If we elect Nutmeg to Governor (middle-class, college, high income)

[Snort]

Politicians should be elected based on their record. Everyone running for office has a resume and some ideas laid out. The ones with the best resumes with bona fide achievements and clearly delineated plans should be the ones to get elected to office.
What happens in reality? The one with the money, the personality, or the big (B.S.) promises takes the day.

[Gentoo]

Originally Posted by Snort

Politicians should be elected based on their record. Everyone running for office has a resume and some ideas laid out. The ones with the best resumes with bona fide achievements and clearly delineated plans should be the ones to get elected to office.
What happens in reality? The one with the money, the personality, or the big (B.S.) promises takes the day.

Gotta agree with that one. This is what most of us are talking about too I think...well...some of us concerning Meg Whitman.

[majoun]

Originally Posted by californio sur

Wow, governor Warren was a Republican? Wasn't he considered one of the most liberal justices on the supreme court or am I getting him mixed up with someone else? But I agree that Republicans in California are entirely different than Republicans in other parts of the nation [mainly the South]. I sure wish the Republican party was like it used to be [then I think our nation would be in better shape].

Yes, Gov. Warren (who was Alameda County DA and then CA Attorney General before he became governor) was a Republican (he was Dewey's VP on the GOP presidential ticket in 1948) and was a liberal justice on the SCOTUS, even more liberal than most people expected. When Ike appointed him to the court, Warren was known as a centrist with a pro-civil rights record as governor. Warren's support of civil rights as both governor and Chief Justice was fueled by his own guilt over being one of the architects of Japanese-American internment when he was Attorney General. Warren's role in the internment was why the NAACP was pessimistic when Brown v. Board of Education came before the court, but they were pleasantly surprised.

Some of those oldtime Bay Area Republicans like the late SF Mayor Elmer Robinson would seem really great in comparison to current CA politicians of both parties. Hard to believe now that the Bay Area was very Republican back then.

[californio sur]

Originally Posted by majoun

Yes, Gov. Warren (who was Alameda County DA and then CA Attorney General before he became governor) was a Republican (he was Dewey's VP on the GOP presidential ticket in 1948) and was a liberal justice on the SCOTUS, even more liberal than most people expected. When Ike appointed him to the court, Warren was known as a centrist with a pro-civil rights record as governor. Warren's support of civil rights as both governor and Chief Justice was fueled by his own guilt over being one of the architects of Japanese-American internment when he was Attorney General. Warren's role in the internment was why the NAACP was pessimistic when Brown v. Board of Education came before the court, but they were pleasantly surprised.

Some of those oldtime Bay Area Republicans like the late SF Mayor Elmer Robinson would seem really great in comparison to current CA politicians of both parties. Hard to believe now that the Bay Area was very Republican back then.

Thanks again for the amazing info on Warren. I am aware that San Fransicso was very Republican but just like the Northeast Republicans, they have vanished. This fact should shame the Republicans into going back to their original roots [and drop the Biblebelt STAT]. Even Jerry Brown's family were San Franciscans, right? Aren't people like senator Diane Feinstein sort of like the old California Republicans?

[Gentoo]

Originally Posted by majoun

Yes, Gov. Warren (who was Alameda County DA and then CA Attorney General before he became governor) was a Republican (he was Dewey's VP on the GOP presidential ticket in 1948) and was a liberal justice on the SCOTUS, even more liberal than most people expected. When Ike appointed him to the court, Warren was known as a centrist with a pro-civil rights record as governor. Warren's support of civil rights as both governor and Chief Justice was fueled by his own guilt over being one of the architects of Japanese-American internment when he was Attorney General. Warren's role in the internment was why the NAACP was pessimistic when Brown v. Board of Education came before the court, but they were pleasantly surprised.

Some of those oldtime Bay Area Republicans like the late SF Mayor Elmer Robinson would seem really great in comparison to current CA politicians of both parties. Hard to believe now that the Bay Area was very Republican back then.

Not really. Back then the republicans were the more liberal party.

[majoun]

Originally Posted by californio sur

Thanks again for the amazing info on Warren. I am aware that San Fransicso was very Republican but just like the Northeast Republicans, they have vanished. This fact should shame the Republicans into going back to their original roots [and drop the Biblebelt STAT]. Even Jerry Brown's family were San Franciscans, right? Aren't people like senator Diane Feinstein sort of like the old California Republicans?

Pat Brown, who was of course a Dem, was from San Francisco. He was DA of SF before he was AG (at the time the only Democrat who held statewide office, under Governors Warren and Knight) and then Governor. Jerry was raised in SF and went to Lowell High (in the same class as SCOTUS Justice Stephen Breyer).

And yes, Feinstein is definitely the heir to the tradition of oldtime SF Republicans like Johnson, Rolph, Robinson, and Christopher.

[TheWhale]

Originally Posted by clongirl

She actually could have saved all the public schools with all the money she's spent on trying to get elected to save the public schools.

And to Nmnita... No offense but, I really wish you'd stop commenting about California's elections (at every opportunity) and who you would/wouldn't vote for if you lived here... you don't. Is it really this boring in Arkansas?

Maybe he knows like I do that the other 49 states are going to be forced into paying for the sins of your open borders state.

[hoffdano]

I am just an interested observer.

I just visited Jerry Brown's website. There is not one thing written there that says how he will fix California's many problems. Lots of stuff about his AG activities.

