Actually, we shouldn’t be that smug. If we had the energy to blog about the 2010 elections before they actually happened, we would have endorsed Ms. Harris but we would have secretly thought that Steve Cooley was going to win.    By October, we knew Jerry Brown would walk away with it and figured Gavin Newsom would win Lt. Governor, but we thought people would want a more conservative type as AG to balance the whole thing out and we we’re almost correct. Although even though nobody knows what the Attorney General does, it does have the words “Attorney” and “General” in it so we thought California voters would want an old white Republican in the gig under the mistaken belief that it was the AG’s job to keep an eye on Jerry and Gavin in case they wanted to legalize ecstasy and force paroled sex-offenders to live in our garages rent-free.  But somehow, California elected  three San Francisco liberals as our top elected officials.

So how did Cooley lose this close of an election?  Well the truth is, there’s really not a whole lot of difference between Harris and Cooley. They’re both career prosecutors, they run DA offices in counties with big city problems, they are both thoughtful and careful when it comes to tough criminal justice issues like three strikes, sex offender residency restrictions, and victims rights.  The differences, some may say, are cosmetic.  We think the difference in this election literally came down to cosmetic issues, namely – Cooley’s campaign photo.  Check it out:

On the left is the official photograph on his campaign website and the website of the LA county DA’s Office presumably shot when Cooley was first elected LA County DA 10 years ago.

On the right, is a photo of Cooley taken about a month ago.

This is going to sound harsh, but these really look like “before” and “after” photos from some kind of cautionary tale.  We here at Johnny California are kind of shocked that his campaign was OK with this sort of inconsistent branding.  This is the kind of thing that gets corporate marketing executives fired.

Even worse, was the website situation.  Cooley’s official campaign website had a photo of him sitting at a desk doing something boring. Yeah, we know that his campaign advisors thought it made him look like he was a grown-up doing the hard work for the people of California, but it really just made him look like a geriatric bureaucrat who was having a hard time staying awake.   The website for the Kamala Harris campaign presents a homepage slideshow of her out and about – talking to people, seemingly on the move in front of government buildings, looking serious and professional but dynamic.  She looks like she’s getting shit done, which is really what Californians want in their government these days.

We’re glad that Kamala Harris won, but Steve Cooley really deserved better from his own campaign.

Get Advice From Criminal Defense Lawyers Who Actually Deal With Marijuana Offenses on a Regular Basis. It seemed to us that the folks behind Prop 19 had little to no input from criminal defense attorneys who deal with misdemeanor marijuana offenses, but it would have been a good idea to get some folks with experience to chime in.   There’s public defenders and private lawyers who deal with these cases every day in every criminal court in California.  Wouldn’t it be a good idea to get their opinion?  I’m not just talking the big cases either, also get input from the young lawyers in the trenches doing the weed misdemeanors and low level felonies, and a wide variety of opinions would be good too ant not just a weed expert from Mendocino or Alameda counties where the laws are relaxed, get a Los Angeles drug lawyer, or some poor slob who has to try defend medical marijuana cases in Riverside or San Bernardino County, they may have some insight on what needs to be in a new law to get this thing passed.  It seemed that these folks were completely shut out of the process.

Driving While High – Gonna Need New Laws. It is well known among prosecutors and defense lawyers that proving DUI for driving while under the influence of marijuana is very difficult.  In criminal court, marijuana DUI cases are routinely dismissed or negotiated down to less serious offenses, once this happens, the DMV has no remedy to suspend someone’s driver’s license (in DUI alcohol cases, the DMV can still suspend or restrict your license even if you get your court case dismissed – it happens all the time).  Prop 19 had no Vehicle Code provisions in place to attempt to deal with marijuana DUI.   No, we probably don’t need new DUI laws on the books, but by ignoring this issue, the Yes on 19 campaign really opened themselves up to attack

