Donald & Kamala And Joe & Jerry Brown

-by emorej

81 year-old 4-term California Governor Jerry Brown's recent comments suggest that he sees himself as a potential Trump-beating anybody-but-Bernie nominee after 2020 primary campaigning has further exposed the general election weaknesses of Harris, Biden and the other anybodies.

Q: Why did Jerry Brown say this 4 weeks ago?

"I think we need stability at the highest level." To counter Trump, he said, "Even a scent of wimpiness would be fatal... You have to not only be strong but exude strength." Don’t trade insults-- "If you insult back, then you violate a very important principle, and that is that voters don’t like squabbling at City Hall." But at the same time, "you’ve got to go toe to toe... just do it with charm"” like John F. Kennedy did. And then, when the moment is right, "You’ve got to hit him between the eyes, rhetorically."

Q: The above can be understood as the answer to the question of why Jerry Brown has not endorsed Kamala Harris-- whose most impressive campaigning accomplishment was early capture of an exceptional range of California endorsements, some of which, like Barbara Lee and Nanette Barragán and (somewhat) Ted Lieu, were less predictable than those from monied moderate California state- and city-level machine cogs-- clearly Brown is not persuaded that Harris has the necessary campaigning skills to beat Trump.

Q: Why does Jerry think Trump will be hard to beat?

As a professional politician, [Jerry] is impressed by Trump’s political skills. "He has a chutzpah and insouciance and just charges ahead," Brown noted, and he is skilled at playing on the "resentment" of his followers. "He’s convincing... He’s a dynamic speaker." Brown is particularly impressed by how Trump has turned the border wall into a "metaphor."

Q: So does Jerry think Joe Biden matches up well against Trump? I think the opposite message is sent by the above interview's conclusion (which is not expressly attributed to Brown, but is redolent of his style) which deniably but unmistakably trolls Biden's propensity for tongue slips:

The question now is which Democratic candidate can exemplify F. Scott Fitzgerald’s definition of a "first-rate intelligence"-- namely, "the ability to hold two opposed ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function."

Q: What about Bernie (who perfectly satisfies that "two... ideas" requirement)? This is about as gentle an anti-Bernie quote as is possible for a veteran of mainstream politics:

It’s a mistake to lay out specific programs "that have trillion-dollar budget implications... the New Deal occurred when there was 19 percent unemployment. That’s a lot different from 4 percent today. So people’s appetite for major change is not as great when everybody’s working."

Q: Finally, why did Jerry Brown select, to carry the above message, none of the media players in the huge California market where Brown has been the dominant politician for much of the last 50 years, but instead this archetype of the MSM-Imperial Deep State-Complex?

Max Boot is a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, a columnist for the Washington Post, and a global affairs analyst for CNN. He is the author of the NYT bestseller The Road Not Taken: Edward Lansdale and the American Tragedy in Vietnam (January 2018) and... The Corrosion of Conservatism: Why I Left the Right (October 2018). Previously he wrote Invisible Armies: An Epic History of Guerrilla Warfare From Ancient Times to the Present, The Savage Wars of Peace and War Made New.

Does The Most Corrupt Man In Congress Really Support Medicare-For-All?

The Republicans in each house of Congress have voted literally dozens and dozens of times over the past 7 years to repeal the Affordable Care Act, a top priority of an avaricious donor class that doesn't like the idea of helping to pay for poor peoples' healthcare. In all those years the Republicans were voting in lockstep to repeal, there was either a Democratic-controlled Senate to stop it or a Democrat in the White House to veto it. Now the Republicans control the Senate, the House and the White House. So where's the repeal? Reality is a bitch! The repeal is the most massively unpopular bill in living memory. Something between 12% and 20% of Americans approve of it. Bush's TARP Wall Street bankster bailout was more popular with American voters than TrumpCare. Republican legislators can't deal with it and are panic-stricken. Ha, ha, ha?

Let's look a little closer to home-- right here in blue, blue California where the Governor is a Democrat and both the state Senate and the state Assembly have massive Democratic majorities. Both houses of the legislature passed single payer legislation-- TWICE-- in the past-- when there was a Republican governor to veto it-- and now...

Tuesday, Lydia O'Neal and David Sirota, reporting for the International Business Times, points to similarities that Republicans in Congress and Democratic in Sacramento face in regard to healthcare. "Democrats,' they wrote, "are facing allegations from progressive leaders that after a decade of promising to create a single-payer health care system, the party is now succumbing to the kind of corporate fealty that national party leaders routinely ascribe to Republicans" and the scumbag and traitor to all things American who has managed to slip into the White House.

As many Democrats enthusiastically promoted single-payer to Golden State voters, the party indeed engineered a complete takeover of the state’s government, giving them unprecedented legislative supermajority power to enact the legislation-- even over a governor’s veto. Yet, as health care industry money flooded into the coffers of the Democratic Party’s candidates for California office, Brown has turned negative about the idea, and late last month, California Democratic Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon halted a single-payer bill in its tracks, preventing it from being voted on by his Democratic supermajority before the legislature’s self-imposed July 14th deadline.

Amid calls for Democratic unity in the Trump era, the party’s move in a deep blue state to block a health care initiative it previously supported has prompted labor movement protests-- and promises of primary campaigns or recall efforts to unseat recalcitrant Democrats. More broadly, eight years after Barack Obama mounted a populist presidential campaign and then did not prosecute any major Wall Street executives, the episode has resurrected progressives’ allegations that while Democrats may talk a good game, they are not nearly as committed to bold action as their rhetoric suggests.

“Talk about fake news-- this is fake politics: stick it to the Republican governor but we’re going to leave dear old Jerry untouched so he doesn’t have to veto this bill,” said Democrat Gloria Romero, a former California Senate Majority Leader who helped pass the single-payer bills in 2006 and 2008. “Probably most of these Assembly members ran for office supporting single payer healthcare. But now that what they ran around promising the people actually has a chance of passage, they don’t dare do what they promised. This kind of thing undermines any integrity from the Democratic Party that is supposed to stand up for the little guy. It creates a disconnect and a distrust.”

In an era that has seen voters enthusiastically respond to populist crusades in both parties, Brown and Rendon have offered technocratic arguments. Both have raised questions about how the most recent single-payer bill, SB 562, would be financed in California, where one previously passed ballot measure constrains the state budget and another requires a set percentage of the budget to be devoted to education.

...[A]n International Business Times review of campaign finance data found that in the intervening years, health insurers and pharmaceutical companies substantially boosted their donations to California Democratic candidates in gubernatorial election years.

