Thanks to computer-aided demographic research, politicians can now draw politically homogeneous districts that guarantee reelection for incumbents year after year. This cripples the ability of Asian and Latino communities to build healthy politics and promote candidates for higher office. And as long as incumbents never have to explain themselves to constituents who don't agree with them, they're free to adopt extremist views, poisoning the national dialogue and wiping out the art of legislative compromise.

Well, that's one way of looking at it. But here's another:

The three judges would have been picked essentially by random lot: One Democrat, one Republican, and one picked randomly. (Note that there would be no chance of an Independent or third-party judge.) This would have given the Republican judges a 50% chance of being able to "compromise" from a position of power... which, in a blue state, is a significant change to the state's political balance... and with 10% of the Electoral College votes, a significant change to the national balance of power.

Schwarzenegger distanced his social views from the Republican base when he ran for governor, positioning himself as a "maverick", but Prop. 77 was a blatant attempt at a power grab by the Republican establishment, which the Governator has cozied up to since his "election".

If unions should be banned from making political

contributions unless they get the written permission of each and every member, then corporations should be banned from making political contributions unless they get written

permission from each and every shareholder.

Fair is fair is fair is fair. Is fair.

California can certainly use a bit of reform. But it's a bit disingenuous to suggest he's just a poor guy who let his swagger get in the way of his honest, well-meaning reform ticket.

Two years ago, Arnold campaigned as a centrist, willing to work with both parties in a non-partisan way to do what needed to be done. And for awhile, he seemed to work that way. But then something happened ... Arnold got the whiff of an Amendment to allow foreign-born citizens to run for President (however unlikely that is in reality), and at that point made a conscious decision to ingratiate himself with the Republican party in the hopes of earning a nomination.

Of course, that meant compromising whatever centrist, non-partisan veneer he'd had. Now he had to on the attack, casting Democrats and liberals as the enemy with his special election propositions, cutting off any hope of compromise. He took on the labor unions, bane of the Grand Old Party, but said nothing about the corporate donors Republicans rely on. Last month he vetoed a legislative marriage bill, snubbing many moderates and liberals and gays who had voted for him earlier, because the Party wouldn't allow him to do anything otherwise.

If Arnold had stuck with the more moderate leadership he claimed to start with and worked at hammering out reform with a more slow, deliberate compromise, he probably could have avoided this whole special election fiasco, kept his political reputation much more intact, and -- perhaps, even -- might have helped to craft some truly helpful legislation by now.

Regarding Chris Thompson's observation that redistricting favors incombants.

True.

Also true that California holds more Democrat (and liberal) seats than any other state (NY a close second). Any change in incombants, for all their evils, realistically means handing them over to the Republicans. No wonder the GOP was salivating over the prospect of California turning itself over.

The day after Texas and Florida change their election laws to favor challengers, then California should consider following a similar path.

Doing anything before then is losing sight of the forest on account of the trees.

C'mon, Chris, wake UP!

yours,

trai dep

Libertarians once advocated the legalization of marijuana and cocaine. They also fought to rid our law books of ridiculous sodomy laws. But now it appears their chief role in the political debate is to lend credence to G.W. Bush and the Republican Party's hatred of taxes.

I voted for Ed Clark in 1980 and I'm disappointed to see the Libertarian Party identified with Arnold Schwarzeneggar.

As for the California initiatives, I am unfamiliar with them all. I certainly do agree about redistricting, but let me remind you that Arnold was unwilling to support the same plan in Florida where republicans are the majority party and redistricting might help the democrats.

I would support a measure that went somthing like this:

I. -- some reasonable scheme to make regular districts. e.g. perimeter-to-area ratio must be within certain range --

II. Part I of this law will not go into effect until a law containing Part I is also adopted by the following states: Texas, ...

Basically, I recognize that the gerrymandering in California is not fair. But this is just as true in Texas. If only CA were to go to a more logical districting scheme, the Republicans would have an unfair advantage. So the law needs to be structured such that TX, plus whichever other states would add up to an even exchange of congressional seats, will have an incentive to do the same thing.

That would be fair.

What astonishes me about all this is that voters who decided to elect as governor a Hollywood star (notice I carefully didn't call him an actor) with no political experience are now shocked, shocked to discover that he is no good at, well, politics. Does anybody remember the carefully staged, constitutional coup of a recall that brought Schwarzenegger to power in the first place? It was all about charisma and flash and arrogance, and Californians got what they paid for. And NOW they're unhappy? Pathetic. Almost as pathetic as the 60% of Americans experiencing "buyer's remorse" for electing a President who had managed to fail upwards for his entire life until there was no higher position to fail upwards to. And now a significant number of the voters who put the failure in power are howling about being saddeled with a failed administration. Well, I guess nobody could have seen that coming. Beyond pathetic.

The problem in the stae is we are a political 50/50 bar: Blue state on the outside (Southern California and the Bay Area) and red on the inside (everything else). Remember, we're the state that gave the country Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan.

The legislature is in potential gridlock with urban Democrats fighitng Republicians, but the real wild card is the ballot initiative process. Every election you have propositions targetd by special interist groups specifically desinged to cancel out the conflicting ballot initiative. The process was created to overcome the gridlock in the state legislature, and guess what, we're gridlocked again! Hijacked by special interists on both sides and the Governarator. Don't blame me, I voted for Arianna Huffington.

As a California voter all of my life, I am at the point where I will not sign any petition to place an initative on the ballot. All too often, the real intent of the measure is hidden, stealth virus like, in the details.

Yes we're a mess, but I am willing to be that our mess is similar to other state governments, there's just more of us.