For the GOP, California is a deep blue hole

[bemildred]

Xpost with California Forum.

The road to redemption for the Republican Party in California may be even rougher than November's statewide electoral drubbing indicated, as a new Los Angeles Times/USC poll shows a deep reluctance among many voters to side with a GOP candidate and broad swaths of the state holding views on government's role that conflict with Republican tenets.

California voters surveyed in the poll repudiated the party's stance on illegal immigration by endorsing a host of positions intended to make it easier for the undocumented to gain legal status. Their support for same-sex marriage outnumbered that opposing any legal recognition by more than 3 to 1. Californians also endorsed an assertive role for government in protecting minority citizens, regulating corporations and helping the poor and needy, and rejected arguments that an activist role for government had harmed the fiber of American society.

The negative overlay both explained and helped determine the fates of the party's candidates in November. As a GOP tide swept the nation, Republicans here lost all statewide offices, with one contest, for attorney general, still unresolved but leaning toward the Democrat. Republicans here also failed to gain any congressional seats and lost a legislative seat.

Strikingly, almost one in five California voters said they would never cast a ballot for a Republican. Among Latinos, that rose to almost one in three. Only 5% of California voters were as emphatically anti-Democrat.

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-poll-20101119,0,1562210.story

[CaliforniaPeggy]

1. I don't know why we seem ahead of the rest of the country...

Somehow, we aren't held back by outmoded ways of thinking...or something...

For whatever reason, we do seem able to see through almost any Republican's rhetoric...well, most of the time anyway...

[xxqqqzme]

4. I just hope people in this state

are finally over electing/casting 'B' movie actors to be governor. Both times have been disastrous for the state and public education.

[bemildred]

5. Things have changed a lot in the last twenty years.

This used to be a Republican state. Reagan was Governor twice, he started the Reaganomics stuff here, before the rest of the country got it, so we are farther along the curve.

[DBoon]

7. Reagan, Deukmejian, Pete Wilson

And for a period in the 1980's and 1990's Rs held the legislature as well

[CreekDog]

18. Facing defeat in 1994, Pete Wilson traded his reelection for the death of CA's Republican party

and now they are paying the piper.

:nopity:

[ShadowLiberal]

19. And Brewer has likely done the same thing in Arizona

The change may not be quite as swift in Arizona, but it's inevitable, over 50% of the students in Arizona's school system are Hispanic. A lot of them may have parents who aren't allowed to vote, but they can vote once they turn 18, and they won't side with a party that wants to kick their family out of the country.

[bemildred]

21. Well, there are other things too.

Like moving all that defense business back east.
But yeah.

[xxqqqzme]

2. I knew there was a reason I lived here.

Now if we could only make a few more inroads in Orange County......

[calimary]

31. Yeah, understood. I guess progress will come WAY slowly to Orange County.

But remember - we did FINALLY get rid of B-One Bob, which I thought might never happen. Thank you Loretta Sanchez!

More than once I've heard it said: "as California goes, so goes the nation." Sadly, California started it awhile ago, with the rise of ronald reagan and howard jarvis and that fucked overkill Proposition 13 which was like a mini-teabagger rage thing out here in the late 70s back when everybody was busy hating Jimmy Carter. The over-arching idea was that property taxes were too high. Tons of little old ladies and pensioners and other fixed-income people made a big stink about it here in SoCal. It was pricing them out of their homes. And developers were coming in and building fancy condos all over the place that these people couldn't afford to move into. So voters took the proverbial meat-axe to property taxes without really thinking it through carefully (and heaven forbid they'd stop a moment to ponder the consequences of applying that kind of tourniquet to public funding from tax revenue) and soon schools and other public services started to suffer. Nobody connected the dots or explained it effectively or "sexily" enough to outshout the huge howard this-year's-darling jarvis juggernaut.

So... hopefully we have a new trend, California staying solidly and resolutely BLUE, and touching off a left-leaning resurgence across the nation - or at least a return to SOME sort of reason. I also hope we don't have to wait that long to see it.

[BlueCollar]

3. Being a Republican in California

must be as hard as being a Democrat in Texas....

[tabatha]

6. And there are many ex-Republicans who have become Democrats.

I know 4.

[Bad Thoughts]

8. So long as there's money, the candle will stay burning

There are enough wealthy donors in California that the GOP will keep politicking there. It doesn't matter if they never win another governorship.

[MadHound]

9. I always find it interesting that Californians like to congratulate themselves on being so liberal

But the truth of the matter is that California tosses up some of the most regressive, conservative politicians and policies around. Nixon and Reagan are a couple of examples, as are Prop 13 and Prop 8. Not to mention the sheer craziness of electing Ahnald.

Frankly I think that California is a politically bipolar state.

[DrToast]

10. Uh, Nixon and Reagan were like 40 years ago

Prop 13 was over 30 years ago. And as for Prop 8, no state has legalized gay marriage via ballot initiative.

[MadHound]

11. Prop 13 is still having an adverse effect on California's economy

It is part of the reason that the state is in such an economic mess, and that it's schools have gone from some of the best in the country to some of the worst. Yet apparently Californians still want to keep it rather than repeal such madness.