In all, donors from the health services sector and major health insurers gave more than $16 million to Democratic candidates and the California Democratic Party in the 2014 election cycle-- almost double what donors from those industries gave in the 2006 election, according to data from the National Institute on Money In State Politics. Donors from those sectors collectively donated more than $3 million to Brown and Rendon since 2010.

In light of that history, longtime single-payer proponents argue that this is a watershed moment for Democrats in advance of the 2018 election. They assert that the California fight will demonstrate whether or not Democrats in the Trump era are willing to use the power they still retain at the state level to defy their major corporate donors and enact the policies they tell voters they support.

“We’ve been talking about this forever,” said Jamie Court, the president of Consumer Watchdog, which has supported the legislation. “When there’s a Republican in charge, Democrats take action,” he said, and with ostensibly pro-single-payer Brown replacing Schwarzenegger, “now it’s time to put up or shut up.”

“It’s a litmus test for whether progressive Democratic politicians can talk the talk and walk the walk,” Court told IBT. “This is about the soul of the Democratic Party as much as it’s about health care.”

Kia Hamadanchy, a former Sherrod Brown staffer, currently running for the House seat Trump's pet congresswoman in Orange County, Mimi Walters, holds told us that "Top to bottom the Democratic Party is in the worst shape its been since right before the Great Depression. Whether its Congress, state legislatures, city councils, or school boards we've continued to lose across the board and across the country time and time again. Donald Trump does not become President of the United States without a massive institutional failure by the Democratic Party. Whatever we've been doing its clear that its not working and we need a complete rebuild from the ground up, with a focus on what we actually stand for and who we actually represent. And as a party how can we possibly win the argument and actually convince people to come along with us if we're constantly running away from ourselves and don't strongly stand behind progressive policy, whether its single payer or whether its anything else."

Dotty Nygard is the progressive nurse running for the blue-trending Central Valley seat held by 100% Trump backer Jeff Denham. She supported Bernie in the primary and is running on similar policies and values now. She told us that "one thing is clear: we need more union members, women, and people of color elected to Congress. These underrepresented groups can better relate to the struggles working families face every day, and as representatives they are more likely to recognize the insanity of winding the income inequality divide amongst Americans, both through messaging and actions. Democrats are supposed to represent the people-- fight for the people-- and lift them up... Leadership cannot idly stand by while only those with money are elected into positions of power within a system that champions money over grassroots support. As Democrats, we must proactively fund, endorse, and otherwise work to elect working-class folks if we want the public to engage in politics again."

So who's the most corrupt man in Congress and what's he got to do with all this? Yes, time to talk about Queens County machine boss, Joe Crowley, a Wall Street scumbag and "former" chairman of the corporately owned and operated New Dems who Pelosi and Hoyer have selected as the next leader of the House Democrats. Crowley has never had a contested election. He was given his seat by a legalistic trick/inside job pulled off by the last Queens machine boss, Tom Manton, as he suddenly resigned from Congress and handed off the prize to his sleaze bag protégée, Crowley.

Progressives have been trying to pass Medicare-For-All since Truman was president. This year, when John Conyers introduced the latest version-- H.R. 676-- in a situation where Trump is president and McConnell and Ryan decide what gets voted on in Congress-- there were 51 original co-sponsors, basically all fervent progressives like Partial Jayapal (D-WA), Barbara Lee (D-CA), Katherine Clark (D-MA), Keith Ellison (D-MN), Raul Grijalva (D-AZ), Ted Lieu (D-CA), Mark Pocan (D-WI), Jose Serrano (D-NY), Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), Bonnie Watson Coleman (D-NJ), Judy Chu (D-CA), Jerry Nadler (D-NY) and Matt Cartwright (D-PA). That was on January 24. As the months rolled on more progressives read the bill and signed on as well-- like Jamie Raskin (D-MD), Ro Khanna (D-CA) and Alan Lowenthal (D-CA) in February, Mike Capuano (D-MA) and Karen Bass (D-CA) and Nanette Barragan (D-CA) in March. By April, even conservative Democrats from the Republican wing of the party started smelling the roses and signing on as co-sponsors, even slimy characters like Gene Green (TX), Lou Correa (Blue Dog-CA), Darren Soto (New Dem-FL), Jim Cooper (Blue Dog-TN), Vicente Gonzalez (Blue Dog-TX), and then on May 5-- soon after a progressive primary opponent, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez jumped into the primary against him, Crowley signed on as a co-sponsor too. What a joke! No one in Congress thinks Crowley supports single payer, Medicare-for-All or anything else remotely progressive beyond what he needs to work on his personal goals wrapped up in naked careerism and grotesque opportunism. But Crowley's signal was quickly picked up up conservative New Dem Adam Schiff who has Dianne Feinstein's Senate seat dictating every decision he makes. Maybe this is the kind of sausage-making it's going to take to finally get this passed. Or maybe opportunists like Crowley and Schiff will betray America as easily as Rendon and Jerry Brown betrayed California.



Let's go back to Lydia O'Neal and David Sirota for a moment. They pointed out that Rendon's Democratic and corporate allies lauded him "for blocking the single payer legislation, even after fellow Democrats had previously passed it."

“I think Speaker Rendon gets a lot of credit for protecting his members from a very stupid idea and making them all politically vulnerable for something that’s not going to happen anyway,” political consultant David Townsend, who works for Democrats and insurance companies, told the Sacramento Bee.

Assembly Democrats have set July 14th as the deadline for policy committees to consider legislation this year, and CNA is continuing to stage protests demanding lawmakers allow the bill to be debated.

Whether or not it advances this year, the legislation faces persistent questions about Proposition 98, which mandates a set percentage of spending on education, and the so-called “Gann limit,” which limits overall state spending. A senate analysis of the bill asserted that those measures “would prevent the legislature from creating the single-payer system envisioned in the bill without voter approval” of exemptions.

Rendon’s move, though, has effectively prevented lawmakers from voting the legislation onto the ballot. Kuehl, meanwhile, rejected suggestions that lawmakers could not find creative ways to work within existing constitutional limits.

“That theory won’t fly,” she told IBT, asserting that there is likely breathing room within the Gann limit. She said after a decade of debate over single-payer, lawmakers should be able to come up with ways to deal with Proposition 98.

“I don’t think it would actually be a problem,” said Kuehl, who is now a Los Angeles County Supervisor. “You would craft it so that it would not be part of the state budget. It would create a separate state health plan.”

As for the political dynamics, Kuehl compared the Democrats’ refusal to pass a long-supported health care policy to Republicans repeatedly voting to repeal Obamacare but now having trouble passing a replacement bill under their own party’s president.

“It’s much more realistic when you’re faced with having something happen or not happen,” she said.

