California
Business & Economics
Making the Mortgage Mess Worse
Recently the Bush administration unveiled a plan for homeowners facing foreclosure to receive a 30-day reprieve from their creditors. This might come as welcome news in Sacramento where a jaw-dropping 46 percent of December sales were foreclosed homes. Unfortunately, the latest plan-as well as earlier government ideas to freeze rate ...
Commentary
Judge: San Francisco ‘Play or Pay’ Measure Violates Federal LawFunding Shortfalls
A U.S. district judge has ruled a controversial expansion of a city health care plan violates a federal law addressing government regulation of employee benefit plans. Judge Jeffrey White’s ruling halted the city of San Francisco’s attempt to expand its government health care program through a mandate requiring employers to ...
California
“Thinking Small” on California Health Reform? Not Small Enough!
Using a very appropriate headline, the features editor of the California Healthline points out that California’s “health reformers try again on a smaller scale”. Unfortunately, they are not trying small enough. Although the Schwarzenegger-Nuñez Health Care Deforminator Model ABX1_1 failed in the Senate health committe last month, after a year ...
Commentary
Teachers unions are the big problem
TEACHERS are in a never-ending Groundhog’s Day situation when they rely on the same old union strong-arm tactics to get a few extra crumbs from the Legislature. The citizens of West Virginia have always honored teachers and willingly allowed their elected representatives to pay teachers the maximum the state can ...
California
Healthy San Francisco: Wouldja Like An Employee Voluntary Waiver with Those Fries?
I’ve not only criticized the Healthy San Francisco employer “pay or play” mandate that has dropped a payroll tax of $1.17 to $1.76 per hour on the city’s struggling businesses; I’ve actually proposed an alternative. But…..they went ahead and did it anyway. Pending the Golden Gate Restaurant Association’s legal appeal ...
California
Senator Kuehl’s Health Care Agenda
Democratic Sen. Sheila Kuehl, who chairs the Senate health committee, made sure that a recent attempt at health care overhaul in California went down in flames last month. Her committee rejected ABX1 1, the Schwarzenegger-Nunez health care reform legislation. That measure aimed for “universal” health care through compulsory purchase of ...
Agriculture
Ethanol craze boosts food prices, world hunger
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (PA), February 15, 2008 Press Dakotan, February 15, 2008 Billings Gazette (MT), February 12, 2008 Investor’s Business Daily, February 11, 2008 WASHINGTON – The red-hot congressional love affair with the alternative fuel ethanol is starting to leave many supermarket customers feeling mighty blue these days as they pay ...
California
Lessons for Arnold from Milton Friedman
Sacramento Union, February 15, 2008 SACRAMENTO – Jan. 29 was Milton Friedman Day, which may have escaped Californians’ notice. I wonder: Could Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger gain inspiration from the ideas of the late Nobel laureate and lauded economist? One in three California public school students is now in a public ...
California
What Now for California Health Care?
Last month the Senate health committee dumped the Schwarzenegger/Núñez Model ABX1 1, California’s trend-setting gadget for health-care repair. Senator Sheila Kuehl, who chairs that committee, tossed it for more personal reasons, other than the obvious $14-billion price tag and state budget deficit of similar size. Senator Kuehl wants to bring ...
Business & Economics
California’s Broadband Bridge to Nowhere
The California Broadband Task Force, convened by Governor Schwarzenegger, concluded last month that high-speed Internet access should be a public investment, much like roads and power lines. The CBTF proposes “state-issued broadband bonds” to bring ultra-fast connections to the state’s most desolate reaches. Without public subsidies, however, California already ranks ...
Making the Mortgage Mess Worse
Recently the Bush administration unveiled a plan for homeowners facing foreclosure to receive a 30-day reprieve from their creditors. This might come as welcome news in Sacramento where a jaw-dropping 46 percent of December sales were foreclosed homes. Unfortunately, the latest plan-as well as earlier government ideas to freeze rate ...
Judge: San Francisco ‘Play or Pay’ Measure Violates Federal LawFunding Shortfalls
A U.S. district judge has ruled a controversial expansion of a city health care plan violates a federal law addressing government regulation of employee benefit plans. Judge Jeffrey White’s ruling halted the city of San Francisco’s attempt to expand its government health care program through a mandate requiring employers to ...
“Thinking Small” on California Health Reform? Not Small Enough!
Using a very appropriate headline, the features editor of the California Healthline points out that California’s “health reformers try again on a smaller scale”. Unfortunately, they are not trying small enough. Although the Schwarzenegger-Nuñez Health Care Deforminator Model ABX1_1 failed in the Senate health committe last month, after a year ...
Teachers unions are the big problem
TEACHERS are in a never-ending Groundhog’s Day situation when they rely on the same old union strong-arm tactics to get a few extra crumbs from the Legislature. The citizens of West Virginia have always honored teachers and willingly allowed their elected representatives to pay teachers the maximum the state can ...
Healthy San Francisco: Wouldja Like An Employee Voluntary Waiver with Those Fries?
I’ve not only criticized the Healthy San Francisco employer “pay or play” mandate that has dropped a payroll tax of $1.17 to $1.76 per hour on the city’s struggling businesses; I’ve actually proposed an alternative. But…..they went ahead and did it anyway. Pending the Golden Gate Restaurant Association’s legal appeal ...
Senator Kuehl’s Health Care Agenda
Democratic Sen. Sheila Kuehl, who chairs the Senate health committee, made sure that a recent attempt at health care overhaul in California went down in flames last month. Her committee rejected ABX1 1, the Schwarzenegger-Nunez health care reform legislation. That measure aimed for “universal” health care through compulsory purchase of ...
Ethanol craze boosts food prices, world hunger
Pittsburgh Tribune-Review (PA), February 15, 2008 Press Dakotan, February 15, 2008 Billings Gazette (MT), February 12, 2008 Investor’s Business Daily, February 11, 2008 WASHINGTON – The red-hot congressional love affair with the alternative fuel ethanol is starting to leave many supermarket customers feeling mighty blue these days as they pay ...
Lessons for Arnold from Milton Friedman
Sacramento Union, February 15, 2008 SACRAMENTO – Jan. 29 was Milton Friedman Day, which may have escaped Californians’ notice. I wonder: Could Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger gain inspiration from the ideas of the late Nobel laureate and lauded economist? One in three California public school students is now in a public ...
What Now for California Health Care?
Last month the Senate health committee dumped the Schwarzenegger/Núñez Model ABX1 1, California’s trend-setting gadget for health-care repair. Senator Sheila Kuehl, who chairs that committee, tossed it for more personal reasons, other than the obvious $14-billion price tag and state budget deficit of similar size. Senator Kuehl wants to bring ...
California’s Broadband Bridge to Nowhere
The California Broadband Task Force, convened by Governor Schwarzenegger, concluded last month that high-speed Internet access should be a public investment, much like roads and power lines. The CBTF proposes “state-issued broadband bonds” to bring ultra-fast connections to the state’s most desolate reaches. Without public subsidies, however, California already ranks ...
