Tomorrow's Endorsements-- In The Races On My Own Ballot In Los Angeles

I live in Los Feliz, a neighborhood of Los Angeles. I vote down the street in a neighbor's garage. We don't have any high-profile races to vote on here-- nothing that will swing Congress one way or the other. Our gubernatorial race-- pitting incumbent Jerry Brown against a random Republican from the Greed and Selfishness wing of his party-- is not being seriously contested. The last publicly available poll showed Brown ahead 56-37%. Almost all the Democrats running statewide are way ahead in the polls-- including good candidates like Betty Yee (Controller), Dave Jones (Insurance Commissioner) and John Chiang (Treasurer) and really bad ones like Gavin Newsom (Lt. Gov.). The race for Secretary of State looks closer, although mediocre state Senator Alex Padilla has a narrow lead over horrific GOP one-percent fanatic Pete Peterson.

The most important statewide race that's up in the air is for state Superintendent of Public Education, which pits a really good incumbent, Tom Torlakson, against a Wall Street whore, Marshall Tuck. The L.A. Times poll shows Torlakson narrowly ahead, 32-29% with most voters completely clueless and undecided-- and no party designation on the ballot to help them make up their minds. The Courage Campaign doesn't endorse candidates but yesterday they warned their members in California about the dangers Tuck poses to education in the state. They highlighted four reasons to oppose Tuck:

• Backed by Wall Street executives and business interests who want to create an education market place and profit off of our kids.

• Proposes to increase standardized testing and then use student test scores to judge teachers and schools -- even though education experts, economists and the American Statistical Association all say that this is a bad use of the data.

• Has alarming ties to for-profit education companies. Anyone who's paid attention to Los Angeles' iPad fiasco can tell you that when education leaders are too closely tied to for-profit companies, it doesn't end well for taxpayers or students.

• Heavily financed by the same people who tried to take down Prop 30-- the measure that gave much needed funds to our schools. They funneled $11 million through a Koch brothers group in 2012 to starve our schools, but they lost, so now they're putting their money behind Marshall Tuck.

The congressional race is between Blue Dog warmonger Adam Schiff and progressive Independent Steve Stokes. I know Schiff will win but I'm eager to cast my ballot for Stokes, a much better candidate, and to help slow down Schiff's push for Boxer's Senate seat. My Assemblyman, Mike Gatto, seems to do a good enough job to merit reelection. And I'm eager to vote for Jeffrey Prang as County Assessor and for Sheila Kuehl as County Supervisor. The 3rd Supervisorial District is much bigger than just one or two congressional districts. We're very enthusiastic about Sheila Kuehl, as are our friends on the West Side. Dorothy Reik, president of the Progressive Democrats of the Santa Monica Mountains is as big a Sheila Kuehl supporter as we are here in Los Feliz. Last April she saw an email touting Sheila's corporatist/developer-friendly opponent, Bobby Shriver, being supported by some astroturf group calling itself "Friends of the Santa Monica Mountains." She told me that "a Google search turned up nothing at all that Shriver had done for the mountains and there was no reason to expect that as Supervisor he would change his ways-- especially since he is being supported by developers who have been eyeing our precious Santa Monicas for decades.  So yesterday when I met former Congressman Anthony Beilenson who wrote the legislation that created the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area I mentioned this to him. He was similarly outraged and issued the following statement:" 

When I heard she was running, I jumped at the opportunity to endorse Sheila Kuehl to be the next County Supervisor. As Henry Waxman recently said, she is a "powerful and effective advocate for the things I care about."

Today, I feel a sense of urgency to talk about what it means to be a friend of the Santa Monica Mountains.

In 1978, as a congressman, I authored the legislation that created the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, (SMMNRA),155,000 acres, visited by millions of Angelenos and people from around the country, and the world.

The Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, the largest urban public park in the world, had no greater friend and advocate in Sacramento than Sheila Kuehl.

For fourteen years Sheila Kuehl passed legislation, identified resources, protected the park's environment, partnered at the federal, state and local county level, and joined the effort to fill in the mosaic of what has become one of the richest contiguous national park systems in the world that sits inside of and is surrounded by a vast metropolis.

