You may vote for as many as you would like!

First, the facts: In the 2008 election cycle, the non-profit corporation Citizens United released a documentary largely antagonistic to Sen. Clinton. Citizens United planned a release for theaters as well as pay-per-view and DVD, but McCain Feingold limited advocacy for or against candidates during elections; even advertising the movie would have been illegal, yet the expenditure for the movie was entirely independent of the campaigns for or against Sen. Clinton, so there can be no charges of corruption, the official reason for campaign finance laws.

During arguments, the government claimed that any kind of broadcast communication that even mentioned a candidate’s name would be covered under the law. This includes advertisements for products. Remember the Obama Commemorative Plates going around a year ago? Illegal! The Kindle, Amazon’s electronic book, is also subject to the law. The Court also found that, by letting the laws stand, they would potentially allow Congress to ban books and other print media that mentioned candidates, and by setting a precedent that such action might be in principle permissible, lead to censorship in other ways. Even the blogosphere wasn’t immune, because express advocacy of candidates in an electronic form is technically illegal under McCain- Feingold. The government also argued that because “the First Amendment refers both to freedom of speech and of the press, there would be a potential argument that media corporations, the institutional press, would have a greater First Amendment right [than other groups].” This means, of course, that media corporations have potentially greater rights to free speech than everyone else, and true to the government’s word, mainstream media giants were exempted from the law.

The hysteria from the left, and even some nominal conservatives and libertarians, has been forthcoming in no short supply. They decry the fact that, by the Court’s decision, corporations will be allowed to influence elections. But what they are largely criticizing, corporate funding of elections, is still illegal. Corporations have been barred from direct contributions to campaigns for a century, and that facet of campaign finance law stands. The decision affirms the right to make independent expenditures and communications – a documentary, a blog, an advertisement. Corporations are still banned from directly contributing to campaigns, and so there can be no corruption – unless congressmen want to admit that as soon as someone says something nice about them they are obligated to dispense favors.

Their criticisms are based in a mindset that evades any consideration of what corporations are. A corporation is simply a voluntary association of individuals who combine their capital to undertake large expenditures and reduce individual liabilities. It does include for-profit corporations, certainly, but also non-profits, think tanks, and policy advocacy groups such as the ACLU, NRA, NARAL, Cato Institute, and Heritage Foundation. Why should individuals, speaking jointly under the aegis of an advocacy group, be prohibited from speaking via broadcast, such as when the ACLU was prohibited from advertising the names of candidates who had voted for warrant-less wiretapping and other invasive government powers? Why should free speech be taken so literally as to exclude dissemination of information by print and broadcast media? As Chief Justice Roberts stated, “The First Amendment protects more than just the individual on a soapbox and the lonely pamphleteer.” And, for the unconvinced who would still claim that a corporation, particularly a for-profit one, is a danger to democracy, consider what would happen to liberty in other areas if organization along corporate lines may be a justification for some restriction. We can have the right to practice religion – but not the right to build a church, which is often a corporate endeavor. You’re free to attend a private school, but you can’t incorporate to establish or maintain one. And you’re free to write about whatever you want on your blog, so long as you don’t use corporate-owned servers.

Logically, the kind of power the government granted itself, and many citizens have supported in the name of “clean politics”, makes any freedom or right currently protected vulnerable to harassment or outright denial by government. Large segments of the population believe nevertheless that for-profit corporations might unduly influence politics so that policies and candidates do not accurately reflect the public’s interests. They fail to take into account two very critical details.

First, corporations and unions do not speak with a uniform voice. While some corporations such as Wal-Mart supported Obama’s health insurance regulation proposals, others, such as Whole Foods, opposed them. Second, corporate shareholders are predominantly average Americans who own corporate assets by proxy, through investment firms who have been entrusted with this money to maximize shareholder wealth. Not only will it be against their self-interest to spend money lobbying for things investors may find controversial, a more plausible attempt to “seek rent” (create a policy good for the company and bad for everyone else) would be severely hamstrung by the fact that diverse portfolios would make such an act cause more self-injury than benefit.