Fabian Nunez, a Democrat who served as Assembly Speaker when Kuehl’s SB 840 first passed both houses, said he believes single-payer simply is not feasible at the state level.

“You could do some things at the state level to improve the quality of care, but you need the cooperation of the federal government,” he said. “The only way to do single-payer well is at the federal level.”

Nunez’s position exemplifies the Democratic Party’s shift on the issue now that it has full legislative power. As Assembly speaker in 2006, he supported the California single-payer bill.

Some single-payer proponents in California say that after multiple attempts to pass a bill, Democrats themselves have become the major obstacle-- and the only way to get the party to restore its credibility and act on its promises is through threats of revenge at the ballot box.

“There have to be electoral consequences for these Democrats,” said Michael Lighty of the California Nurses Association. “The whole basis of their politics is pro-industry, pro-Wall Street. Those folks are driven by their donor agenda and not by popular demand. There just in general has to be a greater grassroots surge to hold these elected officials accountable.”

Primarying Anthony Rendon is an absolute must. Drafting state Senate president Kevin de León to run for Feinstein's seat-- and not Adam Schiff-- is just as important. This is California, not Mississippi and if we let the establishment, primarily Democratic careerists, get away with this kind of crap here, they will be emboldened to rub our faces in shit for eternity. And nationally... Crowley is a DEAD end for Democrats. Contrast his incoherence on healthcare policy with what Ro Khanna, who represents the Silicon Valley and parts of the East Bay, (see tweets above) told me today:

"When Republicans mislead voters into thinking that a single payer health care system costs $32 trillion, Democrats must point out that our current system already costs $49 trillion. A single payer system would actually save Americans $17 trillion. A single-payer system reduces administrative costs and will lower drug prices and hospital costs through bargaining. Ultimately, a single payer system would help reduce our deficit and ease the burden on both businesses and middle class families.

"For decades, the GOP has made economic arguments regarding health care and Democrats have made moral arguments. But we shouldn't be afraid to make the economic case. Expanding health care through single payer isn't just the right thing to do, it's the smart thing to do. Let's not let the GOP get away with fake math, Democrats must point out that a single payer system is fiscally responsible."

Ro Khanna sounds like a credible leader, unlike Joe Crowley, who sounds like what he is: and opportunist and a careerist hack who will sell out the grassroots as easily as he yawns when a staffer tries explaining policy to him.

We've been mentioning that two of our old progressive friends, Mary Ellern Balchunis and Daylen Leach, are both running-- in a crowded field-- for the Democratic nomination to take on Ryan rubber stamp Pat Meehan in PA-07. But there's another excellent progressive in that race too, Paul Perry, a former Obama staffer and a school teacher. I was talking with him yesterday and mentioned that "It's deeply ironic that the DCCC released a series of stickers encouraging voters to 'look at the other guys' when our party would actually be best served by taking a good, hard look in the mirror and changing the cast of characters that we see in it. If we are to learn anything from this last election cycle, it's that Americans are hungry for a new generation of leaders to step up and take tough stances that deliver progress for Americans, like single-payer healthcare and tuition-free college. These are ideas whose time has come and we need the next class of progressive leaders to pave the way for this badly-needed change that most Americans favor by wide margins." Paul Perry knows something about messaging too. Just take a look at this incredible video:



Remind you at all of how Randy Bryce introduced himself? I have no double we're going too be hearing more from Paul as this cycle heats up.

Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon Tosses California TrumpCare Victims Overboard

Remember how the first version of TrumpCare in the House wasn’t quite good enough for the far right savages in the Republican caucus? So they called in Freedom Caucus lunatic Mark Meadows to work with spineless south Jersey multimillionaire Tom MacArthur and they came up with a far worse and more deadly version that the radical right could-- and did-- get behind. That same process is playing out in the Senate now. You have the off-the-cliff extremists like Ted Cruz, Ron Johnson and Mike Lee threatening to tank the bill if it doesn’t kill more people than the bill already worse than the House version will kill. And your have jellyfish Republicans like Rob Portman, Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Dean Heller whining that the bill is already too extreme but… ready to make a deal with Cruz, who’s father was implicated in the assassination of JFK, as you know-- just ask the obese orange baboon who took a moment out from obsessing about his role as Putin’s cockholster to tweet some nonsense over the weekend about Obamacare being dead. In any case, soon after Pence was summoned into the Koch presence Friday, Koch operative Tim Phillips, went publicly bonkers that TrumpCare 3.0 isn’t “conservative” enough, describing it as an “immoral… slight nip and tuck” in the far right’s war against healthcare for working families. “This Senate bill needs to get better,” drooled the well-paid fascist Koch mouthpiece. “It has to get better.” By “better,” they want to see higher projections for likely annual deaths, thousands apparently not sufficient to sate their bloodlust.



In line with Trump’s bogus claim-- terrorism, pure and simple-- that Obamacare is dead, The Hill reported yesterday that “One of the primary arguments from Republicans for repealing ObamaCare is that the healthcare law is ‘collapsing.’ But experts warn that the GOP’s legislation might destabilize insurance markets even more over time” and drive premiums through the roof.

The Senate’s ObamaCare repeal bill, released Thursday, would abolish ObamaCare’s mandate for people to have insurance, but it would still bar insurers from denying people coverage for pre-existing conditions.

Experts warn that arrangement would allow people to wait until they get sick to buy insurance coverage, likely driving up premiums.

  On top of that, the GOP bill cuts back on ObamaCare’s tax credits, providing less financial assistance to help people afford a plan. So in addition to the lack of an enforcement “stick” to get healthy people to enroll, there would also be less of a “carrot,” in the form of financial assistance.

This combination could lead to more insurers pulling out of the market or spiking premiums, experts say, exactly the problems under ObamaCare that Republicans have talked about solving.

“A combination of repealing the individual mandate and diminishing premium subsidies would tend to destabilize the market,” said Larry Levitt, a healthcare expert at the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Rodney Whitlock, a former Republican congressional staffer now a healthcare consultant, wrote on Twitter that the lack of a mandate combined with lower financial assistance “is pretty much the definition of a death spiral.”

The GOP seems to have rigged the bill to trigger a real collapse of the healthcare system to kick it in 2022, so after Trump or Pence theoretically wins the White House. So we were all waiting for California to offer the alternative, right? The state Senate passed a single payer bill and the state Assembly has a massive super-majority so… no brainer, right? Wrong. Assembly Speaker Anthony Rendon, who often pretends to be a progressive-- I realized he wasn’t when he endorsed uber-corrupt conservative Isadore Hall over progressive reformer Nanette Barragan last year-- killed the bill for at least a year by locking it up in the Rules Committee, claiming SB 562 is “woefully incomplete.” The L.A. Times explained what Rendon had done, aside from committing career suicide:

Liar? Coward? Both?