City Ordinance Insanity – Prop 19 was all over the place as far as city ordinances go. Cities and counties were not allowed to restrict personal possession of under an ounce or growing marijuana in 25 square feet or less of private land or a private residence. But cities and counties could tax, restrict, limit, and completely forbid anyone from stepping out side of their homes with marijuana on their breath (well not really – but close).  There were really troubling  sections of the proposed law which which seemed to allow cities and counties to individually regulate the standards of who is qualified to transport, grow or possess more than one ounce of marijuana.  Here’s an example:  Let’s say that the city of Berkeley allowed storefront sales of marijuana and allowed qualified store owners, employees, or growers to transport up to 50 pounds of marijuana at any one time.  Let’s say that the owners of a store in Berkeley also opened a store in West Hollywood, which had a similar local ordinance in place.  They wanted to ship product from their Berkeley store down to West Hollywood.  They obviously can’t take it on a plane (federal law), they also obviously can’t ship it via UPS (federal law), so the qualified employee puts the 50 pounds in his car and dries down to Los Angeles, he gets pulled over for speeding somewhere in Kern County where a local ordinance is in place saying you are allowed to possess no more than one ounce of marijuana, period.  What happens to this guy?  Does Kern County’s ordinance control?   Of course not, state law should control.  The drafters of Prop 19 had some broad language that attempted to deal with this problem, but it was big enough to drive a truck through. Unfortunately, much of Prop 19 gave too much local control to individual cities and counties.  Don’t get us wrong, we like local control, but not when it leads to confusing and contradicting enforcement.

There’s more they need to fix with this law, we’ll get to that later.  But this advice should keep ‘em busy for awhile.

Jerry Brown’s campaign is downright bizarre.  His slogan is “Let’s get California working again.”  But then if you go to his website, there is NO PLAN as to how he’s going to accomplish that.   This is classic Jerry Brown, all sizzle no steak.   The truth of the matter is that he’s is way past his sell-by date and he literally has NO PLAN.  He accomplished nothing as Mayor of Oakland and less than nothing as Attorney General.   He’s the same old egomaniac he’s always been, his bid for the governor’s mansion is nothing more than a grasp at past glory – he’s the political equivalent of Norma Desmond wanting her one last closeup.  We simply can’t imagine voting for him.

Meg Whitman is plain scary.  Her entire goal seems to win, from the $40 million plus she has pledged to her campaign, to her refusal to talk to the media, to her phony “town halls” – where people with opposing viewpoints are escorted out by the police, to her over-the-top negative ads against Steve Poizner, we have no idea what she stands for or who she is.  And no, we’re not impressed by the fact that she ran ebay from 1998 until 2007, come on.  The trick to running eBay from 1998 until 2007 was to stand back and watch the money roll in.  It wasn’t exactly a turnaround story – she was in the right place at the right time. Before ebay she was the CEO for FTD (the florists) and then Hasbro (the children’s toy company).  She has ZERO public service experience and ZERO experience in California politics — which, as we learned from Gov. Schwarzenegger’s tenure is actually important in California.

And that brings us to Poizner — OK we don’t know a lot about him.  But we do know this, he’s got a plan.  Go to his website and see for yourself.  The guy has put some real thought as to how he can right the ship.  It may not be a plan we agree with, but right now – he’s the only one with real ideas.  We are also intrigued by his thoughtful approach to spending cuts.  He also is more than a former CEO, he actually started two wildly successful software companies from scratch and he’s spent the last four years as California’s Insurance Commissioner – a gritty, non-glamorous, out-of-the-spotlight elected office.

The bottom line is this:  Steve Poizner is a nerd.  And right now California does not need a blowhard relic from another era or a showboating corporate executive trying to wow us with her cash flow.  Right now California needs a nerd who will actually do the hard work.  Poizner may just be that nerd.  We’ll see.

Once the Attorney General’s Office gives these ballot props their  “official title and summary”,  each group has 150 days to get enough signature to get their measure on the ballot.   How many signatures do they need? 694,354 signatures of registered voters.   No small feat.