President Obama’s response, and history, are particularly enlightening. He revealed his ignorance and poor taste by remarking in the State of the Union, “With all due deference to separation of powers, last week the Supreme Court reversed a century of law that I believe will open the floodgates for special interests…” The aforementioned ignorance of what McCain-Feingold actually says notwithstanding, it should be noted that the law is about seven years old – that’s a few short of a century, Mr. President. Shortly after the decision, he offered the following commentary: “With its ruling today, the Supreme Court has given a green light to a new stampede of special interest money in our politics. It is a major victory for big oil, Wall Street banks, health insurance companies and the other powerful interests that marshal their power every day in Washington to drown out the voices of everyday Americans. This ruling gives the special interests and their lobbyists even more power in Washington while undermining the influence of average Americans who make small contributions to support their preferred candidates. That’s why I am instructing my Administration to get to work immediately with Congress on this issue. We are going to talk with bipartisan Congressional leaders to develop a forceful response to this decision. The public interest requires nothing less.” This, from the man who accepted nearly $1 million from Goldman Sachs, more than any other contributor, as well as corporate and union contributions as a state legislator.

Mr. Obama’s objections, as far as can be ascertained, are not that corporate money will support a bad agenda. It is that it won’t support his agenda. He was quite fine with corporate funding from rent-seeking unions, insurance companies, and pharmaceutical companies supporting his ambition to tighten health care markets. He conveniently ignores the fact that such corporations would not be “[marshaling] power in Washington”, they would be presenting ads to the general public, and those ads would have to reveal who was funding them. Rather than spending money on lobbying Congress directly, the most they could do is denounce a congressman, and such ads would likely be ineffective since voters can easily establish a corporation’s self-interest in supporting a particular candidate or agenda. A corporation pushing an agenda antithetical to most Americans’ values cannot be successful, unless most Americans are ignorant and easily swayed – and if they are, what does that say about a man who wins a landslide electoral victory? Furthermore, as Obama himself should know from his presidential campaign, small donors and viral advertising through media like Facebook are far more effective than massive television ads.

Campaign finance regulation heavily favors incumbents, who have numerous legal provisions to protect them from competition for public visibility. For starters, they have name recognition. They can fund mailed advertisements (“newsletters”, “Washington Updates”) at taxpayer expense via the franking privilege. They can travel across their states at taxpayer expense. Incumbents often have more money than their challengers due to existing fundraising infrastructure. Yet the public is sold the nonsense that “the public interest requires no less” than these restrictions, and therefore entrenched politicians and interests.

The Constitution is clear enough: “Congress shall make no law…abridging freedom of speech” (emphasis added). The Court, and common sense, tell us that spending is a necessary and constitutionally protected component of speech, because it purchases the medium by which the speech is conveyed.

The dissent, including Obama-appointee Justice Sotomayor, has demonstrated a woefully low level of respect for both the Constitution and the moral principles it embodies. On the other hand, we can be thankful for Justice Kennedy’s opinion standing for the majority. It is commendable for its support of free speech and free thought: “When Government seeks to use its full power, including the criminal law, to command where a person may get his or her information or what distrusted source he or she may not hear, it uses censorship to control thought. This is unlawful…The First Amendment confirms the freedom to think for ourselves.”

The crisis was followed immediately by an outpouring of humanitarian aid from across the globe, leading to the dispatch of medical teams to the nation as well as vast sums of monetary donations. The United Nations initiated an emergency phase of relief that ended on January 22nd, along with an extensive search for survivors. Such dilemmas are not new to Haiti, which experienced 3 hurricanes in the summer of 2008 alone.

Though aid was provided from around the world, these efforts faced many obstacles. As Haiti is the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere, emergency services were proven to be unable to handle a disaster of this magnitude. Very few hospitals were left standing following the quake, causing the Argentine military field hospital to be the only one available the day the earthquake occurred. Doctors Without Borders, which has played a key role in relief efforts, reported that medical facilities were so flooded with the injured that many swift amputations were forced to take place. Furthermore, the limited amount of medical supplies led to crude reinforcements including cardboard splints and frequently reused latex gloves. The amount of injured citizens was such that nearly 20,000 Haitians died each day who would have been saved by surgery, had sufficient medical facilities been in place.