Sheila Kuehl was instrumental in the public private partnership, the team effort required to successfully save critical land and bring it into the public domain as permanent open space.

During her tenure, Sheila identified over $80 million dollars for key acquisitions in the SMMNRA, including Liberty Canyon, a significant wildlife linkage; the former Ahmanson Ranch purchased with state bond monies to protect watersheds and improve water quality; Lower Topanga State Park, 1,800 acres, now part of the Callfornia's largest State Park; Soka campus, now King Gillette Ranch, and permanent public open space; significant wildlife corridors and connectors along the Backbone Trail.

Sheila's genius as a partner in protecting the SMMNRA, to preserve and protect the rare, biologically rich and diverse areas so critical to the survival of the entire ecology of the Santa Monica Mountains, is the kind of experience only  someone who has done what she has done can bring to the Third District as their Supervisor. She knows the ropes.

Her broad support, her intuition, her intelligence her integrity and her strength was unparalleled in Sacramento. Her legacy is apparent today, as those who have followed her, like Senator Fran Pavley, have continued to embrace the importance of federal, state, and local county partnerships  to protect the Santa Monica Mountains.

Now, Los Angeles County again has the opportunity to be the beneficiary of Sheila's extraordinary talent. Millions of Angelenos and visitors from all parts of Southern California and the world, enjoy the natural beauty of the Santa Monica Mountains.

Thanks to the efforts of Sheila Kuehl the Santa Monica Mountains still remain the "people's mountains."

Sheila Kuehl is our friend, and a proven friend of the Santa Monica Mountains.

Former Congressman Tony Beilenson

Let's go through the 6 statewide propositions:

• Prop 1 authorizes $7.12 billion in general obligation bonds for state water supply infrastructure projects, improving access to and quality of drinking water statewide by funding water quality projects in several categories: safe drinking water, recycled water, regional water security, groundwater sustainability and coastal/river protection. I'll probably vote for it but I'm torn because of the nature of the giveaways to special interests and because it is both expensive and wasteful.

• Prop 2 requires the state to siphon off money for a rainy day fund-- while it's still raining and the money is needed to repair the damages already done during the Recession. This is an easy NO vote for me.

• Prop 45 is a big one that the special interests hate and have spent millions to defeat with misleading ads. It puts the brakes on skyrocketing health insurance rates and requires health insurance companies to justify rate increases to the public and receive approval for any increases by the California Insurance Commissioner. This is an easy YES vote for me.

• Prop 46 increases the malpractice damages cap to $1 million for the first time since 1975 to account for nearly four decades of inflation. It also requires mandatory drug testing for doctors with hospital privileges, raising concerns from privacy advocates and the drug policy community. Sounds like a good idea to me-- despite the barrage of special interest TV propaganda against it.

• Prop 47 rolls back the idiotic "war on drugs," while alleviating the state's prison overcrowding. It reduces penalties from felony to misdemeanor for most nonviolent crimes, and redirects savings to rehabilitative programs and schools. Easy YES vote for me.

• Prop 48 is another Indian gaming casino referendum that I can't quite figure out how to vote on-- so I won't. A yes, vote, from what I can tell allows tribes to buy land in areas of California near big population centers explicitly to open casinos.

We Reiterate: Sheila Kuehl For Los Angeles Supervisor

Dorothy Reik is the president of the Progressive Democrats of the Santa Monica Mountains and you may recall the guest post she did for us last week on the state Senate race pitting Sandra Fluke against Ben Allen on the Westside of L.A. Although there was some backbiting from a few EMILY's List deadeners, overall there was such a positive response that I asked Dorothy if she'd be willing to cover another crucial Los Angeles race for us, the supervisorial race where Blue America candidate Sheila Kuehl is facing off against the less progressive, Big Money candidate, Bobby Shriver. (The L.A. Times and Henry Waxman have also endorsed Sheila.)