So whose behind these measures?  Today, we look at the Yes! On Equality folks.

Yes! On Equality: Repeals Prop 8

Yes! On Equality  is spearheaded by Sacromentian (Sacramento-ian?) Charles “Chazz” Lowe.  Lowe, who has been involved in local  LGBT issues for a long time, is confident that if the California Supreme Court does not over turn Prop 8 this Spring then voters will overturn it in a 2010 election.

Like many same-sex marriage supporters, Lowe was disappointed by the insular and ineffective No-On-8 campaign, but he refuses to get caught up in the past.  “It’s time to look forward” he says, ” we need to reach out to more people and be inclusive.”    Lowe says that Yes! On Equality will focus its efforts on reaching out to people that the No-On-8 campaign could not connect with.

“I was baptized in the Mormon church” says Lowe, “there are people in the Mormon church and in every religious group who don’t like Prop 8, we need to include those people…we need their help.”   Yes! On Equality also wants to reach out into their own backyard, specifically  the Central Valley, an area that was sorely ignored by the No-On-8 campaign.

All of this sounds great, right? Yes! On Equality has enthusiasm, youth, and are a willingness to reach out to more people– they’re determined not to make the same mistakes.  So what’s the catch?

Money.  Money is the catch. To get 694,354 valid-registered voter signatures, Yes! On Equality will need to collect about a million total signatures.  that takes professional signature gatherers.  And while Yes! On Equality plans to utilize low-cost organizing tools like social networking and whatnot, Lowe is realistic.  When asked if he thinks they can get their measure on the ballot without millions of dollars, Lowe said simply, “No.”

But the money could come.  Equality California, the established and well-funded same sex marriage advocacy group seems to be willing to work with Yes! On Equality.  Lowe says that his group was invited to Equality California’s January 24 “Equality Summit” in Los Angeles, and today’s SacBee reports that Equality California’s Geoff Kors predicts that “gay marriage advocates will ultimately line up behind the best proposals.”

What could be a better proposal than one that simply, clearly and easily repeals Prop 8?

We’ll be following the Yes! On Equality campaign closely.  We like their inclusive, realistic approach and clear-eyed optimism.

Later today or tomorrow we look at the “Registered Domestic Partnership Act.”  Stay tuned

Link:  Yes! On Equality Website

No details yet about the folks behind these initiatives.  We’re working on finding out all that out right now.  But here’s the test of the proposed laws:

The first initiative is the California Marriage Equality Act.  It repeals Prop 8.  It is sponsored by a group called “YES! on Equality“:

An act to repeal Section 7.5 of Article I of the California Constitution; therefore provisions to be repealed are printed in strike-through text.

Section 1. Title

This measure shall be known, and may cited [sic], as the “California Marriage Equality Act.”

Section 2.  Section 7.5 Article I of the California Constitution shall be repealed, stricken, and removed as such:

Sec. 7.5  Only marriage between a man and a woman is valid or recognized in  California.

The second initiative replaces the word “marriage” with “domestic partnerships.”  There are two individuals sponsoring the initiative, but no details as to whether or not they are part of a larger organization:

Section 1:  Title.
This measure shall be known and may be cited as the “Domestic Partnership Initiative.”

Section 2:  Summary

The proposed measure calls for the term “marriage” to be removed from government legislation.  The State of California’s Law code would have “marriage” replaced with “domestic partnership,” while the definition and the rights provided would remain the same.  The purpose of which is to provide equality amongst all couples, regardless of sexual orientation, without offending the religious sect.  Legally speaking, “Marriage” itself would become a social ceremony, recognized by only non-governmental institutions.  Furthermore, the initiative would void Proposition 8.

Obviously if the the California Supreme Court overturns Prop 8, then there’s no need for the California Marriage Equality Act, but the “Domestic Partnership Initiative” could still go forward…now that would be interesting.

For our take on the idea of replacing “marriage” with “domestic partnerships”,  check out our posts here.