Meg Whitman's website has a "tab" labeled Build a new California - and it contains positions and articles related to what she wants or claims to do.

What are Jerry Brown's positions on repairing California?

[A.J._in_L.A.]

^^^ Those motives will become much more clear once the primaries are over.

Anyway, here's something for you Nutmeg / Megabucks lovers to suck on.

Whitman's tax plan would benefit the rich but put California at risk - latimes.com

A major feature of Republican Meg Whitman's plan to create jobs as governor is to eliminate the state tax on capital gains.

Not merely tax investment profits at a lower rate than wages, as the federal government does, but scuttle the state tax completely.

Most people don't need to worry about paying taxes on capital gains. They're not so fortunate. But a relatively few wealthy Californians pump substantial sums into the state treasury, which would leak even more red ink if those payments ceased.

Nine states -- including Florida, Texas and Nevada -- don't tax capital gains, but they don't tax personal income either.

It's part of Whitman's trifecta of priorities: creating jobs, cutting state spending -- "returning the state to fiscal stability" -- and fixing schools.

The former EBay chief's jobs agenda also includes other "targeted" tax cuts, such as eliminating the sales tax on manufacturing equipment -- what she calls "the factory tax" -- and scrubbing the new-business start-up fee. She'd increase the R&D tax credit, accelerate equipment depreciation and offer a tax incentive for creating green tech jobs.

Her tax reductions would "prime California's economic pump," she contends, and "make California competitive again. . . . grow our tax base and help put an end to the perpetual budget problems in Sacramento."

But it's reminiscent of what George H.W. Bush called "voodoo economics" back in 1980, when Ronald Reagan contended he could cut taxes, balance the budget and increase military spending. He couldn't. He did cut taxes, but then had to raise them and still left the government with a recorddebt.

Atty. Gen. Jerry Brown, the expected Democratic nominee for governor, calls Whitman's plan "snake oil math."

But Brown isn't talking much about taxes, a subject Democrats are learning to avoid. When asked, the former governor promises that under a second Brown administration, there'd be no tax increases unless voters approved them at the ballot box.

Whitman's underdog Republican rival, Insurance Commissioner Steve Poizner, accuses the front-runner of trying to "pick winners and losers" in the tax system -- as if that weren't an American tradition. He wants to cut taxes for everyone -- on income and sales -- 10% across the board.

"Only a massive overhaul will do," Poizner asserts.

"That's not realistic," Whitman countered in an interview. "His plan will cost $10 billion -- on top of the [current] $20-billion budget deficit."

Across-the-board cuts eventually will increase revenue, she says, "but there is a one- or two-year lag. Even for President Reagan, in his second year, revenues were down."

Whitman says her targeted version of "supply-side" economics "will get people hiring relatively quickly."

That's the theory anyway. It would be a huge risk, however, for the funding of such programs as K-12 schools, universities, welfare, healthcare and prisons that rely on the depleted state general fund.

Eliminating the capital gains tax could create a huge budget hole.

Capital gains accounted for nearly 22% -- $10.8 billion -- of the personal income tax in 2007, the latest year for which the Franchise Tax Board has complete data. The income tax supplied roughly 53% of general fund revenue.

But only 20% of income tax returns report capital gains. For most of us -- at least when we're not in a recession -- the biggest investment profit we ever see is when we sell our house. And both the U.S. and the state exempt $500,000 in profit on home sales for married couples; $250,000 for single people, if they've lived in the home for two of the last five years.

It's mainly multimillionaires -- and Whitman's billionaire peer group -- that would benefit from eliminating the capital gains tax.

Who pays the tax?

* People with adjusted gross incomes exceeding $500,000 pay 82% of the total capital gains tax. For them, 38% of their earnings comes from investment profits.

* These $500,000-plus earners amount to only 1% of taxpayers -- or about 150,000 returns -- but provide 48% of the total personal income tax.

* People with more than $200,000 in adjusted gross incomes -- 4.4% of filers -- provide 93% of the capital gains tax.

Whitman says that eliminating the tax would "spur innovation, which we have to own in California."

But, I note, many people realize investment profits merely by buying and selling stock. That hardly induces innovation.

"Right, I agree with that," Whitman says. But she adds that it is important to stimulate the creation and selling of companies, "to make it more attractive to live here, to keep people here, to keep companies here and them expanding here."

I'd suggest we start by cutting the capital gains rate by a third, or maybe half. Not completely erase it.

But there's not much prospect of any of this happening, regardless of who's governor. Not with a Democratic Legislature and not without a long-overdue overhaul of the entire roller-coaster tax system. And Whitman says that's not a top priority.

If you are in favor of the middle class in California getting hit hard once again in a moment where they don't need to be hit any harder, if you are in favor of Meg Whitman bowing down to out of state corporations and giving tax cuts to her corporate buddies, and if you are in favor of California going deeper in the red...

...then by all means, go vote for Meg Whitman.

[BRinSM]

to fix CA's economic issues, we need economic growth. to fuel economic growth, we need population growth. however, the residents of CA are sick of population growth and have lived a long time with the congestion and hassle that continual growth brings. therefore, people will vote anti-growth, thus keeping CA in perpetual stagnation. my guess is that CA will remain the land of "haves" and "have nots" for years to come, especially in the coastal and immediate inland areas.