and the left.
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As time goes on, it looks more and more to me like the two dominant points of view (liberal and conservative) obscure the possibility that for some issues, manybe most, compromise isn’t what is called for. What may be needed for any given issue is a liberal, conservative or compromise policy. However, it is also possible that none of those are what makes the most sense, i.e., a fourth vision of reality and policy flowing therefrom is what would make sense. However, given California’s highly polarized ideologically driven politics where only two points of view dominate, I suspect we usually don’t see or hear about options that neither liberals nor conservatives would like. That makes sense because what ideologues don’t like, they reject, distort or deny. The real devil here is ideology. Its a reality killer and that leads to failure in politics.
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Wish I knew how to fix, but I don’t.

Where I diverge with you is on the intent of TLC members.  I actually think you could get most of them to go along with a split roll and that they’re not coming at this from the same angle as Howard Jarvis and CalTax.  In other words, it was a political rather than policy decision to ignore Prop 13.

You probably disagree, but I really would hate to see the perfect be the enemy of the good.