California Editorial Rdp

June 21

The Press Democrat on President Trump returning to a failed policy on Cuba

President Donald Trump promised to shake things up in Washington, to steer the nation away from the failed policies of the past.

When it comes relations with Cuba, however, Trump is turning back the clock.

The United States isolated Cuba for a half-century, through nine presidential administrations, in hopes of pushing Fidel Castro from power.

It was a quintessential failure of Cold War foreign policy with bipartisan fingerprints. The Cuban people suffered, and so did U.S. relations with the rest of Latin America. Castro endured, while blaming his failures on the United States. When he finally stepped down, he transferred power to his brother Raoul.

President Barack Obama shifted directions on Cuba, restoring diplomatic relations, easing travel restrictions and relaxing sanctions - not because Raoul Castro had changed his brother’s repressive ways but because engagement has proven to be a more effective approach.

Rapprochement had support from both major parties as well as U.S. tourism, manufacturing and telecommunication companies. But three years later, Trump is dusting off the Cold War playbook. “Effective immediately,” he said Friday in Miami’s Little Havana neighborhood, “I am canceling the last administration’s completely one-sided deal with Cuba.”

As is so often the case with Trump’s pronouncements, there’s more bluster than substance here. His executive order will make it more difficult for Americans to visit Cuba - as 285,000 did last year - or do business there, but he didn’t sever diplomatic relations, restore special treatment for Cuban immigrants or prevent Cuban-Americans from visiting their homeland.

Trump framed his decision as a defense of human rights. “We will not be silent in the face of communist oppression any longer,” he said Friday.

But there’s ample reason to believe that Trump was most concerned with reversing the policies of his predecessor and rewarding the hard-line Cuba expatriate community in Florida that lined up behind him during last year’s presidential campaign.

To be clear, the Castro regime has a dreadful record on human rights and deserves condemnation until it restores democracy and stops imprisoning critics of the government.

Until now, however, Trump has shown little interest in such matters, embracing dictators in Egypt, the Philippines, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Turkey.

Speaking in Riyadh during his first trip abroad as president, Trump said: “We are not here to lecture. We are not here to tell other people how to live, what to do, who to be, or how to worship. Instead, we are here to offer partnership - based on shared interests and values - to pursue a better future for us all.”

That sounds a lot like engagement, the diplomatic strategy widely credited with pushing China toward a more responsible approach to climate change and persuading Iran to halt its nuclear weapons program.

Although he didn’t mention Cuba specifically, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson endorsed a policy of engagement in an appearance before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee a few days before Trump’s announcement. “History has shown that the United States leaves a footprint of freedom wherever it goes,” he said.

If Trump is serious about ending repression in Cuba and, in his own words, helping its people find “prosperity and liberty,” he won’t succeed by returning to a policy that already failed.

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June 20

The Sacramento Bee on politicians doing whatever to maintain control

Politicians who hold power wield it, whether it’s in Sacramento, Madison or Washington, D.C.

They do what it takes to maintain their control. They cannot help themselves. And so we offer this pox on both parties.

In Sacramento, Democrats control.

Hoping to chip away at Democratic supremacy, the California Republican Party, egged on by Southern California talk show bloviaters and $500,000 from Chevron, is using the state constitutional power of recall in an attempt to unseat Sen. Josh Newman, D-Fullerton.

Though it’s wrong-headed, it’s understandable. Republicans are peeved that they lost a seat they long held. Relegated to a super-minority in the Legislature, the GOP is taking electoral aim at a convenient target of opportunity.

No matter that Newman committed no misfeasance, and certainly no malfeasance. He merely voted to raise gasoline taxes to pay for road repairs, a rational act seconded by 25 other Senate Democrats and a Republican, Sen. Anthony Cannella of Ceres.

Recall is the Republicans’ prerogative, so they’re exercising it, just as Democrats have the right to come to Newman’s defense by jamming through a bill last week to alter recall rules in ways that would benefit him. The Democrats’ measure, Senate Bill 96, would not apply to other currently pending recalls. No matter. They only care about Newman.