Dorothy asked that we run the following letter from Frank Angel. "The environmental community knows Frank Angel well," she wrote. He is our attorney. He sends this important message about the future of our open space should Shriver prevail and become Supervisor. This is a must read and if your friends are thinking about trying 'something new' please send this to them. Shriver is dangerous to us and to our environment. I heard him last Friday-- he was very clear-- CEQA hinders development and he wants to change it to make it easier for developers! And please also send it to those holding a grudge over the 2012 election-- don't cut off your nose to spite your face, as the old saying goes. Sheila is our champion. Our advocate. Sheila is US!! Bobby is THEM in the worst possible sense.

Did you know that last Friday, Bobby Shriver proudly announced his endorsement by pro-development L.A. County Supervisors Mike Antonovich and Don Knabe (Deane Dana’s successor)?  When Antonovich and Dana had a majority on the Board of Supervisors, L.A. County land use plans were being loopholed to death. Growth and destruction of pristine canyons and ridgelines ran amok. If Shriver gets elected, a pro-development majority will be restored on the Board.  Which means old business-as-usual will resume. At the worst possible time. The newly adopted Santa Monica Mountains LCP means little without a Supervisor we can trust. To pay lip service to the new coastal land use plan isn’t the same as going to bat to enforce it.

Shriver also shares Antonovich’s and Knabe’s disdain for the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). As the L.A. Times reported earlier this month, at a debate between Sheila Kuehl and Shriver, Sheila noted that CEQA works well. Shriver disagreed, saying the law needs to be reformed because too often it is used as a cudgel to slow or even stop development. He stated: “With rents soaring across the region, more building is necessary to increase the stock of affordable housing. This law, because of the way it's written, can be used in a very aggressive way to stop a project."

You bet! Had we not used this law aggressively, the beautiful parklands of King Gillette Ranch would now be developed with the institutional buildings and dorms of the infamous “Soka University” project and a sprawling new city would have popped up at the former Ahmanson Ranch site, just north of Calabasas. I proudly represented the Sierra Club in the first case, and the City of Calabasas in the latter. Just imagine the traffic gridlock on Las Virgenes Canyon Rd. or the 101 Freeway had these projects not been stopped. There are times when our welfare demands that our local elected representatives stand up to development interests, and stop or cut down on growth plans.

Shriver’s quoted statements use the same code language that CEQA’s foes are using-- foes like the state’s Chambers of Commerce. Shriver is endorsed by the downtown L.A. and the Hollywood Chambers of Commerce, and he benefits from their and developer PAC funding (e.g., an investor behind the Edge project in Malibu). When development interests and their allies in the legislature talk about “reforming” CEQA, they mean to gut it. Many public interest attorney colleagues of mine closely follow the “reform” proposals that Chamber of Commerce-led interests write for friendly legislators. We fight them.

As one who has been and keeps fighting before the Board of Supervisors and in the courts for your environmental rights, I am greatly worried for the future of the Santa Monica Mountains if Shriver gets elected. Shriver is not who you may think he is. With the upcoming Supervisorial election, the future of our mountains and our quality of life hangs in the balance. I will vote for Sheila. She will stand up for our rights and protect our interests on the Board of Supervisors. Guaranteed by Sheila’s impeccable environmental record and her honesty in the Legislature!”

Frank P. Angel

Republican Party Love Of Torture Would Be Inflicted On American Children As Well As Suspected Terrorists

Yesterday's D v R showdown in the House wasn't about healthcare reform or even about the dirty filthy banksters stealing the national wealth. It wasn't about Afghanistan or about taking the ability of corporations to purchase the services of wily politicians. But it was a showdown that went to highlight one of the basic differences in worldview between conservatives and humans. George Miller's H.R. 4247, the Preventing Harmful Restraint and Seclusion in Schools Act passed with a wide majority, 262-153, all but 8 conservative Democrats joined by two dozen mainstream Republicans pushing it over the finishing line (where Jim Bunning, Richard Burr and Jim DeMint are likely laying out their strategy to filibuster it to death in the Senate).