An unfortunate complication of relief efforts was that most of Haiti’s communication and transportation systems were destroyed by the quake, making such efforts significantly less effective. Air traffic became thoroughly congested, as were the capital’s morgues that had no choice but to bury tens of thousands of bodies in mass graves. US traffic controllers handled this by assuming control at the Toussaint L’Ouverture International Airport, making sure that planes equipped with emergency medical supplies could not leave the country. These complications were met with confusion over who was in charge, followed by violence from injured survivors who felt that aid was not properly distributed. Aid workers from the region took issue with US dispatched workers, who were accused of letting a number of relief trucks remain unused at the airport. In response to these and other disagreements, US officials as well as Haitian president Preval acknowledged that diplomatic cooperation is central to guide the nation toward recovery.

While there were many complications along the way, Haiti received a remarkable amount of international assistance. In the two days following the quake, over 20 countries dispatched military personnel to the nation to provide medical care and search for survivors. After arriving at maximum possible speed on January 15th, the USS Carl Vinson super carrier delivered 600,000 emergency food rations, 1 million liters of water, and 19 helicopters for victim recovery. These helicopters became essential in the distribution of these rations, as the damage from the quake made many areas inaccessible by land. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton visited Haiti on January 16th to survey the damage, and announced that the U.S. had raised $48 million in relief aid. Two days before, President Obama pledged $100 million to the nation, stating that the victims of the disaster “will not be forgotten”. The European Union was another key contributor, promising $474 million in long-term aid. Recognizing that crowding was a source of much hindrance of relief efforts,

President Abdoulaye Wade of Senegal allowed Haitians access to free Senegalese land. The positive response to this may lead to an entire region being allocated for this purpose. In addition to immediate fiscal contributions, corporations including Coca Cola and AT&T instated donation strategies that allowed consumers to donate digitally from around the world at the click of a button.

Though the emergency phase of relief efforts has concluded, Haiti is nowhere near the end of its ordeal. The damage of the quake was such that the economy will take years to fully recover. Trade and Industry Minister Josseline Colimon Fethiere predicted that 1 in 5 jobs would be lost, while many citizens will need continued medical care for serious injuries. As Vice President Joe Biden explained, President Obama “does not view this as a humanitarian mission with a life cycle of a month. This will still be on our radar screen long after it’s off the crawler at CNN. This is going to be a long slog.”

The governor made the plea in his annual budget proposal, released in January. The state will ask Washington for $6.9 billion in funds it claims are owed from the federal government. “Federal funds must be part of our budget solution because the federal government is part of our budget problem… right now there are discriminatory formulas that force California to subsidize other states. We are asking the federal government to pay us what they owe us,” Schwarzenegger said in a speech.

Members of the state’s congressional delegation were not initially receptive to the request. Senator Barbara Boxer (D-CA), who faces a tough re-election campaign this year, disputed the assertion that California has been shortchanged. According to The Sacramento Bee, she released a report that concluded that California actually received more than it sent to the federal government in 2008 and 2009, a result of increased federal stimulus money. “I just wanted to make the case that California is struggling, and we’re helping,” she told the paper.

California’s other senator, Diane Fienstein (D) argued that the problem is not in the nation’s capitol. “It sounds like the governor is looking for someone else to blame for California’s budget. California’s budget crisis was created in Sacramento, not Washington,” she said, “These problems are not going away until there is wholesale reform of the state’s budget process.”

The criticism led to a strong rebuke from the governor. He noted that during the Bush administration many leaders, including Senator Feinstein, had no problem complaining about the underfunding of California. “Members of our delegation rightly castigated the federal government when President Bush was in office because those promises have not been kept,” he wrote in a January 13 letter. “You were right to fight for California then, and we need you to continue fighting for California now.”