Republicans get huffy that Democrats are overriding the Will of the People. But there’s nothing sacred about California-style direct democracy. Petition circulators get paid by the signature and have been known to mislead voters into signing petitions.

Still, California Democrats, confident that they will hold power for years to come, are resorting to heavy-handed tactics too often. Last year, Gov. Jerry Brown was running short of time to qualify an initiative to overhaul part of the criminal justice system. At his urging, the Legislature appropriated $16 million to support county election officials who would speed signature verification. The initiative qualified.

Last November, voters approved Proposition 54, which requires that bills be publicly available for 72 hours before they are put to a vote. Democrats in the Assembly, facing a deadline to approve bills, proceeded to pass 89 bills that were available for less than 72 hours, as Assemblyman Kevin Kiley, R-Rocklin wrote in an op-ed for The Sacramento Bee. The spirit if not the letter of the law notwithstanding, Democrats control Sacramento.

Republicans are masters of the majority, too. In Washington, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Republicans are preparing to vote on what surely will be an unpopular if not dangerous bill to repeal the Obama administration’s Affordable Care Act. Rather than act in public, they are hiding details. Outrageous, to be sure, but the majority decides the rules.

In most states where one party dominates, politicians draw legislative and congressional district lines in ways that will ensure their party maintains power. The U.S. Supreme Court announced this week that it would hear a suit challenging Wisconsin’s gerrymandered election maps, which favor Republicans.

Justice Anthony Kennedy could be the swing. We hope he notes that in his hometown of Sacramento, Democrats were the masters of gerrymandering district lines until voters took matters into their own hands by approving an initiative that created an independent redistricting commission. Democrats and Republicans objected. They knew they would lose power if people reclaim that which is rightfully theirs.

No matter their party, politicians in power alter rules and push boundaries in the service of maintaining power. They do it because they can. That doesn’t make it right.

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June 17

Ventura County Star on legalization of ’granny flats’

Sometimes the Thousand Oaks City Council reminds us of our president. It will take an important step with potential for much community benefit, but the drama surrounding it is not a good look for the city.

That’s how we feel about the council’s recent decision to legalize accessory dwelling units - so-called “granny flats.”

The council didn’t have much choice, under a new state law designed to help ease California’s housing shortage. So you would have thought council members would just endorse this modest, relatively painless measure and move on. Instead, they spent most of the May 30 two-hour hearing on the measure whining about the loss of local control and raising sky-is-falling fears about parking and other problems.

“I’m sure our Legislature thought they were acting in good faith, but I really don’t think this is going to … solve the housing problem here in Thousand Oaks or even in the state,” Councilman Andy Fox said. “It is . almost guaranteed to cause a lot of problems that we are not really going to have the ability to address.” And this from Mayor Claudia Bill-de la Peña: “I see this as a can of worms. It’s going to cause friction. It’s going to cause tension. And I’m not looking forward to that.”

We didn’t realize the mayor’s job was supposed to be stress-free, but that’s beside the point. Fox is right to say granny flats won’t solve our housing shortage, but there is simply no data that they will destroy neighborhoods, either.

We were especially disappointed with Councilman Al Adam, who campaigned last year on providing housing for seniors and millennials - two groups that could benefit the most from granny flats. Yet he joined the whining May 30, saying, “I think it’s the duty as a council to protect the nature of our neighborhoods.”

First, granny flats are expensive to build. Most homeowners do not want to build one, and cities can still enforce building and health and safety codes. Portland, a national leader in accessory dwelling units after easing its rules and fees in 2010, has granny flats on only about 1 percent of its single-family residential properties.

Martin John Brown, a researcher and consultant on environment and housing who has studied the Portland data, says there is “zero objective evidence supporting two specific fears often mentioned by ADU opponents: parking problems and declines in property values.”

“Each individual ADU is only a tiny change that can have little effect on neighborhood conditions,” he posted on accessorydwellings.org. “But over decades an accumulation of ADUs probably would notably change the character and demographics of a place. But can any neighborhood really be held in an unchanging state? . Hundreds of permitted ADUs have been created (in Portland) and there has been practically no reaction on a neighborhood basis - sometimes the new developments are hardly noticed. Meanwhile, an alternative form of densification, the transit-oriented apartment block, has caused a lot of protest.”