If God were to strike down all the obstructionists in the Senate and it were to become law, it would provide the first comprehensive protections for children against abusive disciplinary actions by schools. Cheered on by the American Federation of Teachers and dozens of disability groups, the 145 Republicans and their 8 motley ConservaDem allies-- mostly Blue Dogs like Jim Marshall, Gene Taylor, Kurt Schrader, and Harry Mitchell-- were brushed aside despite wailing and moaning by every single member of the pathetic GOP hierarchy, from John Boehner and Eric Cantor to Roy Blunt, David Dreier, Thaddeus McCotter and Paul Ryan. (Among the co-sponsors were normally very conservative Republicans like Gregg Harper of Mississippi and Cathy McMorris Rogers of Washington.)

The legislation stems in part from a government report last year that found evidence that hundreds of children-- from preschool age to high school-- had been traumatized or physically harmed by being held down or locked alone in rooms, some even tied to chairs. Many had developmental problems or were in special needs programs; many others were in regular classes. Some children have died, apparently because of overly aggressive discipline, according to numerous reports over the last decade.

The bill would prohibit, except in cases of imminent danger, any restraint that restricts breathing; any mechanical restraint, like straps; and chemical restraint, by drugs other than those prescribed by a child’s doctor. It allows for “time outs” but not for a child to be locked in a room, away from supervision. It requires states to keep careful records of incidents of restraint and seclusion, and for schools to report incidents promptly to parents.

In testimony reported by WKOW-TV in Madison, Wisconsin, we learned that many of the torturous tactics were used predominantly on special-needs students. Keep in mind that Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan, who is a huge torture booster in all cases, was one of the Republicans to vote against the bill, which "would implement minimum federal safety standards for public schools, similar to those already in place for hospitals and other community facilities."

The foster mother of Cedric Price testified before Congress.

"The teacher put him face down and sat on him. He struggled, and said repeatedly, 'I can't breathe,'" said Toni Price.

Cedric was a special education student who was smothered to death in 2002 by his eighth-grade teacher.

I wonder how Ryan would feel about Liza, Charlie or Sam being smothered to death in school. Ryan wasn't part of the Republican House leadership when the party's entire upper echelon banded together to protect Mark Foley, even after they were aware he was molesting young male pages under the auspices of Congress. Among Foley's protectors who knew he was having illicit relations with the boy pages were a dozen who voted against prohibiting torture yesterday, like Boehner, Dreier, Blunt, and Shimkus.

Another vicious torture booster (and sex predator), Ken Calvert (R-CA), voted "no," as did every single Republican member of Congress from California. Calvert, who was arrested in the act of receiving fellatio from a young, drug addicted prostitute in his car, and who steals from taxpayers and refuses to pay child support or alimony, has no empathy and no respect for anyone in a position of vulnerability. I was able to contact the Democrat running against him, Bill Hedrick, who is a public school teacher in Corona. He's been a teacher for 35 years and is currently in his 5th term as president of the Corona-Norco Board of Education, which is responsible for over 50,000 children. Bill's wife is also a school teacher. Unlike Calvert, Bill favored this legislation:

"Every child deserves to be treated with dignity. Schools need to use the many research-based, humane behavior techniques available. The prohibited practices read shockingly like a page from the Inquisition.

"I don't know what is worse-- the need to end such abusive practices through federal action, or the fact that 153 members of Congress saw fit to oppose ending medieval methods."

Coincidentally, Bill is the latest challenger to be added to the Blue America list of endorsed candidates. He'll be joining us for a live blogging session this Saturday, March 6, at Crooks & Liars (11am, PT).


UPDATE: Another Reason To Remember How Bad Arnold Schwarzenegger Sucks

Sheila Kuehl was long one of the most outstanding and progressive members of the California state legislature, first as an Assemblywoman and then as a state Senator. People who paid attention remember that she wrote and successfully passed several bills that would have provided California with single payer healthcare. All of her bills were vetoed by Schwarzenegger. But that isn't the only bill of hers he vetoed. She sent me this after reading about the action in the House:

In 2008, I carried a bill that passed both houses of the California State Legislature with all democratic votes. No republican would vote for it. It was a very reasonable and necessary bill that would have barred some of the most egregious chemical and physical restraints and certain kinds of locked isolation in California schools. When we were preparing the bill, the stories we heard were horrible. Nevertheless, Arnold vetoed it, with a very general and erroneous message. There is absolutely no excuse for our California republicans in congress to block this much needed legislation.