California
California
Real meaning of Brown’s ‘open letter’
Gov. Jerry Brown last Monday released “An Open Letter to the People of California,” in which he called for the state’s taxpayers to approve tax-raising initiatives to “fix” the state’s structural deficit. Here is the letter and my interpretation of what Brown really meant to say: Brown: When I became ...
California
Professors at legislative hearing push more government
The rich are getting richer and everyone else is losing wealth. This phenomenon supposedly would justify more aggressive government policies redistributing wealth. At an Assembly hearing Wednesday about whether the state of California should be actively pursuing additional wealth redistribution policies, Legislators and academics said that the highest degree of ...
Blended Learning
States vs. the Digital-Learning Revolution
Earlier this fall, New York governor Andrew Cuomo announced that five international high-tech companies had entered into investment agreements, totaling $4.4 billion, with the state. The governor boasted that the agreements would make New York the epicenter for the new generation of computer-chip technology. However, when it comes to using ...
Health Care
Medicare Is Increasingly A Benefit Enjoyed By The “One Percenters”
The Congressional Budget Office just released a major new investigation into household income trends over the last three decades. Researchers found that while the total amount of benefits paid out by government social safety-net programs rose between 1979 and 2007, the share going to the poor actually shrank. In other ...
California
California ‘The Big State that Can’t’ (or won’t)
As the public employee pension and health care benefit crisis sweeps across the nation, some states are dealing seriously with these multibillion-dollar threats to public services and treasuries. And other states remain in deep denial. California, to no one’s surprise, is moving stridently in the wrong direction. The tiny state ...
Agriculture
Can’t Live by Scenery Alone
“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul alike,” wrote John Muir, in one of his many celebrations of the majesty of the Yosemite Valley. The Scottish-born founder of the Sierra Club recognized ...
Business & Economics
Getting Serious About Ron Paul
I can’t forgive myself for voting for Arnold Schwarzenegger for governor during the 2003 recall. I selected a “winnable” loser rather than Tom McClintock, a principled conservative who knew what policies to pursue to right California’s sinking fiscal ship. If everyone who voted for Schwarzenegger under the belief that McClintock ...
California
‘Think Long’ report short on serious ideas
Would California be in better shape if former governors Arnold Schwarzenegger or Gray Davis, or former Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, were back in power? That’s an odd question given the fiscal mess that those politicians helped create, or at least were powerless to fix. These politicos had their chance at ...
California
Voters wary of teacher unions
Californians are a little schizophrenic on how they look on the state’s public schools, based on the findings of a new USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll of registered voters. On raising taxes, including their own, 64 percent said they would do so to “increase funding for California schools,” while 32 ...
Business & Economics
The Best States For Jobs
The Texas jobs miracle has received a lot of attention since Rick Perry announced his candidacy for president in August. The numbers are impressive. Texas added 1.2 million net jobs since Perry took office as Texas Governor in December 2000, while the U.S. as a whole lost 1.1 million jobs ...
Real meaning of Brown’s ‘open letter’
Gov. Jerry Brown last Monday released “An Open Letter to the People of California,” in which he called for the state’s taxpayers to approve tax-raising initiatives to “fix” the state’s structural deficit. Here is the letter and my interpretation of what Brown really meant to say: Brown: When I became ...
Professors at legislative hearing push more government
The rich are getting richer and everyone else is losing wealth. This phenomenon supposedly would justify more aggressive government policies redistributing wealth. At an Assembly hearing Wednesday about whether the state of California should be actively pursuing additional wealth redistribution policies, Legislators and academics said that the highest degree of ...
States vs. the Digital-Learning Revolution
Earlier this fall, New York governor Andrew Cuomo announced that five international high-tech companies had entered into investment agreements, totaling $4.4 billion, with the state. The governor boasted that the agreements would make New York the epicenter for the new generation of computer-chip technology. However, when it comes to using ...
Medicare Is Increasingly A Benefit Enjoyed By The “One Percenters”
The Congressional Budget Office just released a major new investigation into household income trends over the last three decades. Researchers found that while the total amount of benefits paid out by government social safety-net programs rose between 1979 and 2007, the share going to the poor actually shrank. In other ...
California ‘The Big State that Can’t’ (or won’t)
As the public employee pension and health care benefit crisis sweeps across the nation, some states are dealing seriously with these multibillion-dollar threats to public services and treasuries. And other states remain in deep denial. California, to no one’s surprise, is moving stridently in the wrong direction. The tiny state ...
Can’t Live by Scenery Alone
“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul alike,” wrote John Muir, in one of his many celebrations of the majesty of the Yosemite Valley. The Scottish-born founder of the Sierra Club recognized ...
Getting Serious About Ron Paul
I can’t forgive myself for voting for Arnold Schwarzenegger for governor during the 2003 recall. I selected a “winnable” loser rather than Tom McClintock, a principled conservative who knew what policies to pursue to right California’s sinking fiscal ship. If everyone who voted for Schwarzenegger under the belief that McClintock ...
‘Think Long’ report short on serious ideas
Would California be in better shape if former governors Arnold Schwarzenegger or Gray Davis, or former Assembly Speaker Willie Brown, were back in power? That’s an odd question given the fiscal mess that those politicians helped create, or at least were powerless to fix. These politicos had their chance at ...
Voters wary of teacher unions
Californians are a little schizophrenic on how they look on the state’s public schools, based on the findings of a new USC Dornsife/Los Angeles Times poll of registered voters. On raising taxes, including their own, 64 percent said they would do so to “increase funding for California schools,” while 32 ...
The Best States For Jobs
The Texas jobs miracle has received a lot of attention since Rick Perry announced his candidacy for president in August. The numbers are impressive. Texas added 1.2 million net jobs since Perry took office as Texas Governor in December 2000, while the U.S. as a whole lost 1.1 million jobs ...