Rendon announced late Friday afternoon that the bill, SB 562 by state Sens. Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens) and Toni Atkins (D-San Diego), would not advance to a policy hearing in his house, dampening the measure’s prospect for swift passage this year.

“SB 562 was sent to the Assembly woefully incomplete,” Rendon said in a statement. “Even senators who voted for SB 562 noted there are potentially fatal flaws in the bill, including the fact it does not address many serious issues, such as financing, delivery of care, cost controls, or the realities of needed action by the Trump Administration and voters to make SB 562 a genuine piece of legislation.”

Rendon took pains to note that his action does not kill the bill entirely-- because it is the first year of a two-year session, it could be revived next year.

But the move is nonetheless a major setback for legislation that has electrified the Democratic party’s progressive flank.

The California Nurses Assn., the bill's sponsors and the state's most vocal advocates for single-payer, blasted Rendon's decision as "cowardly."

"Acting in secret in the interests of the profiteering insurance companies late Friday afternoon abandons all those people already threatened by Congress and the Trump administration," Deborah Burger, the union's co-president, said in a statement.

Burger continued: "The people of California are counting on the Legislature to protect them now, not sometime next year, and as polls have shown Californians support this proposal by a wide majority. A solution to this health care emergency could be at hand; Speaker Rendon is standing in opposition."

In a joint statement, Lara and Atkins, the measure's authors, said they were "disappointed the robust debate about healthcare for all that started in the California Senate will not continue in the Assembly this year."

"This issue is not going away," they added.

Gov. Jerry Brown, who had signaled wariness about the proposal's costs, said in a statement that Rendon "made the case that there’s clearly more work to do before anyone is in a position to vote on revamping California’s healthcare system."

"I recognize the tremendous excitement behind the measure, but basic and fundamental questions remain unanswered," Brown said.

Many Democrats are embarrassed. Ro Khanna spoke up first, tweeting that Rendon should reconsider his decision. But he wasn’t the only one. Newly elected Democratic Party chairman, Eric Bauman, a former nurse, who is committed to single payer, has been politically close to Rendon. But that didn’t stop him from blasting him in a statement to the media:

"Today’s announcement that the Assembly will not be moving forward on single-payer, Medicare-for-All healthcare for California at this time is an unambiguous disappointment for all of us who believe that healthcare is a right for every Californian. We understand that SB 562 is a work in progress, but we believe it should keep moving forward, especially in light of the widespread suffering that will occur if Trump and Congressional Republicans succeed in passing their cold-blooded, morally bankrupt so-called healthcare legislation.

I call upon our Legislative Leaders to work together to find appropriate and acceptable solutions to enable SB 562 to advance as soon as possible.

Hundreds of thousands of people in California stand to lose their health insurance if Trumpcare 3.0 is signed into law. Countless Democrats passionately believe that Medicare-for-all healthcare is a bedrock principle of the Democratic Party, and I stand with them. Our message to our Legislative Leaders is clear: SB 562 must be given the chance to succeed.”

UPDATE: All Fingers Point To The Governor

Today’s bullshitter was yesteryear’s visionary, as you can see in the 1992 video clip below. But, alas, Jerry Brown seems to have changed his mind-- and Anthony Rendon’s mind. Will he now take the whole California Democratic Party down with him? Imagine him shrieking menacingly at Kevin De Leon: "Don't you dare let that bill hit my desk," with KDL stomping out of his office, unphased, not blinking, muttering, "Let the 562 veto be his legacy." He passed it through the Senate… and then Rendon blinked-- just as the details of the TrumpCare tax giveaway were hitting.

Climate Change Shouldn't Be A Partisan Issue-- But It Is

Why is young fogey Marco Rubio such a willfully ignorant science denier?

Yesterday we talked about the passage of Fred Upton's disastrous anti-climate change bill. How is it possible? There are two ways to look at why America is acting like a nation of ostriches with their heads buried on the sand, although both lead back to special interests putting their own tremendous wealth ahead of the survival of the human race-- predominantly the Koch brothers, who virtually control the Republican Party lock, stock and barrel.

Last year when California Governor Jerry Brown denounced the GOP by saying "virtually no Republican" in Washington accepts climate change science, PolitiFact looked into his outrageous charge-- and found it true. Brown, responding to a question from This Week's host George Stephanopoulos, said "[T]here's virtually no Republican who accepts the science that virtually is unanimous. I mean there is no scientific question. There's just political denial for various reasons, best known to those people who are in denial." So PolitiFact decided to find investigate that since Republican elected officials are more skeptical about climate change than Republican voters are (Republican voters not dependent on Koch-related checks). First up was a senator whose state is starting to feel the effects of rising sea waters pretty dramatically:

Most recently, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., made waves for denying a link between human activity and climate change.

"I do not believe that human activity is causing these dramatic changes to our climate the way these scientists are portraying it," Rubio told Jonathan Karl on ABC’s This Week May 11. "And I do not believe that the laws that they propose we pass will do anything about it. Except it will destroy our economy."

That’s in line with other prominent Republicans, such as House Majority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas.

Organizing for Action, a group that backs President Barack Obama, published a lengthy list of climate change deniers in Congress, with evidence to back each one.

Still others, like Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., have notably changed on the issue, even after co-authoring legislation to address the issue.

The only Republicans they managed to dig up who believe in the science of climate change and are taking it even a little seriously were Michael Grimm (R-NY), currently serving out a prison sentence for corruption, Chris Smith (R-NJ), Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-NJ) and 5 relatively mainstream GOP senators, Bob Corker, John Thune, Susan Collins, Lamar Alexander and Mark Kirk. But when I wrote they were taking it a little seriously... well, this is what Frelinghuysen put it: "With the weather patterns over the past five years. … What causes it? Quite honestly, I don’t know. … Humans have some effect on climate change. There’s so many factors." So 8 out of 278 Republicans (3%) are open to arguments from scientists. And Pennsylvania's Republican ex-Congressman Jim Greenwood told PolitiFact that the number of Republicans standing by climate change science has been shrinking. "There used to be a lot more of us. A lot of us were very green in our voting records. That has changed. I think it's part of the phenomenon of the polarization of the Congress." What a party!

This is a Bill Moyers show from 2012 that helps explain what's happened to the GOP and is very much well worth watching again:



Back to Climate Change and a study CBS News did a couple months ago on where the GOP candidates stand on the issue. Short version: scary.