However, many analysts predicted that the governor would likely end up with little or none of what he asked for. The nonpartisan legislative analyst reported the chances of the full amount of federal funds arriving as very small. “The Legislature should assume that federal relief will be billions of dollars less than the Governor wants,” the office wrote. The opinion is echoed by most experts, including academics and bond analysts.

Some suggested that the state could expect a higher likelihood of success if it combined forces with other states, making it a request from states in general, not just California. “To win the support of Congress, our governor should be going to Washington arm in arm with the 45 other governors who are also facing shortfalls this year,” said Jean Ross, director of the California Budget Project in the Christian Science Monitor.

Should the state be unsuccessful in attaining federal dollars, Schwarzenegger would likely propose more cuts to state services. Higher education funding could be impacted, which Schwarzenegger declared in his State of the State speech he would prefer not to cut further. HD Palmer, the governor’s finance director, told The Daily Californian that the state may look at decoupling Cal grant awards from UC and CSU tuition increases. Other cuts would likely come from social services and local governments, among other areas. Schwarzenegger has vowed not to increase taxes after doing so in February of 2009. A revised budget will be released by the governor in May, with the legislature required to pass a spending plan by June 15, although the constitutional deadline is routinely missed. The new fiscal year begins July 1.

However, before the Party loosens its tie and begins to party, it should be careful not to misinterpret the significance of this shifting support. It would be extremely naïve to think that the American public is suddenly voting Republican because of a drastic change in ideology. Instead, the Party has temporarily won over independent voters because of dissatisfaction with failed Democratic policies. In simpler terms, Americans are beginning to support Republicans not because they are Republicans but rather because they are not Democrats. This shift of support to the minority party because of the failures of the majority party has been a common theme in recent politics. In nearly every election cycle, the moderate American voter will vote for the minority party simply because that party is not in power (I’ll call it the “Not Theory”). Republican George W. Bush was elected president in 2000 largely because he was perceived as not being an immoral Democrat who would dare commit adultery in the White House. The Democrats took Congress in 2006 and the presidency in 2008 because they were seen as not being warmongering, blindly patriotic Republicans. One only has to look at the political parties of American presidents over the last quarter-century (with the exception of George H.W. Bush) to see the Not Theory manifested. Thus, like a pendulum, control of national politics continually oscillates back and forth between the two parties while America’s problems continue to become worse and worse.

If the GOP wants to end this circular cycle and maintain a more secure position of power that won’t be easily usurped come the next election, it must center itself around conservative ideology instead of the superficial fact that it is not the Democratic Party. It must return to the days when theorists like Barry Goldwater and William Buckley were on the reading list of every self respecting conservative, instead of Going Rogue by Sarah Palin. It must return to the days when policy was rooted in the political philosophy of limited governance, such as the Ronald Regan presidency, instead of the emotional appeal of hunting terrorists and weapons of mass destruction that do not even exist, as seen through the George W. Bush presidency. If the Party embraces its sensible past and rejects its nonsensical present, it is guaranteed a more permanent position in power because it will have tapped into the biggest unclaimed reserve of voters: the libertarians.

That’s right, I said it. The libertarians are the key to a successful future for the GOP. You may call me just another Ron Paul crazy, but I know for a fact that if the Party wins over the hearts of the libertarians, it will subsequently win over the hearts of the larger American public. That’s because I’ve seen firsthand the libertarian disillusionment with the Republican Party. As the president of Students for Liberty at Cal, I constantly see disenchanted conservatives wander to our club like lost sheep trying to find shelter. They are fed up with supporting a party that claims to promote peace yet supports endless wars overseas. They are fed up with supporting a party that claims to stand for restoring freedom and responsibility to the individual yet strips these freedoms away through bans on gay marriage, failed drug wars, and government censorship. They refuse to support the Republican Party, the party that strips away the individual’s natural right to liberty and has the nerve to claim it is doing it to promote freedom.