The people who would notice granny flats are the existing Thousand Oaks residents who need to provide housing for an aging parent or a caretaker or a nanny or a college graduate returning home. Or those struggling a bit financially who could use the extra rent money to help cover their mortgage and property taxes. Are they not represented by the Thousand Oaks City Council as well?

The modern household is not the bread-winning dad, stay-at-home mom and 2.5 kids anymore, Dana Cuff, the founding director of the CityLab think tank at UCLA, told Business Insider in March. “There’s just an infinite number of ways our housing should be made more flexible for our complete lives,” she said, and ADUs “get the ball rolling.” Granny flats also can help combat climate change and reduce traffic congestion by giving workers a chance to live closer to their jobs, officials say.

Under the new state rules, cities can still regulate granny flats in various ways, including size and exterior design. While the state law allows them to be as large as 1,200 square feet, Thousand Oaks set a maximum of 600 square feet.

Residents of Thousand Oaks and elsewhere in Ventura County have rejected urban sprawl by voting for Save Open-space and Agricultural Resources laws. In already-developed areas, they have opposed apartment projects, mixed-use proposals, assisted-living centers, even housing for veterans who have served this country.

It is time for all of our city councils to reject this zero-growth swamp. Leading the charge for granny flats is a good place to start.

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June 17

The Santa Clarita Valley Signal on Democrats’ delusion of money

California’s supermajority of elected Democrat leaders must have deluded itself into believing it can print money.

That seems to be the only thing that makes sense as legislators plan a national - oops, statewide - health care system (Senate Bill 562, which the Legislative Analyst’s office says would carry about a $400 billion price tag) and jacks up taxes for a revitalized roads system (already siphoning off some of the “dedicated” road funds for other causes).

Meanwhile, its head of state, Gov. Jerry Brown, talks global warming with the president of China.

When did we secede?

And what, exactly, backs up the “California dollar” Democrats apparently plan to print?

That would be your wallet.

If you’re interested in keeping anything in it, we believe some counter-moves are called for.

First, the health care bill. As ridiculous as this proposal is, we worry that the California Legislature may be wacky enough to pass it, relying on funds from - where else? - higher taxes, along with federal funds not likely to materialize.

A study by the California Nurses Association - a strong supporter of Senate Bill 562 - calculates a 2.3 percent statewide sales tax hike, along with a new 2.3 percent gross receipts tax on corporate revenue, should generate the $106 billion needed annually to fund the gap for a statewide health care system.

The difference between the estimated $400 billion overall cost and the $106 billion tax hike revenue makes some assumptions - among them that the federal government will cooperate with federal Medicare and Medicaid dollars.

Like California’s done anything to endear itself to the Trump administration.

“There are many assertions made (in SB 562) that there’s not real clarity on, and some of them are misguided in a lot of ways,” said Bruce Benton, vice president of the California Association of Health Underwriters, during an interview with The Associated Press.

Alice isn’t the only one with a Wonderland, complete with a hookah-smoking Caterpillar. These days Sacramento is looking like another place you could fall down a rabbit hole and smoke something mind-altering.

Gambling California’s financial stability on an untried statewide health-care system is insane. Remember the predictions of success when Obamacare was adopted?

The good news is that two-thirds approval from both the California Assembly and Senate would be required for approval of SB 562. The bad news is that Democrats are truly a supermajority in Sacramento, and zanier things have happened.

Lobbying Santa Clarita Valley’s largely Republican delegation in Sacramento will be pointless on this; they haven’t smoked with the Caterpillar. The rather lengthy list of sponsoring legislators and the governor’s office would be good targets.

Second in need of countermeasures are the gasoline and diesel tax hikes and vehicle registration fee hikes, which begin taking effect in November.

We need to seize every chance we get to overturn these hikes rushed through the Legislature out of recognition for how unpopular they would be.

Much ado was made about guarantees that the new road-funding taxes and fees would deliver some $52 billion annually, all of it set aside for much-needed road improvement and repair.