Climate change, more than many other issues, lays bare a stark divide between the two parties: Democrats warn of the grave threat posed by global warming, stressing the need to reduce carbon emissions to prevent a catastrophe. Republicans, including most of the GOP's 2016 presidential candidates, either don't acknowledge climate change is happening, or they question whether it's caused by human activity.

...At an event sponsored by billionaire industrialist brothers Charles and David Koch in August, Cruz denied the existence of climate change.

"If you look to the satellite data in the last 18 years there has been zero recorded warming. Now the global warming alarmists, that's a problem for their theories. Their computer models show massive warming the satellite says it ain't happening. We've discovered that NOAA, the federal government agencies are cooking the books," he said.

In an interview with the Texas Tribune in March, he said, "the global warming alarmists are the equivalent of flat-Earthers," recalling that Galileo was once branded a "denier" for saying the Earth was round when contemporary scientific wisdom held that it was flat.

...Marco Rubio: "I believe climate is changing because there's never been a moment where the climate is not changing," Rubio said in CBS' Face the Nation in April. In an interview with ABC's This Week in May 2014, he said, "Our climate is always changing. And what they have chosen to do is take a handful of decades of research and say that this is now evidence of a longer-term trend that's directly and almost solely attributable to manmade activity. I do not agree with that."

And what about Mister Republican 2015? Trumpf doesn't issue press statements; he tweets-- and CBS found some:

Yesterday, Paul Krugman, writing for the NY Times noted that "Future historians-- if there are any future historians-- will almost surely say that the most important thing happening in the world during December 2015 was the climate talks in Paris. True, nothing agreed to in Paris will be enough, by itself, to solve the problem of global warming. But the talks could mark a turning point, the beginning of the kind of international action needed to avert catastrophe. Then again, they might not; we may be doomed. And if we are, you know who will be responsible: the Republican Party... [M]ost of the contenders for the Republican presidential nomination are solidly in the anti-science camp. What people may not realize, however, is how extraordinary the G.O.P.’s wall of denial is, both in the U.S. context and on the global scene... The 2016 election should be seen as a referendum on that extremism."

Yesterday saw the release of a WBUR poll of people living in Massachusetts on, among other things, climate change. It was somewhat disheartening. The results also show most people believe climate change is occurring, and is caused by human activity, and that it can be stopped. OK, so far so good, right? However, they fear policies would be too expensive to implement.

Few are paying much attention to the Climate Change Summit in Paris, which is barely being covered by the mass media. Still 78% say the earth's temperature has been rising and 56% say it's due to human activities while another 21% say it's partially die to human activities. 68% say the effects of global warming will be felt within our lifetimes and of those 57% say the effects are already happening-- and 72% of those interviewed say the consequences for people in Massachusetts will be "very serious" (45%) or "somewhat serious" (27%). 55% say it isn't too late to stop global warming and 26% say it's already too late.

Then the questions start getting into costs:

When asked if "greenhouse gases were significantly reduced, but it raised your monthly energy bill by ten dollars," 58% still favored the remediation but opposition increased significantly to 32%. And that's Massachusetts! I don't know that he had seen this polling but early yesterday, Greg Sargent at the Washington Post asserted that "It’s often said that climate change doesn’t motivate voters, and that’s true."

But a confluence of events-- the implementation of Obama’s Clean Power Plan, plus the likelihood that we’ll have a global climate deal very soon-- mean the contrast on this issue really could matter more in this election than in previous cycles. The stakes surrounding this fundamental difference between the two parties are suddenly a whole lot higher. The question is now no longer an abstract one. It’s about whether the U.S. will participate in a concrete, long-term, global agreement to take sustained action to address a crisis that the scientists tell us could soon be irreversibly headed towards catastrophe.

What’s more, for Democrats, this issue is something of a two-fer. It isn’t just about whether we should act on climate, which now has majority support in polls. It’s also about whether to embrace international engagement as a means to act on it. The GOP nominee will have pledged to reverse the steps we’re now taking in this regard by pulling us out of an international deal that (hopefully) will have already been reached. That stance might not be a winner before a general election audience. Dems can use it (among other things) to hammer the GOP as trapped in the past.

Sure, some pundits will proclaim that Dems risk alienating blue collar whites in Rust Belt states by taking this on. But swing voters are dwindling as a factor. The 2016 election could turn on how successfully the Dem nominee motivates the core voter groups that have been powering Dem wins in recent national elections. Climate action polls very well with these groups.

Also, the issue is kind of important. It may not end up mattering much, or even at all, to next year’s outcome. But the more it gets talked about, the better.

Greg is correct; the more it gets talked about the better. And the Blue America candidates are all talking about it. Alex Law, for example, is running for a congressional seat in the South Jersey district across from Philly. The conservaDem incumbent, Donald Norcross, was proud that his very first vote in Congress was for the Keystone XL Pipeline. And he hasn't gotten any better since then. In fact when he was a state legislator, New Jersey environmental groups considered him the worst Democrat in Trenton. Alex has a very different perspective. This is what he told us yesterday after the vote Thursday on Upton's climate change denying "energy bill":

Moral arguments for green energy aside, sustainable energy also has a compelling economic argument. Sustainable energy means sustainable jobs for the United States in manufacturing, operations, and in research and development. These are jobs that aren't limited to areas 'lucky' enough to have oil; these are jobs that can come home to any district, including mine, in the country. America has a tremendous opportunity to lead the world in new technologies that every country on Earth needs. We must seize this moment to lead the world in this growing market and save our planet from the ever looming threat of climate change. Rather than allowing special interests spending to force our government to prop up big oil and coal (with subsidies and horrible legislation like the Keystone Pipeline), we should invest in sustainable energy. When I get to Congress, this will be one of the most important issues for me, and I plan to sponsor legislation making investment in sustainable energy a priority for the United States.

This morning it's been widely reported that negotiators from the 195 countries at theParis Climate summit agreed on a blueprint deal aimed at reducing global carbon emissions and limiting global warming, a good first step in the multinational effort to keep climate change in check. Several of the Republican candidates running for president have vowed to tear up the agreement when they're elected. You can help Alex get to Congress here at the Blue America ActBlue page or, if you'd prefer, on a special page we've set up for congressional candidates who have endorsed Bernie Sanders for President. NJ-01 is a solid blue district and the people there deserve a real Democrat, not a corrupt, conservative machine hack.

But What About Fracking, Governor Brown?

That much water gets you half a glass of oil (image source)

by Gaius Publius

As regular readers know, I've been on about California water lately — in particular, the drought, the rationing and the so-called "free" market way of dealing with it. In general, we're in favor of government-mandated rationing here at La Maison chez nous, but rationing for all, not just for the plebs. With that in mind, note this (my emphasis throughout):

What About Fracking, Governor Brown?