Now, I am not saying that the Republican Party should become the Libertarian Party. Moving too far in the libertarian direction will isolate more voters than it attracts. However, if it wants to end the eternal cycle of party shifting, it must abandon the blame train and start standing up for conservative values. Remember that Ron Paul raised more money in individual donations than any other Republican candidate in his 2008 primary campaign. His newest book, End The Fed, was a New York Times bestseller for several consecutive weeks. There is a huge untapped resource of libertarian voters who refuse to vote for the Party because of its failures. I know because I am one of them. Until the Republican Party wakes up and smells the sweet aroma of liberty, nothing much will change in national politics. After all, it was President Ronald Regan who once said, “the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism.”

Recently, however, the professor has engaged in some word play of his own. In recent months, he has criticized the two-thirds vote threshold required in both houses of the legislature to pass a budget or raise taxes. “As I see it, democracy is the main issue in the governance of our state,” he writes in a September 2009 piece on the liberal Web site Truthout. “The two-thirds rules have an anti-democratic effect. Our legislature is currently under minority rule.” To that end, he has authored and is currently collecting signatures for a constitutional amendment to allow the legislature to pass a budget and raise taxes by a simple majority vote.

The first problem with Lakoff’s statement is that he assumes the Republicans in the legislature are representing only a small minority of California voters. Nothing could be further from the truth. Proposition 1A, which would have extended temporary tax increases, was defeated at the ballot box in May 2009 by over 30 percentage points and in every single county in the state. More recently, a January Rasmussen poll found that only 28 percent of voters favor tax increases as the best solution to fix the state’s budget woes. Mr. Lakoff’s qualifications as a linguistics professor notwithstanding, 28 percent doesn’t quite fit the definition of majority. But let’s dispense that for a moment and assume that the majority party in the legislature really does represent the views of a majority of Californians. Does the two-thirds vote threshold constitute minority rule, as Lakoff claims? If so, then there are several other things that also must qualify as “minority rule:”

* The rules on cloture in the US Senate. Since Democrats took over the body in 2007 this has been used mostly by Republicans but just before then Democrats used the process to block several of President George W. Bush’s judicial nominees, as well as many laws, from ever reaching a floor vote.

* Rules on removing an official from office. Removing almost any elected official from an office requires at least a two-thirds vote. Had this been a majority vote, President Clinton could have been removed from office with just six more affirmative votes instead of 22 more.

* The process for amending the US Constitution. This may be the biggest triumph of “minority rule” of all. Not only does it take two-thirds of both houses of Congress, but three-fourths of the states as well.

* The US Constitution itself. The Constitution could not go into effect until it was approved by nine of the thirteen states.

So are these examples of obstructionist “minority will” where a minority can effectively run the state by refusing to provide the votes needed for progress unless their will is implemented (as Lakoff claims is currently the case in California)? Of course not. Each of these cases is a representation of one of the fundamental principles of the American republic: empowering the majority but placing limits on their power to protect minorities.

In order to make sure that important changes and policies are executed wisely and while addressing the concerns of those not in power, certain actions require more than a majority vote. This includes our budget process. Because the annual budget has such far reaching impacts, it is wise that it be held to a higher standard. This is by no means minority rule. If the California legislature were under minority rule, Republican legislators would be actively implementing their agenda. This has not happened and indeed is not possible. Both sides must negotiate to reach a deal that is acceptable to both parties (or at least enough members of both to secure a two-thirds vote).

One can also easily imagine a scenario in which the tables are switched, with Republicans in the majority and Democrats the minority. Just as Republicans in the present scenario have been fighting for their principles, Democrats in this case would likely oppose the majority Republicans to make sure their “progressive” ideas are addressed in the final product. Somehow I imagine that in this case Professor Lakoff’s “minority rule” would quickly turn into “a check on power.”

Californians should reject Professor Lakoff’s proposed amendment, and the professor should avoid baseless rhetoric.

Scott Brown’s victory in the Massachusetts special Senate election caught national attention as a political game-changer. In a state where only 11% of the electorate is Republican, Brown won against Democrat Martha Coakley with a solid margin. Remarkably, Brown did not campaign as a “moderate”, but as a candidate who would fiercely oppose Obama’s agenda.

