Is California Libertarian?
johnhcochrane.blogspot.com
johnhcochrane.blogspot.com
Prop 19 is not a simple “property tax reduction”; it increases the scope of allowed basis value transfers for the elderly and disabled for principal residences but terminates inheritance of basis value (forcing full value assessment) where an inherited property isn't used as a primary residence and also increases the assessed value of inherited properties otherwise subject to basis value transfer (i.e., used as primary residence) when the actual market value is over $1,000,000 more than the basis value. It is overall a property tax increase, not a decrease, and was promoted as a revenue source.
Also, he misrepresents the opposition to Prop 21 as opposition to rent control, even though the argument against Prop 21 included (and this was Gov. newsome’s position) that the new local rent control powers it created were unnecessary because the state had just adopted statewide rent control and the i itiaitve undermined the statewide policy.
> The election seems to be heading to a never-Trumper Republican's dream: Biden wins by about 1 electoral vote. Trump rides into the sunset. (Starts a new show on Fox?) The Senate stays Republican
Never-Trumper Republicans have mostly been arguing that in this election, Democrats should be preferred for federal office generally, not advocating ticket-splitting, so I don't think that's true.
> More broadly, the big news of the election seems a clear rejection of the far-left agenda.
100% agree with this conclusion.
I think the Biden administration will have a lot of problems in the next four years and set a massive red carpet for a huge Republican victory in 2024. They will have to pick up an economic crisis post COVID-19 and struggle with the senate. Additionally Biden has been so long in politics that he's not going to look at things with fresh eyes and question the system. He's quickly going to fall back to status quo and alienate a lot of his reluctant supporters. Trump had 50% of the country hating him, but he also had 50% of the country absolutely loving him. It's the hate for Trump which secured Biden a narrow margin, but let's be absolutely clear, nobody voted for Biden because they liked him. In some ways the Biden administration will have less support, less enthusiasm and less success that the Trump administration before him, which is kind of ironic when you think about it.
Anyway, that's just my perspective as an outsider looking across the pond from Europe.
I consider providing people with PTO, parental leave, healthcare, education, and environmental reforms to be reasonable. Apparently, according to this writer, those are part of the far-left agenda.
I think in US political terms, these are pretty far-left aren't they?
It's not a comment on whether any individual person such as you, I, or the author think they're reasonable. The author isn't giving a personal opinion. It's about what the people would support. I think there's probably little support for these things across the broader US, for many complex historical reasons.
These are also the more populous states, so nationwide, I can easily imagine a significant portion, if not majority support these basic standards of living for their fellow countrymen.
Nobody's saying it's as far-left as it's possible to go. But in US terms, it's about far-left as it goes.
Legalizing marijuana most definitely has majority support in the US, but few states have done it. But I wouldn't classify legalizing marijuana as a far left position.
Through the fact that the US doesn't have them?
I mean if they were really widely supported they'd have them by now.
The UK widely supports national healthcare... so it's got a national healthcare service.
Example: Hillary Clinton received more votes than Donald Trump. Hillary Clinton did not become president.
Also see:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerrymandering
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First-past-the-post_voting
and the resulting 2 party government.
There's no federal ballot proposition mechanism that allows the public to vote directly on issues, so it's up to elected officials to represent their constituents (or not).
It's also worth noting that voters overwhelmingly re-elect their members of Congress, 80-90% of the time[1], despite Congress having a ~20% approval rating[2]. It's hard to imagine that puts a lot of pressure on members of Congress to enact the will of the people.
[1] https://www.opensecrets.org/elections-overview/reelection-ra...
[2] https://www.statista.com/statistics/207579/public-approval-r...
I find it very frustrating that so many people seem to not want to acknowledge that they're sharing the country with a lot of other people who don't agree with them.
EDIT: To be clear, this isn't a position based on personal political beliefs. I find it equally inappropriate to describe anti-abortion as a "far-right" belief. Even though it's a minority of Americans that feel this way, it's clearly a sizable enough minority that painting it as fringe somehow instead of mainstream is not justified.
Again, neither the author nor I are giving any personal opinions or moral appraisals.
I think it's pretty factual to say that support for these things in the US does seem to be much more niche than it is in other countries.
And even then, it’s an urban/rural split, and it’s pretty clear that the urban areas, which contain most of the US’s population, support those policies. Unfortunately, political power in the US is not apportioned to individuals, so this widespread support of policies is not visible as enacted policies.
> Fifty-six percent of Americans think providing access to affordable health care coverage for all Americans is the responsibility of the federal government, and two-thirds favor the creation of a national, government-administered health insurance plan similar to Medicare that would be available to all Americans.[1]
> Sixty-nine percent of registered voters in the April 19-20 survey support providing medicare to every American.[2]
> Americans largely support paid leave, and most supporters say employers, rather than the federal or state government, should cover the costs.[3]
> Majorities of Americans say the federal government is doing too little for key aspects of the environment, from protecting water or air quality to reducing the effects of climate change. And most believe the United States should focus on developing alternative sources of energy over expansion of fossil fuel sources, according to a new Pew Research Center survey.[4]
> Voters “are committed to and favorable toward local public schools and teachers in their community,” and 58 percent like school boards. “Voters support increased funding for public schools even if it increases their taxes."[5]
[1] https://www.cbsnews.com/news/2020-polls-national-health-care... [2] https://thehill.com/hilltv/what-americas-thinking/494602-pol... [3] https://www.pewsocialtrends.org/2017/03/23/americans-widely-... [4] https://www.pewresearch.org/science/2019/11/25/u-s-public-vi... [5] https://www.politico.com/newsletters/morning-education/2020/...
You're forgetting about the blinding red wave coming in 2022. Whatever actual fascist gets elected in 2024 is going to have a Republican House and Senate, and won't squander it like Obama did.
> 100% agree with this conclusion.
Except the reason that Biden isn't doing as great as he could be is because he's too centrist. He isn't getting enough of the far-left vote because of their apathy towards his agenda, which does not reach far enough by far.
As an example, Florida did not vote for Biden. Not because he's too left, but because he's not left enough. The proof for this is that they also just voted to increase the minimum wage to $15. The democrats wanted a candidate with broader appeal than Bernie, but they only succeeded in alienating the social-conservatives even further.
If this were true, then Florida's state laws wouldn't so conservative. Passing one minimum wage law, which is long overdue and lags behind any "left" state, does not lead to the conclusion that Florida would have voted for someone such as Bernie Sanders.
Even the minimum wage law FL passed is very weak. It's $1 per year, starting at $10 per hour, starting Sep 1, 2021.