When Californian Governor Jerry Brown announced wide ranging water restrictions for California last week, the news went global.

The headlines reported how this was the first time in California’s history that such drastic measures had been introduced. And here was a Governor who was prepared to tackle the devastating four-year drought head on. ...

It was all very choreographed. Brown’s press conference took place on a barren, brown slope in the Sierra Nevada mountains, where snow fall is a record low levels.

And it is not just the snow which has gone. The whole state is in the middle of its worst drought for centuries. There is no end in sight, with scientists warning the region may be entering a “mega-drought” which could last for decades.

“Today, we are standing on dry grass where there should be five feet (1.5 meters) of snow,” Brown said. “This historic drought demands unprecedented action …  As Californians, we must pull together and save water in every way possible.”

What Brown proposed was unprecedented, in that he was attempting to reduce water usage across urban California by twenty five per cent.

That was the good news, the emergency-recognizing mandate. But what about saving water "in every way possible"? Not so much:

But his plan is flawed in that it does not “save water in every way possible”. The main focus of Brown’s water reduction plan is to reduce urban water usage. He did not mention the state’s guzzling fracking industry and the even more water-hungry agricultural sector.

"Did not mention" means "put no restrictions on." Common Dreams: "Brown’s mandate, announced Wednesday, directs cities and communities to cut down their water consumption by 25 percent, but does not make any requirements of the state’s numerous oil companies, including those which practice the water-heavy fracking method of extraction, nor of large-scale farming operations."

Fracking means Big Oil, like Occidental Petroleum and the like. Agriculture means millionaire growers and, increasingly, billionaire bankers. Let's look at them one by one.

Is Brown Transferring Urban Water to Millionaire Bankers and Growers?

As we noted earlier, agriculture consumes "80 percent of California’s developed water but account[s] for only 2 percent of the state’s GDP." Why do growers consume so much water? Because money. Because, for example, wealthy almond growers are making a killing exporting the state's water (via almond shipments) so they can be even more wealthy. And wealth tends to own the political process, even in California.

That's Nuts: Almond Boom Strains California Water Supply

Asia’s love of nuts is draining California dry.

Amid one of the worst droughts in the state’s history, farmers are scrambling to find enough water to irrigate lucrative almond trees they planted after abandoning other, less thirsty crops.

Why’s there such a market for California nuts? As incomes in countries such as China, South Korea, and India have risen, so has demand for nuts that formerly were out of reach for many Asians. Added to the mix are Wall Street firms who, smelling a quick buck, are paying top dollar for vegetable farms and converting them to orchards....

In 2011, almonds surpassed grapes as California’s second largest agricultural product, and the crop “now attracts more money per acre than any other type of parcel in California's Central Valley," Heather Davis, the senior managing director for global private markets at financial services firm TIAA-CREF, explained in an August 2013 investment note.

The firm, which has $569 billion under management, did not own a single farm before 2007. Today it owns more than 500, including 35,000 acres in California as of 2012, and is one of the top five almond producers in the world. The nuts, Davis wrote, are an "attractive long-term investment theme."

So to my question above, Is Brown transferring urban water to millionaire bankers and growers? — the answer, of course, is yes. The LA Times:

Standing in a brown field that would normally be smothered in several feet of snow, Gov. Jerry Brown on Wednesday ordered cities and towns across California to cut water use by 25% as part of a sweeping set of mandatory drought restrictions, the first in state history. ...

The order focused on urban life even though agriculture accounts for roughly three quarters of Californians' water usage. Cities have to stop watering the median strips that run down the middle of roads. The state will partner with local agencies to remove 50 million square feet of grass — the equivalent of about 1,150 football fields — and replace it with drought-tolerant landscaping.

State agencies will create a temporary rebate program to encourage homeowners to replace water-guzzling appliances with high-efficiency ones. Golf courses, campuses and cemeteries must cut their water use. New developments will have to install drip or microspray systems if they irrigate with drinking water. Water agencies will discourage water waste with higher rates and fees.

The order aims to reduce the amount of water used statewide in urban areas in 2013 by 25%.

You don't have to care that agriculture is drinking up urban water savings. California residents will do that for you; they will care, and care increasingly. This is what happens when the rich break the social contract. It breaks for everyone else as well.

What About Fracking, Governor Brown?

Fracking, like almond-growing, is also notoriously thirsty. Just one example:

“At the height of California oil production in 1985, oil companies in Kern County pumped 1.1 billion barrels of water underground to extract 256 million barrels of oil—a ratio of roughly four and a half barrels of water for every barrel of oil,” according to Miller. “In 2008, Kern producers injected nearly 1.3 billion barrels of water to extract 162 million barrels of oil—a ratio of nearly eight barrels of water for every barrel of oil produced.”

Again, by that measure, the ratio is eight to one — eight barrels of water produces one barrel of oil. Whom does fracking benefit? The owners of Big Oil:

Clean Water Action has the scoop on which companies have the biggest stakes in the Monterey [California] Shale [oil fields]:

Occidental Corporation (Oxy) is the largest holder of land/mineral rights in California, holding rights to drill over 1.6 million acres of land in the Monterey Shale. In a presentation to shareholders in 2010, Oxy officials stated that “in 10 years, California shale could become Oxy’s largest business unit.”

Venoco Inc. has one of the largest stakes in the Monterey Shale with rights to drill in over 300,000 acres. There are more than 10 billion barrels of oil available for extraction at its current sites. In its 2011 report to shareholders, the company stated that it continues to expand its onshore Monterey acreage lease holdings across three basins: Santa Maria, Salinas Valley, and San Joaquin (which includes the Sevier discovery). ...

And so on. Why does fracking, like big agriculture, get a pass? Maybe this is the reason:

The oil and gas industry gives millions of dollars to California’s elected officials to ensure their interests are served in Sacramento. Governor Brown is one of these recipients, having accepted at least $2,014,570.22 [$2 million] from fossil fuel interests since his race for Attorney General in 2006.

As the public awakens to the dangers of fracking in California, the fossil fuel industry is spending as much money as it takes to protect their dirty interests. Billions of barrels of untapped oil are sitting in the Monterey Shale and Big Oil is pushing to make sure it all stays on the table.

State campaign finance laws prohibit any company or individual from contributing more than $27,200 per candidate, per election — but many of these companies have found loopholes that let them flood the system with their petro-dollars, making sure our elected leaders, and Governor Brown in particular, protect their interests.

The fossil fuel corporations and associated industries at the top of the dirty money pile include: Chevron, Occidental Petroleum, Southern California Edison, Valero Energy, Tesoro Corp, Plains Exploration and Production, Venoco, Conoco Phillips, and Aera Energy (owned jointly by Shell and ExxonMobil). 