Interestingly enough, both Obama and Brown reveal a stunning political reality: while “moderation” sounds more appealing than “extremism”, it is the “extreme” – the consistent – who actually win elections. He did so in a state used as a model for Obama’s health insurance regulatory scheme, a tragic irony for the left’s hubris and an indication that voters in that state are fed up with both the Democrats’ national agenda, and perhaps their own health insurance policies.

What’s really important about the election is the fact that it gives Republicans 41 seats in the Senate. While technically only a majority is needed to pass legislation or confirm appointments, Senate rules allow for unlimited debate. Democrat Strom Thurmond currently holds the record for longest speech, at 24 hours and 18 minutes, in a last ditch attempt to block the Civil Rights Act of 1957. If debate never stops, the Senate is unable to move to a final vote, and the legislation or confirmation cannot be passed. Under current Senate rules, 60 votes are needed for a “cloture motion” to stop debate and proceed to a vote. This means that a bill or confirmation can literally be talked to death, even if a majority would have supported it. With Brown as the 41st Republican Senator, a unified vote can block any legislation that does not have bipartisan support, meaning Democrats can no longer unilaterally force bad laws (additional health insurance regulations, “cap and trade”, etc) on the public.

Ultimately, though, the election doesn’t change the majority in the Senate, and Republicans will still be unable to advance their own agenda. What it does win is valuable time, allowing Republicans to hold out until the November elections. Then, voters across the country will instate a new House of Representatives and replace one third of the Senate. While many incumbents will remain, history and the current political climate indicate that the midterm elections will bring with them significant turnover, and Republicans running under a coherent agenda may be able to win back Congress.

In this e-mail, our Canadian friend expressed support for Governor Arnold Schwarzengger’s proposal to amend the state constitution to change the way money is budgeted for higher education. Knowing how we are supposed to feel, Birgeneau writes, “I am sure that you are as uplifted and encouraged as I am by this very positive outcome.”

Although there has been no “outcome” so far, there is little about which to be uplifted or encouraged in these recent developments. Governor Schwarzenegger was elected on a promise to be different than the Sacramento politicians who have systematically created the mess, fiscal and otherwise, this great state finds itself in. As he completes his stay in office, a stay that was once so promising in the hope for reform it offered, it is a sad irony that he would propose a constitutional amendment that would amount to exactly the same type of autopilot spending mandates he once opposed so vehemently.

According to comments made to The New York Times by the governor’s chief of staff, Susan Kennedy, “[t]hose protests on the U.C. campuses were the tipping point” that prompted the governor to propose the constitutional amendment in question. Apparently, Republican leaders no longer stand up to violent mobs of disaffected students who occupy buildings and throw torches at the houses of administrative figures. These leftist radicals, toting scarlet armbands as though they’re in Mao’s Red Guards, evidently achieved their objective — rather than confronting extremists as Governor Reagan once did, Mr. Schwarzenegger seems content to give them what they demand. A solid precedent he sets. Can we say girlie man?

Taking at face value the left-wing slogan “schools not prisons,” Mr. Schwarzenegger asks Californians to enshrine in the Constitution his plan that no more than 7% of the state’s General Fund be devoted to prison spending, while at least 10% be committed to the University of California and the California State University systems. Now, it does not appear that the figures are based on any pedagogical or criminological information, but let us not worry about such trivialities. There is a legacy to be made!

Currently, the state spends 5.9% of its general fund on the two university systems, while spending 9.7% on the prison system. Admittedly, it is viscerally disturbing that we spend more money on coddling criminals than on educating the youth. But rarely is the issue that clear-cut. Governor Schwarzenegger is correct in claiming that we spend tens of thousands of dollars more per prisoner than comparable states, and that this can be alleviated in part by contracting out prison operations. Studies have shown that a “private option” limits prison spending. Reforms of overreaching criminal law, as well as alternative sentencing, could also reduce the need for such large prison capacity. But the governor is delusional if he genuinely believes his proposal is a panacea to education spending reductions. Unlike other states where prisons operations have been contracted to private companies, California is a state where unions retain tremendous power, and the California Correctional Peace Officers Association, one of the most powerful unions, will surely stop any attempt to break their monopolistic stranglehold on the multi-billion prison industry.

