Lots of people in California Democratic circles have buzzed for years about Rick Jacobs, a former aide and longtime ally of Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, being a major league asshole. But Yashar Ali has uncovered a mountain of fresh dirt on Jacobs that lays out all the various and sundry ways in which that may have been truer than anyone thought up until now. From Yashar’s newsletter (which, by the way, you should spend the money to subscribe to): In the fall of 2018, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti was talking to an adviser about his top aide, Rick Jacobs. Garcetti told the adviser: “I can’t believe Rick worked at City Hall for three years and we didn’t get sued.” … according to sources, Jacobs regularly engaged in sexual harassment and assault; displayed abusive behavior toward colleagues and underlings; and had questionable ethics. Also stunning, the adviser said, was…
This is not good news for local journalism: “The owner of The Sacramento Bee is trying to tie journalists’ pay to the number of clicks their stories get.” We get that McClatchy, parent of the Bee, is in financial trouble. We get that local news could sometimes use some sexing up. But we’ve also got to wonder who’s going to churn out well-researched stories on the full bevy of legislative issues put on the table every year in California? Because let’s be honest: Payday lender regulation, the intricacies of vapor bans, and minutiae about whether the Attorney General’s office is sufficiently well-funded aren’t going to get clicks the same as London Breed firing off missives about the renaming of public schools – and yet several of these things are massively more important that Breed trying to goad teachers back into the classroom by invoking the “cancellation” of Abraham Lincoln and…
The Yes on 22 stop-making-Uber-drivers-employees campaign appears to be wasting a lot of money on targeting voters in… Boston. From Saturday: For the record, @kombiz’s profile specifically lists his location as Boston, and describes him as a “labor campaigner.” So set aside that he hasn’t lived in California in decades, and lives all the way on the other side of the country, even if he did still live in California, he’d probably be about the least probable “Yes on 22” voter out there anyway. The “Yes on 22” campaign is being run by California ballot initiative powerhouse firm Winner Mandabach, which reportedly refuses to take on ballot propositions it doesn’t think have a decent chance of winning. The campaign has sustained some reputational trouble because of reported activities of conservative consultant Mark Bogetich. You’ve got to wonder whether this one gets over the finish line if they’re engaging in these…
Heading into Election Day, very few undecided voters remain in America. However, CNN found a few in Arizona and surveyed them post-debate last night. The big news: Even among people who are still considering voting for Trump, as many voters as not felt that Sen. Kamala Harris won the VP debate against Mike Pence, with two voters considering it a tie. Go to minute 4:00 here and watch it: The upshot? Even among people still open to voting for Trump, Harris held her own against Pence, who universally seemed to be described as a “polished” and “seasoned” debater by every cable news pundit going. That’s bad news for the Trump-Pence ticket.
This surprised us this morning… Ultra-libertarian DC think-tank the CATO Institute put out fiscal ratings on America’s governors this week and it appears that Gov. Gavin Newsom, who California right-wingers love to bash as super-lefty, scored pretty high. (Photo via gov.ca.gov) CATO gave Newsom a C grade and wrote this: The pace of spending growth has fallen under Newsom, compared with the 13.7 percent increase in Brown’s final year. In Newsom’s first year as governor, general fund spending increased 5.6 percent.[…]Fortunately, California entered the current recession in a better position than the last one. In 2014, voters approved Proposition 2, which created a more robust funding structure for the state’s rainy day fund. The rainy day fund balance has grown from 4.6 percent of annual spending in 2014 to 13.7 percent by 2020. Obviously, CATO being ultra-libertarians, they dinged Newsom for tax hikes that left-of-center Californians would argue were basically…
With Assemblymember Monique Limon’s anti-predatory lending bill reportedly headed towards Senate action next week, scrutiny of the measure is increasing. But something smells fishy here. From the Sacramento Bee: For California borrowers trapped in loans with triple-digit interest rates, a proposed bill to impose a 36% cap might seem like a godsend.If passed, Assembly Bill 539 would end a decades-long practice of allowing installment loans of $2,500 to $10,000 to carry such high interest rates by limiting that number to 36%.But in striking a deal on the legislation with loan companies, Assemblywoman Monique Limón, D-Goleta, and consumer advocates decided the bill would apply only to interest on the loan itself.It now leaves state agencies to continue oversight of other practices critics consider “predatory,” including credit insurance and additional fees that the Pew Charitable Trust says can unnecessarily increase borrowing by more than a third.“We have found in our research that…
Actress Jessica Biel is turning progressive heads today with news breaking that she has been lobbying California legislators to shoot down a pro-vaccination measure aimed at ensuring herd immunity against measles. Jessica Biel palling around with the wrong kind of Kennedy. From the Daily Beast: On Tuesday, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental activist whose recent work has focused increasingly on baseless allegations that vaccines are unsafe and can injure a statistically minuscule population of “medically fragile” children, appeared at the California State Assembly beside an unlikely scene partner: actress Jessica Biel. In a series of Instagram posts, first reported in Jezebel by Anna Merlan, the two posed with activists, legislators, and miscellaneous bureaucratic architecture. In the caption, Kennedy called Biel “courageous.” The duo had come to lobby against SB 276, a California state bill that would limit medical exemptions from vaccinations without approval from a state public-health officer. The…
As California politics junkies, we’ve watched as presidential primary polling has fluctuated and recently, Sen. Kamala Harris looks like she’s taken a bit of a dive in the polls. Mostly, that seems to be attributable to Sen. Elizabeth Warren getting ahead of the pack in calling for President Trump’s impeachment– arguably the best-ever example of adopting a policy position just to curry favor with the base. But if you’re a right-leaning reporter at DC’s National Journal (check out said reporter’s Twitter feed), it’s evidence of Harris pandering to the base, even though she’s appeared far, far less tempted to do that than has Warren. Questionable takes are… questionable. Credit: @McDeereUSA Over to National Journal: If there was a primary for the most self-destructive presidential candidate, Sen. Kamala Harris of California would be the front-runner of the 2020 field. Instead of leveraging her profile as a pragmatic prosecutor who has distinguished herself…
With the entry of former Vice President Joe Biden into the 2020 presidential race, Sen. Kamala Harris’ luster has been a little lacking lately. But she’s grabbing attention this morning with a volley at gender-discriminating corporate America with a brand new proposal to fine them if they don’t pay men and women equally. From the Wall Street Journal: Sen. Kamala Harris is proposing that large employers pay women on an equal basis with their male counterparts or face government fines, seeking a sweeping shift in the way the nation addresses pay inequity. The Democratic presidential candidate released a plan Monday that would put the burden on companies to demonstrate that they are not engaging in pay discrimination. Ms. Harris’s campaign said companies would be fined 1% of their profits for every 1% wage gap they allow to continue for work of equal value. The campaign estimated that the plan would…
Chris Matthews: He’s the MSNBC “Hardball” host who induces groans from tons of progressives for his perceived outdated and outmoded version of left-of-center politics and filibustering of progressive favorites who appear on his show. Last night, Matthews was interviewing Sen. Kamala Harris and engaged in a little Matthews-standard long-windedness, on-the-fly-punditry and gaffery. “I guess the question is once he’s testified before Mr. Mueller’s special counsel investigation, how can he now say I won’t make the same testimony in public claiming executive privilege. I think it is sort of like virginity, kinda… Once you start talking about a matter in your jurisdiction and then you say, ‘oh, I’m not doing it anymore.’ You can’t do it once you’ve started talking. I understand that’s how executive privilege works. Once you have given it up, you can’t grab it back. How do you see it?” This was Matthews’ “question” posed to Harris, whose non-verbal…