So the opening question comes back at the bottom: So what about fracking, Governor Brown? And what about agriculture as well? It's not just us asking, we in the nation waiting our turn. It's your own residents, on whom you're putting the squeeze so ... it has to be said this way ... wealth can be served. The tighter the squeeze, the more urgently the question will be asked. The Social Contract, the glue that holds a society cooperatively together, can be bent, but only so far. At some point it breaks.

When the Social Contract Breaks from Above, It Breaks from Below As Well

This has been a theme of mine for years, but it's never not true. When the wealthy strip-mine a nation this thoroughly, the residents rebel, and they don't always rebel "pretty." In fact, rebellion is pretty ugly stuff. No one, certainly not I, wants to live through this:

When the Social Contract breaks from above,
it breaks from below as well

But it's not my choice to stop the predation; it's someone else's. Governor Brown could start the ball rolling in the other direction — the populist one — by recognizing the needs of all the people, not just those with money. After all, constantly bowing to money is almost trite these days, isn't it?

GP

Jerry Brown Runs Into Trouble-- Conscious Grassroots Democrats

Do you notice that it isn't just conservatives who don't care about protecting the planet but that there's also a fault line between young people-- who believe in a future-- and lots of old people, who just don't get all that worked up over the future? For the record, I'm old-- and I very much do care about preserving our planet. I heard Alan Grayson speaking at a live event a few days ago and he talked about people who care very deeply about their friends and family and no one else and about people who care very deeply about their friends and family and ethnic group and no one else and about people who care very much about their friends and family and ethnic group and their country and no one else. But then there are people who think a little more abstractly and care about things like "humanity" and values and principles.

California's Governor, Jerry Brown, is a lot older than me. I bet he cares too-- just not as much, or as passionately, as he once did. Or perhaps he just doesn't prioritize the planet as much as other stuff governors have to worry about, like employment of reelection campaigns. Brown was boo-ed and heckled at the California Democratic Party convention over the weekend because of his refusal to hold the frackers accountable. The next day California Democrats unanimously approved a platform that calls for an immediate ban on fracking. On Monday, David Dayen-- a Californian originally from Bucks County, PA-- penned a powerful piece for Salon about the price politicians are having to pay for refusing to stand up to the frackers. "[T]his weekend’s convention in Los Angeles," he reported, "exploded into an unusually vocal battle over fracking, revealing tensions between the elected leadership and the party rank-and-file."

Similar debates have played out among Democrats across the country, with activists no longer allowing establishment figures to talk about stopping climate change out of one side of their mouth and support what they see as a devastating attack on the climate with the other.

A few years ago, California had no regulations at all against fracking, and an unknown number of companies were already injecting liquids at high pressure to release natural resources hidden in shale rock. In California, fracking is not generally done for natural gas, but oil, most of it in the Monterey shale, a massive sedimentary formation in the central part of the state. This region contains, by some estimates, more than half of the recoverable shale oil in the United States, and as such represents a bonanza for oil companies.

“Some of our oil is dirtier than the Canadian tar sands,” said RL Miller, the head of the state party’s environmental caucus and a key anti-fracking activist, noting the intensity of energy needed to recover the thick oil out of the Monterey Shale. “In my mind fracking for that oil is as bad as the Keystone pipeline.” In addition to the environmental costs, engaging in the seismically volatile activity in a known earthquake zone unsettled many in the state, including normally conservative local farmers.

Activists sought a moratorium on fracking, but have been consistently stymied. Proposed regulations were defeated in the state Legislature in 2012, and the eventual bill that passed in 2013 was a weak alternative. It did mandate disclosure of fracking activities and the chemicals used in fracking, and would pre-test water wells near fracking sites before and after production to examine changes to water quality. But the rules won’t take effect until 2015, and an environmental impact study was similarly delayed as well.

Critics consider the bill a poor substitute, resentful that a Legislature dominated by Democrats would produce regulations with such deference to the oil industry. Many blame Gov. Jerry Brown for orchestrating the opposition to stronger regulations, and they vowed to continue their fight for an outright ban. A bill, SB1132, has been introduced that would pause fracking in the state until the release of the 2015 environmental impact report.

…Gov. Brown, a fairly stubborn politician, is unlikely to be moved by such a public display of opposition, even as an anti-fracking rally scheduled next week in Sacramento gets thousands of sign-ups. But the tide around Brown has turned. Keep in mind that the crowd at a state party convention is made up of party stalwarts, inclined to support top officials almost unreservedly. That this became the site of a backlash speaks to the intensity of opposition to fracking inside the party, an intensity that’s bound to grow over time. With California the only major oil-producing state without a tax on oil extraction, and with Monterey shale fracking on the industry’s agenda, this issue is sure to percolate in the state for the next few years, and activists have grass-roots support and the funds to act on their side.

In fact, on Sunday delegates passed a fracking moratorium in the plank of the state party platform, a useful tool for getting the Democratic-led Legislature to pass the moratorium bill.

Politicians, and not just Democrats in California but across the country, have a choice to make. They can continue an unholy alliance with the oil industry, trading environmental stability for a promise of jobs, and hiding behind rhetoric about stopping climate change while allowing fracking to flourish. Or they can listen to increasing unrest among the public, and align their stated desire to protect the planet with their actions.

Remember I mentioned that Dayen is originally from Bucks County, PA? That's a anti-fracking piece of Pennsylvania and the fracking debate there has upended the DCCC's attempt to slip a conservative ex-CIA agent, Kevin Strouse, into Congress. Steve Israel, a politician who may be in serious trouble back home because of his own wretched pollution record, recruited Strouse and immediately added them to their Jumpstarter list. His grassroots opponent, Shaunghnessy Naughton is a scientist by trade and she came right after him on it. Last week when the DCCC announced their Red-to-Blue program, Strouse was one of the only Jumpstarters to be passed over-- downgraded to an Emerging District. I'm sure there are other issues in the primary contest but Naughton and Strouse are pretty similar on nearly everything… but fracking. He's for it and she's against it-- and even the DCCC was forced to shove him aside and acknowledege they'll back whomever wins the primary. Saving the planet is paramount. Nothing else will be worth anything if we don't do that. That's why the Senate stayed up so late last night. "Climate change is real, it is caused by humans, and it is solvable," said Senator Brian Schatz (D-HI).  "Congress must act. On Monday night we’re going to show the growing number of Senators who are committed to working together to confront climate change."