But Sen. Jim Nielsen, vice chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, has a different tale of the not-yet-collected revenue’s fate.

“This budget is filled with broken promises made by Democrats to the citizens when they passed the massive new $52 billion gas and car tax; it takes gas and car tax money that is supposed to go to roads, highways and bridges to pay for recruiting lifeguards, park rangers and state park maintenance and local park operations, to name just a few examples,” he said in a statement issued this week after the budget was approved.

Following the release of the budget proposal earlier this year, both Santa Clarita Valley Assembly members noted how quickly the state hijacks funds earmarked for one purpose and directs them elsewhere.

Funds from Proposition 56, approved by voters in November, were supposed to go toward low-income health services, including Medi-Cal and Denti-Cal. But in the newly approved 2017-18 budget, tobacco tax funds go into the Medi-Cal general fund, as they did before Prop 56 passed.

A drive is afoot to overturn the gas and diesel tax hikes and boosted vehicle registration fees, but pundits give it little chance to pass because it’s backed by no high-rollers.

Assemblyman Travis Allen, a Republican from Huntington Beach, has launched the drive to overturn the taxes and is looking for $5 donations and volunteers to circulate petitions. Visit nocagastax.com for more information.

Citizens who like their wallets to have some green in them can see the writing on the wall; they need to look ahead to the 2018 election and see what leadership is emerging in Sacramento that won’t tax residents right into the tea party seat next to the Mad Hatter.

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June 16

The San Diego Union-Tribune on $125 billion state general fund budget:

The $125 billion state general fund budget approved Thursday is a welcome reflection of Gov. Jerry Brown’s caution and common sense at a time when California has hundreds of billions of dollars in unfunded long-term fiscal obligations and is overdue for one of its periodic downturns in revenue. No big new program advocated by Democratic lawmakers - such as providing college students with free tuition and spending money - won funding.

This helped explain the unusual level of bipartisan support for the spending plan, with yes votes from five GOP lawmakers - including Assemblymen Brian Maienschein of San Diego and Rocky Chavez of Oceanside. Even a conservative who voted no - Assembly Budget Committee Vice Chair Jay Obernolte, R-Big Bear - said that “on the macroeconomic side” it was “a pretty responsible budget,” with spending hikes in line with inflation.

The budget is far from ideal. It ignored Brown’s call for new state efforts and laws to make it easier to add housing stock to address California’s brutal housing crisis. Instead, Democratic lawmakers continue to focus on subsidized housing programs with a poor record of providing help to more than a relative handful of families. But the spending plan does have some welcome provisions.

One highlight is the expansion of the earned income tax credit to help the self-employed and workers earning up to $22,300 a year, which could increase the take-home pay of 1 million more people in the state with the nation’s highest poverty rate.

Another highlight is a provision that gives the Legislature more control of funding for the University of California’s Office of the President in the wake of a harsh audit that found UC President Janet Napolitano had not disclosed her office’s $175 million in reserve funds while she lobbied for and won a tuition hike. The budget also specifies that $50 million will be withheld from the UC system if audit recommendations aren’t implemented.

The lowlight of the spending plain is its inclusion of last-minute, retroactive changes to the state’s recall elections process meant to block a pending attempt to remove Sen. Josh Newman, D-Fullerton, and preserve Democrats’ supermajority in the Senate. The recall, prompted by Newman’s vote to raise gasoline taxes, is led by former San Diego Councilman Carl DeMaio. The most noteworthy rule change is that counties must now verify every voter signature instead of a random sample, as is the case for other citizen measures.

“The recall provision is perfectly crafted in order to try and help state Sen. Newman keep his seat,” Loyola law professor Jessica Levinson told Capital Public Radio. That’s gaming the system - not just for Newman but for all incumbents from here on out. That’s shameful.

There’s no question that California’s version of direct democracy could use fine-tuning. It should be much easier to quickly establish who is paying the bills for proposed ballot measures, such measures should be better vetted and ballot language should be more scrupulously neutral. But the changes too often considered by the Legislature seem intended to limit direct democracy’s power. The attempt to protect Newman falls squarely in this category.