Reagan had a long political career, one that started out when he sold out his fellow actors in the McCarthy hearings. This political career of his, which ended twenty two years ago, still has far reaching impact today. Same with Nixon. In fact it is some of the very same politicians, Cheney, Rumsfeld, Rove, etc. who were mentored by Nixon and Reagan, who've currently put us in this mess we're in.

You're right, no state has legalized gay marriage. But Prop 8 shut the door on that happening in California, while other states still have that option.

And need I remind you of California's latest two additions to the right wing national discourse, Whitman and Fiorina. Yeah, they didn't get elected, but they got on the national political stage and I doubt that they're going away soon.

Like I said, while a lot of folks like to think of California as this wonderful liberal paradise, it really isn't. It's more politically bipolar, or schizophrenic. You have a wonderfully open, liberal city like San Francisco, then you have conservative San Diego. You have liberal, tolerant state policies, yet a racist, intolerant police force in LA. You have a liberal community of actors, yet a conservative community of producers who have the real money and power.

It really is quite bizarre, yet fascinating to watch.

[chocolate ink]

16. conservative california

Kern County is not liberal and I mean voting here is over 80% republican. Anyone who lives here and is not only liberal but progressive is like a fish out of water. It's pretty depressing. We have the confederate flags, the KKK and all manner of conservative 'christians' here who continue to vote against their own interests. Boxer for instance only got 25-27% of the vote here.

As MadHound mentioned, California is a mix and luckily the larger areas such as L.A. do vote dem.

[CreekDog]

20. the blue is creeping in

LA and the Bay Area are overwhelmingly Democratic but in recent years, Sacramento and suburbs are increasingly blue and now several San Joaquin Valley counties are turning blue, along with Alpine County and Imperial County.

[Dreamer Tatum]

29. OK, so, where do we put the millions who'd be evicted for tax liens?

Seriously, it amazes me how people begrudge the wealthy any fucking nickel they ever get, but as soon as regular people get and maintain real estate that will provide for their retirement, they have to have their nuts taxed off.

Here is a FACT: if you repeal Prop 13, millions of old and middle income people who have done nothing other than pay their mortgage on time for MANY years will be dumped on the street, and the STATE will own the property.

So sick of the two-faced bullshitters, complaining about banks foreclosing on houses, yet salivating over the STATE kicking people out.

[blue_onyx]

17. They are still effecting the country

Many members of the Nixon administration, like Cheney and Rumsfeld, have played a huge role in putting the country in its current situation.

Reagen was a horrible president but very influential. Reaganomics is destroying the country. Many, even some on DU, have bought into the idea that you can have lower taxes but not make any sacrifices.

[flamingdem]

13. I think the bipolarity is OVER thanks to the Latinos, muchas gracias gente nt

[MadHound]

14. Maybe, maybe not.

We'll see, there's still plenty crazy left with demon sheep woman and Whitman, among others. And that whole Prop 8 thing, ouch.

[flamingdem]

15. I must be the only person who liked the Demon Sheep ad

from a conceptual point of view, not political. Fiorina is a nut job who hopefully will shrivel and disappear along with Whitman.

[WestSeattle2]

30. It is. There are some VERY conservative areas. Take the Central

Valley for example. There are more good ol' boy rednecks in that neck of the woods, than in the whole state of Alabama. The only difference is you don't see rebel flags in the Central Valley.

[flamingdem]

12. We may be broke but at least we elected Democrats nt

[bluedigger]

22. And yet they show no ability to govern themselves.

:shrug:

[bemildred]

23. Who? Republicans? nt

[bluedigger]

24. Sorry.

No, Californians.

[bemildred]

25. Let me guess, you don't live here?

We can govern ourselves fine, we just get a lot of outside interference.

[bluedigger]

26. Which part do you like the best?

The inability to balance your budget for as long as I can remember, the arbitrary life sentences for three-strikers, the lowest ranked congressional district in the US per the Human Development Index, or the sunny weather and movie stars, because I had little to do with any of that. (This is how outsiders see you...)

[KingFlorez]

27. There's a lot of states that can't balance a budget

We have our problems like every other state does, plus we've had an incompetent Governor for a few years. There are plenty of states that are in much more dire shape.

[bluedigger]

28. No argument there.

[bemildred]

32. Anything that keeps more people from moving here is OK with me.

:hi:

[bemildred]

33. California posts biggest job gain since May 2006

The state's struggling labor market showed signs of life in October, adding 39,000 jobs in the biggest employment increase since May 2006.

The gains were widespread, with employers adding positions in nearly every sector of the economy. But it wasn't enough to make a dent in California's unemployment rate, which remained at 12.4%, according to figures released Friday by the state Employment Development Department. Still, the performance was a major improvement over September, when payrolls declined by 53,600 jobs.

October "marks the first solid month of recovery for the California economy," said Stephen Levy, director of the Center for Continuing Study of the California Economy in Palo Alto. "If these gains are confirmed in the following months California will have finally turned the corner toward job growth and reducing unemployment."

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-1120-caljobs-20101120,0,6575200.story

[StarsInHerHair]

34. good

nt