Even if by some miracle it was made possible to introduce competition into corrections, California’s activist judiciary would still mandate incredibly high standards of care for inmates. J. Clark Kelso, a court-appointed receiver for the prison health-care system, infamously demanded the state spend $8 billion on a gold-plated hospital plan that would allow inmates to enjoy yoga and art therapy, a hospital plan that would go beyond what is offered by almost any private insurance. Until the power of the judiciary to pervert the law to mandate unreasonable spending on the comfort of inmates, massive reductions in prison spending are unlikely.

This all means that under Mr. Schwarzenegger’s plan, so trumpeted by the administration of the UC, spending by the state on university systems will need to be increased significantly. Prison spending is unlikely to be reduced much, so such a plan would not be cost-neutral—rather, it would equal an overall ballooning of spending. If we assume prison spending remains constant, to meet the 7%-10% ratio mandated by the constitutional amendment, the state would be required to increase its spending on the UC and CSU systems by approximately 242%. More spending — isn’t that what got the state into the mess in the first place? And can we expect a 242% increase in the quality or quantity of public education? History suggests not.

Fundamentally, the issue with the proposal at hand is that it is an ‘autopilot’ formula. Spending mandates like this one virtually ignore the realities of revenue, limiting the ability of the legislature to cut services as appropriate to a particular economic environment. Mr. Schwarzengger once railed against these formulas, denouncing them for what they were. He even proposed a landmark constitutional amendment, Proposition 76, to limit the deleterious effects of these mandates. But its defeat at the hand of the teachers’ union seems to have destroyed his commitment to financial responsibility.

California already has a gamut of autopilot spending mandates. Introducing more will further destroy the state’s fiscal solvency and almost necessitate tax increases, the last thing needed as California attempts to revitalize its economy. Rather, Californians must demand fiscal responsibility from their state legislators.

The University of California is a jewel, fueling the state’s economy with its teaching mission and ground-breaking research. It is among the prime assets of this beautiful state. But trying to avoid economic realities that call for sources of funding other than the taxpayer, including tuition increases, is not the way to maintain its premier status. Rather, it is a recipe for disaster for both the state and the university itself.

In a recently released study, the Department of Health and Human Services affirmed that the 45-year-old Head Start preschool program has no lasting effects on its students in all of 114 academic and non-academic tests. “These results make it clear that we need to build a more coordinated system of early care and education, and to focus on key improvements to teaching and learning in the early grades,” said US Secretary of Education Arne Duncan. In the wake of the report, HHS Secretary Sebelius called for greater funding and more federal control of both Head Start and elementary education, declaring that “research clearly shows that Head Start positively impacts the school readiness of low-income children.” Naturally, the only possible solution is to spend more money on it.

2. SB 518 To End Free Parking in California

California State Senator Alan Lowenthal’s bill, SB 518, recently passed in the California legislature. The bill imposes programs on local governments which eliminate ordinances that require parking spaces in commercial lots. The bill is intended to support AB 32, which requires California to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions to 1990 levels by 2020. In the name of fighting global warming, the bill imposes state-mandated local programs, empowers the California Air Resources Board to assign “cap and trade” points or other measures, takes authority over money apportioned to cities or counties, and dictate local ordinances, all without State compensation. The bill has no provisions – other than harassment and micromanagement of drivers and taxpayers – to alleviate traffic congestion.

3. Obama vs. Perry, Round 297

Responding to President Obama’s statements indicating that his administration will attempt to federalize education with the “Race to the Top” plan, Texas Governor Rick Perry stated, “I will say this very slow so they will understand it in Washington, DC: Texas will fight any attempt by the federal government to take over our school system.” Texas withdrew from the program “in the interest of preserving our state sovereignty over matters concerning education”, and because the federal government is “further interfering in state and local affairs and betraying their clear disdain for our rights.” According to Texas education officials, accepting the plan would cost over $3 billion in up-front costs and acceptance of as-yet-unwritten standards, likely inferior to those recently implemented by the Texas state legislature, for an uncertain one-time benefit of under $1 billion. Don’t mess with Texas.