Enthusiasm Gap? More Than A Few California Republicans Want Their Pathetic Party To Endorse Jerry Brown This Year

Crackpot Tim Donnelly could signal the end of California's Republican Party

No one serious thinks there's a Republican who can defeat California Governor Jerry Brown in November. He turned Schwarzenegger's deficits into surpluses and, other than zombie-partisan rightists, voters love him. In 2010, despite Meg Whitman's jaw-dropping $160 million spend, Brown beat her by over a million votes and she limped ito the finish line with a mere 40.9%. This coming November, the Republicans will be lucky if they go much beyond 33.3%-- and they know it.

But they need a plausible candidate and a robust campaign to hold on to several state legislative seats and several congressional seats that are being swept out of the Republican orbit by demographics. Just by their Cook PVIs, which lag by about 6 months in favor of Republicans, there are 5 congressional seats the GOP could lose if the Democrats had an even vaguely competent DCCC:

• CA-10 (Jeff Denham)- R+1
• CA-21 (David Valadao)- D+2
• CA-25 (Buck McKeon/open)- R+3
• CA-31 (Gary Miller)- D+5
• CA-49 (Darrell Issa)- R+4

Obama won every one of these districts in 2008 and/or in 2012. DCCC lack of strategy guaranteed Republican wins in each one in 2012. If Nancy Pelosi fired Steve Israel and his corrupt staff tomorrow, at least 4 of these districts-- CA-10, CA-21, CA-25 and CA-31 would be guaranteed Democratic wins and the fifth (plus Ed Royce's CA-39) would be in the bag for 2016. But DCCC competence isn't the sole factor, of course. What will the Democratic and Republican turnouts be like in November when Obama isn't on the top of the ticket but Jerry Brown is? This morning, the L.A. Times looked at the dilemma for the already devastated state GOP. They have a slick greed-and-selfishness millionaire like Whitman and a sociopath ideologue who fits extremist Republican candidates like Gary Miller in CA-31 and Steve Knight in CA-25:

Facing a daunting effort to unseat Gov. Jerry Brown, Republican activists in California are openly worrying about whether the party's donors, elected leaders and voters will embrace any of the GOP gubernatorial candidates.

If Neel Kashkari or Tim Donnelly-- the two major GOP candidates hoping to challenge Brown in November-- do not receive enough support to gain momentum, critical races across the state could be lost.

They include several tight congressional races that could affect the party's level of power in Washington and enough state legislative contests to affect Republicans' ability to increase their voice in Sacramento by breaking the Democrats' supermajorities there.

"I believe we are about two steps away from a nightmare scenario where [some] Republicans begin to simply give up and throw in with Brown, with serious negative consequences," said Ron Nehring, former chairman of the California Republican Party.

His concern is emblematic of the party's troubles in California. A Republican has not been elected to statewide office since 2006, and the GOP share of registered voters has dipped beneath 30%, a historic low. No viable Republicans have emerged this year to contest most of the other statewide offices up for contention, such as attorney general, controller, treasurer and lieutenant governor.

Political leaders in other states have grappled with cross-party backing for a popular incumbent, stoking Nehring's fears in California.

In New Jersey, many Democratic mayors endorsed Republican Gov. Chris Christie's reelection bid last year. That has been thrust into the news recently with allegations that his administration rewarded those who backed him and punished those who didn't.

Earlier this month, a state GOP chairman in New York sent a letter to Republicans leaders imploring them not to endorse Democratic Gov. Andrew Cuomo for a second term. That state has not elected a Republican to statewide office since 2002.

In California, Republican Jon Fleischman, publisher of an influential conservative blog, is particularly worried about the gubernatorial contest's potential effect on more than half a dozen Congressional seats.

Many of those are held by Democrats considered vulnerable because their narrow victories in 2012 were sealed by the high turnout of President Obama's supporters. If Republicans could flip those seats, their power in the nation's capital would increase, or at least help them offset losses elsewhere.

"That could tilt the balance of power in Washington, D.C.," Fleischman said. "Because of that more so than anything else, there is a reason to not want to see the top of the ticket be anemic in California. If Jerry Brown wins in a blow-out election… he has big coattails."

Public attention has just begun to focus on the governor's race.

Kashkari, a former U.S. Treasury official and fund manager, jumped in Tuesday. Donnelly, a second-term assemblyman from Twin Peaks, began exploring a run in late 2012 and declared his candidacy in November 2013.

Kashkari, a Laguna Beach multimillionaire who has never held elective office, is a fiscal conservative who supports same-sex marriage and abortion rights and voted for Obama in 2008. He has pledged to create jobs and improve schools.

He spent much of the past year meeting with donors, voters, party activists and others as he weighed a bid for governor. Whether he can raise money and whether he will be competent on the stump are open questions.

Kashkari has some establishment support. His team includes veterans of the campaigns of former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and former GOP presidential nominees Mitt Romney and John McCain.

The Republican Governors' Assn. this week urged its Twitter followers to check out Kashkari's campaign website, something it did not do on the day Donnelly kicked off his bid.

But what Kashkari's campaign touts as his chief credential-- leading TARP, the taxpayer-funded bank bailout under presidents George W. Bush and Obama-- is also a vulnerability. The program was deeply unpopular among voters, who saw big banks getting help from the government as many homeowners suffered.

Donnelly, meanwhile, appeals to the grass roots of the Republican Party with his unabashed conservatism. He is a tea party favorite and the founder of a Minuteman border-patrol chapter.

His campaign asserts that he excites bedrock Republicans, who are tired of being urged to support ultimately unsuccessful moderates such as 2010 GOP gubernatorial candidate Meg Whitman. She and others were said to have a better chance of winning a statewide race than a conservative candidate.

But Donnelly's hard-line views on issues such as immigration and gun control may not appeal to a broad swath of Californians. And he has failed to raise any significant money.

Money will be critical in the contest against Brown, who has already raised $17 million, can claim to have repaired the state's finances and is popular among voters.

GOP strategist Rob Stutzman, a former Whitman and Schwarzenegger advisor who is not working for a gubernatorial candidate this year, repeated what many Republican leaders said privately: that they fear the fallout if Donnelly is their standard-bearer in November. But they also don't know if Kashkari is viable.

"If Donnelly somehow ends up being the nominee … I think you'll see institutional Republicans, elected Republicans, supporting Gov. Brown. I think it will create a Republicans-for-Brown movement that will be rather open and probably energetic," he said.

But "Kashkari remains a huge unknown," he added, "because he's never done anything like this before. "

Meanwhile, if you'd like to help the two California progressives most likely to turn red seats blue-- Lee Rogers and Eloise Reyes-- you can do that here.

Steve Knight & Tim Donnelly, virulent anti-Latin racists, want to reassert control over the California Republican Party