4. By the Numbers: State of the Union Address Edition

A simple fact of safety, no matter if you live in Beverly Hills or East Oakland, is that the police are not omnipresent. Not even an unlimited law enforcement budget, with an army’s worth of police, cruisers and security cameras on every street corner would prevent every crime. These robbers know the streets; they know how to blend in and avoid detection, even seconds after committing the crime in broad daylight (see the article).

The painful truth is that residents cannot rely on the cops alone for protection. Ideally, the goal of law enforcement should be to discourage criminals through their presence, and to pursue and bring perpetrators to justice after a crime has occurred, but police are rarely around to stop crimes in progress. Often the difference between becoming a victim and staying safe is the circumstance of the individual. Since law enforcement cannot stop every crime, citizens must take steps to protect themselves. A growing movement across the country is for students to exercise their right to bear arms on university campuses.

The tragic events that took place at Virginia Tech three years ago, and other universities across the country, were a wake-up call to many students, parents, and politicians – college campuses are not as safe as they could be. At universities, carrying a weapon for self-defense is a felony. This encourages crime by telling criminals that everyone in the area is unarmed and helpless. Criminals actively target unarmed and unsuspecting college students for petty theft and violent crimes. When effective self defense is a crime, what else could be expected?

Currently, very few colleges and universities allow students to exercise their Second Amendment rights while on campus; Utah is the only state that explicitly protects students’ rights. While recent legislation and civil suits have indicated pro-gun advocates are gaining ground, they have failed to make progress for students. The Virginia Tech massacre successfully mobilized activists on both sides of the debate; anti-gunners have won in every instance, even in states with strong gun-rights reputations like Texas and Tennessee. Often, they present arguments designed to appeal to emotion, understandably recruiting families and friends of victims to speak out against guns, and evoking visions of “fraternity militias [charging crime scenes] with all guns blazing,” to borrow from Louisiana Rep. Hollis Downs. But these arguments fail to stand up to facts; citizens who legally obtain Right-to-Carry permits are overwhelmingly responsible gun owners, who are fanatically devoted to safe handling of their firearms and regularly practice their skills. The states with the lowest firearm-related homicide rates like North Dakota, Maine, and Vermont also have the most freedom-friendly gun laws. Those rates are similar to those observed in 1900, when gun control laws were rare, and on average were one-eighth of the rates seen today. While regions with higher population density tend to have higher rates of crime, very few cities have opted to relax their draconian gun control laws, essentially holding their citizens hostage in a similar predicament as college campus residents.

While most of America has made great strides towards preserving citizens’ gun rights, California has bucked the trend. Fortunately, legislators recently rejected the false premise that gun shows contribute to local firearm-related crime and struck down a provision preventing these events at San Francisco’s Cow Palace. However, probably more important to California gun owners, they did pass a law requiring ammunition purchasers to register with the state and get fingerprinted, as well as prohibiting the purchase of ammunition online. The former strategy for reducing crime was tried in the past nationally by the FBI and was soundly rejected as ineffective. The latter will most certainly negatively affect an already strained market where ammunition is either very expensive or, as is often the case, simply unavailable. The additional labor and documentation costs increase transaction costs significantly on a market that already has razor thin profits. Indeed, the legislation will most likely only succeed in further restricting the access of law-abiding citizens to self-defense by making ammunition unaffordable and by encouraging the harassment of gun owners.

While not expressly banning firearms, these laws attempt to create a de facto ban, which violates the spirit of the right to bear arms. Still, California does have a few amenities for gun enthusiasts, such as the Chabot Gun Club, a picturesque pistol, rifle, and skeet range, tucked away cozily in the Chabot Redwood regional preserve. The range is perfect for both novice and veteran shooters; the presence of even a few Chabot Gun Club members in and around campus would surely go a long way in aiding our overstretched law enforcement saddled with the impossible task of preventing every crime from taking place. The presence of at least a few self-reliant and accomplished marksmen would surely make criminals think twice about assailing UC students.